Hawaii Language

Hawaii has two official languages, English and Olelo Hawaii. English is spoken universally on the islands. The Hawaiian language, Olelo Hawaii, is spoken largely by Native Hawaiians. Olelo Hawaii is a Polynesian language distinctive for its reduplication, apparent in words like wikiwiki (fast). Hawaii’s unofficial language is Hawaiian Creole English (HCE). A byproduct of Hawaii’s tremendous diversity, HCE, commonly known as “pidgin,” is an other-than-standard English which developed as a means of communication for business transactions. The dialect integrates elements from Hawaiian, English, Chinese, Japanese, and several other languages. Although it is primarily used by teenagers, pidgin is incorporated in many Hawaiians’ daily conversation. While Hawaiians often appreciate attempts by visitors to speak Olelo Hawaii, it is inadvisable for visitors to speak pidgin unless fluent, as it is usually considered condescending.

Alphabet. The Olelo Hawaii alphabet (piapa), was written by 19th century missionaries. The alphabet contains 12 letters: 5 vowels (a, e, i, o, u) and 7 consonants (h, k, l, m, n, p, w). Olelo Hawaii is considered unique by linguists due to its prolific use of vowels and its single guttural letter (k).

Pronunciation. The key to pronouncing all things Hawaiian is to sound consonants as in English and break up words so they are easy to say. For example, Waianapanapa sounds like “Wai-a-napa-napa.” The Hawaiian language often utilizes two symbols, the glottal stop,” ’, (or ‘ okina in Hawaiian) and the macron (kahakō). The glottal stop is sometimes utilized in Hawaiian words like Hawai’i and O’ahu , indicating a short break in pronunciation. English orthography does not use the glottal stop and often Native Hawaiians also omit it from their writing. It is advocated mainly by teachers of Hawaiian as a second language and by linguists. The macron marks that a vowel is a double or long vowel in phonetic terms. Similar to the ‘ okina , the kahakō is only used sporadically in written Hawaiian and is often not pronounced in conversation. Pronounce vowels marked by a glottal stop (’) quickly, that is, o’o sounds like “oh-oh!” in English. Stress rising dipthongs (ae, ai, ao, au, oi, ou, eu, ei) on the first letter and end with a short e, i, o, or u. Thus, oi sounds like “oy” in “boy,” ending with a short “i.” These are the basic vowel pronunciations: