Hawaii Books

I just finished reading this book and admiring the photographs and am inspired to get back to the Hawaiian Islands as soon as possible. The obvious knowledge and expertise of the author is a boon to the rest of us who struggle to perfect our game. Hawaii has always been one of my favorite golfing vacation locations,now I am reminded why. The course descriptions and photography are simply incredible. Just about the time I thought I wanted to return, I now find I am driven back. The photos are fabulous and the detail given on the courses with information from the architechs makes them even more enjoyable and challenging. I look forward to my next trip to golf in Hawaii and definitely with this book by my side as my guide.

I picked this book up on the Big Island and now wish I had bought 3 more copies for gifts! What a gorgeous book with accurate and inspiring photos of all the sites we visited on our trip. This book doesn't have much text - just gorgeous photos.

"Displacing Natives" is a splendid study, making Hawai'i resonate with wit and concern, by tracking how the "rhetoric of demonization" was followed by a "rhetoric of preservation" that, in both historical instances and rhetorical tropes, worked to displace the Hawaiian Natives and their prior mythologies of place and nation. The wry chapter on the Hollywood movies of "safe savagery" makes an important and lasting contribution to the semiotics of imagining Hawai'i. This book would be of value to all students of Hawaiian literature and culture, and to scholars of Pacific native cultural studies as well. When transnational cultural and postcolonial studies turn to work up the Pacific (when the heck would that be?), this fine book will be here waiting, despite the poor marketing tactics or the lack of market flash.

For anyone who has snorkeled in Hawaii, this is a wonderful book to share with their young ones!

I am a preschool teacher and needed some books to help support the learning of my Hawaii unit. While searching I came across these books, there are several, one about shapes, colors, numbers, and the touch and feel. I enjoyed sharing these with my children and I noticed that they would go back and pick these for independent reading. The back page has a glossary with pictures and the correct name underneath the picture. This book is a favorite because of the different surfaces for them to touch. I would recommend this one and the others for a fun and cute inforamtive book to teach skills.

We bought this book on a recent trip to Maui. Oour daughter loves reading it over and over again. The story is really well written in a poetic format and the colorful drawings are educational and fun. Worth every penny!

Once again we have an excellent combination of Author and Publisher who have collaborated to provide an invaluable guide book for any diver contemplating a trip to Hawaii. "Diving Hawaii" is another Scuba Diving guide book in the medium size format favoured by Aqua Quest. These publishers have a reputation for high standards - in terms of quality of information and standard of photography, and it is easy to see why.

"Diving Hawaii" is clearly laid out with chapters on; An introduction to the Hawaiian Islands, Diving in general, the specific dive sites of Oahu, Maui, Hawaii and Kauai and local Marine Life. The book concludes with some very useful Appendixes containing; Emergency information, details of local Scuba Diving centres, miscellaneous useful numbers for visitors and some brief notes on another 20 dive sites.

Chapter One begins with an all-important historical précis of Hawaii. This gives the visitor a brief insight into the country's first Polynesian settlers, the way in which the country was then ruled by it's own system of chiefs for something like 1,000 years, the islands' discovery by Captain Cook, the importance of sugar plantations, the time when Hawaii became a US territory and, eventually (in 1959) the 50th State. All of which is followed by equally important notes on present day Hawaii and all the essential information the visitor needs to know.

Chapter 2 is an overview of Diving in general with notes on; boat, shore and night diving as well as conservation. There is also a very important and well written description of the unusual underwater lava tubes and cave formations created by the flow of volcanic lava into the sea. These are probably very different from any other form of Cave Diving found anywhere else in the world and Page 21 is rightly devoted to a full-page warning of the dangers involved here.

We now come to those Chapters individually dedicated to each of the four main islands in the Hawaiian group and these take in any smaller adjacent islands as well. Once again, we are treated to an introduction to the island itself before getting down to diving specifics. This commences with a map of the island(s) showing the primary dive sites as numbers - each of which is then described in more than adequate detail and headed by the relevant depth, experience level required and access.

Altogether a well-rounded book containing all the information required by anyone considering a diving trip to Hawaii.

According to the Author's biography on the back page, Steve Rosenberg specialises in underwater photography. As a fellow professional "Underwater Photographer & Author," I congratulate him on some truly outstanding pictures.

NM

This book was a great mix on the culture and history of Hawaii, as well as great advice on scuba diving from people who actually dive and live there. The authors, who are also marine biologists and photographers, pointed out a lot of marine life that I previously didn't even know to look for. After reading, my dives were greatly enhanced having this added knowledge. And the photography was nice too. Very easy and interesting to read.

DOGEN STUDIES. Edited by William R. LaFleur. Kuroda Institute : Studies in East Asian Buddhism No.2. 165 pp. Honolulu : University of Hawaii Press, 1992.

Most collections of academic critical articles tend to follow a similar pattern. Among the dozen or so pieces comprising the collection, one or two will invariably prove to be of exceptional merit and interest, with the remainder, in contrast, looking like humdrum and uninspired filler. Perhaps, given the greatly varying abilities of human beings, this is inevitable. There are Scholars and scholars, and one can't go about smashing rice bowls.

Happily, the present collection of 'Dogen Studies' is that rare exception in which, not just one or two, but all of the contributions, although not perhaps of equal brilliance, are certainly interesting. I don't know whether this is because Dogen is himself such an interesting and multi-faceted thinker, or whether it's because he attracts a more interesting kind of mind, but I can assure readers that all of the pieces in the present collection are well worth reading by anyone with a serious interest in Dogen.

The collection is made up of the following eight articles : 'Design in the Academy' by William R. LaFleur ; 'Recarving the Dragon : History and Dogma in the Study of Dogen' by Carl Bielefeldt ; '"The Reason of Words and Letters" : Dogen and Koan Language' by Hee-Jin Kim ; 'The Incomparable Philosopher : Dogen on How to Read the Shobogenzo' by Thomas P. Kasulis ; 'The Oneness of Practice and Attainment : Implications for the Relation between Means and Ends' by Masao Abe ; 'The Practice of Body-Mind : Dogen's Shinjingakudo and Comparative Philosophy' by John C. Maraldo ; 'Dogen's View of Authentic Selfhood and its Socio-ethical Implications' by Francis H. Cook ; 'The Meaning of Dogen Today' by Robert N. Bellah.

The book is rounded out with a detailed List of Contributors, their affiliations, backgrounds, and main publications, and a 5-page bilingual Glossary of Chinese and Japanese Terms (with sinographs). Among the contributors are some outstanding Dogen scholars whose names will already be familiar to students of Dogen.

'Dogen Studies' is a carefully conceived and well-balanced collection, and seems to have been designed to show us something of the range of possible approaches to Dogen. Everyone will have a favorite, my own being Francis Cook's piece, an article which seems to me to be the finest and most interesting treatment of 'enlightenment' that I've ever seen. But, as I've indicated, I enjoyed all of the others too.

As an added bonus, the many translated excerpts from Dogen that are scattered throughout the book are of uniformly high quality. Here are some particularly fine lines from the 'Shobogenzo Genjo-koan' as rendered by Francis H. Cook:

"Conveying the self to the myriad beings to authenticate them is delusion; / The myriad things advancing to authenticate the self is enlightenment" (page 133).

'Dogen Studies' is a book that I'm pleased to be able to recommend, as I feel sure that all serious students of Dogen will find it of real interest.

This book is a gem. Intended as a guide for individuals seeking to conduct research in Japan in the social sciences or cultural studies, DOING FIELDWORK IN JAPAN not only accomplishes that goal beautifully but also serves as an invaluable and entertaining introduction to the rules of Japanese society that will be of interest to a wide range of readers. Here is a chance to learn about the customs that govern social interaction in Japan from bright, articulate, and, yes, even humorous scholars for whom mastering and implementing these rules was absolutely essential to the accomplishment of major research projects that earned them positions as respected commentators on Japan.