Indigenizing Urban Spaces: Towards a Critical Consciousness for Indigenous design in Hawai‘i

Abstract

We have occupied earth since time immemorial and have creation stories to connect us to this distant past. Our existence and occupation on earth has evolved to shape what looks, feels, and behaves differently from moment to moment and place to place. Hawai‘i is no exception. Our built environment is a combination of identities and moments that resulted from the interplay between American occupation of Hawai‘i on the one hand and sustaining Indigenous prerogatives on the other. Urban spaces are particular moments in the built environment where dominant settler-colonial narratives and constructs reinforce the perception that Indigeneity is somehow incongruent with city life and the modern world. This research seeks to confront the impacts of settler-colonialism in the city by exploring ways to Indigenize urban spaces. The goal of this research is to make visible and recognizable Indigenous design in the city in ways that are authentic to Indigenous peoples. It is my position that without a critical consciousness for Indigenous design, Indigeneity will continue to be relegated to the periphery or worse, appropriated in inauthentic ways. I argue that Indigenizing urban spaces is possible through decolonizing perspectives and exploring the underlying workings of urban space that offer agency for Indigenous worlds to emerge. The design research informs a discourse on Indigeneity and architecture that remains largely unexplored by questioning: How do we recover respect for the inseparability of place in Indigenous ways of knowing? How do we restore a nontrivial connection to place? How do we make visible the key moments in our built environment that truly reflect this place and our position in the world? The product of this research resulted in a new urban typology that is in service to Indigenous design and perspectives. While this concept draws on the collective knowledge and resources from Indigenous people and places around the world, its application in this research is for and specific to Hawai‘i.