Hawaiʻi's cold war: American empire and the 50th state

Abstract

To understand how Hawaiʻi became part of America's Cold War domestic and foreign policy, this project examines the role of films, congressional statehood hearings, domestic print media, literature created by Hawaiʻi-based authors, and State Department documents. Together, these forms created a distinct historiography about Hawaiʻi that recast Hawaiʻi's history within Cold War objectives that the U.S. sought at the time. This collection of official documents and popular media sources served to reinforce ideas about American exceptionalism while further normalizing American hegemony in Hawaiʻi.