Talk:List of English words of Hawaiian origin

Capitalized
I have capitalized each word as per the general convention in a dictionary entry. --Bhadani 08:58, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Two lists?
I'm not understanding why there are two lists of words, some overlap and some not. Looking at it again, it looks like the whole thing has a formatting error. I don't know how to fix stuff like that. Makana Chai (talk) 02:20, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I've merged the two lists back together. -- jonny - m t  14:36, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Hawaii "Originally meant paradise"?
The article says Hawai'i means paradise? Do you have a cite for that? Makana Chai (talk) 00:10, 3 May 2008 (UTC) LOL I would first like to know were this nonsense came from; being a Kanaka myself I answer with This Only a true Kupuna will tell you the real answer and only if you are deserving enough and is rarely told to non Kanakas. I can tell you the definition given here is incorrect. Kimo Rapoza (talk) 21:43, 2 October 2013 (UTC) Kimo Kimo Rapoza (talk) 21:43, 2 October 2013 (UTC)]

Criteria for inclusion?
So far I've just put in words that come up in dictionary.com. But I'm wondering about 3 words: lomilomi, Huna and ho'oponopono. All 3 of these have many adherents throughout the U.S. Books on all 3 sell all over the world. However, they're not in the dictionary - yet. Your advice? Makana Chai (talk) 09:47, 3 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Carr lists lomilomi as one of 108 Hawaiian words commonly heard in English in Hawaii. Is that good enough? Viriditas (talk) 08:54, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Re-examination of a few items
So I understand from talking with Viriditas that there's a push to get this to FL--I think it's a great candidate, and I'm on board. First, though, I think we need to be sure we have a firm criteria for inclusion (see also Makana Chai's comments above).

My personal opinion is that we should focus as much as possible on words that have entered the general lexicon. For example, "lei", "taboo", "ukulele", and "hula" are all well-known outside of Hawaii, but no one uses "lanai" to refer to a veranda on the mainland. Likewise, "haole" is a word used only in Hawaii, but you don't have to be there to get "mahi-mahi". I bring this up because I noticed a lot of words that, while they may be commonly used in Hawaii, they seem to be members of a regional dialect rather than of the English language as a whole.

Any thoughts? -- jonny - m t  14:32, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks for all your good work! I agree need to have firm criteria for inclusion. I think if they're in the dictionary that's a good criteria. I haven't checked everything on the list to see if they are in the dictionary, but I will if you agree that's the criteria. I was surprised to see aa in the dictionary but there it is, along with haole and lanai. Makana Chai (talk) 18:18, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Hmm...I've been going over a few more lists (List of English words of French origin, List of English words of Spanish origin, and List of English words of Japanese origin--actually closed the AfD there), and I think they all suffer from similar problems. I check out WP:FL to see if there was any equivalent list in another language that we could borrow criteria from, but sadly there isn't.  I suspect this is due to the fact that English borrows so heavily from so many languages that most of these lists become too broad in the end to be comprehensive.


 * The good news, though, is that I don't think we'll have that problem with Hawaiian. After looking at those other lists, I think you're right on with your criteria, although it might not hurt to start with dictionary.com and then narrow down the list with something a bit more discriminate such as the Oxford dictionary.  In addition, I think it would be a good idea to exclude Hawaiian foods as a rule (possibly by pointing either to Cuisine of Hawaii or creating a separate list) in order to make sure our list doesn't lean too heavily on one topic for content. -- jonny - m  t  04:25, 8 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Sounds good. I'd say let's not exclude anything (food or whatever) yet. It's not that long! If we see it is getting crazy, we can edit from there. Makana Chai (talk) 08:34, 8 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I have access to a list of 108 common Hawaiian words in Elizabeth Ball Carr's, Da Kine Talk (ISBN 0824802098), as well as Simonson's Pidgin to da max, Elbert and Pukui's Hawaiian Grammar, and Cleeland's Olelo Oiwi. Viriditas (talk) 08:40, 8 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I see that Carr's book is for Hawaiian words used by English-speakers in Hawaii, rather than those in use generally in U.S. So I guess we need to be clear on what this list is. Or have two? Makana Chai (talk) 07:31, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I think the list should reflect English usage in general, not just mainland usage. Carr's book was published in 1972, but in the chapter listing the 108 most popular Hawaiian words in English, the author touches upon the number of Hawaiian words in Webster's New International Dictionary, which in the Third Edition published in 1962 numbered 182.  Is there any way to track the current number?  My guess is that Carr's list of 108 words is fairly conservative.  Do you think we should only list English words of Hawaiian origin that are in general use outside Hawaii?  If so, how would you make that determination?  I have no horse in this race, so any decision you and Jonny make is fine with me. Viriditas (talk) 09:19, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, that was my original proposal, but on further examination it seems that the more objective we can make our criteria, the better. So if we can determine a sort of baseline collection that we can draw from (Webster's would be good), I think that would be the way to go. -- jonny - m  t  09:29, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Webster's sounds good to me. Mahalo. Makana Chai (talk) 09:40, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

A couple questions
I have just a couple of questions about this list: &mdash;Kal (talk) 03:42, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
 * 1) Is it convention to use the Hawaiian or general English spelling in the "Hawaiian word" column?
 * 2) Like #1, do the IPA transcriptions follow the Hawaiian or English pronunciations? I noticed that some words have glottal stops in the IPA when, based on the Hawaiian pronunciation, they shouldn't. But if the column uses general English pronunciation, I suppose it's fine.
 * In response to the inline comment about kava: the word "kava", in Hawaiian, is awa. Kava is likely Tongan (I'm not sure), but it's definitely from another Polynesian language. &mdash;Kal (talk) 06:55, 17 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I have to agree with you. The Hawaiian alphabet does not have any v's, but it would make so much sense for awa to be the Hawaiian version. – Obento Musubi (C • G • S) 07:17, 17 October 2008 (UTC)
 * awa is the Hawaiian word. See dictionary entry. &mdash;Kal (talk) 21:35, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

taboo and shaka
According to the OED, "taboo" is from Tongan. I find it unlikely that "shaka" is from Hawaiian, since Hawaiian doesn't have /ʃ/. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Morphail (talk • contribs) 15:35, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 22:07, 29 April 2016 (UTC)