Support your local PBS station in our mission to inspire, enrich, and educate.
Donate
Celebrate Utah Pacific Islander Heritage Month
In August of 1889, 46 Pacific Islander settlers arrived in Utah, establishing the Iosepa settlement in Tooele’s Skull Valley. Today, nearly 50,000 Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders live in Utah, with the majority living in Salt Lake and Utah Counties.
Since 2012, August has been declared Utah’s Pacific Island Heritage Month by former Governor Gary Herbert. Join PBS Utah in celebrating the 10th anniversary of recognizing the rich history, culture, and contributions to the Beehive State’s arts, food, business, sports, and more.
Browse our curated collection of videos and podcasts celebrating this dynamic community.
From PBS Utah
Art Elevated: The Governor's Mansion Artist Awards
Ta'u Pupu'a
While his teammates listened to rock or hip-hop to get pumped up before a game, Ta’u Pupu’a listened to Luciano Pavarotti. After an injury ended his professional football career, Ta’u moved to New York City to purse a new life in the opera. Now, Ta’u works as a professional opera tenor, sharing what he calls the “universal language” of music with the world.
this is utah
Malialole
Merine “Vida” Tu’itama’alelagi Hafoka and her son Haviar “Havi” Tuitama Hafoka run Malialole, a Polynesian music and dance group that celebrates and preserves Pacific Islander art, culture, and history. Now three generations strong, Malialole is spreading Polynesian culture to today’s youth, helping to foster a sense of identity and strengthen the community of Pacific Islanders in Utah.
Art Elevated: The Governor's Mansion Artist Awards
Fidalis Buehler
Many of Fidalis Buehler’s paintings feature the image of a wanderer, personified as a stray dog. A child of parents from Wisconsin and the Gilbert Islands, Fidalis never felt like he fit in either group — but in the arts, he saw an avenue for exploration. For Fidalis, art is a quest to know thyself. Now a professor at BYU, Fidalis teaches students to harness the nuances of their own identities.
more than half podcast
Carrying Our Legacy
If you see an alarmingly high infant mortality rate in a group of people - how do you go about changing it? One program used cultural knowledge, intergenerational wisdom, and storytelling to create awareness about maternal and infant health in Utah's Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander communities.
More From PBS
PbS digital studios | Indie america
The Hawaiian Hut
The Hawaiian Hut is Utah's largest Polynesian market. It serves people in the Salt Lake City area with authentic and traditional food and ingredients from places like Tonga, Samoa and Hawaii.
american MASTERS
Waterman – Duke: Ambassador of Aloha
Five-time Olympic medalist Duke Kahanamoku shattered records as a swimmer and brought surfing to the world while overcoming rampant racism in a lifetime of personal challenges. Narrated by Jason Momoa, this documentary reveals Kahanamoku’s influence on surfing’s global spread, his life-saving achievements, and the obstacles he conquered both within and outside the sporting world
if CITIES could dance
How Hula Dancers Connect Hawaii’s Past and Present
Honolulu is home to tourism hotspot Waikiki, and many of the city’s beachfront hotels host lavish luaus showcasing styles of hula influenced by Western music and instrumentation. But for Native Hawaiians, the origins of hula are deeply spiritual and rooted in Hawaii’s creation stories and the history and culture of their kūpuna or ancestors. Driven by the mele (poetry), hula marries movement with spoken word to express stories about specific deities, people, places and events.
Pacific heartbeat
Loimata, The Sweetest Tears
Featuring the redemptive tale of waka builder and captain Lilo Ema Siope’s final years, "Loimata, The Sweetest Tears" is a chronicle of journeys – journeys of migration, spirituality, voyaging, healing and coming home. Confronting intergenerational trauma head on, the Siope family returns to their homeland of Sâmoa.
adaptation
Coral Reefs of Vanuatu
The South Pacific island nation of Vanuatu may be one of the world’s most beautiful diving destinations. Its coral reefs are the backbone of the island’s environmental and economic health. Today they face destruction from a silent predator that can rapidly decimate an entire reef. Dive in with Alizé to discover how local communities are adapting to the threat and reviving coastal ecosystems.
pacific heartbeat
The Healer Stones of Kapaemahu
On Honolulu's famous Waikiki Beach stand four large stones that represent a Hawaiian tradition of healing and gender diversity that is all but unknown to the millions of locals and tourists passing by. According to legend, the stones are a tribute to four mahu, people of dual male and female spirit, who brought the healing arts from Tahiti to Hawaii and used their spiritual power to cure disease.
