Prof J. Kehaulani Kauanui

J. Kēhaulani Kauanui (Kanaka Maoli/Native Hawaiian) is an activist, radio producer and writer. She is Professor of American Studies and Anthropology at Wesleyan University, where she teaches courses related to Indigenous studies, critical race theory. settler colonial studies and anarchist studies.

Kauanui earned her B.A. in Women’s Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, and her Ph.D. in History of Consciousness at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She is the author of Hawaiian Blood: Colonialism and the Politics of Sovereignty and Indigeneity (Duke University Press 2008); Paradoxes of Hawaiian Sovereignty: Land, Sex, and the Colonial Politics of State Nationalism (Duke University Press 2018); and Speaking of Indigenous Politics: Conversations with Activists, Scholars, and Tribal Leaders (University of Minnesota Press 2018).

Her work is widely published in a range of academic journals and edited books. Kauanui also co-edits a book series on “Critical Indigeneities” for the University of Carolina Press. She is one of the six co-founders of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association, established in 2008. And she is the recipient of the Western History Association’s 2022 American Indian History Lifetime Achievement Award.