Aloha! In celebration of Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, the DePaul Humanities Center gave a lecture and-performance that combined philosophy, art, history, dance, and several other disciplines in order to investigate the nature of ethics, finding moral inspiration in the culture of Hawaii, and in the being of rocks. Yes, we are talking about ‘rocks’! According to the Hawaiian culture, rocks tell us a lot by their existence and shape. The lecture was given by professor H.Peter Steeves, with Halau I Ka Pono – The Hula School of Chicago.
The lecture started with an introduction and was followed by six acts from the Hawaiian myth “Pele and Hi’iaka”. The story involves a journey, and professor Steeves took that story and transposed it into the literary scaffolding of another classic journey, the novel Ulysses by James Joyce. Between every act, professor Steeves talked about ethics by using the Hawaiian rocks to explain how Hawaiians look at ethics. The Hula School of Chicago visualized the acts by singing and dancing.
Most of the people who came to the lecture wanted to hear Hawaiian stories and enjoy Hawaiian music, which was also why I came to this event. I had no idea I would learn so much about living a meaningful life and ethics. This lecture taught us how to enjoy life to the fullest, without money. I spoke to some people at the event, and they all thought this event was fun, inspiring and informative. This was a perfect Asian Pacific American Heritage Month event that combined cultural performances with information, art and history.
Ha Duong
