Colonizing Hawai'I: The Cultural Power of Law

Posted: 27 Apr 2000

See all articles by Sally Engle Merry

Sally Engle Merry

Wellesley College - Department of Anthropology

Abstract

How does law transform family, sexuality, and community in the fractured social world characteristic of the colonizing process? The law was a cornerstone of the so-called civilizing process of nineteenth-century colonialism. It was simultaneously a means of transformation and a marker of the seductive idea of civilization. Sally Engle Merry reveals how, in Hawai'i, indigenous Hawaiian law was displaced by a transplanted Anglo-American law as global movements of capitalism, Christianity, and imperialism swept across the islands. The new law brought novel systems of courts, prisons, and conceptions of discipline and dramatically changed the marriage patterns, work lives, and sexual conduct of the indigenous people of Hawai'i.

JEL Classification: K40

Suggested Citation

Engle Merry, Sally, Colonizing Hawai'I: The Cultural Power of Law. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=222188

Sally Engle Merry (Contact Author)

Wellesley College - Department of Anthropology ( email )

Pendleton East, Room 331
Wellesley, MA 02181
United States
781-283-2138 (Phone)
781-283-3664 (Fax)

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