Nā Loea: The Masters | Lolena Nicholas: Lolena’s Legacy

One hundred years after the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom, the government oppression of the native language and two generations of very few native speakers, the Hawaiian language was near extinction by the turn of the 20th century. Despite the odds, a small group of determined parents banded together with the few remaining native speakers in the early 1980’s, to bring the ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi (Hawaiian language) back to the mouths and ears of keiki (children) in Hawaiʻi. Lolena Nicholas, a native of the isolated island of Niʻihau, was one of these very first native speakers that came forward to help raise a new generation of native speakers. Since then she has taught the keiki of her first keiki and she continues to give selflessly to this thriving movement, building a legacy of language.