On Thursday, August 2, 2018 at 1:20:04 PM UTC-10, tert in seattle wrote:
>
> You are preoccupied with race in the same way that residents of
> Teamsterville (see Gerry Philipsen - Speaking culturally: explorations
> in cultural communication [Albany : State University of New York Press,
> ©192]) are preoccupied with ethnic origin. This approach sees people
> not as individual selves but as forms that fit a particular cultural
> place. It is a way of ordering the world that is old world, in contrast
> to the typical middle-class "Nacirema" culture that values the individual
> as unique and not bound to cultural expectations simply by virtue of
> their race or ethnicity.

That's an interesting interpretation. I can't say that we're preoccupied with race but maybe we are. Either way, the local people of Hawaii have no problem with other people and other cultures because we have to live in such close contact with everybody.

Most of Hawaiian humor deals with the differences between race/culture. We don't have any problems with making fun of other ethnicities because in order to do this, we have to have an intimate knowledge of each other's race/culture. Rather than pulling us apart, the expression of me knowing about where you're coming from, brings us closer together. You know how inside jokes can bring people together? Same thing.

So if I say that the Samoan assault weapon of choice is a 2"X4", you're not going to think that's funny. The reason being that you guys don't know nothing about the Samoans. OTOH, please don't be telling that joke on the mainland. It might not go over well - in a most extreme way.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-un-LUjRX14