Introduction
Every text has a print of its author’s personality, and it is impossible to avoid a certain level of subjectivity in one’s narration. However, historians must maintain this level as low as possible and be impartial and objective in their descriptions, assessments, and judgments. The purpose of the review is to compare how Gavan Daws and Tom Coffman perceived the overthrow and annexation of Hawaii. The material would be their books “Shoal of Time: A History of the Hawaiian Islands” and “Nation Within: The History of the American Occupation of Hawaii,” respectively.
General Information about the Authors and the Books
Before analyzing the books, one should learn some major facts about their extratextual context. It includes information about the authors, the historical period they wrote their works, and various external factors that could have influenced the writers’ impression of the described events. The latter may include some personal connection with Hawaii, thus, it would also be a subject of scrutiny. This data would be useful for a better understanding of the authors’ perspectives and the sources of bias that might be present in their texts.
Daws is not a Hawaiian author, as he was born in the Australian city Shepparton in 1933. He got his B.A. at the University of Melbourne in 1954 and later earned a master’s degree and a Ph.D. at the University of Hawaii in 1960 and 1966, respectively. His major research topic is the Pacific region (“Gavin Daws”, n.d.). In brief, Daws is an Australian who works a lot in Australia and the USA. However, he studied and worked in Hawaii as well, therefore he could get a genuine insight into the state’s history and the annexation’s consequences directly from its inhabitants.
Daws wrote Shoal of Time: A History of the Hawaiian Islands in 1968. That was the time of Hawaiians’ increased dissatisfaction with their oppressed status. It would later turn into open protests and demonstrations that would eventually lead to the Constitutional Convention that consolidated Hawaiians’ self-determination rights. That time’s political and social atmosphere might have influenced Daws; therefore, it is important to remember this historical context while analyzing his work.
Coffman is not a native Hawaiian either, as he was born in Kansas, the USA. He is a professional journalist, but unlike Daws, he is not a historian in a strict sense since he does not (“Tom Coffman”, 2019). Coffman was a “government and politics reporter for Hawaiian newspapers in the 1960s and early ’70s” (Borreca, 2019, para. 2). This experience inspired him to research Hawaiian history and politics and write several best-sellers covering these topics. Among them was his Nation Within: The History of the American Occupation of Hawaii, first published in 1998. On the whole, Coffman may be considered more of “an insider” while writing about Hawaii, compared to Daws, whose perspective is more external. However, one should remember that he is not a historian; thus, his book might be less objective.
Review of Daws’s and Coffman’s Perspectives
Coffman’s work gave me food for thought and made me look at Hawaii’s annexation in a different light. It seems to be a rare book where Queen Lili’uokalani is presented as a staunch, strong, and loyal leader of her nation, while the actions of the American government are obviously criticized. The author clarifies that for him, Hawaiians are a “suppressed nation” (Coffman, 2016, p. 6). On the one hand, he appears to be genuinely supportive of Hawaiians. On the other hand, it sometimes feels as if he is too sympathetic in a patronizing way. In any case, Coffman might be biased in his support for the Hawaiians due to his close contact with them, but it is still refreshing to see a new perspective on those events. What frustrates me a bit is some inconsistency in Coffman’s narrative structure that is evident when one compares his work to some historical research made by scholars.
Unlike Coffman’s, Daws’s work is very well structured and seems to follow all the rules of academic research. The list of references he utilized for it is impressive. Daws appears to demonstrate a broad scope of events from 1778 till 1959 in a rather compact form. However, he focuses mostly on politics and does not give much social context to Hawaiians’ views on the events and their protests. Moreover, he started his book about the history of Hawaii with the description of Captain Cook’s expedition, as if nothing existed there before (Daws, 1968). It frustrated me as it does not seem to be appropriate and respectful towards Hawaiians.
As a historian, I would cautiously use Coffman’s book due to its disorganized content, and I would not fully and blindly rely on it in any serious scientific research. Daws’s work seems more objective but still lacking in the Hawaiian’s perspective of annexation. It is quite useful to read both books to learn about those events and form one’s opinion since they show rather different perspectives. Even if they contain a certain bias and Coffman’s work has some academic shortcomings in terms of its format, the specific details provided by the authors might be too valuable to miss.
Conclusion
In conclusion, both writers gave me some new insight into the overthrow and annexation of Hawaii. Daws’s work provides a broad overview of events, and the author seems as objective as possible, but he lacks some internal perspective from native Hawaiians. The latter is present in Coffman’s book, but the writer’s close contact with Hawaiians and lack of academic knowledge in historical research makes his work quite subjective. However, both authors did thorough research and presented valuable details about the described events, and it is up to the readers how to interpret them.
References
Borreca, R. (2019). Political history – the gift of author – historian Tom Coffman. Hawaii Herald. Web.
Coffman, T. (2016). Nation within: The history of the American occupation of Hawaii. Duke University Press.
Daws, G. (1968). Shoal of time: A history of the Hawaiian Islands. Macmillan Company.
Gavin Daws. (n.d.). Harper Collins Publishers. Web.
Tom Coffman. (2019). Hawaii’s Book and Music Festival. Web.