Dr. Valli Kalei Kanuha: Back to the Future

Valli Kalei Kanuha is Professor, Department of Sociology at the University
of Hawai‘i at Mānoa. Her professional and research interests focus on violence against women of color, specifically in Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander, Asian and LGBTQ communities; child abuse and family violence; and alternative justice interventions for interpersonal and community violence. Born and raised in Hilo, Hawaiʻi Kalei’s current research focuses on the use of Native Hawaiian cultural beliefs, values and traditions to address domestic, sexual and family violence in Hawaiian and Polynesian families. Professor Kanuha is the first and only tenured faculty of Native Hawaiian ancestry in the 95-year history of the Sociology Department at the University of Hawai‘I at Mānoa. Professor Kanuha will share the moʻolelo (story) of Namelehuapono, a Hawaiian culturally-based domestic violence intervention developed as a partnership between a university-based researcher, Hawaiian cultural practitioners and domestic violence advocates.

Watch the video.