Haole
Hawaiian term for individuals who are not descendants of the ethnic native Hawaiians or other Polynesians.
Haole (, HOW-lee; Hawaiian: [ˈhɐo̯.le]) is a Hawaiian term for individuals who are not native Hawaiian, and is applied to people primarily of white European ancestry.
Background
The origins of the word predate the 1778 arrival of Captain James Cook, as recorded in several chants stemming from that time. The term was generally given to people of European descent; however, as more distinct terms began to be applied to individual European cultures and other non-European nations, the word haole began to refer mostly to Americans, including American black people (who were referred to as haole ʻele ʻele, i.e., "black haole"). Its connotations range from positive, neutral, and descriptive to invective, depending on the context in which it is used. Of the Polynesian race, Robert Louis Stevenson said: "God's best—at least God's sweetest works" and then wrote of the "beastly haoles". In correspondence to a friend, he stated, "What is a haole? You are one; and so, I am sorry to say, am I".
Etymology
A newspaper challenge in 1929 offered one hundred dollars to anyone who could satisfactorily explain to Dr. Theodore Richards what the word meant. James K. Keola stated that he believed the term only referred to white foreigners, giving as his own references such figures as Stephen Desha and Joseph M. Poepoe.
The public source identifies “Haole” as hawaiian term for individuals who are not descendants of the ethnic native Hawaiians or other Polynesians. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Haole, Hawaiian and term.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Haole”, the useful work is to connect “hawaiian term for individuals who are not descendants of the ethnic native Hawaiians or other Polynesians” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5651514. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1778 and 1929.
A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
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- Subject orientation
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The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Haole”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Haole primary sources, Haole archive and Haole research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
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Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Haole” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.