num_pages: 364
description: How does law transform family, sexuality, and community in the fractured social world characteristic of the colonizing process? The law was a cornerstone of the so-called civilizing process of nineteenth-century colonialism. It was simultaneously a means of transformation and a marker of the seductive idea of civilization. Sally Engle Merry reveals how, in Hawai'i, indigenous Hawaiian law was displaced by a transplanted Anglo-American law as global movements of capitalism, Christianity, and imperialism swept across the islands. The new law brought novel systems of courts, prisons, and conceptions of discipline and dramatically changed the marriage patterns, work lives, and sexual conduct of the indigenous people of Hawai'i.
language: English
title: Colonizing Hawai'i: The Cultural Powers of Law
titlecomplete: Colonizing Hawai'i: The Cultural Powers of Law
genres: History, Law, Nonfiction, Anthropology
ratings_count: 34
awards: awardedAt: 1009872000000
name: James Willard Hurst Prize
publisher: Princeton University Press