Suppressed by Missionaries, Reclaimed by a Cultural Revival

Nineteenth century Christian missionary influence in Hawaii and Tahiti actively worked to suppress mahu status and the wider indigenous understanding of gender it belonged to, treating it as morally deviant and pressuring Native Hawaiian and Tahitian communities to adopt a strict Western binary understanding of sex and gender in its place, a suppression that pushed mahu identity toward the margins of public life for much of the following century.

The broader Native Hawaiian cultural revival movement of recent decades, which has also renewed interest in traditional navigation, language and hula practice, has brought with it a parallel renewed public recognition and pride around mahu identity and history, with contemporary mahu individuals and scholars actively working to recover and assert the role's traditional cultural standing rather than accept the missionary era framing that had displaced it. This revival treats mahu status as a genuine part of precontact Hawaiian and Tahitian religious and social life rather than as a modern invention, even as its exact traditional scope and meaning continue to be actively researched and discussed. This work treats mahu status as a genuine part of precontact religious and social life rather than a modern invention, even as its exact traditional scope continues to be actively researched.