Social Sciences Newsblog

MacLennan on Hawai’i’s Sugar Industry

Published
By
Beginning of the harvest. Kïlauea Sugar Plantation, Kaua‘i, 1912. H. W. Thomas photograph album. Hawaiian Historical Society
Beginning of the harvest. Kïlauea Sugar Plantation,Kaua‘i,
1912. H. W. Thomas photograph album. Hawaiian Historical
Society

Dr. Carol MacLennan presented to the Hawaiian Historical Society on topics in her new book, Sovereign Sugar: Industry and Environment in Hawai’i (Univ. of Hawai’i Press, 2014),  in Honolulu, Hawaii on October 23, 2014.

ABSTRACT:  MacLennan focuses on the rise of power among the sugar planters and the ecology of plantation agriculture. It is a story of land and water, community, and politics. By the 1930s, the sugar economy engulfed both human and environmental landscapes. Sugar manufacture not only transformed Hawai‘i but its legacy provides lessons for the future.