Dr. Kaliko Baker will begin the series with a talk on the re-awakening and re-establishing of Kanaka Maoli traditional religious practices on July 15 at 6 p.m.

LAHAINA – For the second year in a row, Na Aikane o Maui Cultural Center will host a free, public West Maui Kanaka Scholars lecture series, cosponsored by the HK West Maui Community Fund, the University of Hawaii Maui College Hawaiian Studies Department and the Ku’e Petition Hui.

The lectures will be held monthly on the third Monday of the month beginning in July.

Dr. Kaliko Baker, associate professor at the Hawai’inuiakea School of Hawaiian Knowledge at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, will initiate the series with his discussion of the re-awakening and re-establishing of Kanaka Maoli traditional religious practices on July 15 at 6 p.m.

The series features a host of new and established scholars and innovators, and their research and work on Hawaii and Hawaiian communities.

Upcoming speakers include Professor J. Kehaulani Kauanui of Wesleyan University, the author of “Paradoxes of Sovereignty;” Professor David Chang, University of Minnesota, the author of “The World and All the Things Upon It: Native Hawaiian Geographies of Exploration;” Dr. Noenoe Siva, author of “The Power of the Steel Tipped Pen: Reconstructing Native Hawaiian Intellectual History,” who will give the talk “Na Mea Kakau Wahine o Ka Hoku o Hawaii: The Women Columnists of Ka Hoku o Hawai’i;” Dr. Kekuewa Kikiloi from the Hawai’inuiakea School of Hawaiian Knowledge; Dr. Jamaica Osorio, assistant professor of Indigenous and Native Hawaiian Politics at the University of Hawaii at Manoa; and Dr. Kekoa Harman, associate professor, Ka Haka ‘Ula O Ke’elikolani, College of Hawaiian Language, UH-Hilo, who will present the talk “I Lala Mau Na Hula Ilalaole: Continuing the Hula of Joseph Ilalaole, a Native Speaker from Puna, Hawai’i.”

These events are free and open to the public.

Doors open at 5:30 p.m. Public lectures begin at 6 p.m.

Dinner or heavy pupus will be served.

Na Aikane is located at 562-A Front St. in Lahaina.

For information, call Ke’eaumoku Kapu at (808) 298-5639.