Conclusion

With regard to religion and its cognates, approaches in religious studies still frequently reify the category and its presumed turf, shortchanging other domains such as culture, history, and political life as a result. Indigenous studies often has the opposite effect, largely ignoring the category for a variety of understandable reasons in view of the legacies of missionisation and its disciplining tendencies, on the one hand, and anthropology and its fetishising habits, on the other. For many Hawaiians, ‘tribe’ is a construct of the US federal government that implies and enacts encapsulation and usurpation. Native’, ‘aboriginal’ and ‘first peoples’ are terms of choice in such contexts. Similarily, ‘religion’ is not usually invoked when Hawaiians and Native Americans address sacred matters. Contexts of usages of indigenous religion(s) include protests, celebrations, politics, tourism, education, scholarship, missionisation, litigation, art, exhibitions, and popular culture and media.