The Dream Begins: How Hawaii Shaped Barack Obama by Stu Glauberman and Jerry Burris

Born and raised in the most multicultural state in the union, President Barack Obama bears the indelible stamp of his native Hawai‘i. Stu Glauberman and Jerry Burris’s book, The Dream Begins: How Hawai‘i Shaped Barack Obama (Watermark Publishing, 2009), is a coming-of-age story set in Hawai‘i’s storied “melting pot”—a revealing look at the island state that is surely a core part of what makes Obama tick.

In their 152-page book Honolulu journalists Glauberman and Burris examine Obama’s early years in Hawai‘i. The self-described “skinny kid with the funny name” flourished in the Islands, where local values foster tolerance, compromise and mutual respect—and where diversity defines people rather than divides them. The social mores of the Aloha State and the experience of growing up in an island culture have had a deep and lasting influence on the candidate. Obama himself has noted, “What’s best in me, and what’s best in my message, is consistent with the tradition of Hawai‘i.”

However, President Obama has largely played down the fact that he was born and bred in Hawai‘i. In stump speeches and ads during his campaign, Obama stressed his grandparents’ bedrock Kansas values and his Chicago political experience over the Aloha Spirit of his own boyhood home.

But it is clear Hawai‘i holds a special place in the President’s heart: we’ve already seen a White House lū‘au, and the First Family will not be staying in Washington, D.C., or heading to their former Chicago home for their first presidential holiday season—they’re coming to Hawai‘i.

In The Dream Begins, Glauberman and Burris offer concise lessons in Hawai‘i history to help the reader understand its racial and social climate, and how such an environment influenced a young man like Obama. Interviews with Obama’s Punahou School classmates and teachers, as well as others who knew the President in his youth, add a personal dimension to the narrative. Obama’s paternal and maternal family history and his years in Indonesia are also thoroughly covered.

Obama himself has said that Hawai‘i taught him to build bridges between people. Here he saw the ideal of how people of different backgrounds can live together in a climate of mutual respect. He has said that Hawai‘i is part of his core being; it is what’s best about his message. Hawai‘i is a model for the kind of America he hopes his presidency will bring about: a place where people rise above the barriers that divide them.

As his wife, Michelle Obama, has said, “You can’t really understand Barack until you understand Hawai‘i.” The Dream Begins is the key to gaining that understanding of the man who has made history as the first African-American—and the first Hawai‘i-born—President of the United States.

During his career as a journalist with The Honolulu Advertiser and Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Stu Glauberman covered many beats including education, politics, business and Hawaiian affairs. He has traveled widely and also reported from Asia. Jerry Burris is Hawai‘i’s foremost political analyst, having reported and commented on politics for readers of The Honolulu Advertiser and Honolulu television viewers for more than 30 years.

The Dream Begins: How Hawai‘i Shaped Barack Obama (ISBN 978-0-9821698-2-7) is available for $17.95 at bookstores and other retail outlets, from online booksellers, or direct from the publisher at www.bookshawaii.net. Contact Watermark Publishing, 1088 Bishop St., Suite 310, Honolulu, HI 96813; telephone (808) 587-7766; toll-free (866) 900-BOOK; fax (808) 521-3461; e-mail sales@bookshawaii.net.

Tags: Barack Obama, Jerry Burris, Stu Glauberman, The Dream Begins

This entry was posted on Friday, December 18th, 2009 at 8:31 am and is filed under Biography, Book events, Current Events, History, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.