Our conversation with Kau­makaiwa Kanaka’ole could have gone in any number of interesting directions: songwriting; gender politics; the beauty of the Hawaiian language; the power of Mauna Kea, the volcano under which her family has lived for generations. But today, relaxing under a tree and resting up for her next set at the Vancouver Island MusicFest, the Big Island–born singer wants to take us deep—deep into the painful history of colonized Hawaii, deep into the healing balm of a place that many call paradise, and deep into the shamanic practices that root human nature within a web of wind and water, trees and tides.

At the end of our talk I felt like I’d been given a gift—and that’s no coincidence, for art and knowledge are the currency of the Kanaka’ole family, a multigenerational clan of artists and activists who have dedicated themselves to preserving and reviving Hawaiian culture ever since Kaumakaiwa’s great-grandmother Edith’s time.

“Music, dance, and art have always been the tools with which one combats the colonization of one’s mind,” Kanaka’ole explains. “When you colonize a people, you can take their land and you can take their sovereignty, but the sovereignty of one’s mind is truly the final frontier, and it’s the mentality of our people that we’re trying to change.”

Although Kanaka’ole sometimes performs as a folk-roots songwriter, and will be accompanied at the Vancouver Folk Music Festival by slack-key guitarist Shawn Pimental, her primary medium is hula. And if that conjures up images of grass-skirt-clad, lei-festooned dancers, you’re only seeing part of the picture.

“Hula is the environment,” Kanaka’ole explains. “It’s as simple as that. It is the medium in which the Hawaiian has interpreted and mimicked his or her environment through movement and dance. But, really, hula has less to do with the human aspect of dance, and more to do with the dance that is happening in the environment. Whether or not we choreograph, or whether or not we get the human body to move, the waters and rivers still flow down to the ocean, and the tides still ebb and flow, and both the Earth and the forests on it still breathe. So that’s hula: it’s the movement of the environment, and we have to encapsulate that in a human aesthetic.”

In the Kanaka’ole family, she continues, both dance and music are considered an embodiment of Pele, the goddess of fire and volcanic action. “We try to dance as low to the ground as possible, and that draws the energy. Our chants and dances are meant to garner a response from the natural world. So the more we exert ourselves, the more we become synchronized with the environment around us.

“The hope is that when one practises ritual hula, you achieve that transcendence,” she adds. “You have pulled yourself through that wall of exhaustion, or physical exhaustion and exertion, almost to the point of delirium—and then you get to that euphoric and almost trancelike state.”

Can non-Hawaiians get there, too? Kanaka’ole doesn’t rule that out, and she’s certainly convinced that her art is a way of asking settlers and tourists to consider their role in the ongoing occupation of the Hawaiian archipelago.

“Politics begets politics,” she says. “When someone confronts you with anger and anxiety, then that’s what you give in return. But if you approach someone through spirit, through the medium of dance and song, they have no choice but to turn in to themselves and really ask themselves those questions. Being open to the human experience—that’s really all we want.”

Kaumakaiwa Kanaka’ole and Shawn Pimental play the Vancouver Folk Music Festival’s Stage 3 on Sunday (July 17).