Noelani Arista

Noelani Arista (Kanaka Maoli) is Associate Professor and Canada Research Chair specializing in 19th-century Hawaiian legal history and Indigenous knowledge systems. She directs McGill's Indigenous Studies Program and authored the award-winning book The Kingdom and the Republic, which reframes colonial histories through Hawaiian-language documents. Her research examines governance, law, and epistemology prior to US annexation.

Current projects explore artificial intelligence applications for Indigenous language archives and traditional knowledge organization. She founded the '365 days of aloha' initiative to share Hawaiian language and cultural knowledge through social media. Her publications frequently analyze intersections of indigenous sovereignty, archival practices, and decolonization methodologies.