By Joseph O. Gill July 4th, 2013

Montanitas, Ecuador                                                                                               2013 University of Hawaii at Manoa, Outreach College
 

Joseph Gill has talked for over 8 hours on national syndicated talk radio shows, with 6 to 7 million listeners, about symbolism and the simple origins of our different religions.  After many personal requests Joseph has put together this simple picture documentary article for easy understanding.

This paper is given after 40 years of research in thousands of books and 50 years of travel 1961-2013; personally viewing symbolism in over 150 countries.

Please see his three other articles on Symbolism on the top of our homepage of www.worldglobetrotters.com .

I first went to Hawaii with my parents in 1961, and visited many times thereafter. On September 6th 1989 I moved to the Big Island of Hawaii, a year after my retirement from business. I lived in South Kona for 13 wonderful years before selling our home and leaving on our 10 years of continuous World travel.

As a symbologist I noticed many people giving each other the "Shaka" symbol illustrated above. The people had many interesting stories of it's origins. I had in the early 1980's been a director of Sotheby's, the largest fine arts and antiques auction house in the world. While there, I had seen among many thousands of antiques, some heavy earthenware bottles from 1480-1750. They weighed near 100 pounds when filled. They were used by the early Portuguese sailing ships to transport rum. These bottles, being so very heavy, had a special 3-fingered handle, with 2 small ribs to separate the fingers so they could be more easily held up for drinking of the rum. The thumb and little finger were also used to balance this heavy bottle. Your other hand was used to hold up and steady the bottom of this bottle. A well known Historian of Hawaiiana and friend, had told me that the Portuguese had come to Hawaii near 100 years before Captain Cook. In my World travels in the 1960s, with my Mother, I had seen the same shaka symbol in many other countries, all where the Portuguese had traded in the early days.

The explanation is very easy: when the ships appeared on the horizon the local peoples ran to the shore and put the "Shaka" symbol up, meaning "BRING THE RUM".

Over the years I spent living in Hawaii I have never had a single argument from the local Hawaiian people, but I always got a laugh of amazement and agreement. This short article is my gift to help the wonderful Hawaiian people to reclaim the original meaning of this important symbol in their culture.

The shaka sign, commonly known as "hang loose", is a gesture often associated with Hawaii and surfer culture. It consists of extending the thumb and smallest finger while holding the three middle fingers curled, and raising the hand in salutation while presenting the back; the hand may be rotated back and forth for emphasis.

The shaka sign was popularized among locals in Hawaii through its use by surfers and in surf culture throughout the state in the 1960s. It has remained a salutation of friendship used by the local culture at large from then on.

Hawaiian locals use the shaka to convey what they call the "Aloha Spirit", a gesture of friendship and understanding between the various ethnic cultures that reside within Hawaii, and thus it does not have a direct semantic to literal translation. Depending on context it can also be used to communicate notions such as "thank you", "hi", "howzit", and the like. The shaka is used on the road among drivers and in photographs to communicate a distant greeting.

Outside of Hawaii, the shaka may be used to mean "hang loose", "hello", "goodbye", "till next time", "take care", or "all right!". In sign language, the shaka is one of the two signs used to refer to surfing.^{[citation needed]} In California, the Shaka sign may be referred to as the "chill" or "hang ten" sign- both associated with surfer culture.

The gesture enjoys common use in American hang gliding culture, for both sentiment and word play, in part due to the simultaneous rise of surfing and hang gliding in California in the 1960s and 70s.

On the coast of Brazil, the shaka sign is known as the "hang loose" sign and is a common gesture; the shaka is also associated with the brazilian jiu jitsu community through the world.

There are two textese glyphs for the shaka sign - \.../ and \, ,/ - the first known use of both is in c. 2006.

The sign can also be used to gesticulate the imbibing of a bottled drink, as attested to below, by placing the thumb to the mouth and motioning the little finger upward as if tipping up a bottle's bottom end.

With the thumb held near the ear and the little finger pointed at the mouth, the gesture is commonly understood to mean "call me", as it resembles a handheld telephone.

With the fingers facing forward, the same gesture is the letter Y in the American manual alphabet. Also see ILY sign.

In the Caribbean, mostly in the Lesser Antilles Aruba, Bonaire & Curaçao, it may be used to suggest a sexual exchange; for such, the thumb points to the gesturer and the little finger toward the subject of the proposition as the hand is moved forward and back.

In China, this gesture also means "6".

In Russia, this gesture with vertically oriented thumb and horizontally oriented little finger as if holding a beer mug is understood as an invitation to have a drink.

In Australia and New Zealand, raising the thumb to the mouth while pointing the pinky to the air is seen as invitation for one to smoke cannabis, the posture resembling the use of a pipe.

The "shaka sign" may have its roots in the Hawaiian custom of holding a lei (a necklace made of flowers) for the purpose of placement over the head on the shoulders of another in an Aloha greeting. The three middle fingers grasp the lei from over the top while the thumb and small finger rest under the lei thus spreading the 'necklace' open.

The shaka sign resembles the American Sign Language letter for Y.

Another theory maintains that when Spanish explorers initially came upon the islands and their people, unable to speak the native tongue, they motioned the gesture as if drinking from it, like a bottle of sorts, in an attempt to convey peaceful intentions; namely, sharing a drink. Perhaps misunderstanding the gesture, the natives took it to be a friendly greeting, and the behavior persisted.^[4]