Aloha ‘Āina
![](https://emergencemagazine.org/app/uploads/2024/06/EM-Series-Page-Aloha-AIna-2160p_0010-1-2200x1238.jpg)
![](https://emergencemagazine.org/app/uploads/2024/06/EM-Series-Page-Aloha-AIna-2160p_0010-2200x1238.jpg)
What does it mean to love the land? For acclaimed Kanaka Maoli poet and activist Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio, this love is held in aloha ‘āina, a Hawaiian concept that teaches if we are connected to one another, it is only because we are connected to the land which nourishes us both. Laying bare the remaking of Hawai‘i from a place where people and land have lived in kinship for thousands of years to a place colonized with projections of pleasure and profit, Jamaica summons the true spirit of aloha. At the forefront of the fight to prevent a thirty-meter telescope from being constructed at the summit of Mauna Kea—the most sacred mountain in Hawai‘i—she speaks verses that command love and responsibility for any land that has fed and held us.
![](https://emergencemagazine.org/app/uploads/2024/06/EM-Series-Page-Aloha-AIna-2160p_0010-2200x1238.jpg)
Director
Adam Loften is an Emmy- and Peabody Award–nominated filmmaker and producer of virtual reality experiences and podcasts. His films include Sanctuaries of Silence, The Atomic Tree, Counter Mapping and Welcome to Canada. His work has been featured on PBS, National Geographic, The Atlantic, and The New York Times.
Director
Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee is an Emmy- and Peabody Award–nominated filmmaker and a Sufi teacher. His films include Earthrise, Sanctuaries of Silence, The Atomic Tree, Counter Mapping, Marie’s Dictionary, and Elemental. His films have been screened at New York Film Festival, Tribeca Film Festival, SXSW, and Hot Docs, exhibited at the Smithsonian Museum, and featured on PBS POV, National Geographic, and New York Times Op-Docs. He is the founder and executive editor of Emergence Magazine.
Credits
Featuring Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio
Directed by Adam Loften & Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee
Produced by Adam Loften, Devin Tellatin, Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee
Director of Photography Jeremy Seifert
Edited by Adam Loften
Music by Logan Stahley, H. Scott Salinas
![](https://emergencemagazine.org/app/uploads/2024/06/EM-Series-Page-The-Last-Ice-Age-2160p_0010-2200x1238.jpg)
The Last Ice Age
For storyteller Andri Snær Magnason, climate change is like a black hole: so big, it’s larger than language. Retracing his grandparents’ annual spring journey to Iceland’s Vatnajökull glacier to witness the loss of Europe’s largest ice cap with his son, Andri searches for the stories that can help us understand our ecological crisis.