Cooling the Tropics

"Cooling the Tropics offers a compelling model for future research focused on the simultaneously sensorial, biopolitical, and ecological implications of colonialism’s thermal infrastructures." -- Hsuan L. Hsu * The Senses and Society *
"Fascinating and thoughtful. . . . Recommended. General readers and advanced undergraduates through faculty." -- F. Ng * Choice *

“Cooling the Tropics is well worth reading. … With many revealing and fascinating examples, [Hobart] tells an engaging story of the American colonisation of Hawaii that is open, unfixed and challengeable.”

-- Helene Brembeck * Review of Agricultural, Food, and Environmental Studies *

"Contributing to a rich, contemporary conversation of critical ruminations on materiality, the elements, and questions of race and indigeneity, Cooling the Tropics pushes readers to think about how indigeneity is shaped in colonial discourses. … This well researched book will fascinate and keep readers on the hook."

-- Jen Rose Smith * Society and Space *
"Throughout the book, Hobart’s eloquent, witty, yet to-the point writing style is outstanding. . . . By bringing together analyses of settler colonialism, sensorial experiences, and food, the author creates evocative word combinations and points to seemingly mundane phenomena—such as to melting ice toward the end of the book—that form new concepts." -- Mascha Gugganig * Gastronomica *
"A work like Hobart’s Cooling the Tropics is a much-needed investigation into how ice served as a necessary conduit for American influence to grow and expand within the Hawaiian
Islands. . . . Hobart’s work is a chilling reminder that despite encroaching American influence, the tropics and, by extension, Native Hawaiian bodies could not be packed, moulded, or served alongside icy commodities. Instead, Kanaka Maoli persevered in the face of shifting power dynamics by remaining cool and collected, and ultimately reaffirmed their presence in the islands." -- Kale Kanaeholo * Journal of Pacific History *
"With Cooling the Tropics, Hobart has contested these depictions and convincingly opened a path for future studies of colonialism, Indigeneity, and foodways in the Pacific. For these reasons, scholars across disciplines and fields will find Hobart’s careful study . . . refreshing." -- Issay Matsumoto * Journal of American Ethnic History *
"Until reading this book, I had not fully grasped the impacts of thermal dependency on our lives and futures. . . . After reading this book I now realize that my thinking about Indigenous resurgence and futurity needs to also attend to issues of temperature control, refrigeration, and ice."
  -- Hokulani K. Aikau * Native American and Indigenous Studies *
"Cooling the Tropics has a substantial bibliography and notes and will fit beautifully into an undergraduate or graduate course in ethnography, anthropology, sociology, Hawaiian Studies, food and culture courses, and political science. Hobart weaves a narrative that leads towards another way to consider the history and culture of the Kānaka Maoli of Hawai‘i." -- Kristin McAndrews * Hawaiian Journal of History *
"Cooling the Tropics is an engaging text that will make generative reading for anyone interested in the relationship between foodways and colonial history but may hold specific interest for those interested in technological development and thermal media." -- Briand Gentry * Journal of Cinema and Media Studies *