Meki Toalepai is an advocate for ethnic arts as he grew up in his family’s Polynesian entertainment business. Meki’s Tamure Polynesian Dance Group was founded in 1969 by Meki’s parents, Meki & JoAnn Toalepai, who were performers at Baltimore’s most famous tiki restaurant – The Hawaiian Room in the Emerson Hotel. Meki recently returned from a 5 year sabbatical in Hawaii. He is now taking the group in a new direction to not only provide Polynesian entertainment to Maryland but to add educational and instructional components to share his heritage with greater audiences. Meki received funding and recognition as a master Tahitian drummer from the Maryland State Arts Council as a 2019 Maryland Traditions grantee. 

Meki's visit to UMBC, as a guest of the Department of American Studies' Indigenous Heritage: Issues of Ownership and Representation course, will help our campus community to better understand and appreciate the diversity and dynamic qualities of indigenous cultures, including indigenous identities and everyday practices, the performance of culture, intangible cultural heritage, and issues surrounding cultural appropriation. 

This event will be held on Thursday, December 6, 2018 in the  Albin O. Kuhn Library Gallery.