Word of the Day · Archive
The Hawaiian word for June 12, 2026
Archive · June 12, 2026
KŌKUA
say it: koh-KOO-ah
Help · assistance · to help or support — the everyday island word for lending a hand, freely given and never demanded
What it means
In the Pukui-Elbert Hawaiian Dictionary, kōkua is both noun and verb: help, aid, assistance, relief — and also the person doing the helping: assistant, associate, deputy, helper. As a verb it means to help, assist, support, accommodate, and even, in meeting-room Hawaiian, to second a motion.
That double life — the help and the helper in one word — says something. In ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi, you don’t just give kōkua; you can be someone’s kōkua. The act and the person aren’t separated.
You’ll hear it constantly in island life: on signs, at the post office, in the checkout line, anywhere someone is being asked — gently — to pitch in.
How to use it
A few documented ways it shows up:
Why this word matters
Kōkua carries an expectation that’s quieter than charity and warmer than duty: you help because you’re part of the place, not because someone asked. The neighbor who shows up with a ladder before you’ve mentioned the gutter. The aunty who takes your plate before you stand up. That’s kōkua working.
The help and the helper share one word — in Hawaiian, what you do and who you are aren’t kept apart.
It travels with its companion word laulima — “cooperation, joint action; a group of people working together,” literally many hands. Kōkua is one person stepping in; laulima is everybody’s hands in the same work. Island life runs on both.
And it asks nothing back. That’s the part visitors sometimes miss when they read “mahalo for your kōkua” on a sign: it isn’t a transaction being closed. It’s a community being maintained — one small, unprompted act at a time. Our roots connect us; kōkua is what that connection looks like when it moves.
Sources
Definition of kōkua (“help, aid, assistance, relief, assistant, associate, deputy, helper; to help, assist, support, accommodate, second a motion”) and the compound mea kōkua (“helper, benefactor; useful, helpful”) verified against the Pukui-Elbert Hawaiian Dictionary (1986) via wehewehe.org, along with laulima (“cooperation, joint action; group of people working together”). The directional construction with mai and aku follows Elbert & Pukui’s Hawaiian Grammar. “Mahalo for your kōkua” is noted as contemporary everyday usage in Hawaiʻi, not a dictionary entry.