The song is one of the first Samoan songs that I learn to play on the piano as a teenager and I loved the chords and sound of it. I also have since sung it at many occasions where my family is together and as we reflect on being Samoan within Aotearoa, New Zealand.
It's been an interesting journey in my studies so far. Firstly, I started looking at Pasifika educational alternatives in Mangere that were trying to bridge the gap for success for Pasifika students but as I then won the job as a lecturer/tutor for Indigenous Research and my focus changed.
I realised, DING!, that that question wasn't for me to answer and that it was a Ministry of Education question that they needed to check out for themselves i.e. in being a colonising force that has disabled Maori and Pasifika and particularly Samoan students from succeeding in NZ education as a group and indeed being called the "brown tail" end of not achieving. Not so simple but that's it in a nutshell.
So in I went to talk with my supervisors about my new topic. I'm sure they weren't amused as I talked about my interest in studying educational concepts of the faaSamoa i.e. values, concepts, ideas and gave a long winded speech about all my interests in this area.
It turns out that it still seemed a bit "woolly" and needed more defining which got me upset and angry as I reflected on a big blow up that I with my eldest about the differences in our paradigm of parenting i.e. free style vs faaSamoa stylez. DING!
Then I had another epiphany (the first one was about me not answering a Ministry of Education question - my former employee) and the second was about investigating the tension between faaSamoa values, ideologies etc. and NZ education ideologies, philosophies etc.
Well of course if you were brought up as a young woman in faaSamoa styled parenting as I was with my parents in Mangere, away from the mother land, then there were certain expectations that were expected of you like behaving in a certain manner, dressing in a certain manner, talking in a certain manner and conducting yourself in a certain way - the way or manner being that of within faaSamoa paradigms.
Of course, as in any generation, we rebelled and wanted to do things in our own manner but what I also was very much aware of was that the media, education, global diaspora generations were expected to take on the values of the society from which they were now a part of which is/was very different for immigrant parents who often held strong to their values, culture etc. in contrast the first generation born in a host society would often leave behind their parents cultural values and much of those messages were often transmitted through education paradigms.
So here I am now considering the first part of my question and problem which is: what is significant about the faaSamoa? and why is it important to preserve it? what answers does it hold for our future generations? i.e. why bother? and as I begin to research through some of the writings and ideas, it seems clear to me that many believe that these customs and rituals were divinely given to Samoa, almost a sacred covenant to continue to uphold. Sorry, no referencing - I'll leave that to the thesis.
And I reflect upon my parents and the many parents, grandparents like my grandmother and many of those who have since passed on but wanted to leave their warm island homes to give their children a better future and other opportunities that they believed couldn't be found in island homes but little did they know about what was awaiting them in the host societies and what that would mean for future generations...
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