Importance of a Local Context

The Pasifika community in Christchurch is of significance as a sample area because the regional specificities make it different from cities where the population size of Pasifika people is far greater. Most areas of Pasifika research have been conducted in areas where there are high numbers of Pasifika people. The Ko e Ako a’e Kakai Pasifika Report, MOE (1998:5) acknowledges that “Few initiatives involve Pacific Islands communities in areas where their numbers are low or where Pacific Islands peoples are isolated from each other.” Mamoe (1999:4) argues the need for research in “less populated areas to check trends or to develop answers that may be applied to larger areas.” As an active member of the Christchurch Pasifika community, I believe that when initiatives based on research for cities with large Pasifika populations are transplanted without consideration of regional specificities, they do not necessarily work successfully because of the different dynamics of diverse local Pasifika communities. Customarily, funding for specific interventions and initiatives that target Pasifika peoples are implemented in areas with large Pasifika populations. However, in predominantly monocultural areas such as Christchurch, the need and capacity to assert a minority cultural identity is made more difficult. Furthermore, as there are fewer resources available, the smaller enclaves of Pasifika populations in Aotearoa/New Zealand are in more vulnerable positions.

This highlights the importance of research done at a local level. Pasifika communities away from the bigger cities such as Auckland and Wellington where a bigger proportion of Pasifika people reside, contend with more barriers in asserting their identity. The

environment is more monocultural and their ‘face’ is less visible, leading to local authorities allocating fewer resources to what they consider less economically viable communities. A case in point would be the Christchurch City Council’s threat to discontinue the local Pasifika festival, which has been held for the past four years at the Arts Center, on the grounds of economic viability. One of the concerns for local Pasifika communities would then be the contention that there were fewer opportunities for them to profile their uniqueness and ‘Pasifika flavour’. It is useful to note that Pacific Underground, a local theatre and performing arts trust was instrumental in making Pasifika stories visible nationwide. The question has often been asked at how unusual this was, given that it came out of such a ‘monocultural’ city such as Christchurch. This highlights the fact that barriers can also act as a motivating factor. Because of the need to assert a Pasifika identity, often Pasifika people in isolated areas need to work that much harder at finding innovative ways to express and explore their identity as Pasifika people. Additionally, Pacific Underground gave opportunities for young Pasifika people such as playwright and comedian, Oscar Kightly and musician Scribe, to explore their talents in the arts.

Notwithstanding local barriers and a smaller population base, the Christchurch Pasifika communities are often able to work more effectively as a united front. The close work with local ministries such as MPIA and MOE is a testament to this collaborative approach. Progressive interventions such as more effective professional development in local PECCs are prime example.

4.2 METHOD

This research is a qualitative study, based on the responses generated by a sample of Pasifika parents in Christchurch. I considered that the qualitative approach was the most culturally appropriate way of gathering meaningful explanations of the rationale that underpinned parental choice as it accommodated the oral tradition of Pasifika peoples and it allowed me to ‘uncover’ the ‘hidden voices’ of factions within our Pasifika community who are usually overlooked. Moreover, this approach respects and reinforces our oral tradition where people’s stories are regarded as essential forms of knowledge (Pasikale 1997; Mamoe 1999; Tiatia 1998; Huakau 2001). For these reasons, I believe that a qualitative approach should be incorporated in any research project involving our

Pasifika communities. It is not enough to make assumptions based on statistical data, for not only the quantitative approach often ‘blankets’ Pasifika people as one homogenous group, but it also disregards the validity of individual perspectives and experiences.

Primary data was collected from a population who identified as ‘Pasifika’ people. The Samoan population in Aotearoa/New Zealand is heterogeneous and participants in this study were NZ-born or NZ-raised parents of Samoan extraction who identified as Samoan, regardless of the percentage of Samoan blood they had. Thus, by utilizing the concept of ‘ethnicity’ rather than the pseudoscientific construction of ‘race’ I was able to include parents of mixed heritage that represent an increasing section of the Pasifika communities.

The sampling technique that I used to generate a group of participants is commonly called the ‘snowball effect’ (Tuckman, 1978 cited in Fonoti, 1998:18). The ‘coconut wire’ produced a group of twenty-eight possible participants, who were narrowed down to sixteen. This included eight in each sample group, a number I considered manageable in terms of the logistics involved in interviewing. However, during the process of interviews, I discovered three participants who had enrolled their child/children in a PECC but for various reasons decided to withdraw their child/children. As I considered that their experiences would provide unique insights into reasons parents terminated their child/children’s participation in early education, a third group was created. Accordingly, for the purposes of this thesis, participants are categorized in groups in the following manner:

Group A: NZ-born Samoans whose child/children attended a PECC

Group B: NZ-born Samoans whose child/children attended a PECC but were withdrawn. Group C: NZ-born Samoans who did not choose to enrol their child/children in a PECC.

While participants came from a variety of backgrounds, all met the criteria of having had children in the last decade. Fifteen out of sixteen were NZ-born Samoan and one who was born in Samoa but had migrated as a child of seven to NZ. Their characteristics are outlined in the profile below.