Palagi
Encyclopedia
Palagi or papaalagi (plural) is a term in Samoa
n culture of uncertain meaning, but sometimes used to describe foreigners or anything that does not 'belong' to Samoan culture. Tent & Geraghty (2001) comment that the origin of the Western Polynesian Papāalagi~Pālagi, and the Fijian Vāvālagi~Pāpālagi remains a matter of speculation.
Papāalagi~Pālagi is a word in the Samoan language
describing non-Samoans especially European westerners or Caucasians
. In Samoa
the term is used to describe 'foreigners' or anything that does not 'belong' to Samoa or Samoan culture. The word is both a noun
e.g. a Palagi (European person) or an adjective
e.g. Palagi house (non-traditional Samoan house). The word is a cognate
in other Polynesian languages
and has gained widespread use throughout much of western Polynesia, including in Tokelau
, Tuvalu
, 'Uvea and Futuna
, etc.
Written Pālagi or Papālagi in Samoan, and Papālangi in Tongan, the term Pālagi is also used in Niuean
.
The explanation of Niuean
word "Palagi", is that "pa" means bang such as that of a gun and "lagi" means sky, literally means bangs into the sky. In "Papa-lagi" "papa" means more than one bang or many bangs, and "lagi" means sky. In the olden days, Europeans who landed on Niue
carried guns and often fired the guns into the sky, when landed on the reef, to scare away potential trouble-making natives.
Jan Tent, a Macquarie University
linguist
, and Dr. Paul Geraghty
, Director of the Institute of Fijian Language and Culture in Suva
, suggest that the word may have its origins in the travels of the Polynesians themselves. They believe that the Polynesian islanders may have encountered Malay travellers prior to contact with Europeans, and adopted the Malay
word "barang" (meaning: imported cloth). These researchers also suggest another possible etymology - the Malay word for European, as used in the 17th and 18th centuries, was 'faranggi'. However, they discount this possibility as the word palangi seems to have originally referred to cloth; only later was the word transferred to the people.
, with Cook's transcription being "Towacka no papalangie" and his translation as "cloth ships".
The specific origin of this term remains uncertain. The term has gained widespread use throughout much of western Polynesia including Tokelau, Tuvalu, 'Uvea and Futuna, etc., with the expansion of use of the term being though to have occurred in the 18th century when Tongans, and to lesser extent Samoans, regularly interacted with white sailors, beachcombers, convicts, missionaries, and whalers who clearly delineated ethnoracial boundaries between themselves (papalagi/papalangi) and the Polynesians they encountered.
The missionary John Williams (London Missionary Society
) records a speech in Samoa, in 1830, referring to the great powers of the "papalangis".
Louis Becke
after having worked and travelled in the Pacific from 1869 to 1885 uses papalagi to mean a white person in stories set in what is now Tuvalu
,The Rangers of the Tia Kua, Kennedy the Boatsteerer in which appears "The last native girl who occupied the proud position of Te avaga te papalagi (the white man's wife) was a native of the island of Maraki"; Samoa
, A Basket of Bread-Fruit, At a Kava-Drinking in which appears "alii papalagi (white gentleman)" and "this wandering papalagi tafea (beachcomber)", The Best Asset in a Fool’s Estate in which appears “the papalagi mativa (poor white)”; and the Tokelau
, Challis the Doubter.
For the book The Papalagi by Erich Scheurmann, see The Papalagi
.
culture in New Zealand, this word has been adopted by other Pacific cultures. Its usage in New Zealand's Pacific Islander media such as television and radio is common, and it is often used by the mainstream media to describe non-Samoans of European descent.
The term is now also used in New Zealand in a similar way to the Māori term Pākehā
, but is not restricted in referring to white people within Pacific-island surroundings. As with Pākehā
, Samoans and Tongans initially applied palagi/palangi and papalagi/papalangi to whites of British derivation. Today, the Samoan term "gagana fa'a Palagi" still refers to the English language specifically, even though it is understood that many ethnic Europeans who are considered "palagi" do not speak English but rather German, French, Spanish, etc. While the term is generally applied to people of European ancestry as a means of differentiation or categorization, some feel the term is derogatory, especially when aimed pointedly toward half-caste Samoans or ethnic Samoans who were born and raised in western, metropolitan societies; "fia palagi" and "fie palangi" are commonly applied to ethnic Samoans and Tongans, respectively, who are viewed as favoring the "white man's" lifestyle or culture in lieu of traditional Polynesian modes of speech, dress, housing, interpersonal relations, etc.
Many NZ Europeans find this word extremely offensive, much more so than Pākehā
. Tcherkezoff (1999) comments "Europeans are still called Papālagi in today's languages. In Samoan, it is an absolutely common everyday word, not in any way a metaphoric ceremonial expression used for special circumstances or used in [purely] derogatory/laudatory ways."
Campbell, Ian C., 1994. European-Polynesian encounters: a critique of the Pearson thesis, Journal of Pacific History, 29, 2: 222-231.
Kennedy, Gavin, 1978. The Death of Captain Cook, London: Duckworth.
Obeyesekere, Gananath, 1992. The Apotheosis of Captain Cook: European Mythmaking in the Pacific, Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press.
Quanchi, Max, 1993. Being discovered: perceptions and control of strangers, In Max Quanchi & Ron Adams (eds), Culture Contact in the Pacific: Essays on Contact, Encounter and Response. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 45–56.
Tcherkezoff, Serge, 1999. Who said the 17th-18th centuries paplagi/'Europeans' were 'sky-bursters'? A Eurocentric projection onto Polynesia, Journal of the Polynesian Society, 108, 4: 417-425.
Tent, Jan and Paul Geraghty, Paul, 2001, Exploding sky or exploded myth? The origin of Papalagi, Journal of the Polynesian Society, 110, No. 2: 171-214.
Tuiteleleapaga, Napoleone A., 1980. Samoa: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, New York: Todd & Honeywell.
Samoa
Samoa , officially the Independent State of Samoa, formerly known as Western Samoa is a country encompassing the western part of the Samoan Islands in the South Pacific Ocean. It became independent from New Zealand in 1962. The two main islands of Samoa are Upolu and one of the biggest islands in...
n culture of uncertain meaning, but sometimes used to describe foreigners or anything that does not 'belong' to Samoan culture. Tent & Geraghty (2001) comment that the origin of the Western Polynesian Papāalagi~Pālagi, and the Fijian Vāvālagi~Pāpālagi remains a matter of speculation.
Papāalagi~Pālagi is a word in the Samoan language
Samoan language
Samoan Samoan Samoan (Gagana Sāmoa, is the language of the Samoan Islands, comprising the independent country of Samoa and the United States territory of American Samoa. It is an official language—alongside English—in both jurisdictions. Samoan, a Polynesian language, is the first language for most...
describing non-Samoans especially European westerners or Caucasians
Caucasian race
The term Caucasian race has been used to denote the general physical type of some or all of the populations of Europe, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, Western Asia , Central Asia and South Asia...
. In Samoa
Samoa
Samoa , officially the Independent State of Samoa, formerly known as Western Samoa is a country encompassing the western part of the Samoan Islands in the South Pacific Ocean. It became independent from New Zealand in 1962. The two main islands of Samoa are Upolu and one of the biggest islands in...
the term is used to describe 'foreigners' or anything that does not 'belong' to Samoa or Samoan culture. The word is both a noun
Noun
In linguistics, a noun is a member of a large, open lexical category whose members can occur as the main word in the subject of a clause, the object of a verb, or the object of a preposition .Lexical categories are defined in terms of how their members combine with other kinds of...
e.g. a Palagi (European person) or an adjective
Adjective
In grammar, an adjective is a 'describing' word; the main syntactic role of which is to qualify a noun or noun phrase, giving more information about the object signified....
e.g. Palagi house (non-traditional Samoan house). The word is a cognate
Cognate
In linguistics, cognates are words that have a common etymological origin. This learned term derives from the Latin cognatus . Cognates within the same language are called doublets. Strictly speaking, loanwords from another language are usually not meant by the term, e.g...
in other Polynesian languages
Polynesian languages
The Polynesian languages are a language family spoken in the region known as Polynesia. They are classified as part of the Austronesian family, belonging to the Oceanic branch of that family. They fall into two branches: Tongic and Nuclear Polynesian. Polynesians share many cultural traits...
and has gained widespread use throughout much of western Polynesia, including in Tokelau
Tokelau
Tokelau is a territory of New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean that consists of three tropical coral atolls with a combined land area of 10 km2 and a population of approximately 1,400...
, Tuvalu
Tuvalu
Tuvalu , formerly known as the Ellice Islands, is a Polynesian island nation located in the Pacific Ocean, midway between Hawaii and Australia. Its nearest neighbours are Kiribati, Nauru, Samoa and Fiji. It comprises four reef islands and five true atolls...
, 'Uvea and Futuna
Futuna Island, Wallis and Futuna
Futuna is an island in the Pacific Ocean belonging to the French overseas collectivity of Wallis and Futuna. It is one of the Hoorn Islands or Îles Horne, nearby Alofi being the other...
, etc.
Written Pālagi or Papālagi in Samoan, and Papālangi in Tongan, the term Pālagi is also used in Niuean
Niuean language
The Niuean language or Niue language is a Polynesian language, belonging to the Malayo-Polynesian subgroup of the Austronesian languages. It is most closely related to Tongan and slightly more distantly to other Polynesian languages such as Māori, Sāmoan, and Hawaiian...
.
Use, meaning and origin of term
The etymology of the term Palagi is disputed. An explanation that emerged in the 19th century is that word is derived from the Polynesian rootwords "pa" (meaning: gates) and "lagi" (meaning: sky or heaven), hence the standard translation "gates of heaven" It has been suggested that the compound word comes from the Polynesian's reaction to seeing for the first time, European missionaries enter the country. Skin being a different color made them think they were men sent from the gates of heaven Tcherkézoff (1999) argues that such an interpretation is a European projection to explain Polynesian cosmology.The explanation of Niuean
Niuean language
The Niuean language or Niue language is a Polynesian language, belonging to the Malayo-Polynesian subgroup of the Austronesian languages. It is most closely related to Tongan and slightly more distantly to other Polynesian languages such as Māori, Sāmoan, and Hawaiian...
word "Palagi", is that "pa" means bang such as that of a gun and "lagi" means sky, literally means bangs into the sky. In "Papa-lagi" "papa" means more than one bang or many bangs, and "lagi" means sky. In the olden days, Europeans who landed on Niue
Niue
Niue , is an island country in the South Pacific Ocean. It is commonly known as the "Rock of Polynesia", and inhabitants of the island call it "the Rock" for short. Niue is northeast of New Zealand in a triangle between Tonga to the southwest, the Samoas to the northwest, and the Cook Islands to...
carried guns and often fired the guns into the sky, when landed on the reef, to scare away potential trouble-making natives.
Jan Tent, a Macquarie University
Macquarie University
Macquarie University is an Australian public teaching and research university located in Sydney, with its main campus situated in Macquarie Park. Founded in 1964 by the New South Wales Government, it was the third university to be established in the metropolitan area of Sydney...
linguist
Linguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....
, and Dr. Paul Geraghty
Paul Geraghty
Paul Geraghty is a British based author and illustrator of children's picture books. He also writes teenage fiction and won the Young Africa Award for his first novel Pig.- Background :...
, Director of the Institute of Fijian Language and Culture in Suva
Suva
Suva features a tropical rainforest climate under the Koppen climate classification. The city sees a copious amount of precipitation during the course of the year. Suva averages 3,000 mm of precipitation annually with its driest month, July averaging 125 mm of rain per year. In fact,...
, suggest that the word may have its origins in the travels of the Polynesians themselves. They believe that the Polynesian islanders may have encountered Malay travellers prior to contact with Europeans, and adopted the Malay
Malay language
Malay is a major language of the Austronesian family. It is the official language of Malaysia , Indonesia , Brunei and Singapore...
word "barang" (meaning: imported cloth). These researchers also suggest another possible etymology - the Malay word for European, as used in the 17th and 18th centuries, was 'faranggi'. However, they discount this possibility as the word palangi seems to have originally referred to cloth; only later was the word transferred to the people.
Recorded Use
Captain Cook noted the expression "ko e vaka no papalangi" ('the boats of Papalangi') in TongaTonga
Tonga, officially the Kingdom of Tonga , is a state and an archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean, comprising 176 islands scattered over of ocean in the South Pacific...
, with Cook's transcription being "Towacka no papalangie" and his translation as "cloth ships".
The specific origin of this term remains uncertain. The term has gained widespread use throughout much of western Polynesia including Tokelau, Tuvalu, 'Uvea and Futuna, etc., with the expansion of use of the term being though to have occurred in the 18th century when Tongans, and to lesser extent Samoans, regularly interacted with white sailors, beachcombers, convicts, missionaries, and whalers who clearly delineated ethnoracial boundaries between themselves (papalagi/papalangi) and the Polynesians they encountered.
The missionary John Williams (London Missionary Society
London Missionary Society
The London Missionary Society was a non-denominational missionary society formed in England in 1795 by evangelical Anglicans and Nonconformists, largely Congregationalist in outlook, with missions in the islands of the South Pacific and Africa...
) records a speech in Samoa, in 1830, referring to the great powers of the "papalangis".
Louis Becke
George Lewis Becke
George Lewis Becke was an Australian short-story writer and novelist.-Early life:Becke was born at Port Macquarie, New South Wales, son of Frederick Becke, Clerk of Petty Sessions and his wife Caroline Matilda, née Beilby. Both parents were born in England...
after having worked and travelled in the Pacific from 1869 to 1885 uses papalagi to mean a white person in stories set in what is now Tuvalu
Tuvalu
Tuvalu , formerly known as the Ellice Islands, is a Polynesian island nation located in the Pacific Ocean, midway between Hawaii and Australia. Its nearest neighbours are Kiribati, Nauru, Samoa and Fiji. It comprises four reef islands and five true atolls...
,The Rangers of the Tia Kua, Kennedy the Boatsteerer in which appears "The last native girl who occupied the proud position of Te avaga te papalagi (the white man's wife) was a native of the island of Maraki"; Samoa
Samoa
Samoa , officially the Independent State of Samoa, formerly known as Western Samoa is a country encompassing the western part of the Samoan Islands in the South Pacific Ocean. It became independent from New Zealand in 1962. The two main islands of Samoa are Upolu and one of the biggest islands in...
, A Basket of Bread-Fruit, At a Kava-Drinking in which appears "alii papalagi (white gentleman)" and "this wandering papalagi tafea (beachcomber)", The Best Asset in a Fool’s Estate in which appears “the papalagi mativa (poor white)”; and the Tokelau
Tokelau
Tokelau is a territory of New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean that consists of three tropical coral atolls with a combined land area of 10 km2 and a population of approximately 1,400...
, Challis the Doubter.
For the book The Papalagi by Erich Scheurmann, see The Papalagi
The Papalagi
The Papalagi is a book by Erich Scheurmann published in Germany in 1920, which contains descriptions of European life, supposedly as seen through the eyes of a Samoan chief named Tuiavii...
.
Modern usage
Thanks largely to a growing Pacific IslanderPacific Islander
Pacific Islander , is a geographic term to describe the indigenous inhabitants of any of the three major sub-regions of Oceania: Polynesia, Melanesia and Micronesia.According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, these three regions, together with their islands consist of:Polynesia:...
culture in New Zealand, this word has been adopted by other Pacific cultures. Its usage in New Zealand's Pacific Islander media such as television and radio is common, and it is often used by the mainstream media to describe non-Samoans of European descent.
The term is now also used in New Zealand in a similar way to the Māori term Pākehā
Pakeha
Pākehā is a Māori language word for New Zealanders who are "of European descent". They are mostly descended from British and to a lesser extent Irish settlers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, although some Pākehā have Dutch, Scandinavian, German, Yugoslav or other ancestry...
, but is not restricted in referring to white people within Pacific-island surroundings. As with Pākehā
Pakeha
Pākehā is a Māori language word for New Zealanders who are "of European descent". They are mostly descended from British and to a lesser extent Irish settlers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, although some Pākehā have Dutch, Scandinavian, German, Yugoslav or other ancestry...
, Samoans and Tongans initially applied palagi/palangi and papalagi/papalangi to whites of British derivation. Today, the Samoan term "gagana fa'a Palagi" still refers to the English language specifically, even though it is understood that many ethnic Europeans who are considered "palagi" do not speak English but rather German, French, Spanish, etc. While the term is generally applied to people of European ancestry as a means of differentiation or categorization, some feel the term is derogatory, especially when aimed pointedly toward half-caste Samoans or ethnic Samoans who were born and raised in western, metropolitan societies; "fia palagi" and "fie palangi" are commonly applied to ethnic Samoans and Tongans, respectively, who are viewed as favoring the "white man's" lifestyle or culture in lieu of traditional Polynesian modes of speech, dress, housing, interpersonal relations, etc.
Many NZ Europeans find this word extremely offensive, much more so than Pākehā
Pakeha
Pākehā is a Māori language word for New Zealanders who are "of European descent". They are mostly descended from British and to a lesser extent Irish settlers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, although some Pākehā have Dutch, Scandinavian, German, Yugoslav or other ancestry...
. Tcherkezoff (1999) comments "Europeans are still called Papālagi in today's languages. In Samoan, it is an absolutely common everyday word, not in any way a metaphoric ceremonial expression used for special circumstances or used in [purely] derogatory/laudatory ways."
External links
Further reading
Bergendorf, Steen, Ulla Hasager & Peter Henriques, 1988. Mythopraxis and history: on the interpretation of the Makahiki, Journal of the Polynesian Society, 97, 4: 391-408.Campbell, Ian C., 1994. European-Polynesian encounters: a critique of the Pearson thesis, Journal of Pacific History, 29, 2: 222-231.
Kennedy, Gavin, 1978. The Death of Captain Cook, London: Duckworth.
Obeyesekere, Gananath, 1992. The Apotheosis of Captain Cook: European Mythmaking in the Pacific, Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press.
Quanchi, Max, 1993. Being discovered: perceptions and control of strangers, In Max Quanchi & Ron Adams (eds), Culture Contact in the Pacific: Essays on Contact, Encounter and Response. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 45–56.
Tcherkezoff, Serge, 1999. Who said the 17th-18th centuries paplagi/'Europeans' were 'sky-bursters'? A Eurocentric projection onto Polynesia, Journal of the Polynesian Society, 108, 4: 417-425.
Tent, Jan and Paul Geraghty, Paul, 2001, Exploding sky or exploded myth? The origin of Papalagi, Journal of the Polynesian Society, 110, No. 2: 171-214.
Tuiteleleapaga, Napoleone A., 1980. Samoa: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, New York: Todd & Honeywell.