Total population | |
---|---|
c.10,000 | |
Regions with significant populations | |
Tokelau Samoa | |
Languages | |
Tokelauan, English | |
Religion | |
Congregationalism, Roman Catholic | |
Related ethnic groups | |
Other Polynesians |
Tokelauan people are a Polynesian ethnic group native to Tokelau, a Polynesian archipelago in the Pacific Ocean, who share the Tokelauan Polynesian culture, history and language.
The group's home islands are a dependent territory of New Zealand. 77% of Tokelau's population of 1,650 claims Tokelauan ancestry, [1] while 8,676 Tokelauans live in New Zealand. [2] A small number also live in Samoa.
The Tokelauan language is part of the Polynesian language family. Most Tokelauans are fluent in both English and Tokelauan. [3] There are approximately 4,000 speakers, the majority of whom live in New Zealand. [4]
The majority of Tokelauans live in New Zealand, concentrated in the Hutt Valley and Porirua, [5] as well as Auckland. [2] They are the sixth largest Pacific Islander ethnic group in New Zealand, and one of the most socio-economically deprived. [5] Migration to New Zealand began in the 1950s and increased in the 1960s under a government resettlement scheme driven by fears of overpopulation and a tropical cyclone striking the islands. [6] The New Zealand-based population exceeded that of Tokelau in 1976, and immigration declined after that point. [6]
As of 2019, 50.4% of Tokelauan people belong to the Congregational Christian Church while 38.7% belong to the Catholic Church. The rest of the population adheres to various Christian denominations, such as Presbyterianism. [1] Roman Catholicism is mostly practiced in Nukunonu, whereas inhabitants of the islands of Atafu and Fakaofo adhere to Congregationalism. Prior to the arrival of Christianity, Tokelauans worshiped a god named Tui Tokelau.
Netball, rugby, football and cricket are popular in Tokelau. Tokelau Games are held yearly.[ citation needed ]
The demographics of New Zealand encompass the gender, ethnic, religious, geographic, and economic backgrounds of the 5.3 million people living in New Zealand. New Zealanders predominantly live in urban areas on the North Island. The five largest cities are Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, Hamilton, and Tauranga. Few New Zealanders live on New Zealand's smaller islands. Waiheke Island is easily the most populated smaller island with 9,140 residents, while Great Barrier Island, the Chatham and Pitt Islands, and Stewart Island each have populations below 1,000. New Zealand is part of a realm and most people born in the realm's external territories of Tokelau, the Ross Dependency, the Cook Islands and Niue are entitled to New Zealand passports.
Tokelau is a dependent territory of New Zealand in the southern Pacific Ocean. It consists of three tropical coral atolls: Atafu, Nukunonu, and Fakaofo. They have a combined land area of 10 km2 (4 sq mi). In addition to these three, Swains Island, which forms part of the same archipelago, is the subject of an ongoing territorial dispute; it is currently administered by the United States as part of American Samoa. Tokelau lies north of the Samoan Islands, east of Tuvalu, south of the Phoenix Islands, southwest of the more distant Line Islands, and northwest of the Cook Islands.
The culture of New Zealand is a synthesis of indigenous Māori, colonial British, and other cultural influences. The country's earliest inhabitants brought with them customs and language from Polynesia, and during the centuries of isolation, developed their own Māori and Moriori cultures. British colonists in the 19th century brought Western culture and had a dramatic effect on the indigenous inhabitants, spreading Western religious traditions and the English language. Over time, a distinct Pākehā or New Zealand European culture emerged.
Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, Pacificans, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the Pacific Islands. As an ethnic/racial term, it is used to describe the original peoples—inhabitants and diasporas—of any of the three major subregions of Oceania or any other island located in the Pacific Ocean.
Polynesians are an ethnolinguistic group comprising closely related ethnic groups native to Polynesia, which encompasses the islands within the Polynesian Triangle in the Pacific Ocean. They trace their early prehistoric origins to Island Southeast Asia and are part of the larger Austronesian ethnolinguistic group, with an Urheimat in Taiwan. They speak the Polynesian languages, a branch of the Oceanic subfamily within the Austronesian language family. The Indigenous Māori people form the largest Polynesian population, followed by Samoans, Native Hawaiians, Tahitians, Tongans, and Cook Islands Māori.
Tokelauan is a Polynesian language spoken in Tokelau and historically by the small population of Swains Island in American Samoa. It is closely related to Tuvaluan and is related to Samoan and other Polynesian languages. Tokelauan has a co-official status with English in Tokelau. There are approximately 4,260 speakers of Tokelauan, of whom 2,100 live in New Zealand, 1,400 in Tokelau, and 17 in Swains Island. "Tokelau" means "north-northeast".
New Zealanders are people associated with New Zealand, sharing a common history, culture, and language. People of various ethnicities and national origins are citizens of New Zealand, governed by its nationality law.
Atafu, formerly known as the Duke of York Group, is a group of 52 coral islets within Tokelau in the south Pacific Ocean, 500 kilometres north of Samoa. With a land area of 2.5 square kilometres, it is the smallest of the three islands that constitute Tokelau. It is an atoll and surrounds a central lagoon, which covers some 15 km2 (5.8 sq mi). The atoll lies 800 kilometres south of the equator at 8° 35' South, 172° 30' West. Atafu is the northernmost area under New Zealand sovereignty.
New Zealand is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island and the South Island —and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island country by area and lies east of Australia across the Tasman Sea and south of the islands of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga. The country's varied topography and sharp mountain peaks, including the Southern Alps, owe much to tectonic uplift and volcanic eruptions. New Zealand's capital city is Wellington, and its most populous city is Auckland.
Indian New Zealanders or informally known as Kiwi Indians are people of Indian origin or descent who live in New Zealand. The term includes Indians born in New Zealand, as well as immigrants from India, Fiji, other regions of Asia, parts of Africa such as South Africa and East Africa, and from other parts of the world. The term Indian New Zealander applies to any New Zealander with one or both parents of Indian heritage. Although sometimes the Indo-Kiwi definition has been expanded to people with mixed racial parentage with one Indian parent or grandparent, this can be controversial as it generally tends to remove the ethnic heritage or identity of the foreign parent or grandparent, which may be seen as insensitive to those with mixed parentage, who tend to value both their Indian and non-Indian parents and grandparents.
Pitcairn Islanders, also referred to as Pitkerners and Pitcairnese, are the native inhabitants of the Pitcairn Islands, a British Overseas Territory including people whose families were previously inhabitants and maintaining cultural connections. Most Pitcairn Islanders are descendants of the Bounty mutineers and Tahitians.
Foua Toloa was a Tokelauan politician who served as the Head of the Government of Tokelau, or Ulu, from 21 February 2009, to 21 February 2010. He was a member of the Council for the Ongoing Government of Tokelau, and was a faipule on Fakaofo. As the office of Ulu rotates on an annual basis, Toloa resumed office on 21 February 2011. For a time in 2011-2012, he was also Tokelau's minister for Finance, Telecommunication, Energy and Transport.
Tokelau has two official languages: Tokelauan and English. Over 90% of the population speaks Tokelauan, and just under 60% speak English. Also, 45.8% of the population speak Samoan, and small percentages of the population speak Tuvaluan and Kiribati.
The Polynesian Leaders Group (PLG) is an international governmental cooperation group bringing together four independent countries and eight self-governing territories in Polynesia.
Japanese New Zealanders are New Zealand citizens of Japanese ancestry, which may include Japanese immigrants and descendants born in New Zealand. Japanese people first began immigrating to New Zealand in the 1890s. Until 1920, 14 Japanese citizens resided in New Zealand. Japanese immigration was halted during the period of the Pacific War and recommenced around the 1950s. From this period onwards, Japanese immigration remained small until the 1990s. In 1997, Japanese peoples were the 19th-largest ethnic group in New Zealand. As of the 2018 census, 18,141 New Zealand residents identify themselves as Japanese New Zealanders.
The vast majority of people in Tokelau are Christians and Christianity plays a significant role in the Tokelauan way of life.
Momoe Malietoa Von Reiche is a Samoan poet, artist, sculptor, photographer.
Susana Tetane Lemisio is a community organiser and educator from Tokelau.
The dawn raids were crackdowns in New Zealand from 1973 to 1979 and then sporadically afterward on alleged illegal overstayers from the Pacific Islands. The raids were first introduced in 1973 by Prime Minister Norman Kirk's Labour government, who discontinued them in April 1974. However, they were later reintroduced and intensified by Rob Muldoon's Third National government. These operations involved special police squads conducting often aggressive raids on the homes and workplaces of overstayers throughout New Zealand, usually at dawn and almost exclusively directed at Pasifika New Zealanders, regardless of their citizenship status. Overstayers and their families were often prosecuted and then deported back to their countries.
Pasifika New Zealanders are a pan-ethnic group of New Zealanders associated with, and descended from, the indigenous peoples of the Pacific Islands outside of New Zealand itself. They form the fourth-largest ethnic grouping in the country, after European descendants, indigenous Māori, and Asian New Zealanders. Over 380,000 people identify as being of Pacific origin, representing 8% of the country's population, with the majority residing in Auckland.