Transcript
ROBYN LESATALE: Instead of it being about sort of supporting the other party it's more about showing that I have all this money and I'm able to show that my family can afford it when really behind the scenes many family members are struggling to even contribute.
KATHRYN RYAN: What did some of those respondents say either about their own financial pressures or perhaps what they say among their parents and their family?
RL: A lot of them said they had to get loans out or they just, because of the experiences that they've had of it that a lot of matais are greedy, they found that it's just not worth it. They've got their own priorities to worry about like their kids, especially here in New Zealand, the housing crisis that we have at the moment, a lot of people feel they can't contribute and so with that said, they're sort of outcast from their community and I got that sort of response a lot through my survey research.
KR: So those that couldn't pay, their rent was just too high, or they just weren't going to go to the loan shark or maybe in some cases they had, those who didn't give actually felt outcast because of it in some cases?
RL: Well because we take a lot of pride in fa'alavelave and it encompasses so much of our Samoan culture and identity and pride there is this responsibility to give and if that becomes a social norm within a community, within the Samoan community, you could be looked down upon and I'm only speaking from my research, and this isn't the situation for every single Samoan out there.
KR: What do you think of the future then? Because what I'm also hearing from you is that people also understand the cultural impetus and the purpose of this, the intent and the value of it but it's got out of hand, that's sort of seems to be the message I'm getting from you, and do you think the practice will continue with these future generations, those who are coming through who are your age and those coming through after you, do you think it's going to continue as a tradition is there a way to do that, or will more and more people just take the risk and say, I can't go there?
RL: I think that was sort of the point of where I was getting across, if there's nothing done to sort of take away this stigma of fa'alavelave then our younger generation are not going to want to participate. They will probably move away from their cultural Samoan identity, that sense of belonging within the Samoan community and so in conclusion to my research, and with a lot of academics who have written about fa'alavelave, they talk about how there is a lack of understanding of what that concept is and we shouldn't take in the Western implications around us, we should really look at fa'alavelave though a Samoan perspective and the fact that we should emphasis that it's about love, it's about family.
