Pacific Islanders, Pacificer, Pasifika, or Pasefika, are the peoples of the Pacific Islands. It is a geographic and ethnic/racial term to describe the inhabitants and diaspora of any of the three major sub-regions of Oceania (Micronesia, Melanesia, and Polynesia). It is also sometimes used to describe inhabitants of the Pacific islands (i.e. citizens of Pacific states who are of Asian and European descent who call the Pacific their home).
New Zealand has the largest concentration of Polynesian Pacific Islanders in the world—during the 20th century and into the 21st century the country saw a steady stream of immigration from Polynesian countries such as Samoa, Tonga, the Cook Islands, Niue, and French Polynesia.
Pacific Islander regions
The Pacific islands consist of three main regions:
Polynesia
The islands are scattered across a triangle covering the east-central region of the Pacific Ocean. The triangle is bound by the Hawaiian Islands in the north, New Zealand in the west, and Easter Island in the east. The rest of Polynesia includes the Samoan islands (American Samoa and Western Samoa), the Cook Islands, French Polynesia (Tahiti and The Society Islands, Marquesas Islands, Austral Islands, and the Tuamotu Archipelago), Niue Island, Tokelau and Tuvalu, Tonga, Wallis and Futuna, Rotuma Island, Pitcairn Island, Nukuoro, and Kapingamarangi.
Melanesia
The island of New Guinea, the Bismarck and Louisiade archipelagos, the Admiralty Islands, Bougainville Island, Papua New Guinea, Western New Guinea (part of Indonesia), Maluku Island, Aru Islands, Kei Islands, the Solomon Islands, the Santa Cruz Islands (part of the Solomon Islands), New Caledonia and Loyalty Islands, Vanuatu (formerly New Hebrides), Fiji, Norfolk Island and various smaller islands.
Micronesia
Kiribati, Nauru, the Marianas (Guam and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands), the Republic of the Marshall Islands, Palau, and the Federated States of Micronesia(Yap, Chuuk, Pohnpei, and Kosrae, all in the Caroline Islands).
Ethnolinguistics
Ethnolinguistically, those Pacific islanders who reside in Oceania are divided into two different ethnic classifications.
- Austronesian language peoples
- Austronesian peoples who speak the Oceanian languages, numbering about 2.3 million, who occupy Polynesia, Micronesia, and most of the smaller islands of Melanesia.
- Papuan language peoples
- Papuan peoples, those who speak the Papuan languages, who number about 7 million, and reside on the island of New Guinea and a few of the smaller islands of Melanesia located off the northeast coast of New Guinea.
Usage by country
The umbrella term Pacific Islands may take on several meanings. Sometimes it refers to only those islands covered by the region of Oceania. In some common uses, the term “Pacific Islands” refers to the islands of the Pacific Ocean once colonized by the Portuguese, Spaniards, Dutch, British, French, United States, and Japanese, such as the Pitcairn Islands, Taiwan, and Borneo. In other uses it may refer to islands with Austronesian linguistic heritage like Taiwan, Indonesia, Micronesia, Polynesia, Myanmar islands, which found their genesis in the Neolithic cultures of the island of Taiwan.
Australia
In Australia the term South Sea Islanders was used to describe Australian descendants of people from the more than 80 islands in the western Pacific who had been brought to Australia to work on the sugar fields of Queensland, in the 19th century called Kanakas. The Pacific Island Labourers Act 1901 was enacted to restrict entry of Pacific Islanders to Australia and to authorise their deportation. In the legislation Pacific Islanders were defined as:
“Pacific Island Labourer” includes all natives not of European extraction of any island except the islands of New Zealand situated in the Pacific Ocean beyond the Commonwealth as constituted at the commencement of this Act.
In 2008 a Pacific Seasonal Worker Pilot Scheme was announced as a three-year pilot scheme. The scheme provides visas for workers from Kiribati, Tonga, Vanuatu and Papua New Guinea to work in Australia. The pilot scheme includes one country each from Melanesia (Vanuatu), Polynesia (Tonga) and Micronesia (Kiribati), countries which already send workers to New Zealand under its seasonal labour scheme. Australia’s pilot scheme also includes Papua New Guinea.
New Zealand
Cook Island dancers at Auckland’s Pasifika Festival, 2010
Local usage in New Zealand uses “Pacific islander” (formerly “Pacific Polynesians” or Pasifika) to distinguish those who have emigrated from one of these areas in modern times from the New Zealand Māori, who are also Polynesian but are indigenous to New Zealand.
In the 2013 New Zealand census, 7.4 percent of the New Zealand population identified with one or more Pacific ethnic groups, although 62.3 percent of these were born in New Zealand. Those with a Samoan background make up the largest proportion, followed by Cook Islands Maori, Tongan, and Niuean. Some smaller island populations such as Niue and Tokelau have the majority of their nationals living in New Zealand.
To celebrate the diverse Pacific island cultures, the Auckland region hosts several Pacific island festivals. Two of the major ones are Polyfest, which showcases performances of the secondary school cultural groups in the Auckland region, and Pasifika, a festival that celebrates Pacific island heritage through traditional food, music, dance, and entertainment.
United States
According to the United States Census Bureau, Population Estimates Program (PEP), a “Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander” is “A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Hawaii, Guam, Samoa, or other Pacific islands. It includes people who indicate their race as ‘Native Hawaiian’, ‘Guamanian or Chamorro’, ‘Samoan’, and ‘Other Pacific Islander’ or provide other detailed Pacific Islander responses.”
According to the Office of Management and Budget, “Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander” refers to a person having origins in any of the original peoples of Hawaii, Guam, Samoa, or other Pacific Islands.
List of Pacific peoples
- Austronesian-speaking peoples
- Taiwanese indigenous peoples
- Polynesians
- Western Polynesian region
- Samoans
- Rotumans
- Uveans
- Futunans
- Tokelauans
- Tongans
- Tuvaluans
- Niueans
- Northeast & South Polynesian region
- Hawaiians
- Māori
- Tahitians
- Tuamotuans
- Tubuai
- Rapans
- Marquesans
- Gambier Islanders
- Cook Islanders
- Rapanui
- Western Polynesian region
- Melanesians
- ‘Are’are people
- Kanak people
- Kwaio people
- Motuan people
- Ni-Vanuatu
- Fijians
- Micronesians
- Marshallese
- Palauans
- Carolinians
- Chamorros
- Chuukese
- Yapese
- Kosraen
- Pohnpeian
- Nauruans