Tokelauans

## Country of Origin

Tokelau (New Zealandic Dependancy): 4,600

## Religion or Spirituality

Congregational Christian Church of Samoa, and Roman Catholicism

## Related Ethnic Groups

Polynesians Austronesians Oceania

**Tokelauan people** are the indigenous Polynesian people of Tokelau, an island group in Polynesia, in the Pacific Ocean. The group's home islands are a dependent territory of New Zealand. The majority of Tokelauans live in New Zealand, concentrated in the large Wellington suburbs of the Hutt Valley and Porirua, as well as Auckland. They are the sixth largest Pacific Islander ethnic group in New Zealand, and one of the most socio-economically deprived. 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. The New Zealand-based population exceeded that of Tokelau in 1976, and immigration declined after that point.

## Etymology

*Tokelau* is a word meaning "north wind" in the native Tokelau language.

## History (Hitohī)

Archaeological evidence indicates that the atolls of Tokelau – Atafu, Nukunonu, and Fakaofo – were settled about 1,000 years ago from Samoa and may have been a gateway into Eastern Polynesia. The inhabitants embrace Polynesian mythology and the local god, Tui Tokelau. Over time, they developed distinctive musical and art forms. The three atolls have historically functioned separately politically, while maintaining social and linguistic cohesion. Tokelauan society has been governed by chiefly clans, and there have been occasional skirmishes and wars between the atolls, as well as inter-marriage. Fakaofo, the "chiefly island", held some dominion over Atafu and Nukunonu after the dispersal of Atafu. Life on the atolls was historically subsistence-based, with a diet that relied mainly on fish and coconut.

Missionaries preached Christianity in Tokelau from 1845 to the 1870s. French Catholic missionaries on Wallis Island (also known as 'Uvea) and missionaries of the Protestant London Missionary Society in Samoa used native teachers to convert the Tokelauans. Atafu was converted to Protestantism by the London Missionary Society, Nukunonu was converted to Catholicism and Fakaofo was converted to both denominations.

Helped by Swains Island-based Eli Jennings senior, Peruvian "blackbird" slave traders arrived in 1863 and kidnapped nearly all (253) of the able-bodied men to work as labourers, depopulating the atolls. The Tokelauan men died of dysentery and smallpox, and very few returned. With that loss, the system of governance became based on the "Taupulega", or "Councils of Elders", on which individual families on each atoll were represented.

Between 1856 and 1979, the United States claimed that it held sovereignty over the island and the other Tokelauan atolls. In 1979, the U.S. conceded that Tokelau was under New Zealand sovereignty, and a maritime boundary between Tokelau and American Samoa was established by the Treaty of Tokehega.

## Beliefs (Lotu)

As of 2019, 50.4% of people belong to Congregational Christian Church while 38.7% belong to Catholic church. The rest of the population adhere to various Christian denomination such as Presbyterian. Roman Catholic is mostly practiced in Nukunonu whereas inhabitants of the islands of Atafu and Fakaofo adhere to the Congregationalism.

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