[feature]


The Polynesian Panthers
Exclusive interview with Dr. Melani Anae of the Polynesian Panthers

Dr. Melani Anae is Senior Lecturer in Pacific Studies at the Centre for Pacific Studies, University of Auckland, New Zealand. Dr Anae has been instrumental in leading the Centre for Pacific Studies to grow from a small language-based programme into a collaborative hub for studying Pacific culture, history, identity, art, language, performing arts and literature, centred on a modern Fale Pasifika complex. She is a recipient of the Fulbright New Zealand Scholar Award 2007 in which she focused on first- and second-generation Hawai’ian and US-born Samoans, examining changes in ethnic identity arising from the Samoan diaspora for a book she is writing. She has carried out research and published extensively in the areas of ethnicity, health, education, Pacific research methodologies and Pacific approaches to a broad range of social issues. Her most recent publication is a chapter in Settler and Migrant Peoples of New Zealand, published with the assistance of the Ministry for Culture and Heritage Te Manatu Taonga. Her research interests include regional processes of migration, urbanization, ethnicity, and the politics of identity, more specifically focusing on more finely nuanced understandings of identity construction of Pacific peoples and communities in New Zealand. She is part of a large extended Samoan aiga, and is the mother of three children.

Dr. Anae discusses with Pacific Eye Magazine the purpose and journey of one of the most influential political groups in New Zealand in the 1970’s, the Polynesian Panthers.

CONTINUE HERE >