Date of Award:
5-2026
Document Type:
Dissertation
Degree Name:
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department:
School of Teacher Education and Leadership
Committee Chair(s)
Steven Camicia
Committee
Steven Camicia
Committee
Amy Wilson-Lopez
Committee
Rachel Turner
Committee
Shireen Keyl
Committee
Sarah Braden
Abstract
This study was an autohistoria-teoría, a type of autoethnography, where I focused on my writing process as a Pasifika researcher creating a middle- grade fiction. As the researcher, my questions delved into how I engage in writing for a majority-culture dominated publication house in a Western-world writing genre while maintaining the cultural significance of the ancient Pasifika mythologies I reproduced and recontextualized in the novel. The research site was my writing process, and the data gathered came from the variety of ways I navigated cultural stimuli specific to writing the novel. The outcome engaged with the specific way Pasifika (and particularly Tongan American) diaspora engages with constructing cultural ties between abstract spaces like different national and generational identities.
The implications approach theoretical, methodological, and empirical. Theoretical advancements in Pasifika theory including the vahanoa and ’ofa-ki-he-vahanoa theories. Methodological contributions include adjustments in the use of creative writing and personification to characterize elements of identity, and a model to the responsibility researchers and readers must take as they create, consume, and proliferate research centering Pasifika and other communities. Empirical contributions include a caution for classroom teachers as they engage with the complex nature of cultural identity for diasporic learners.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Fotu, Belinda 'Ofakihevahanoa, "An Autohistoria-Teoría of a Pasifika Neptantlera" (2026). All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present. 707.
https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/etd2023/707
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