ABSTRACT
Moving in multiple spaces in society as a marginalised person, I have often felt, seen and heard what is in the unseen. It is Friday morning and I am setting up to take a class. A student walks in and asks ‘Do you know where my lecturer is?’ I smile, and continue setting up. My physical presence is a language which often automatically categorizes me as the ‘other’ and this example is often my ‘norm’. Yes, I/Eye am a chocolate brown skin Pasifika-Samoan woman with a voluptuous body in higher education. My colleague Tessa, asked me a question. She said, ‘Fetaui if we taught behind a curtain would people know what colour we were?’ I burst out laughing replying, ‘No, I don’t think so, weird huh? But once the curtain is opened they’ll be saying, “pull back the curtain pull back the curtain”.’ We both continued to laugh. I continued, ‘You know Tessa, I didn’t come into university to become more palagi (white). I chose to come to university to become more Fetaui.’ In this piece, I will explore the Samoan Indigenous Reference (SIR) while negotiating and constructing in the ‘third space/Va’.
