ABSTRACT
This chapter is grounded in data from qualitative in-depth interviews that were undertaken in Tonga in 2019 to explore the lived experiences and the perspectives of young women and girls who faced an unplanned pregnancy. The young women's stories elucidate points of tension between traditional social norms and the lived realities of sexual and reproductive health for young women in modern-day Tonga; a social context wherein traditional values and norms around young womanhood rub up against the proliferation of social media, civil society organisations advocating for gender equality and broader processes of economic and social development. Findings clearly demonstrate a lack of reliable and consistent sexual and reproductive health information for young women and girls in Tonga, as well as a lack of support mechanisms that might help them negotiate the landscape of gender and sexual relations in a locally appropriate way. This chapter considers the practice of talanoa and poses the potential for utilising or adapting talanoa in a manner that maintains its cultural integrity, in order to better include young women and address their needs around sex and relationship information, and sexual and reproductive health decision-making.
