Nicola Young: Hard questions behind Pacific identity

Am I A Pacific Islander? I was born in the Pacific, on an island - New Zealand - and there's no arguing with New Zealand being smack bang in the southern Pacific Ocean.

Consulting Dr Google, I find a Pacific Islander is "a native or inhabitant of any of the islands in the South Pacific, especially an indigenous person of Polynesia".

No Polynesian blood in my veins, but I did spend nearly four years living in Fiji as a young child. My sister was born there and would tell people "if you scratch my skin, I'm brown underneath" - she believed she was Fijian, and was not distracted by her blond hair and blue eyes.

I'm discounting the "West Island" from this Pacific Island census, and not just because I don't want to be an Australian (without insulting my Australian friends, I'm over the abhorrent Aussie policies around refugees, and Kiwis) - it is a continent, not an island.

This question of identity was posed as part of New Frontiers, a gathering in the Hutt Valley I attended this week. Hosted in part by Kiwi Connect - an organisation encouraging global entrepreneurs to New Zealand to help grow startups and tech innovation - the event had an incredible commitment to sustainability and creativity. The environment was a mix of high-tech gear alongside wheat-germ smoothies and composting toilets. We had musical interludes from Trinity Roots' Warren Maxwell and poetry by award-winning Ben Stokes, plus a demonstration of the latest virtual-reality technology.

Te Papa's senior curator of Pacific Cultures Sean Mallon asked this identity question with a mix of provocation and genuine interest.

Is Pacific culture an inherent part of Kiwi identity? What do we think when we say the words Pacific Islander? Are Maori the first Pacific Island immigrants to New Zealand? How do we engage with some of our less proud moments of history, like the Dawn Raids in the 1970s, targeting people overstaying their visas, an operation which had strongly racist undertones?

What do you think? Are New Zealanders a sub-set of Pacific Islanders? We describe many of our Kiwi heroes as both New Zealanders and Pacific Islanders - but are we all? The late great Jonah Lomu might be both a Kiwi and a Pacific Islander, but what about Sir Edmund Hillary? As Mallon asked, what if Everest was conquered by a Pacific Islander?

How would government ministers approach climate change action if they thought of themselves as Pacific Islanders, with sea level rise already affecting our northern neighbours? How would a change in language affect our investment in narrowing the gaps between Europeans and Pacific Islanders when it comes to health, employment and life expectancy?

Mallon was asking for a deeper exploration of what makes us Kiwis. I think he had a good answer - we need "safe, provocative and meaningful" conversations to test and develop our sense of identity.

We talked about the Treaty of Waitangi, of course. I flashed back to the experiences I had as a seventh-former in 1990, 150 years after the Treaty's signing, when I attended a number of hui and went on a rollercoaster of emotions. It was a solid foundation to consider my place in New Zealand, without feeling vulnerable or guilty as a descendent of those who were part of the warts-and-all colonisation in the 19th century.

It really hit me - the important connections between our individual well-being and sense of identity. These conversations might be part of the prescription we need to respond to our negative statistics.

How do we stake our claim on New Zealand's soil without deeply examining and understanding our uncomfortable histories?

Nicola Young has worked in government and private sectors in Australia and New Zealand, and now works in Whanganui for a national charitable foundation. Educated at Wanganui Girls' College, she has a science degree and is the mother of two boys.