Talk:Palagi

Racial Epithet?

Neither Pakeha nor Palagi are particularly comparable to nigger, and Pakeha is even less so. (What a load of bullshit... Palanga? why not say White man? like you have done so already? Pakeha? meant to say "Little White Pig" reason maori have referred to white people as "Little pig" Back in 1980, the common idea amongst Islander people was to "BREED THEM OUT" now most of them are dying.)

Nigger has a long history and context of being used in a particularly negative way, and is rarely used as a primary self-identification by anyone.

With Pakeha, a large number of NZ-born europeans identify primarily as Pakeha, making it a largely self-defined term. It is one that has been willingly used by NZ Europeans (especially ones with Maori language fluency), since early settlement. That should show that it is not historically or currently a negative term. If you take a look at the logs of the pakeha wikipedia page, the current 'debate' appears mostly fuelled by a few sockpuppet accounts of, by their/his own definition, white racist/s.

P

Palagi is less commonly within NZ as a self-defined term by europeans, and therefore a larger percentage of the usage is by people intending to be nasty - just because any term used about a group that is not by that group (ie a self-defined term), tends to take on more negative connotations.

The term still doesn't have much historical negative usage, so, at most, it would be a very minor racial epithet.

I can't comment on it's usage within Samoa, and whether it is used as a self-defined term there.

I would suggest that that section be removed, or replaced with 'minor racial epithet'

Cheers.

- A. Nonymous, Wellington, NZ

I've removed the claims about the term being a racial slur, as they are unsourced (and I don't think they can be supported). I've changed "sometimes" used in mainstream media to "often" because while this is sourced, it underestimates the wide acceptance the term seems to have in contemporary NZ, at least in areas of greater Pacific populations (Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington, Christchurch etc).--Januarian (talk) 11:46, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Etymology

Apparently, the word bailang (白浪) is used by the Pingpu tribes of Taiwan (who are Austronesian peoples) to describe the Han Chinese, who are foreigners to their lands. On the surface it looks like a cognate. Related to Thai "farang"? Malay "feringi"? Tamil "parangiar"? Latin "foranus"? Inquiring minds want to know! 61.224.44.12 (talk) 08:59, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

I second the need for discussion of this seemingly obvious origin.

Persian 'Farang', derived from Frank, meaning European or foreigner, has a continuum of cognates well into Southeast Asia. The meaning--European--is consistent all the way to Samoa. The F->P transition for Samonan is also consistent with this model. Phytism (talk) 11:30, 20 June 2025 (UTC)

Clean up

This article reads like a story and cites few references. It needs to be redone. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mack Daddy NZ (talk • contribs) 08:12, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Meaning

When I lived in Samoa in 2000, I asked several locals about the exact meaning of the term. They all told me it literally means 'Sky Breaker' and came from European tall ships where the central mast appeared (to locals) to break the sky. I never heard of any other origin for the term. Hanoi Road (talk) 19:09, 5 December 2020 (UTC)