Samoan Children in a New Zealand Secondary School: a Semiological Study of social Communication

Abstract

The aim of this thesis is to present the social communications of Samoan children in a New Zealand secondary school. In order to concentrate on the social communications of the Samoan children I sought a situation in which the school was not a major contributing factor to mis-communication between the Samoan children and their teachers and fellow students. Whilst recognizing the importance of English language competence for adaptation to a new culture, I believe that, since this is well recognized by researchers and policy-makers a study of the language competence of the Samoan children would be repetitive. I chose to concentrate on understanding the Samoan children's social communications in the hope of discovering the key concepts which hinder the growth of cultural competence and result in mis-communication. The field experience extended over a nine month period and com-prized a number of discussions, and involvement in activities with one or more of the fifteen Samoan children. The discussions and activities were held at school or associated with it. Three homes were visited, six of the children came from these three homes. A four questionnaire was distributed to all the teachers and the results were instrumental in explicating the central concerns of the study. The theoretical approach used in the study is Semiological, based on Ferdinand de Saussure's ideas and drawing upon those of Roland Barthes, Roman Jacobsen and Umberto Eco. An analysis of the Samoan Creation myth and Albert Wendt's book Sons for the Return Home (1973), aims to discover principles for the synthesis and reconstruction of the Samoan children's social communication. Possible directions for action, to alleviate cross-cultural mis-communication and to help the migrant move towards bi-cultural competence, are provided by a review of the Samoan children's reconstructed communications.