Understanding the history that ties Hawaiʻi and football together
Football is in Hawaiʻi’s blood. With its cultural embedding only further cemented by the rise of Polynesian football players like Tua Tagovailoa.
At just 24-years-old, Tagovailoa is in the midst of a breakout season. Though it was almost entirely derailed by one of the most gruesome head injuries in recent history. The hit was posted all across the internet. Feelings of grief, shock, and anger swept through the islands, though there was an underlying but palpable feeling in the following days that went largely unaddressed: Is anybody going to pull their kid out of football because of this?
To see one of our own keiki lay there motionless on national television is traumatic. So where exactly is the cultural prominence headed? And how exactly did this Western sport gain such popularity amongst Pacific Islanders in the first place?
Early days of football in Hawaiʻi
Before O‘ahu’s North Shore was known for its monster waves, it served up swathes of land ripe for sugar cane farming. Right around the turn of the 20th century, Mormon settlers from America got word of this “business” opportunity and began flocking to the beachside towns of Kahuku and La‘ie.
In order to best “shape” the local people who now “worked” for them, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints introduced American football, and as time went on the community embraced the sport and built it into an ethos of their own. Slowly but surely the North Shore went from exporting sugar to sending boys to the NFL.
Fast forward to the present and Polynesian football players make up a high number of players in the NFL in comparison to their makeup in the United States population. Polynesian football players are almost forty times more likely than their counterparts to play professionally, and that’s not by some coincidence.
Faʻa Sāmoa
In 1966, Kahuku High School became the first program in the country to be led by a Samoan head coach — Famika Anae. Having earned a scholarship to play at Brigham Young University, Anae returned to the North Shore to lead a new generation of young men through Faʻa Sāmoa.
Faʻa Sāmoa is the cultural context by which Samoans and the greater Polynesian community live their lives. It places a great deal of importance on the achievements of collectivism through personal triumph. Anae recognized what the game had done for him, and believed that football could be the way the community succeeded as a whole.
Although Faʻa Sāmoa is a truly virtuous way to live, the “fear of failure” mindset that comes with it can often lead to its own set of detriments.
Football’s in Hawaiʻi
Despite the slow nationwide attrition in youth football rates, Hawaiʻi has actually seen a jump in financial investment from parents. Why is it that Hawaiʻi seems to be an outlier in this case?
Polynesians in their own home of Hawaiʻi have some of the highest rates of poverty amongst all ethnic groups. This lower economic standing means less accessibility to resources that would normally predispose one to societal success. Because of this cycle of inequality, football is appearing to be one of the only ways to break free.
With an increased value placed on the demanding sport, it becomes easy to deprioritize one’s own physical well-being for the sake of community, but Hawaiʻi without football doesn’t feel like Hawaiʻi at all.
As grim as that may sound, football has also proven to become a new site for community connection and recognition, and a focal point for resilient cultural practice — check out the Haka. So the reason why that underlying but palpable forethought went largely unaddressed wasn’t because of apathy towards Tagovailoa’s injury. In fact, it was quite the opposite.
Hawaiʻi’s greatest strength has, and always will be, its sense of community. Many people’s goal is to make it off the Rock, just so they can make home proud. Bless Tua’s soul because for now he carries the weight of Polynesia on his shoulders. With that comes strength though, and from the moment he got hit people were never worried if he would get up, but rather when.
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