Samoan literature Samoan literature Samoan literature can be divided into oral (pre-colonial and post-colonial) and written literatures, in the Samoan language and in English or English translation, and is from the Samoa Islands of independent Samoa and American Samoa, and Samoan writers in diaspora. Samoan as a written language emerged after 1830 when Tahitian and English missionaries from the London Missionary Society, working with Samoan chiefly orators, developed a Latin script based Samoan written language. Before this, there were "logologo" (tapa signs) and "tatau" (tattoo signs) but no phonetic written form. Pre-colonial and post-colonial Samoan oral literature includes "solo" (poetic narratives), "fa'alupega"
Fa'afafine the Tongan "fakaleiti" (also "fakafefine"), the Cook Islands Māori "akava'ine", the Hawaiian and Tahitian "māhū" (literally "in the middle"), the Māori "whakawāhine", the Niuean "fiafifine" (also "fakafifine"), the Tokelauan "fakafāfine", the Tuvaluan "pinapinaaine", the Gilbertese "binabinaaine", and the Wallisian "fakafafine". The FTM or female-to-male equivalent in Samoa are known variously as "fa'atane", "fa'atama", and "fafatama". Ultimately, Western terms like gay, transgender, FTM, etc., do not align exactly with Samoan terms like fa'afafine, fa'atane, etc., which have meaning within the fa'asamoa traditional cultural systems of Samoa. The Samoan slang word "mala" (or "devastation" in the Samoan language) is in less frequent