It is to be expected that expressions of identity will be different for established and new Pacific transnationals. Recent transnationals are likely to display more obviously the home culture and be more familiar with its current practices. They will also be more readily identifiable to the home community than older Pacific transnationals. Researchers Roudometof and Karpathakis (2002, 41) have found this to be the case with Greek Americans and it influences how and to what extent Greek Americans identify with the home country. The difference between generations is also significant for migrant identity ‘as those who grow up in different locations than their parents may have less (or different) interests’ in their homelands (Armbruster 2002, 19). Similarly, there are those ‘who believe they belong to the same community as their relatives abroad, but who do not, or cannot, engage in transnational networking with them’ (Al-Ali and Koser 2002, 19). Transnationalism has different meanings for different peoples at different times in their lives and one outcome is ‘the development of new identities among migrants who are anchored (socially, culturally and physically) neither in their place of origin nor in their place of destination’ (ibid., 1–4). Ley and Walters (2004, 104) say that migrants who arrive at a new place without really leaving their place of origin turn the ‘linearity of migration’ into the circularity of transnationality.

Pollock’s use of food as a marker of Pacific transnational identity brings home to the reader how the processes of transnationalism simultaneously maintain cultural identities and transcend cultural boundaries. Pollock’s argument that food globalises at the same time that it localises allows for transnationals to reinforce their identity while sharing those foods and gastronomic habits which identify them. But compared to the presence of Pacific foods in transnational communities, there is a much greater variety and quantity of Western food found in the Pacific Islands though there is not a similar influx of North American or Western transnationals in the Pacific to accompany the presence of these foods. This can be attributed largely to the economic disparity between the two regions. Other transnational foods such as those belonging to the Chinese (egg foo young and chop suey) and Indian (roti and curries) cultures have made their way into the gastronomic identities of some Pacific communities to the extent that these foods are now considered local fare by both the home residents and the Pacific transnationals.

The way in which a host society accepts transnational communities has a major influence on how these communities shape their identity. For example, the exclusion of Palestinians from Lebanese society reinforces their ethnic identity in what Portes (1999) calls reactive ethnicity and is an underlying cause for the maintenance of their transnational identities. In a similar way, New Zealand’s rejection of Pacific nations’ transnationals during its recession in the 1980s led to a resilient Pacific community whose support came from its strong cultural networks and the presence and maintenance of a dominant Pacific identity. The chapter by Evans, Reid and Harms demonstrates that Pacific communities do not have homogeneous identities, and that there can be considerable variation both within and between migrant and homeland populations. Although they show that true Tongan-ness for Tongan transnationals depended on those factors discussed by the other authors, including kinship, work, respect and reciprocity, their respondents placed differential emphasis on these factors, influenced by a range of variables that did not fall neatly into a migrant/non-migrant dichotomy.

Pacific peoples, utilizing the concept of transnationalism as it covers place, landscape and space (Brah 1996) have managed to ‘re-territorialize’ themselves in places away from home, and create opportunities for their local goods and services to appear where there are Pacific transcommunities (Jackson, Crang and Dwyer 2004, 8). The geographical and historical spaces held by these communities become ‘constitutive’ (ibid., 1–4) of Pacific transnationality. As the Pacific diaspora continues its global spread and transnational communities develop and grow away from their home communities, the concepts of space, attachments and distance are ‘reconfigured’ (Brah 1996). Gabriel Sheffer (in Dorai 2002, 88) identifies three main criteria for a diaspora: a common ethnic identity, internal organisation and a significant level of contact with the homeland. Portes (1999) believes that diasporas and transnational communities differ in the nature of their relationship with the homeland. According to Portes, the relationship that diasporic communities have with the homeland is symbolic whereas for transnational communities, the relationship is real. This may be because as transnational communities become subsumed into the diaspora, ties to the homeland weaken as the bonds to other transnational residents strengthen and a common homeland becomes for the diaspora, a symbol of its relationship with its former home. On the other hand, transnational communities within the diaspora maintain a relationship to the homeland through their transnational activities and are essentially the drivers and keepers of Pacific transnationalism.

Although reciprocity, kinship, ties and relationship are significant components of transnationalism, none of these begins the process of transnationalism in the way that ‘home’ does. It is axiomatic that without the origin of the homeland, there can be no migration or consequent transnational communities. The relationship to homeland for the increasingly migratory Solomon Islanders, as a consequence of social catastrophe, is necessary in order to ‘reinforce aspects’ of their traditional culture (Gegeo 2001). Gegeo sees this relationship as an expression of place rather than a move away from home. The concept of space is central to Tongans’ understanding of transnationality because people and things move and flow within and across spatial boundaries (Ka’ili 2005). The expansive spread of the Pacific Islands has led to the establishment of ‘far-reaching exchange and social networks’ (Ka’ili 2005, 3). Pacific communities can no longer claim to be organised locally and completely around a single village but instead exist transnationally between different countries (Dorai 2002). The building and maintenance of kin-based communities ‘assures the availability of emotional, spiritual and material support’ for Samoan transnationals on what Burns McGrath describes as ‘long, modern-day voyages’ (Burns McGrath 2002). As Pacific communities continue to live and work between their countries and those that permit multiple residence and dual citizenship, they are, in a sense, developing local transnational communities in their own countries (Dorai 2002, 89).

Transnationalism involves the construction of homelands or localities in a mobile world (Kempny 2002, 126). Portes, Guarnizo and Landolt (1999, 219) add that transnationalism is the ‘occupations and activities that require regular and sustained social contact over time across national borders’. As activities that significantly affect the relationship between transnational communities and communities in the countries of origin intensify across national boundaries, this intensification reflects the growing interest and influence of transnationals on the affairs of their home countries. The pro-democracy protests in 2005 by the Tongan transnational communities in Aotearoa/New Zealand can be said to have prompted the local demonstrations in Tonga in 2006 for higher wages and a more equitable standard of living.

As Pacific transnationals begin to turn their thoughts to returning home, questions turn to their status as transnationals. Even though Connell and Nosa note that the reasons for returning home are complex and diverse, one wonders whether Pacific transnationals ever return home completely or whether ‘home’ no longer is clear in meaning and place for them as they cast continual glances over their shoulders to the lands they have left. Does their return home cancel out their initial departure so that they are no longer transnationals or do the ties to their once adopted homeland permanently make them transnationals? For Connell’s educated health workers, the dilemma is not eased by their educational status and many will re-migrate after a period of return ‘home’. For Nosa’s Niueans, the incentive to return home is initiated largely by the government although the limited economic potential for them makes the return migration unattractive even when family ties remain strong.

Francis’ chapter explores the diversity of international and local movement for the residents of three different Tongan villages. The reasons for these movements, which include socio-cultural factors, religion, education and the selling of produce, are influenced in a significant way by the economic and social status of its residents. Hoëm’s chapter about the physical and cultural construction of home in Tokelau reminds us that transnationalism exists because of the connections that transnationals maintain with home. Her illustration of the ‘modern’, two-storey, concrete floor homes that cater for smaller independent families as compared to the traditional thatched homes shows how this has changed the configuration of Tokelauan life by including a sense of privacy within the walls and a competition for economic status among Tokelauans. Her disturbing account of the sexual abuse by a pastor of a twelve year old reveals the conflict that exists between the political situation of the transnationals and the influence they wish to have over what they may see as the incestuous and closed practices of the home country.

As political agreements between countries allow older island-born Pacific nationals to return home to retire after living and working overseas, retirees maintain their links to their families, children and grandchildren back in their adopted countries and to the friendships and interests that were built and developed there. Burns McGrath (2002) says this circular migration is characteristic of Pacific Islanders and has to do with their relationship and ties to the land and sea. These transnationals can be thought of as reversing their transnational status on their return home as they create collective ‘homes’ around themselves and have multiple identities grounded in more than one society (Wong 2002, 170–171).

According to Vertovec (2004), transnationalism is the interactions that link people and institutions across nation-states. It is about having a place where one was born and another place to which one has ties. In whatever way it takes place, identity and relationship to homeland must be reciprocated between the transnational community and the place and persons with whom these connections are made. If reciprocity is not part of the process, then transnationalism cannot be said to exist.

Tongans see reciprocal transnational exchanges as nurturing the ‘socio-spatial ties with kin and kin-like members’ or tauhi vā (Ka’ili 2005, 5). Small (1997) refers to the transnational family where members live in different countries but maintain close links with each other, and where reciprocity is important to maintaining these links. According to Hau’ofa (1994 cited in Ka’ili 2005, 4), these reciprocal exchanges involve relatives abroad sending back money and resources such as appliances and clothes, while the home-based kin send local goods such as mats, tapa, and taro, and maintain the home for the returning traveller. Reciprocity also occurs in links with other diasporic communities, even through the internet as we search for and receive responses about information and news of people, place and the homeland to which we belonged. For some Pacific transnationals, reciprocity is in the giving up of their land in exchange for the opportunity to be educated abroad, thereby increasing their ability to send back money and resources, while others give up the opportunity to travel overseas in exchange for taking care of the land and maintaining the culture for themselves and those who may return one day (Gegeo 2001).

Francis highlights the inequity and imbalance between the activities that ‘home’ residents must undertake to maintain the cultural traditions and the reciprocal and compensatory gifts accorded these residents by their transnationals for doing so. Addo and Lilomaiava-Doktor discuss gifts as an important ritual of Pacific transnational life because of the process and values system that accompany it. For Addo, the question is whether cash can be a modern day substitute for traditional gifts among Tongan transnationals. She is concerned about how Tongan families will continue to provide for each other as expectations of money in exchange for traditional gifts become the norm. This can be answered in part by Lilomaiava-Doktor’s analysis of home (i’inei) and reach (fafo) for Samoan transnationals as they leave behind what were once familiar practices of home to reach out for those practices in their new places—practices that seem more pragmatic, appropriate and acceptable. These changes are not limited to money and remittances but include education, relationships, and even chiefly titles. As Pacific transnationals persist with changed practices that have the potential to change the traditional practices at home, we may be looking at a reversal of home and reach so that the fafo becomes i’inei and vice versa.

In cities across Aotearoa/New Zealand, Australia and the USA, interactions take place not only between the city’s Pacific transnationals and the home country, but also between earlier and newer transnationals. Reciprocal exchanges occur as the more established group shares information and provides networks that assist the recent arrivals to resettle, while the new transnationals share their more recent knowledge of the customs and practices of the home country with the earlier arrivals. The Macphersons and Alexeyeff argue that kinship, the co-dependence between home and migrant, is key to being a Pacific transnational, and if kinship changes, so does a Pacific transnational. Alexeyeff says that the expectation within traditional home practices such as the tere pati (travelling party) which have now crossed transnational boundaries is for the exchange of economic sustenance for the upkeep of agenda, obligations and emotions of Cook Islands’ social relationships. As Pacific diaspora populations grow as large as or larger than the home populations, the issue of power—a seldom discussed feature of Pacific transnationalism—arises as we observe the significant difference in human capital between transnational and home residents which has the capacity to influence and alter traditional practices and relationships as well as increase pressure on the transnational communities to provide for those at home. The contemporary practices of saofa’i (title conferring ceremony) in Pacific diaspora communities appear to be a kind of truce in this power dynamic which subtly dictates that these communities will attend to the affairs of their Pacific transnationals while home residents attend to theirs. This does not mean that the reciprocal contacts between the home residents and the transnationals become obsolete but rather that there are changes to the way that this reciprocity occurs. It takes place in the agreements between the resident and the transnational matai (chief) of the different communities and an acknowledgement of each other’s status and roles while maintaining and reinforcing the migrant-home kinship ties, ties that the Macphersons explain have been key to the establishment and maintenance of transnational Samoa.