Talk:Tonga/Archive 1

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Christianity and the Church

I think the section on Christianity and church denominations needs to be expanded. It plays such a large role in schools, politics and social life. Plus the whole country shuts down on Sundays except for bakeries in the evening to honor the Sabbath. Also could incorporate the notions of tapu and sharing versus selfishness from their belief structure.


I find it curious that they cite the "great majority" of Tongans to be Methodist, yet Latter-day Saint statistics indicate 53,449 members of record in Tonga, and Wikipedia cites a population of 102,000. Either there are figures off, or there are considerable LDS Tongans who are practicing Methodists, or the statement that the "great majority" of Tongans are Methodists is incorrect. Would welcome some clarity to this matter.

I agree. I think the phrase "great majority" of Methodists is misleading if less than 40% of Tongans are Methodists. Some reliable statistics should be found, especially since there is disagreement about the number of Mormon Tongans, etc. 64.142.43.180 (talk) 22:27, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

It's not misleading, it's flat out wrong. A majority is over 50%; what we are talking about here is a plurality. Unless that "Free Church of Tonga" is also considered to be Methodist. Wschart (talk) 21:55, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
Here is the government census data on religion. The LDS figure of 47k and the government of 17k are in wide disagreement. As long as we count LDS as a Christian derivative then 98% of Tongans are Christian. 58% are Methodist derived from splintering of the original Methodist church. 97.85.163.245 (talk) 05:55, 11 September 2011 (UTC)
I'd like to signal this article from "The South Australian Advertiser" dated 29 March 1889 (page 4, columns 4-5), on the Free Church of Tonga facts of the same years. Don't know the reliability of the source and/or of the author, but it's still quite interesting to read: http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/30786901. 193.111.70.3 (talk) 09:35, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

There seems to be a huge disparity between the number of Mormons claimed by the Mormon church itself and the number reported in the Census. The Mormon church's website[1] claims 61,470 members in Tonga, but the Census of Tonga counted only 13,383. [2] In order to keep a consistent source for the statistics in the religion section (the census,) I have reverted an edit that changed the listed LDS numbers to the numbers listed on the LDS church's website. If someone wants to add that number back, I think it should be added separately from the numbers reported by the census along with a note pointing out that it varies dramatically from what was reported in the census. The edit I reverted left the section in a self-contradictory state, as the percentage of religious adherents added up to well over 100%. Vbscript2 (talk) 01:40, 4 October 2014 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/facts-and-statistics/country/tonga/
  2. ^ http://www.spc.int/prism/nada/index.php/ddibrowser/13

Trivia Section

The last trivia entry about the public enemy appears to be vandalism. lol

The entire Trivia Section appears to have been removed. Astonzia (talk) 17:54, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Second Paragraph

I'm pretty certain that a discussion which pertains to a tale told about the islands, which infers that the islanders were cannibals - isn't quite appropriate here. Such a point should be placed lower down in the article in the appropriate context, and certainly not at the top.—86.134.195.89 23:40, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Is there any documented proof that cannibals lived there? Such people would have died off from prion-based diseases centuries ago. Cyslmwah (talk) 23:06, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Politics

Pretty much, the 5th paragraph of the section is a citationless claim. Anyone know where one could find any information? Squiggyfm

Looks like information is pretty scattered. There's a story about Royal Tongan Airlines being shut down at [1] and more about some of the schemes to try to make money at [2]. The Guardian also has a column about Tongan press at [3]. It looks like most official news about Tonga covers the rugby team, some of the economic situation, and the recent deaths of members of the royal family, but not so much really critical of the king's policies. With the media being so tightly controlled I imagine official sanction has been given to stories suggesting Tonga needs more investment. mh. 12:42, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

I forgot to put it in my edit summary, but I reverted a poorly-conceived sentence in the Politics section to an earlier form. Curlingforever 03:03, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

I removed the sentence "Per capita of the population, it could well be argued that Tonga has more Ph.Ds than any other country" from the end of the 2nd paragraph in the politics section. Speculative, possibly true of course but equally possibly untrue. Anyone with an investment in this proposition should actually discover a source for the per capita rates of PhDs by country and reference the result. Deoxyribonucleic acid trip (talk) 15:53, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

Rugby

It should be mentioned that rugby is a very popular sport in Tonga.


Hi, your Wesleyan link goes to the Wesleyan Disambig page, so I piped it to "Methodism." Feel free to pipe it to something else if I mis-interpreted the usage.
--Asbestos 01:05, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

NO, you're right. I've changed the main article, to Wesleyan Methodist. I was oblivious to the fact that not everyone is up on the various branches of Methodism. After Wesley died, it broke into a number of branches, of which the Wesleyans were the largest. Zora 08:59, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Hello out there, everyone else working on the Tonga page. I have a lot to contribute, when and if I have time. I never finished writing up my dissertation, but I did spend 2 1/2 years there, researching the churches.

The current treatment of Tongan history and politics is fine work. I'd be of most use in the non-existent 'culture' section -- even though I have serious reservations about the idea of 'culture' per se. I have just completed a major revision of the page for Music of Tonga.

Thanks for the compliment! As for a 'culture' section -- your reservations are the key reason I've left 'culture' out just yet. It's already highly objectivized and officially hegemonic (but very much alive and well, thank you very much)! Re: work on Tongan churches, you might want to look at Ernest Olson's work (Ph.D. circa 1997). 'ofa atu moutolu.

Royal tortoise?

Can someone find a source and add a section on the "Tongan royal tortoise" supposed to have been given to the Tongan king by Capt. Cook in 177-something? It was supposed to have been still alive in the mid-20th century, I think -- according to a faint memory I have of reading about it in "Ripley's Believe It or Not" back in the 1950s. Is this a Pacific-urban myth? Or for real? Or a little of both? --Michael K. Smith 18:00, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)

It's true. Try Bott, Latukefu, Wood-Ellem, Kaeppler....

tonga in zimbabwe

There is also a people called tonga, living in Zimbabwe, Zambia and Malawi. I work on a webpage: [4] promoting the Tonga in Zimbabwe. if i find the time I would like to contribute something about them, but this has noththing to do with the island of Tonga ...

  • I think the custom, if you have enough to say, is to create a page called something like Tonga (Africa) and link it at the top of this page, like: Tonga is also the name of a people in Zimbabwe.

Tui Malila

I moved the bit about the tortoise into miscellaneous, as it's purely a miscellaneous tidbit. I also removed the remark about the tortoise being the oldest living creature. What is a creature? If it includes trees, the tortoise is a piker. Longest living vertebrate? Do we know for SURE? Zora 04:29, 17 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Honestly, I read it in the Guinness Book of World Records that no other thing from the Animal Kingdom has lived longer than that tortoise. Seems strange, but true. I guess I'll go back and edit it with that qualification added. RyanGerbil10 04:44, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I tweaked it a bit more. We don't know that it's the oldest, we only know that it's the oldest recorded. (There might be 300 year old tortoises, or giant clams, or whatever, out there, but no way of knowing or proving it.) Also, I think we have to consider animal a technical term here (kingdom Animalia). Yes, I know, I'm being a nitpicker -- but isn't that the point of writing encyclopedia articles <g>? Zora 08:48, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Only monarchy?

I've got rid of the comment that Tonga was the only monarchy in the Pacific and changed it to "only absolute monarchy". The reason: Samoa is a monarchy according to its article. Ben Arnold 11:22, 24 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I see that you've just changed it to monarchy. We could perhaps go into further detail. The king is in effect an absolute monarch, because he can appoint and remove nobles and cabinet ministers (who are members of the legislature) in whatever quantity he pleases, whenever he pleases, which means that the commoner members of the legislature are always outvoted. They can remonstrate, but they can't change anything. So the constitution allows the king to do what he darn well pleases.
Then of course there's the cultural factor -- the respect for hierarchy and the king. When I was in Tonga, I sat through any number of sermons extolling "talangofu'a ta'e fehu'i", obedience without question. Not just to the king, but to the minister, the church, the head of the household, whatever. The opposite of talangofu'a is fa'iteliha, doing whatever you want. Tongans feel that as a general social condition, this is chaos. It must be stopped. Officially. Unofficially, fa'iteliha is a highly desirable state, for any individual Tongan.
Anyway, there are few if any restrictions on the king and the royal family, either by law or by public opinion. So you were not far off the mark with the "absolute" bit, even if Tonga is supposedly a constitutional monarchy. Zora 11:46, 24 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Friendly Islands

Why does Friendly Islands redirect here? Is it another name for Tonga? Thanks.

Yes, it is. Perhaps that should be mentioned. I'm not sure I'm recalling this correctly, but I think the name was given by Captain Cook. It's an ironic name, because, as the later memoirs of a British seaman who lived for years in Tonga explain, the only reason that Cook and his men weren't mobbed and killed was that the Tongans couldn't agree on how to go about it. Zora 08:21, 27 July 2005 (UTC)
Actually, Tonga is called the Friendly Islands because it is. There is no irony to that. Tongans kill and mobbed those because they tried to stand up for themselves and we are natural warriors. We are very friendly people and we are head of Tourism in the Pacific Islands. This is from a native from Tonga; a tongan. Teine tonga (talk) 00:53, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Latitude/Longitude Incorrect for Capital City

Listed on main entry page is: 20°00′ S 175°00′ E

Should be W, as it is for the city entry.

I couldn't figure out how to correct that on the main entry page.

Tonga's GDP and emigrants

In a Finnish economics newspaper it was reported today that Tongan emigrants sending money back to their homeland make up 31 % of the GDP. I'm no expert in economics, but as far as I know, sending money does not add to the GDP of a nation but it's GNP. I'd appreciate if someone had original statistics where one could count the real numbers and make the right conclusion. -EnSamulili 19:31, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

Correct Info about the Tongan Empire during the 12th century

I'm surprised its stated here that the 12th century Tongan empire ran from Niue to Tikopia. Is Niue the most furtherest northern island on the empire? If you look on a map Niue lies between Samoa and Tonga. The most supreme Tu'i Tonga ruled all of the Samoas (not part, all! for 300 years) and including the Tokelaun ( Tokelau means North). The empire also extended northwest to the islands of Futuna and Tuvalu, and south to include Rarotonga (Raro means lower Tonga). All people, under the empire were required to pay tribute to the Tu'i Tonga once a year. This tribute was name the "inasi". Inasi is the Tu'i Tonga way of paying taxes. People from all over the empire travel to Tongatapu (sacred island) were the Tu'i Tonga resides, and present the ruler with gifts such as fine mats, food, large canoes, anything that was of value at that time was presented to the Tu'i Tonga. The finest mat of Samoa is name after their master of that time, ('Ie Tonga). The islands of Tonga does not have any forest with large trees to build large canoes such as the 'kalia' (large double rigger canoes that could fit 100 people). These large canoes were build from Fiji and Samoa where forest exist. One of the large kalia that you have meantion 'Lomipeau' (wave crusher) was a gift to the Tu'i Tonga from Samoa, and was presented during the 'inasi' period.

Kia ora,

Rarotonga meaning "Lower Tonga" ?New one to me as it actually means "South West" (south west of where? Tahiti).In fact, the supposed subjugation of Rarotonga to Tongatapu is never mentioned at all by Rarotongans at all.

123.200.247.191 (talk) 08:08, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

country infobox

I have migrated from the static table box to a standard country infobox. Please verify info and change accordingly.Pizzadeliveryboy 23:24, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Tongan barons

Is there a specific article about the style and title of barons in Tonga (I assume it's different to a European baron)? Neither "Tonga" nor "Baron" seem to include a great deal of info on the matter. Walton monarchist89 14:59, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Why no mention of the barbaric cannabilism?

You're thinking of Fiji, where it was widely practiced. A few Tongan warriors were said to have eaten an enemy, but this seems to have been generally regarded as strange. Symbolic cannibalism features in ceremonies like the lou-ifi, where a individual or a group beg pardon by presenting themselves with leaves, as pigs to be cooked if the offended person so desires. This is the ultimate self-abasement. Zora 20:13, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Line of succession

I've made a start on Line of succession to the Tongan Throne, but I really don't know much about it. if anyone can check what I've got and improve the article, it'd be much appreciated! Grutness...wha? 12:45, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

Deaths of Prince Tu'ipelehake and Princess Kaimana

How do we get this onto the main page of Wikipedia? I've never needed to make a recommendation about this before, so I'm not sure how to do it. I'd say the death of members of a royal family are at least as important as the death of a thieving lowlife.

Septegram 12:41, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

This was more than a murder than just a death. I think the US should give East "Palo Alto" over to Tonga as reparation. 69.228.240.61 15:10, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Paragraph better off gone?

I'm not sure about the paragraph that begins with "King Tāufaʻāhau and his government have made some problematic economic decisions and are accused of wasting millions of dollars in poor investments.". While that statement is sourced, the rest of the paragraph is riddled with citation signals and looks like a load of potential PoV. Does anyone know if the claims made are true/sourcable? If not, should the unsourced stuff just be removed? 68.39.174.238 17:35, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the claims are true. The late king was notoriously vulnerable to conmen and wacky schemes. I was present at one church conference (Siasi Uesiliana) where the church president, with a carefully expressionless face, read a proposal from the king to buy coffins in bulk to save money on funeral expenses for Wesleyans. The king, of course, knew someone who would sell coffins cheap. I believe the assembly voted to respectfully consider the notion, thereby tabling it. He lost millions of dollars to one con man, his "court jester." Zora 00:13, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Acusations?

Insert non-formatted text here yes the acusations i that paragraph of bad investments is in fact true and has had a large impact on tongas economic system. however, I am not sure if it is partically relevant, just that it is not vandelisim.

RoNa_CaBiLlO Ronacabillo 03:00, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Springcleaning

I updated some references to the late king, rewrote the section on culture a bit (it's a copy of the intro to the main Culture of Tonga article, which someone cut and pasted), corrected a few grammatical errors, and generally tried to make sure that the article was coherent. Comments invited. Zora 06:48, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Other relevant data

Two points of discussion worth adding here:

1) Constant warring with Samoans

2) Kontiki regarding other plausible ancestrage of the Tongan people... Although most anthropologists discount, it is worthy of including. DNA research doesn't discount the possibility that people migrated to Tonga from both the East/West.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kontiki —The preceding unsigned comment was added by MonteShaffer (talk • contribs) 17:19, 16 December 2006 (UTC).

Proposed WikiProject

In my ongoing efforts to try to include every country on the planet included in the scope of a WikiProject, I have proposed a new project on Polynesia at Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals#Polynesia whose scope would include Tonga. Any interested parties are more than welcome to add their names there, so we can see if there is enough interest to start such a project. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 17:20, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Obesity

I saw a program on the BBC tonight about eating in dangerous places, "Cooking in the Danger Zone". The presenter went to Tonga and stated they had 92% of people being overweight. Since this is a huge number, possibly highest in the world, would it be worth a mention (obviously also a citation?) Popher 23:47, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

Nauru also has something in that range, and 40% diabetes. Chris 06:52, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
see www1.tonga-now.to/Article.aspx?ID=3741 --Tauʻolunga 07:45, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
Why in the heck is Tonga's "Obesity" listed under sports?!?! Since it is listed verbatim previously, I am taking this out. 8P! --Billy Nair (talk) 22:24, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Scouting in Tonga

Can someone render "Be Prepared", the Scout Motto, into Tongan? Thanks! Chris 06:52, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

toka mateuteu, a standard expression, --Tauʻolunga 07:33, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Thank you so much! Chris 05:35, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Article

There was a national geographic article on him and tonga. It mentioned something about the crown prince saying without royal guidance the people of Tonga would urinate in elevators. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 162.83.164.35 (talk) 21:15, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Category:Schools in Tonga

There seems to be a disconnect go up from the category - it ultimately points to a non-existent article Education in Tonga...--Smkolins (talk) 13:35, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Paula Mataele

I'm working on creating an article on Tongan boxer and kickboxer Paula Mataele. He himself sometimes spells it Pola. I'd really appreciate if someone with more knowledge can confirm that Paula is the correct spelling of Tongan first name. thx. (Marty Rockatansky (talk) 00:24, 5 February 2008 (UTC))

Copyright violation

The entire paragraph beginning 'The coronation of its Oxford educated, Sandhurst trained King George Tupou V...' in the Politics section is copied verbatim from this Guardian article published on May 9th.--GagHalfrunt (talk) 23:30, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for catching that. I've removed it (although it's still in the history). You can do that yourself if(or when, sigh) you see future examples. Thanks again. 75.213.238.122 (talk) (really, User:JesseW/not logged in) 20:17, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Pronunciation

If the Tongan people themselves and most English speakers pronounce it /toŋa/, then aren't the people pronouncing it /ˈtɒŋgə/ just ignorant? The Oxford Dictionary lists /tɒŋə/ only so I'm going to remove the other, unless someone can come up with a good reference for /ˈtɒŋgə/. Nick (talk) 23:11, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Americans pronounce it as tonka, and they do not like to hear that they are wrong. Ultimately the source of the error is most likely a confusion from tonga, which is pronounced as such. --Tauʻolunga (talk) 06:36, 23 March 2009 (UTC)
actually the reason for the confusion is that it is spelled "tonga." ViniTheHat (talk) 22:24, 26 November 2010 (UTC)
Yes, I agree the thing about the carriage should be removed. Americans pronounce in "Tonga" because that's how an intervocalic "ng" is pronounced in American English ("longer", "anger", etc.). Far more people have heard of Tonga the country than some obscure carriage, and this is certainly not the reason for the confusion. --18.21.0.100 (talk) 17:35, 19 July 2011 (UTC)
We must distinguish between on the one hand the native, and on the other hand the English pronunciation, which are probably not the same. While the native pronunciation may be something like [toŋa], that would, in my opinion, sound rather awkward in English. 1700-talet (talk) 14:44, 20 October 2012 (UTC)
Your argument is incorrect. If it were correct then 'singer' (with the exact right 'ng' for Tonga) would be pronounced as 'sinker.' --Tauʻolunga (talk) 05:36, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
Someone has merged the pronunciations by writing 'tɒŋ(ɡ)ə, to show that the hard g is a variation. However the recently added audio file only plays the variation with the hard g. The hard g version is a variant pronunciation and tends to be used only by a subset of English speakers who use and hear the word rarely, not those who use it frequently, eg in the Pacific, Australia, NZ, and rugby commentators of all nationalities. The audio file should be changed to the 'tɒŋə pronunciation rather than solidify the secondary pronunciation. This would also make it closer to how Tongan people themselves pronounce it. Schnackal (talk) 15:44, 6 November 2021 (UTC)

French, national language ?

Where could we find some clue of it ? I'm quite sceptical... Sroulik (talk) 09:30, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Confusing and possibly inaccurate entry on colonial rule and monarchy

Quote: Although under the protection of Britain, Tonga is the only Pacific nation never to have given up its monarchical government as did Tahiti and Hawaii. The Tongan monarchy unlike the UK follows a straight line of rulers.

This implies a connection between colonial rule and the demise of an indigenous monarchy. Hawaii was indepenedent until annexed by the United States, and its phase a republic began before this happened. Additiionally, what on earth is meant by "a straight line of rulers"? I might hazzard a guess, but a guess it would be. This should be clarified Dainamo (talk) 18:22, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Straight line means the successor is the eldest son of the monarch irespective of the monarchs sex. Some matrolinear systems of succession do have the "son" of the eldest sister (daughter of the same mother) as the successor. "Blood linearity" as it was known in medieval Europe. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.186.133.249 (talk) 12:07, 23 July 2011 (UTC)

98%

98% and 3% add up to more than 100%, re "Demographics".

Some people have multiple ethnicities. Some people are both Tongan and Chinese.-gadfium 19:44, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Socialized medicine

The following sentence sounds suspiciously like it was written by an American: "Tongans also have universal access to a socialized medical system".

I have changed the sentence to read national health system to avoid the use of a highly stigmatized and specifically American term. 121.73.7.84 (talk) 10:21, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Tonga Government Information

www.mic.gov.to —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tminoinfo10 (talk • contribs) 09:00, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Ministry of Information - Government of Tonga

Government News and Information www.mic.gov.to —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tminoinfo10 (talk • contribs) 09:06, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

www.mic.gov.to Ministry of Information & Communications - Kingdom of Tonga

www.mic.gov.to —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tminoinfo10 (talk • contribs) 09:08, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

The Government - Tonga

Official Website of the Government of the Kingdom of Tonga - Government News and Information. www.mic.gov.to —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tminoinfo10 (talk • contribs) 09:16, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Spaceport Tonga

This source says that InterOrbital Systems (InterOrbital.com) plans to build a private spaceport in the Kingdom of Tonga with orbital rocket launches starting as early as this year. The company tag line is apparently on that is, 'from paradise to outer space'."

Does anyone else have a reliable source for this claim? Ought we reflect this in the article on Tonga? N2e (talk) 00:11, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Tonga and the German Language

Doesn't Tonga speak German? If you have any confusions with this, go to www.hodenmumps.to, a website from Tonga. Trust me, it's in German!

82.12.1.173 (talk) 15:10, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Many websites using .to are unrelated to the country. See .to. I doubt that German is a common language in Tonga.-gadfium 21:24, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
Correct. The common languages in Tonga are Tongan (96.7% literacy) and English (73.8% literacy,) according to their census.[1] Vbscript2 (talk) 01:52, 4 October 2014 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ http://www.spc.int/prism/nada/index.php/ddibrowser/13

how many islands??

there are different information about the amount of islands. english wikip says 176, german 169 and the CIA reports says 169. https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/tn.html ... also the amount of islands which are inhabited is different (36 vs. 56) ... WHATs the correct information, if this is important?? -- Ronny - 20101124 - —Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.191.198.91 (talk) 10:10, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

The source for the article figures is [5], which says it is the Official Tonga Government Tourism Website. It was removed from the article yesterday on what appear to be spurious grounds, and I've restored it. I would prefer to see a more authoritative source; perhaps a census report or publication of the Tongan government.-gadfium 18:59, 25 November 2010 (UTC)
You will never get an answer if you do not first define what is an island. Is that single rock there, or that sandbank there, etc. a seperate island or not? --Tauʻolunga (talk) 06:06, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Not the only monarchy

In addition to the Samoa instance mentioned above (which a weird ambiguous case), there are also Tuvalu and the Solomon Islands, which are monarchies that happen to have as their monarch the same person as the Queen of the UK. Nevertheless, they're fully sovereign. --Jfruh (talk) 23:13, 28 November 2010 (UTC)

Tuvalu and the Solomon Islands are fully independent now, but this was not always the case. Both gained independence in 1978. Vbscript2 (talk) 02:21, 4 October 2014 (UTC)

Infobox content

I placed English ahead of Tongalese, per alphabetcial order. GoodDay (talk) 21:44, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

The Tongan government note their languages (here) as "Tongan, English". There is no reason to use a different order to the government. I will revert. Daicaregos (talk) 10:50, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
No probs. GoodDay (talk) 14:51, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Major recent Political developments have not been added to article

Quick search of the news shows Tonga now has its first democratically elected PM. This isn't even in the article. Also the political/government structure has changed dramatically, including the role and responsibility of the King. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.228.219.66 (talk) 02:19, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

United Nations Peacekeepers

Tonga did contribute troops to conflict in Bouganville and the Solomon Islands, but neither were with the United Nations. Solomon Islands was with RAMSI and Bouganville ??? (121.73.69.226 (talk) 07:39, 3 April 2011 (UTC))

mention of the UK monarchy in History section

I removed a passage from the following sentence (in bold): The Tongan monarchy, unlike that of the UK, follows an uninterrupted succession of hereditary rulers from one family. The passage concerning the UK monarchy is not correct. The British royal family is itself an unbroken line that stretches back almost 1200 years. The crown has always stayed "in the family", or rather, given to the "next of kin". The only arguable exception is the succession of King George I, who was of the house of Hanover but descended from King James I...he came to the throne because Queen Anne died without any issue of her own, & since all family in the line of legitimate succession were Catholics, the UK parliament gave the crown to the first protestant on teh list. See the article Descent of Elizabeth II from William I. --Mrlopez2681 (talk) 21:57, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

Erroneous Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice

Complaint.

DMCA notice dated January 11, 2012 for this section: Tonga#Economy from Cengage Learning.

Response from the Wikimedia foundation:

In its DMCA notice, the company involved charged infringement, claiming that the article “Tonga” on the English Wikipedia contained content copied from their publication. Our investigation showed that the content in question had been on Wikipedia for years before their work was published, having been taken from public domain publications by the US Department of State (with proper attribution at the time of the edit). The company publication apparently copied from the same source. They have withdrawn their takedown notice, with apologies. We have reported this erroneous report to http://www.chillingeffects.org/.

The probable original source, added 20 December 2003.

Igottheconch (talk) 16:49, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Actually, they first published this in 2001, so it's not true that it was on Wikipedia first. But if it appeared on state.gov at the time it was inserted here, and was in the public domain then, it does not matter I guess. --JN466 13:46, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

Possible copyright problem

This article has been revised as part of a large-scale clean-up project of multiple article copyright infringement. (See the investigation subpage) Earlier text must not be restored, unless it can be verified to be free of infringement. For legal reasons, Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or printed material; such additions must be deleted. Contributors may use sources as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously. Diannaa (talk) 02:17, 13 March 2014 (UTC)

External links modified

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This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 18 January 2022).

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Cheers. —cyberbot IITalk to my owner:Online 18:14, 27 August 2015 (UTC)

Number of islands, habitation status

I noticed the introduction says there are 177 islands, of which 52 are inhabited, cited from www.tongaholiday.com, run by the Tonga Tourism Authority. However, under the geography section it again says 177 islands, but here states only 36 inhabited and I see no source for this. Then we go to the wiki article Geography of Tonga, which gives the number of islands at 176 and 36 inhabited. It also mentions a new volcanic island that formed in 2014-15, so that might explain the difference between total number of islands, but not the number of inhabited ones.

At the aforementioned www.tongaholiday.com/about-tonga/ it reads 176 islands with 40 inhabited. This is the only inline cite I have seen and simply do not have time to go through each source or do my own research; hopefully this will catch the attention of someone more knowledgeable in Tongan geography and/or the criteria involved in declaring an island 'inhabited' or not. Thank you for bearing with my disorganized writing style. Respectfully, --WikiEnthusiastNumberTwenty-Two (talk) 16:36, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

EDIT: There seems to be some kind of formatting error with the above section's links being grouped in this one. I am afraid I do not know how to correct it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by WikiEnthusiastNumberTwenty-Two (talk • contribs) 16:42, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

It's because references are put at the bottom of the page when people forget to add the {{reftalk}} template. These links didn't actually belong to the above section but to earlier discussions. I've added the templates now to the appropriate sections. - Lindert (talk) 18:10, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
I've made the introduction and geography section consistent using the CIA World Factbook as a source. This is generally considered a reliable source, and almost certainly it carries more weight than tongaholiday.com. If a better source can be found, eg a Tongan Government source, then we can consider changing to that.-gadfium 02:57, 23 March 2016 (UTC)

External links modified

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Cheers.—cyberbot IITalk to my owner:Online 14:49, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Autochthonous and indigenous

I believe the reference to the Commonwealth is confusing. Indigenous peoples is defined by Wikipedia as follows: "Indigenous people, aboriginal people, or native people, are groups protected in international or national legislation as having a set of specific rights based on their linguistic and historical ties to a particular territory, their cultural and historical distinctiveness from other populations. The legislation is based on the conclusion that certain indigenous people are vulnerable to exploitation, marginalization, oppression, forced assimilation, and genocide by nation states formed from colonizing populations or by politically dominant, different ethnic groups."

I do not believe that this applies to Tongans, who are not marginalized in their own country and do not need protecting. So, to address the recent editing dispute I propose the following:

"Tonga joined the Commonwealth of Nations in 1970 (atypically as a country with its own monarch rather than that of the United Kingdom, similar to Malaysia, Lesotho, and Swaziland), and became a member of the United Nations in September 1999. While exposed to colonial pressures, Tonga has always governed itself, which makes it unique in the Pacific and gives Tongans confidence in their monarchical system and much pride." Roundtheworld (talk) 07:16, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

Religions

The Infobox lists the Free Wesleyan Church of Tonga as the only religion but, in fact, it only accounts for about 40% of the population. Should not other major religions be listed? Roundtheworld (talk) 07:24, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

I went ahead and removed it from the infobox - we usually don't list religions in the inofobox, perhaps unless there is one vastly dominant. Materialscientist (talk) 11:23, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

Orphaned references in Tonga

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Tonga's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "cia":

  • From French Polynesia: "French Polynesia". The World Factbook (2024 ed.). Central Intelligence Agency.. Retrieved 25 September 2012.
  • From Palau: "Palau". The World Factbook. CIA.
  • From Iraq: "Iraq". CIA Factbook.
  • From Cocos (Keeling) Islands: "Cocos (Keeling) Islands". The World Factbook. CIA. Retrieved 27 January 2012.
  • From Papua New Guinea: "Papua New Guinea". The World Factbook. Langley, Virginia: Central Intelligence Agency. 2012. Retrieved 5 October 2012.
  • From East Timor: "The World Factbook -- Field Listing - Population - CIA". Central Intelligence Agency. Retrieved 7 March 2015.
  • From Norfolk Island: "Norfolk Island". The World Factbook. CIA. Retrieved 22 July 2015.
  • From Japan: "CIA Factbook: Japan". Cia.gov. Retrieved November 9, 2011.
  • From Samoa: "Samoa". CIA – The World Factbook.
  • From New Caledonia: "New Caledonia". The World Factbook (2024 ed.). Central Intelligence Agency.
  • From Vanuatu: Central Intelligence Agency. "Vanuatu". The World Factbook. Retrieved 6 January 2010.
  • From Turkey: "Turkey". The World Factbook. Retrieved 9 February 2013.
  • From Canada: "Canada". World Factbook. CIA. May 16, 2006. Retrieved May 23, 2011.
  • From Wallis and Futuna: World factbook: Wallis and Futuna

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT⚡ 20:28, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

Dog consumption

Has there been sources written on the history of dog meat consumption in Tonga? I've been researching a lot about the Polynesian Dog and a few scholars seem to say that dogs were absent in Western Polynesia including Tonga and Samoa before the arrival of Europeans and that it was only then that dog was introduced, although they were recognized culturally before then. I wonder if Tongans started eating dogs after the introduction of dogs by Europeans?--KAVEBEAR (talk) 20:16, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

Hello. This isn't necessarily obvious, but an article's Talk page is for discussions about the care and maintenance of the article itself, not for general discussion about the article's topic. See Help:Using talk pages. Largoplazo (talk) 21:00, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

External links modified

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External links modified

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External links modified

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A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for speedy deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for speedy deletion:

You can see the reason for deletion at the file description page linked above. —Community Tech bot (talk) 21:54, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

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