Dr Inez Fainga'a-Manu Sione was born in Fiji to Tongan parents, Ilaisia and Fatai Fainga'a, and married a Samoan chief, Ps Toleafoa Bruce Manu-Sione. She was adopted into a Yolngu clan, the Gumatj clan, and given a Yolngu name, Budiyo. She has spent the past 25 years working in community, specifically with Pasifika and Māori peoples across Queensland. She originally studied a Bachelor of Theatre and enjoyed a career performing with La Boite and Queensland Theatre. She also completed a Bachelor of Laws/Business at QUT (after which she was admitted into the Supreme Court as a lawyer) and a PhD. In addition to her role with Pathways in Place, she is a Community Research Fellow with the Pasifika charity Village Connect Ltd. This is Australia's first Pasifika Holistic Health hub that co-located within a Pasifika church, weaving together the intersectionality between spiritual, clinical, cultural, communal, holistic wellness that encompasses both the Pasifika ways of being, knowing and doing, privileging Pasifika knowledges and that of the west.

Holistic Wellness, Decolonization, Cutural Change, Cultural Education, Customary Law, Decolonising Academia, Social Change, Multiculturalism, Youth, Christianity

Education sciences
Health and nutrition studies

Australian Association for Pacific Studies (AAPS)

Australia (area)
Polynesia

21st century

Tongan