Maori history

Te whakamahi i te kupu rangatiratanga i te tekau mā iwa o ngā rautau.

by Lachy Paterson

He Pukenga Kōrero, 10:1 (2011), pp. 17-24.

[Written in Māori.  He mea tuhituhi i roto i te reo Māori]
"Rangatiratanga" is a derived noun from... more [Written in Māori.  He mea tuhituhi i roto i te reo Māori]
"Rangatiratanga" is a derived noun from the term "rangatira" (chief) and traditionally referred to the qualities and practice of chiefdomship.  The term "rangatiratanga" has an important place within New Zealand historiography as it was utilized within New Zealand's foundational document, the Treaty of Waitangi, to translate Māori land rights.  It is now generally accepted within scholarly debate in New Zealand that the chiefly signatories were likely to have considered that the Treaty's rangatiratanga guaranteed more than mere land ownership.  This article investigates the use of the word "rangatiratanga" in nineteenth-century Māori-language texts (scriptural, governmental, and Māori-produced documents) to show that rangatiratanga had a variety of meanings depending on the context of the text, and the agenda of those who were using it.

Nga Tamatoa and the Rhetoric of Brown Power: Re-Situating Collective Rhetorics in Global Colonialism

by Lachy Paterson

By Sharon Stevens and Lachy Paterson.  In Darin Payne and Daphne Desser (ed). Teaching Writing in Globalization Remapping Disciplinary Work, Lanham: Lexington Books, pp. 17-38.

8.2 "New" New Zealand Editorial

by Moving Worlds: A Journal of Transcultural Writings

8.2 "New" New Zealand Table of Contents

by Moving Worlds: A Journal of Transcultural Writings

CALL FOR PAPERS, JEASA 3.2 Special Issue - Indigenous marriage, family and kinship in Australia, Aotearoa New Zealand and the Pacific: the persistence of life and hope in colonial and neo-colonial contexts.

by Victoria Grieves

This edition of JEASA aims to focus on the development of the Indigenous/mixed race family in Australia, New Zealand... more This edition of JEASA aims to focus on the development of the Indigenous/mixed race family in Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific from the early colonial period up until the present, set against the persistence of Indigenous cultural, social and political innovations through the generations and against genocidal forces. It will be edited by Dr Victoria Grieves of the University of Sydney and Dr Martina Horakova of the University of Masaryk.

From the beginnings of contact with newcomers from different cultural contexts children of mixed race have been conceived and various family formations have developed to care for them, with or without usually destructive state interventions. In the cases where the state has intervened and the course of peoples' lives moves out of their control, the overwhelming reaction has been to reconnect. For example, the bringing home of stolen Aboriginal children, the enormous endurance of children who followed the Rabbit Proof Fence, and the reunion of the children of American GIs in the Pacific with their American families.

Moreover, in the midst of poverty and despair, individuals such as Samson and Delilah have formed enduring and mutually supportive liaisons while the protagonist in Mad Bastards is attempting to reconnect with family, life and hope. Thus the assertion of life and hope that continues in the many varied cultural and cross-cultural connections that are revealed in history, film, literature and theatre are inextricably bound with the celebration of survival amongst Indigenous peoples of Australia, Aotearoa New Zealand and the Pacific.

The solidity and persistence of Indigenous family and kinship ties is sometimes foregrounded but is also often a subtext in the portrayals of Indigenous lifeways in history, biography and autobiography, theatre, film, literature and dance. Moreover, contemporary political commentary such as that occurring around the Northern Territory Emergency Response (NTER), the Intervention into Aboriginal communities is couched in terms for the protection of children. Since the advent of colonialism the impact of settler colonial pubic policy on the Indigenous family has been overwhelmingly destructive, but this recent development paradoxically sees the state claiming to hold the key to the protection of children in family environments constructed as toxic and dangerous.

Thus it is that Indigenous family histories can be a vehicle for revealing an "other" history of settler colonialism, unjust and inhumane, that sought to destroy the Indigenous family and the life and hope inherent in the projection of family into the future. This history illuminates developments about race thinking, social ostracisms and "passing"; including policy innovations as attempts to control racial intermixing, such as "protectionism", segregation, control of marriages, removal of children into institutions, dormitories and boarding schools and adoption into white families.

These histories also highlight the development of cultural hybridity evident in Indigenous knowledges and Indigenous cultural innovations in literature, film and the arts. Also evident in resistance to governments' control, including political activism, cultural innovation and the maintenance of cultural lifeways and relationships with kin, within the surviving Indigenous family.

We welcome interdisciplinarity! Scholarly articles from history and literature to film studies, sociology and cultural studies that relate to any of the issues raised above, that engage with an aspect of Indigenous marriage, family and kinship in Australia, Aotearoa New Zealand and the Pacific are welcome.

Submissions should be sent to Dr Vicki Grieves at vicki.grieves@sydney.edu.au by April 30, 2012.

Formatting instructions can be found on the journal's website, but for now any scholarly model will be appropriate until an article has been accepted.

JEASA is a peer-reviewed, MLA-indexed, open-access online journal, whose first issue appeared in 2009. The journal's website may be found at http://www.ub.edu/dpfilsa/jeasamainpage.html

The meaning of 'colour': photography and portraiture, 1889-1904

by Angela Wanhalla

published in Early New Zealand Photography: Images and Essays, edited by Angela Wanhalla and Erika Wolf, Otago University Press, 2011.

The Kohimarama Conference of 1860: A Contextual Reading

by Lachy Paterson

Journal of New Zealand Studies, NS12 (2011): 29-46.

Paradoxically, the Kohimarama Conference of 1860 stands in contemporary historiography as a shining example of Maori... more Paradoxically, the Kohimarama Conference of 1860 stands in contemporary historiography as a shining example of Maori interaction with the Crown and of what might have been possible if the government was not being so dastardly in its other pursuits. However, the month-long conference, attended by over 100 Māori chiefs, was not a “ratification” of the Treaty of Waitangi as argued by some historians, but an attempt by the government, then under extreme pressure during the first Taranaki war, to avert a more wide-spread conflict, and to advance its colonial project. Using both Maori and English-lnguage newspapers, the conference, the largest propaganda effort and political theatre directed towards Maori, was further projected out to the Maori and Pakeha reading publics.

Permission to get inked - who were allowed to get tattooed in traditional societies?

by Sophie Andersson

Short essay, in Sweden called a B-level essay (2011)

This essay is about tattoos in traditional societies, more specific amongst the Maori people of New Zealand. This... more This essay is about tattoos in traditional societies, more specific amongst the Maori people of New Zealand. This choice was made since these tattoos have been well described and observed as a traditional pattern already in the 18th century. The main thing to investigate is who was allowed to get a tattoo. I will write about the history of moko (as it is called amongst the Maori people), how it is done, the different patterns and a little about how the contact with the western world affected the practice.

2009 ‘Jack, Queen, King - Playing Cards as Influence of Empire’ in Context, Journal of Costume

by Patricia Te Arapo Wallace

Print Culture and the Collective Maori Consciousness

by Lachy Paterson

Journal of New Zealand Literature, 18:2 (2010), pp. 105-129.

Although literacy and print were essential tools of the New Zealand colonial project ultimately designed to... more Although literacy and print were essential tools of the New Zealand colonial project ultimately designed to ‘amalgamate’ Māori into the modern Pākehā-dominated world, ironically they also helped in the evolution of a collective Māori consciousness. This collective sense of being manifested itself in such pan-Māori movements as the Kīngitanga, Kotahitanga and Te Aute College Students Association. Māori were not passive recipients of print culture, and each of these movements utilized newspapers as a means of disseminating their discourses. Utilizing aspects of Benedict Anderson’s theory on the role of print in the formation of national consciousness, this essay looks at how Pākehā-run newspapers assisted in the development of a collective Māori consciousness, and how each of these movements projected this identity in their own publications.

Music Transculturation and Identity in a Maori Brass Band Tradition

by David Hebert

Hebert, D. G. (2008). Music Transculturation and Identity in a Maori Brass Band Tradition. In R. Camus & B. Habla, (Eds.), Alta Musica, 26 (pp. 173-200). Tutzing: Schneider.

Keywords: Maori music / Brass bands / Ratana bands / Juji Nakada

Genre: Original cross-national historical... more Keywords: Maori music / Brass bands / Ratana bands / Juji Nakada

Genre: Original cross-national historical research.

Discusses: "some musical implications of the historical relations between Maori prophet Tahupotiki Wiremu Ratana (1873-1939) and Japanese Rev. Juji Nakada (1870-1939), as reflected in contemporary brass bands and liturgical practices."

Ngā reo o ngā niupepa: ngā niupepa Māori, 1855-1863

by Lachy Paterson

PhD thesis (University of Otago, 2004) Māori-language version

Nö te tau 1855, ka noho tonu te nuinga o te iwi Mäori i runga i ngä tikanga Mäori, käore e tino raweketia ana e te... more Nö te tau 1855, ka noho tonu te nuinga o te iwi Mäori i runga i ngä tikanga Mäori, käore e tino raweketia ana e te ringa käwanatanga. E pënei ana tënei ki tö rätou whakaaro mö te tino rangatiratanga he mea whakapümau ki te Tiriti o Waitangi. Engari he ao hurihuri tënei ao. Kua uru ngä tini Mäori ki roto i ngä mahi hokohoko kia riro ai ngä taonga Päkehä. Kua tahuri te nuinga ki te whakapono Karaitiana. Ka taea e te tokomaha te körero pukapuka. Kua tukuna atu e ëtahi he whenua hei nohoanga mö ngä tini Päkehä e haere mai ana. Nä ēnei momo āhuatanga hou, ka ähuareka te käwanatanga, i pïrangitia he häpori hou mö Niu Tïreni e tüturu ai ngä tikanga Päkehä, e tü ä-tinana ai töna mana käwanatanga (e whakaarohia ana e rātou) he mea whakatü ki te Tiriti. I taua wä, ka whäia e te käwanatanga te kaupapa o te “iwi kotahi”, o te “amalgamation” ränei. Mä tënei kaupapa, ka tukua ki te iwi Māori ngä painga o te “civilisation" o Üropi kia häpainga te taha ä-häpori, ä-öhanga hoki. I rapuhia hoki kia äkina ngä Mäori kia tukua tonutia ö rätou whenua “takoto noa” hei nohoanga mö ngä Päkehä, ä, kia whakaaetia te ture Päkehä me te mana o te käwanatanga. Hei mutunga, hei häpori kotahi ngä iwi e rua, arä, hei häpori tikanga Päkehä. I mahia te niupepa e te käwanatanga hei tohatoha i täna körero ki te iwi Mäori, arä, ko te niupepa reo-rua, ko te Maori Messenger – Te Karere Maori mai i Hänuere, 1855 tae noa ki Hepetema, 1863. Mä tënei tuhituhinga e rangahau te niupepa käwanatanga me ërä atu niupepa reo Mäori i puta mai ai i tënei wä, he mea tä e ngä äpiha käwanatanga, e ngä Päkehä whaiwhakapono, e te Hähi Wëteriana, e te käwanatanga tawhai o te Mäori, ko te Kïngitanga. Ma te tuhituhinga nei e tirotiro te pänga o ngä niupepa ki ngä tikanga me ngä mahi torangapü a te Mäori o taua wä, e rünanga i pëhea tä ngä niupepa whakaaturanga i ngä take nui ki te iwi Mäori, hei tauira, ko te pakanga tuatahi ki Taranaki, ko te Huinga Nui ki Kohimarama, ko te taenga mai o te pakanga nui ki te Kïngitanga i Waikato. Mä ngä niupepa hei tino rauemi, ka rapu tënei tuhituhinga ki te whakaatu i pëhea te iwi Mäori i mōhio ai ki ngä take o te wä, ä, kia tukua rätou kia whakautu ana i roto i ö rätou ake reo. Me kore ake tā te Kīngitanga pepa, ko te Hokioi, hei whakaputa mai i ä rätou ake körero i roto i te tau 1862 tae atu ki 1863. Nä konei, ka taea e ngä Mäori e ātete ana ki te käwanatanga ä rätou ake whakaaro te whakamärama. Engari, käore ngä whakaaro o ngä Mäori katoa e tū ngātahi ana. Ka whakakitea e ngä niupepa reo Mäori a ngä Päkehä he whakaaro kë o ngä Mäori mö ngä take ä-häpori, ä-torangapu, arä, i roto i ngä rongo, i ngä whaikörero he mea tä, i ngä reta tuku mai hoki. Ka nui ngä hïtori o tënei takiwä e äta titiro ki ngä raruraru me ngä whawhai o te Karauna me ngä Mäori. Nä konei, ka whakakatotetia ngä Mäori e piripono ana ki te käwanatanga rätou ko ngä mea ngäkaurua ko te iwi kïhai i pïrangi ki te raruraru. Ka rapu tënei tuhituhinga kia whakamöhiotia te whänui o ngä whakaaro o taua wä.

Reweti Kohere's Model Village

by Lachy Paterson

Published in New Zealand Journal of History, 41, 1 (2007), pp. 27-44.

Rēweti Kōhere’s paper on a hypothetical model Māori village at a Te Aute College Students Association conference in... more Rēweti Kōhere’s paper on a hypothetical model Māori village at a Te Aute College Students Association conference in 1897 encapsulated the Te Aute vision for a reformed Māori society. When editor of the Anglican newspaper, Te Pipiwharauroa, Kōhere published this paper in an extended form in 1902. This article discusses the content of this piece of writing in the context of the time, and how the advent of Maori Councils in 1901 led him to broadcast it to a larger Māori audience five years later. It also seeks to position Kōhere, a figure eclipsed in history by Ngata, Pōmare and Te Rangi Hīroa, as one of the leading Te Aute intellectuals of his time.

Māori "Conversion" to the Rule of Law and Nineteenth-Century Imperial Loyalties

by Lachy Paterson

Published in Journal of Religious History, 32, 2 (2008), pp. 216-233.

Missionaries were among the first Europeans to interact with the New Zealand Māori, bringing an evangelical message... more Missionaries were among the first Europeans to interact with the New Zealand Māori, bringing an evangelical message with a strict set of "laws" for Māori to follow. Māori, whose own religious beliefs required rigid observance to ritual, took time to convert to missionary Christianity but, like many Oceanic peoples, did so with fervour, regulating their daily lives according to the Laws of the missionaries’ God. With the advent of British rule in New Zealand in 1840, the Treaty of Waitangi gave Māori the same rights as British subjects, but also (in the Māori-language version) guaranteed tribal autonomy. As the British administration established itself, it slowly attempted to bring Māori under the authority of the Queen's Laws, using persuasion rather than force. This article, using Māori-language newspapers of the mid-nineteenth century, discusses how some Māori approached the question of Law in a similar way to how they had converted to Christianity. This was partly due to their own, now Christianised, worldview, but it was also due to how the colonial authorities presented the principles of Law to them.

Nga Reo o ngā Niupepa, Māori-language newspapers, 1855-1863

by Lachy Paterson

PhD thesis (University of Otago, 2004) English-language version

By 1855, most Mäori still lived in a tribal setting, with little official Päkehä interference. This would have been as... more By 1855, most Mäori still lived in a tribal setting, with little official Päkehä interference. This would have been as they expected, exercising their tino rangatiratanga, the chiefly rights guaranteed by the Treaty of Waitangi. However, their world was changing. In an effort to gain Päkehä goods, many Mäori had entered the market economy. Most had converted to Christianity. Many could read and write. Some sold land to accommodate the increasing number of Päkehä settlers. These trends gratified the government. It envisaged a New Zealand society dominated by Päkehä, in which European mores would be norm, and where its sovereignty, gained through the Treaty, would be more substantive rather than nominal. At this tme, the government pursued the policy of iwi kotahi (one people) or "amalgamation". The policy included the aim of elevating Mäori socially and economically by extending to them the benefits of European civilisation. It sought too to encourage Mäori to give up their "waste" lands for Päkehä settlement, and for Mäori to accept the rule of English law, and government authority. Ultimately the two races would become one society - a Päkehä-style society. The government used newspapers for disseminating its message to Mäori, publishing the bi-lingual Maori Messenger - Te Karere Maori from January 1855 to Spetember 1863. This thesis investigates the government's newspaper, plus other Mäori language newspapers appearing within the period, printed by government agents, evangelical Päkehä, the Wesleyan Church, and the rival Mäori government, the Kïngitanga. The thesis not only looks at the impact of newspapers upon Mäori society and political issues to Mäori, including the first Taranaki War, the Kohimarama Conference, and the impending all-out war with the Kïngitanga in Waikato. Using the newspapers as its major source, this thesis seeks to show how Mäori might have understood the issues, and where possible, to allow them to respond in their own voices. We are fortunate that for almost a year the Kïngitanga was able to publish its own views in Te Hokioi, thus allowing the anti-government Mäori voice to articulate its stand. However, Mäori opinion was hardly unitary. The Päkehä-run Mäori language newspapers, through reports, reported speeches, and their corrsepondence columns, provide another set of Mäori opinions, which show a variety of opinions on political and social issues. Many histories of this period focus on the tensions and conflicts between Crown and Mäori, thus marginalising pro-government Mäori, the waverers, and those who merely wanted to keep trouble from their door. This thesis endeavours to illuminate the whole colonial discourse as it appeared in the Mäori language newspaper, providing a wide range of opinions as possible.

Hawhekaihe: Māori Voices on the Position of 'Half-castes' in Māori Scoiety

by Lachy Paterson

Published in Journal of New Zealand Studies, NS9 (2010), pp. 135-156

The essay first provides a quantitative over-view of Māori discussion of hāwhekaihe (half-castes) within the... more The essay first provides a quantitative over-view of Māori discussion of hāwhekaihe (half-castes) within the Māori-language newspaper corpus (1842-1933), and then discusses selected articles, in order to reveal a number of key points. First, hāwhekaihe were not generally viewed as a distinct racial group, and in many respects were well-integrated within Māori communities.  Second, colonialism produced a number of tensions over land within Māori tribal groupings, where members at times attempted to exclude others from land rights. Divisions between Māori and hāwhekaihe over land were most apparent in the South Island. Third, the competition for mana within the parliamentary political arena at times resulted in the two groups criticizing each other from the late 1860s. This tension between Māori and hāwhekaihe over land and mana was expressed within a “discourse of blame” that emerged in the later nineteenth century in which both groups blamed each other for the ills that had befallen the Māori people. Fourth, while a number of Pākehā spoke out against “miscegenation”, there is only one article in the niupepa specifically appealing to Māori not to marry Pākehā. Unlike the Pākehā commentators, the writer is more concerned with Māori extinction through absorption, and the loss of Māori land. Most discussion about hāwhekaihe appears in the last three decades of the nineteenth century, and tensions between Māori and hāwhekaihe appear to have largely dissipated by the early twentieth century.