MAOR108: Mana and Power Masterdoc

Mana and Power

Core Myth #1 – “Power Is Absolute in Māori Society”

• Narrative claims Māori power is unquestionable, unchecked, “might-is-right.”

• Implications of the myth:
  • Māori politics allegedly lack appeals to principle, value, or tikanga (customary law).
  • Societal decisions assumed to rely solely on raw force.
  • Reinforces depiction of Māori as “savage / barbaric,” therefore legitimising colonial suppression.

• Edward Said’s Orientalism frame: such myths reveal more about Europe’s power to manufacture knowledge than about Māori reality.

Ancillary Myth – A Pre-Māori “Pacifist” Race

• Early ethnographic texts described an ancient people with “skinny calves” & tight hair predating Polynesian arrival.

• Purpose: Intensify image of Māori as brutal conquerors, thus naturalising later British conquest.

• Historically baseless yet rhetorically powerful – shows how narrative creates colonial justification.

Clarifying Utu: Balance, Not Revenge

• Tripartite schema in Māori jurisprudence:
  • Ātākē – the initiating cause / transgression.
  • Utu – acts (violent OR non-violent) to re-establish equilibrium.
  • Ea – final state of completion / closure.

• Utu may involve:
  • Armed retaliation (killing).
  • Material appropriation (plunder).
  • Symbolic gestures (composed song).

• Western mistranslation of utu as “revenge” forces a primordial / emotional reading rather than a juridical one centred on relational balance.

19th-Century Musket Wars – Special Case, Not Norm

• Pre-musket fighting = small‐scale skirmishes (“guerrilla” in size).
  • Major workforce could not be lost; warriors were also gardeners.
  • War season = interval after planting kūmara and before harvest.

• Arrival of muskets amplified lethality & scope:
  • Hongi Hika travelled to England & Sydney, secured caches of firearms, led $10$–$15$ years of campaigns against historic rivals.
  • Violence intensity thus materially linked to European technology.

• Myth of endless cyclical warfare ignores Māori exit mechanisms (see below) and broader global parallels.

Myth #2 – “Māori Cannot Reason”

• Colonial trope of Indigenous peoples as ruled by passion, lacking intellect.

• Enabled missionary “civilising” rationales & Pākehā schooling projects.
  • Quoted warning from prophet Te Kooti Rikirangi: “Don’t send our children to those schools lest they return to oppress us.”

Power of Narrative – Butler’s Materialisation

• Judith Butler: words materialise; discourse has real-world effects—policies, land seizures, schooling practices.

• Māori parallel: kupu (word) carries more danger than a stick; linguistic acts can reorder reality.

Cannibalism – Fact, Scale, and Humour

• Yes, practiced, though frequency greatly exaggerated.

• Explanations:
  • Ritual consumption of mana.
  • Pragmatic or acquired taste.

• Black-humour anecdote: Bay of Islands chiefs re-exhumed body for feast after missionary insisted on burial.

Structure & Logic of Māori Warfare

• Typical battles: handful of casualties; retreat once tide turned.

• Largest pre-European battle Hingakākā (Southern Waikato) – ~$10{,}000$ combatants; fought over control of wānanga (higher schools / knowledge), not land or women.

• Conflicts remembered via whakapapa (genealogy), songs, names—ensuring later redress yet also providing institutional memory for peace.

Treaty of Waitangi – Divergent Texts & Rising Tension

• $1840$: c. $2{,}000$ Britons vs up to $100{,}000$ Māori ⇒ Britain sought treaty over war.

• Signatures:
  • English text – $\approx30$ rangatira.
  • Māori text – $\approx500$ rangatira.

• Textual conflict:
  • English: Māori cede sovereignty yet retain undisturbed land possession.
  • Māori: grant kāwanatanga (governance) to Crown, but retain tino rangatiratanga (sovereignty).

• Post-treaty dynamics: by $1858$ settler population ≅ Māori; land hunger intensified; Parliament (est. $\approx1852$) began legislating authority.

Brookfield’s “Gradual Revolution” Theory

• Legal scholar F. M. Brookfield: Although Māori did not cede sovereignty in $1840$, Crown gained de facto sovereignty gradually via institutions & assertion of law.

• Insight: if sovereignty shifted once through gradual change, it could theoretically shift again the same way.

Developing a Theory of Power

• Classical Europe: authority flowed from God → clergy → laity; behavioural regulation through moral coercion (omnipresent deity).

• Modern metaphor: Panopticon prison design (Foucault’s Discipline and Punish)—architecture internalises surveillance; mirrors God-like gaze.

Māori Concepts – Mana & Tapu

• Mana: transferable, relational charisma / authority bestowed by gods; “felt” through aura, achievements, lineage.
  • Neither intrinsically good nor evil – agnostic.
  • Can empower constructive leadership or destructive domination.

• Tapu: manifestation of divine potency when sacred realm intersects human realm; signals heightened risk/sanctity.

• Distinction: mana resides primarily among humans; whenever that potency becomes sacralised or dangerous, it is experienced as tapu.

• Illustration: meeting Sir Hugh Kawharu—audience sensed mana through his intellect, athleticism, chiefly whakapapa.

Foundational Cosmology – Conflict as Normative

• Creation narrative: Children separate Rangi (Sky-Father) and Papa (Earth-Mother).
  • Establishes conflict & tension as the baseline of existence.
  • Society therefore crafts tools to manage, not deny, conflict.

Institutional Tools for Peace & Balance

• Utu system (see earlier).

• Tātau Pounamu – literally “greenstone door”; inter-tribal marriages sealing peace.

• Hohou rongo – generic term for peacemaking/reconciliation rites.

• Efficacy: post-marriage, warring tribes became inter-related; violent recourse now socially costly.

Tikanga – Contextual Jurisprudence

• Root tika = “correct / fitting within context,” not absolute good.

• Tikanga comprises actions/protocols that restore balance in relationships (human ↔ human, human ↔ environment, living ↔ ancestral).

• What is tika in one scenario may be kāhoro (inappropriate) in another; judgement requires reading of time, place, relationships, and prevailing mana / tapu states.

Ethical & Practical Take-Aways

• Reject simplifications of Māori violence; instead analyse comparative context, technology influx, and indigenous governance mechanisms.

• Discursive myths are not harmless: they justify dispossession, schooling agendas, and ongoing power imbalances.

• Re-centering Māori epistemology (mana, tapu, utu, tikanga) offers alternative frameworks for justice and sovereignty conversations today.

Nation State, Naming, and the Aotearoa Debate

• Lecture goal: unpack myths that “Aotearoa is a post-colonial invention,” critique anti-Aotearoa arguments, and explore how names shape nationhood.

• Central claims disputed:

  • “Aotearoa is an inauthentic Māori tradition; we should stop using it.”
    • Variant 1 – people wanting no Māori names at all.
    • Variant 2 – people wanting Māori names used only in a narrowly “correct” (static) way.

  • “This country already has a name/identity—New Zealand—and it is sufficient.”

• Nation-state concept: modern “country” status arises only once other nation states recognise your borders and governing structures (international narcissism: “I recognise you because you look like me”).

• Key historical marker: $1884$ Berlin Conference, where European powers formally carved up much of the world (including the Pacific).

The Political Act of Naming

• Naming ranges from apparently benign (naming a dog “Spot”) to deeply political (naming land, peoples, or genders).

• Judith Butler (Gender Trouble): the doctor’s birth announcement (“It’s a girl!”) is a speech-act with material consequences—sets life pathways; words do things.

• Treaty settlements frequently restore Māori place-names (e.g., Aoraki / Mt Cook), demonstrating the political stakes of a single letter (e.g., the Whanganui “h” debate led by Michael Laws).

Language, Perception, and Environmental Stewardship

• Language reflects/structures what we notice and value in the world.
  • Māori possess many words for winds and incantations—because winds predict weather, vital for planning.

• Tove Skutnabb-Kangas (“Linguistic Genocide in Education,” $800-900$ pp): argues correlation $\big(\text{Linguistic Diversity}\downarrow \;\Rightarrow\; \text{Biological Diversity}\downarrow\big)$.
  • Fewer languages ⇒ fewer named phenomena ⇒ less care ⇒ environmental degradation.

Authenticity Arguments Regarding Aotearoa

• Variant 1 (No Māori names): often cite other Māori names (Te Waipounamu, Te Ika a Māui) to dismiss “Aotearoa.”
  • Tactic viewed as bad faith—goal is erasure, not accuracy.

• Variant 2 (Correct use only): presumes language is static; ignores natural semantic change (e.g., Waikato chiefs’ names removed from everyday speech, forcing new words).

• Paradox: applying same authenticity test to “New Zealand” exposes its shaky Dutch origin (Abel Tasman likened land to Zeeland).

Bad Faith Argumentation

• Definition: engaging under pretence of debate while having already foreclosed other views.

• Modern polarisation fosters bad-faith stances; lecturer avoids such debates.

Invention, Tradition, and Cultural Dynamism

• Words/rituals are invented, then become “traditional.”
  • Māori myth pair: Tāwhaki (stability) vs Māui (internal change); once Māui’s innovation settles, it becomes new tradition.

• Alan Hanson, “The Making of the Māori: Culture Invention and Its Logic” ( $1988$ ): examples of post-contact inventions:
  • Io – supreme creator god, articulated c.$1850s$ after tohunga conference; responds to Christian monotheism.
  • Great Fleet myth – orderly arrival of $7$ waka; actually many canoes over generations.
  • Māoritanga – political umbrella term to unify diverse iwi.

• Homi Bhabha’s “originary moment”: anti-colonial movements idealise a frozen pre-European past.

• Lewis Gordon: “imposition of authenticity” expected of Indigenous peoples (blood quantum, language fluency) yet never of Europeans.

Patriotism, Diaspora, and Māori Identity

• Rugby-league case: James Tamou (Australian team, Māori heritage) vs Benji Marshall calling him unpatriotic. Raises: loyalty to which nation-state when the state is colonial?

• Building a marae in Sydney debate: Morgan Godfrey claimed disrespectful to Aboriginal people; lecturer counters that Māori have historic presence (e.g., Parramatta’s Tī Rangihaeata Park, named $1800s$).
  • Movement and new “homelands” (Hawaiki) align with ancestral voyaging tradition—mobility ≠ loss of authenticity.

The “Sea of Islands” and Regional Reimagining

• Epeli Hauʻofa’s essay “Our Sea of Islands.”
  • Rejects narrative of tiny, weak island states; re-imagines Pacific peoples as connected by ocean vastness.
  • Borders are recent, colonial impositions that ignore centuries of Polynesian navigation.

• Provocation: could South-Pacific states cooperate—or confederate—like multilingual $\approx$ $17,000$-island Indonesia, to amplify political clout?

Key Scholars, Texts, and Terms Mentioned

• Judith Butler – Gender Trouble.

• Tove Skutnabb-Kangas – Linguistic Genocide in Education.

• Alan Hanson – Counterpoint in Māori Culture; The Making of the Māori.

• Homi Bhabha – concept of “originary moment.”

• Lewis Gordon – “imposition of authenticity.”

• Epeli Hauʻofa – Our Sea of Islands.

• Michael Laws – Whanganui “h” controversy.

• Names & concepts: Aoraki, Te Waipounamu, Te Ika a Māui, Io, Great Fleet, Māoritanga, bad-faith argument, international narcissism.

awheke, me mate ururoa” – “Do not die like an octopus (which curls in on itself); die like a hammerhead shark (fighting to the end).”

• • Embodies perpetual resistance ideology.

Outcomes Summarised by Historian James Belich

• Māori won most individual battles but ultimately lost the war.

Major Campaign Regions

• Bay of Islands (Northern War)

• Bay of Plenty

• East Coast pursuits (e.g., Te Kooti)

• Waikato invasion (Great South Road, Rangiriri, Rangiaowhia, Ōrākau)

• Taranaki (North & South; prophet Tītokowaru; American advisor Kimble Bent)

• Wellington & Blenheim (smaller engagements)

• South Island largely spared large-scale conflicts.

Māori Military Innovations

• Strategic maxim: choose battle sites—never engage unless confident of victory (pre-Sun Tzu logic).

• Fighting pā redesigns:

  • Zig-zag embrasures in palisade walls create interlocking musket fields.

  • Extensive tunnel networks—protection from artillery & surprise counter-attacks.

  • Example: Pukehinahina (Gate Pā, Tauranga) endured a record bombardment (24 h, heaviest shell weight of any 19ᵗʰ-c. battle to that date); Māori emerged from tunnels, encircled British storming party, inflicted heavy losses.

• Guerrilla tactics: hit-and-run raids on British supply lines along Great South Road; slow British logistics earned General Cameron nickname “the lame seagull.”

• Formal etiquette: Chief Henare Taratoa issued written rules of engagement to British (protect women/children, care for wounded on both sides).

Factors Undermining Long-Term Māori Resistance

1. Seasonality – warriors were also gardeners; campaigns limited by planting & harvest cycles.

2. Inter-tribal divisions – “Kingites” (Kīngitanga loyalists) vs “Queenites” (Crown allies); British exploited historical debts & rivalries.

Economic Cost & Shift to Legal Mechanisms

• Wars became too expensive for a declining British Empire.

• Turning-point population parity $1858$ – Europeans ≈ Māori.

• Land acquisition pivoted to legislation:

  1. New Zealand Settlements Act $1863$ – legalised large-scale confiscations.

  2. Native Land Court Acts $1863$ & $1865$ – converted communally held whenua into individual titles for purchase; historian David Williams labels it “Te Kooti Tango Whenua” (“land-grabbing court”).

• These tools surpassed warfare in effectiveness.

Reparations Politics & Waitangi Tribunal

• Tribunal (est. 1975) hears claims of Crown breaches, but process designed & controlled by Crown—judge, jury, and defendant.

• Post-1990s: Crown ceased presenting rigorous counter-evidence → claimant narratives less challenged → nuance further reduced.

• Settlements driven by politics of public acceptability, not full restitution or utu (reciprocal justice).

• Outcome: reinforces international myth of New Zealand’s “good race relations.”

Historiographical Shifts & “Revisionist” Scholarship

• Early colonial propaganda: framed Māori as savage aggressors; British as righteous.

• Since 1960s: wave of historians (Belich, King, etc.) reevaluate sources, emphasise Māori agency & complexity.

National “Goodness” & Theodicy Analogy

• Western tradition grapples with theodicy (If God is all-good & all-powerful, why evil?).

• Nation-states inherit this binary morality: portray themselves as inherently “good” while acknowledging past wrongs in ways that do not tarnish self-image (Biggar as exemplar).

Brookfield’s “Gradual Revolution” Thesis

• Paul Brookfield: Māori did not cede sovereignty in 1840; Crown acquired it later through incremental, often unlawful, steps (“revolution by stealth”).

• Implication (lecturer’s optimistic spin): if taken gradually, sovereignty can also be re-taken gradually through persistent activism.

Two Long-Standing Māori Strategies

1. External challenge & open resistance.

2. Collaboration / co-option to reform system from within.

• 20ᵗʰ-c. emphasis on systemic engagement (legal, political) → surprising patience despite slow material change.

Speculative Exercise: If Tino Rangatiratanga Had Been Honoured

• Linguistic landscape – widespread bilingualism / multilingualism (Te Reo + English + Pacific languages).

• Political geography – Aotearoa might be one node in a broader Polynesian/Oceanic federation; analogy to the EU or Indonesia’s archipelagic state.

• Foreign relations – NZ could shed colonial oversight mindset; e.g., allow Cook Islands or Solomon Islands free to choose partners (China) without NZ anxiety.

• Encourages students to envision transformative futures beyond current nation-state boundaries.

Black-Humour Battlefield Anecdotes

• At Pukehinahina, two chiefs joked as artillery shells landed; intestines landed on a taiaha: “Look how kind the Pākehā are—they send us delicacies.”

• Intended to show Māori psychological resilience and gallows humour.

Dates & Facts Worth Memorising

• $1790s$ – Māori (Ngāti Mutunga & Ngāti Tama) conquer Chatham Islands: example invoked by Biggar.

• $1835$ – Chatham Islands massacre/enslavement (10 % killed, rest enslaved).

• $1845–46$ – Northern War (Ruapekapeka, etc.).

• $1858$ – European population equals Māori.

• $1860–72$ – New Zealand (Land) Wars peak years.

• $1863$ – New Zealand Settlements Act; Native Land Court Act.

• $1865$ – Further Native Land Court legislation.

Practical Implications for Students

• Critically interrogate all narratives—whether comforting or offensive.

• Be wary of binary moral framings; seek nuance.

• Remember quiz in Week 4:

  • 20 items, based solely on PowerPoint content.

  • $15\text{–}20$ min typical; open-slide allowed; peer-sitting irrelevant.

Closing Thoughts

• The struggle over historical narrative is ongoing; recognising complexity empowers meaningful engagement and future change.

• Lecturer encourages continuous resistance and imagination: What new configurations could emerge if we truly centre Te Tiriti o Waitangi and Māori sovereignty?

Revival of Traditional Karakia (Incantations)

• Traditional karakia (ritual incantations) now ubiquitous at marae openings, tangihanga, public gatherings.

• Revival traced to Te Māori Exhibition of the $1980\text{s}$:

  • Māori artefacts toured major U.S. museums; delegations of kaumātua performed ritual openings.

  • Elders (e.g.

  • Hohua Tutunui-Aihe) researched, re-composed or even invented incantations to meet ceremonial needs.

• Pre-$1980\text{s}$ Māori gatherings more likely featured Christian prayers; the exhibition signalled a flip toward "traditional" karakia.

Historical Background: Missionaries & Early Conversion

• First sermon by Samuel Marsden $\text{(Christmas Day }1814\text{)}$; arrival of Thomas Kendall early $1810\text{s}$.

• Kendall:

  • Published first Māori book Te Karatia o Ngā Ture $\approx$ Te Korao no New Zealand.

  • Learned te reo, declared Māori had adequate spirituality, urged London CMS to halt mission; later recalled for "going native" and an extramarital relationship.

• By mid–$19^{\text{th}}$ C. Anglican & Catholic churches held strong Māori footholds; whānau often dedicated one child to the clergy.

Syncretic Māori Christian-Political Movements

• Pai Mārire / Hauhau (founded by Te Ua Haumēne, Taranaki): "Good & Peaceful"—became ideological base for Kīngitanga (Māori King Movement).

• Ringatū (founded by Te Kooti Rikirangi):

  • Te Kooti wrongfully imprisoned on Rēkohu (Chatham Islands), "rose from death", escaped, waged decades-long guerrilla campaign; left prolific prophecies & waiata.

• Iharaira / Israelites (founded by Rua Kēnana at Maungapōhatu, Tūhoe):

  • Taught community to see themselves as a Lost Tribe of Israel; practised deliberate tapū disruption (e.g. burning carving chips as firewood).

• Dozens of smaller prophetic movements in Hokianga, Bay of Islands etc.—all re-read Bible through Māori cosmology.

Key Figures & Texts Mentioned

• Te Ua Haumēne → Pai Mārire / Hauhau.

• Kereopa Te Rau: Hauhau leader who executed Rev. Volkner (episode of utu; lecturer cites earlier lecture).

• Te Kooti Rikirangi → Ringatū; see Judith Binney Redemption Songs.

• Rua Kēnana → Iharaira; see Allan Hanson "The Cult of Rua: Māori Roots & Christian Branches".

• Wīremu Tāmehana (the "Kingmaker")—devout Christian who still confessed inability to "forget the old ways" before death.

• Scholarship:

  • Bronwyn Elsemore Mana from Heaven.

  • Judith Binney The Legacy of Guilt (life of Thomas Kendall).

  • Lindsay Head on "Christian mana".

Core Theoretical Concepts & Lecturer’s Critiques

1 Expunging versus Layering

• Idea that colonisation "deleted" Māori religion likened to swapping Lego blocks—oversimplifies cultural memory.

• Human cognition lacks an "existential delete button"; beliefs "seep into our bones" and swell (adapt, hybridise).

2 Māui–Tāwhaki Model (Change vs. Tradition)

• Tāwhaki = inherited, stable tradition.

• Māui = disruptive innovation, novelty on cultural periphery.

• Christianity read as Māui-type intervention that was co-opted into Tāwhaki core over time; did not erase it.

3 Universalism vs. Pluriversalism

• Universalism: European Enlightenment claims single, correct worldview; exports it globally.

• Boaventura de Sousa Santos: calls Western knowledge "abyssal thinking"—non-Western knowledges rendered absent.

• Proposes ecology of knowledges / pluriversalism—multiple epistemologies coexist without forced reconciliation.

4 Comfort with Paradox

• Māori epistemology handles contradiction (e.g. only "one God – and many Māori atua" story).

• Practical value: more conceptual tools to tackle problems (climate change example & lecturer’s debate with daughter).

Case Study: Rua Kēnana & Tapū/Noa Oscillation

• Outsider view: Rua abolished tapū.

• Hanson’s analysis: community cycles between gathering (tapū) at Maungapōhatu and dispersal (noa) mirror classic Māori sacred/profane rhythm—more Māori than Judeo-Christian.

Arguments Against Total Christian “Purge” in De-colonisation

• Logically impossible to forget $200+$ yrs of entanglement.

• Risks romanticising a pre-contact "originary moment" that never existed (Homi Bhabha).

• Implies younger generations "know better" than tūpuna who adopted Christianity tactically.

• Examples from Mexico & Philippines: Indigenous cosmologies persist behind Catholic forms—subversion, not capitulation.

Christianity as Political Technology

• Biblical literacy used to hold Pākehā to account (e.g. Ngāti Pāoa elders quoting scripture in $1990\text{s}$ Environmental Court).

• Ringatū practice: continuous oral recitation of scripture during Rā & Hāpati lasting hours / days—oral retention strategy.

Wider Ethical & Philosophical Implications

• Need to resist drive to declare a single "right" system—otherwise anti-colonial struggle reproduces colonial universality.

• Embrace pluralist or pluriversal stance: different knowledge systems may produce incommensurable yet co-valid insights.

• Cultivate ability to "sit with the uncomfortable," as lecturer’s basketball coach: "Suck it up." (Accept paradox & complexity.)

Metaphors & Illustrative Examples

• Lego blocks: wrong idea that beliefs can just be swapped (Indigenous out, Christian in).

• Night & Day in Māori thought: day (agency) vs. night (uncontrollable forces); humility toward uncontrollable events (applied to climate change debate).

• Millennial cults comparison: climate-catastrophe activism framed like apocalyptic religious movements—illustrates human hubris & need for epistemic plurality.

Important Dates, Numbers, Places (LaTeX Form)

• $1814$ – Marsden’s first sermon.

• $1810\text{s}$ – Thomas Kendall’s arrival; first Māori orthography.

• $1840\text{s}$–$1870\text{s}$ – Peak of prophetic movements (Pai Mārire, Ringatū, Hauhau).

• $1858$ – Pōtatau Te Wherowhero crowned first Māori King.

• $1880\text{s}$–$1890\text{s}$ – Lindsay Head’s period for "Christian mana" formation.

• $1905$–$1916$ – Rua Kēnana’s Maungapōhatu era; police raid $1916$.

• $1980\text{s}$ – Te Māori exhibition & karakia revival.

Connections to Prior Lectures & Foundational Principles

• Links back to earlier lecture on utu (Kereopa Te Rau & Rev. Volkner).

• Continues theme of Māori intellectual appropriation and indigenisation of foreign concepts (cf. Maui/Tāwhaki tension covered previously).

Suggested Readings for Deeper Study

• Allan Hanson, "The Cult of Rua: Māori Roots and Christian Branches".

• Judith Binney, Redemption Songs (Te Kooti) & The Legacy of Guilt (Thomas Kendall).

• Bronwyn Elsemore, Mana from Heaven.

• Boaventura de Sousa Santos, "Abyssal Thinking" (ecology of knowledges).

• Lindsay Head articles on "Christian mana".

• Graham Hingangaroa Smith et al., "Equivocal Knowing & Elusive Realities" (discusses paradox & pluralism).

Study & Exam Tips

• Be able to define: karakia, tapū/noa, syncretism, universalism vs pluriversalism.

• Memorise key prophetic leaders and match them with movements & regions.

• Understand Maui–Tāwhaki model as analytical tool for cultural change.

• Prepare examples of subversive uses of Christianity (e.g. court testimony, Rua’s oscillations).

• Reflect on ethical debate: Is purging Christianity necessary or even possible? Formulate your stance with evidence.

Key Terminology & Definitions

• Modernity

  • European project beginning circa $15^{th}-16^{th}$ centuries.

  • Characterised by Enlightenment rationality, industrialisation, capitalism, scientific revolution.

  • Lecturer mantra: “When Europe left Europe and tried to make the rest of the world Europe.”

  • Modernity’s wealth extracted from Global South colonies – the “dark side” (Mignolo).

• Colonialism (formal)

  • Period of direct political domination by European powers.

  • Formally “ended” via independence movements but institutions remain colonial.

• Coloniality (Maldonado-Torres)

  • Long-standing patterns of power born of colonialism that continue to shape culture, labour, knowledge and inter-subjective relations long after formal colonial rule.

• Decoloniality / Decolonialism

  • Intellectual & practical project aimed at dismantling coloniality.

  • Focuses on reconceptualising relationships among humans and with environment.

• Mana / Power

  • Mana: Māori concept encompassing authority, prestige, spiritual power.

  • Power: broader social–political force; lecture explores intersections.

• Post-colonial vs. Decolonial

  • Post-colonial implies colonialism is finished; decolonial scholars argue coloniality persists.

Foundational Thinkers & Quotes

• Frantz Fanon

  • Quote: “Decolonisation involves the destruction of the coloniser and the native.”

  • Interpretation: Destroy the categories/labels and asymmetric relations they entail, not literal people.

  • Identifies twin neuroses:

  • Inferiority complex of colonised

  • Superiority complex of coloniser

• Walter Mignolo

  • Coloniality = “dark side of modernity”.

• Maldonado-Torres

  • Coloniality survives colonialism; reconfigures relationships, environment, epistemology.

• Hokowhitu

  • Proposes “Monster Post-Indigenous Studies”.

  • Challenges complicity of Māori Studies with academic norms; advocates bringing the “unintelligible” into the academy.

Modernity, Enlightenment & Power

• Enlightenment shifted source of truth from God to human reason.

• Question posed: If Enlightenment logic created inequities, can the same logic solve them?

• Analogy: Bible justified slavery; later re-readings used Bible to abolish slavery – yet reliance on same text is problematic.

Critiquing Power: Two Pathways

1. From within modern/colonial logic

   • Use existing concepts, laws, institutions (e.g., Bible, courts, parliamentary politics).

   • Advantages: Recognised, can hold colonisers to their declared standards.

   • Limits: May reinforce existing structures; can produce only incremental change.

2. From without modern/colonial logic

   • Invoke alternative epistemologies, relationalities.

   • Potential for radical transformation but risks being deemed “unintelligible” or dismissed.

Epistemic Wilderness Concept (Lecturer’s Research)

• Two strategies for Indigenous knowledge vis-à-vis science:

  1. Critical engagement with science (prove value on scientific terms).

  2. Disengagement to develop knowledge autonomously (“epistemic wilderness”).

• Catch-22: Recognition often demands conformity, yet conformity dilutes radical difference.

Case Study 1: Mana & Power in Aotearoa Politics – The Māori Party

• Founded $2004$ in response to Foreshore & Seabed legislation (largest single confiscation of Māori land rights).

• Political stance: Will work with either Left or Right if policy gains for Māori achieved.

• Partnership with National under John Key ($2008$) strategic for both sides.

  • Key used ACT, NZ First, Māori Party interchangeably to pass bills.

• Outcomes/limits:

  • Provided Māori voice inside government (critical engagement).

  • Did not fundamentally transform underlying colonial constitutional structure.

Foreshore & Seabed Debacle (Background)

• Māori aquaculture interests in Marlborough sought licence extension.

• Māori Land Court indicated plausible customary ownership claim over foreshore (space between low & high tide) & seabed.

• Political panic: Potential nationwide Māori ownership claims.

• Labour PM Helen Clark prioritised centrist Pākehā electorate; enacted Foreshore & Seabed Act $2004$ declaring area public (effectively Crown control).

• Ignored existing private marina/beachfront titles held by non-Māori.

• Sparked nationwide hīkoi (largest protest pre-$2023$).

Political Spectrum & Māori Alignment

• Traditional Māori support for Labour (since $1920s$) eroded $1990s$ due to unmet promises.

• Significant Treaty settlements signed under National governments.

• Right-wing appeal:

  • Property rights focus (e.g., Ngāi Tahu leaders & ACT in earlier era).

  • Charter schools enabling Māori immersion education.

• Historical conservative Māori figure: Āpirana Ngata opposed welfare dependency; valued work ethic.

Case Study 2: Hokowhitu’s Monster Post-Indigenous Studies

• Critique of Māori Studies genealogy:

  • Rooted in Anthropology (discipline of $early\,20^{th}$ century).

  • First Māori Studies seeds planted $1950s$ by linguist Prof. Bruce Biggs.

  • Early Māori scholars (Rangi Walker, Patu Hohepa, Margaret Mutu) trained within same structuralist frameworks.

• Risks:

  • “Disciplining the native” – Indigenous scholars forced into Western forms.

• Hokowhitu’s proposal:

  • Break dialectic of thesis/antithesis/synthesis that collapses difference.

  • Fanon’s metamorphosis sequence: Human → Monster (savage) → Semi-human (assimilated) → Self-determined Black man (outside dialectic).

  • Bring “unintelligible” Indigenous modes into academy to transform it.

  • Reassert metaphysical genealogies; recode Māori concepts on their own terms; centre difference without seeking sameness.

Dialectic, Symmetry & Asymmetry

• Asymmetrical relationships = power imbalance; achieving “symmetry” on coloniser’s terms still asymmetrical.

• True mutuality requires recognising/valuing radical difference, relinquishing desire for total control/knowledge of Other.

• Riddle posed: “Is achieving symmetry on the terms of one side symmetrical?” – answer: No.

Matauranga Māori vs. Science Controversy

• $2021$: Auckland University professors claimed “Mātauranga Māori is not science.”

• Debate polarised:

  • Some Māori insisted it is science to gain legitimacy (internal-logic engagement).

  • Lecturer & Hokowhitu view: It need not be shoe-horned into science; its value is intrinsic and can challenge scientific hegemony.

• Lesson: External benchmarks shouldn’t dictate Indigenous knowledge worth.

Practical / Ethical Implications

• Decolonial project is for everyone (coloniser & colonised) because colonial neuroses harm all.

• Environmental relations:

  • Coloniality commodifies nature as resource.

  • Māori epistemology frames environment relationally, not extractively.

• Research & pedagogy:

  • Need spaces to innovate outside dominant paradigms, yet also avenues to confront power structures.

  • Risk of co-optation when entering institutions; must stay alert to subtle disciplining.

Connections to Prior Lectures

• Continuation of theme: Aotearoa as “semicolon” – nation-building still in progress.

• Builds on earlier discussions of mana, power, modernity, Maui as disruptive figure, and colonial genealogies of NZ institutions.

Numerical / Statistical References (LaTeX format)

• Foreshore & Seabed Act: $2004$

• Periodisation of modernity: $15^{th}$–$16^{th}$ centuries → present.

• Time to complete upcoming quiz: <15\text{ min}

• Quiz weighting: $10\%$ of course grade.

• Political timeline snapshots: Labour dominance $1920s$ → Māori shift $1990s$; Māori Party–National accord $2008$.

Proposition & Framing

• Core claim examined: “Schooling in Aotearoa is an inherent public good.”

  • The word inherent signals an absolutist, non-nuanced stance.

  • Lecturer warns against unequivocal statements; urges analytical caution.

• Schooling is not a benign, neutral service; it is a political institution in which people decide:

  • What knowledge is valued (curriculum).

  • How it will be taught (pedagogy).

  • How it will be measured (assessment).

Assessment Debates & Current Context

• Recent government decision to abandon $\text{NCEA}$ and revert to “traditional” test-heavy systems.

• Origins of current assessment debates:

  • Global testing regimes: $\text{PISA}$, $\text{TIMSS}$, $\text{PIRLS}$ collected large-scale data on Maths, English, Science.

  • $\text{NCEA}$ was originally a reaction against rigid exam models; attempted to broaden evidence of learning.

• Lecturer:

  • Personally “not a fan of tests” because they attempt to ascribe value to thought.

  • Prefers valuing things “we ourselves connect with.”

Theoretical Lens: Bourdieu & Symbolic Violence

• Pierre Bourdieu: schools are sites of symbolic violence.

  • Capital concept: students arrive with differing social / cultural capital (language, values, habits).

  • When school rewards one form while de-valuing others, students experience symbolic violence.

• Therefore, curriculum decisions = sociopolitical struggle over knowledge.

Key Māori Education Timeline

• $1816$ – first European-style school for Māori (Thomas Kendall, Bay of Islands).

• Early $1800\text{s}$: Māori chiefs invite missionaries; schooling viewed positively as gateway to literacy & trade.

• Orthography for te reo Māori still fluid; literacy often bilingual.

• Governor Sir George Grey:

  • $1847$ Education Ordinance Act: state funding aimed to assimilate Māori children, remove them from “demoralising” village influence.

  • Grey studies Māori language & tikanga, publishes “Polynesian Mythology” (authorship contested).

• Native Schools Act $1867$:

  • Nondenominational state-controlled schools; communities had to build & partly fund.

  • Native School Code: teach literacy in Māori as a bridge to English; gradually shifted to English-only.

• Language Suppression:

  • $1905$ – Inspector formally bans te reo Māori in playgrounds.

  • Stats (Bruce Biggs): $\approx 90\%$ of Māori children spoke te reo in $1900$ → < $5\%$ by $1975$.

  • Corporal punishment for speaking Māori well-documented (Waitangi Tribunal Wai $11$ evidence).

• Curricular Discrimination:

  • $1931$ T. B. Strong: Schools should train Māori boys as “good farmers” & girls as “good farmers’ wives.”

  • Clear vocational/academic divide; school–work link assumed natural.

Māori Boarding & Area Schools

• Examples: Te Aute, St Stephen’s, St Joseph’s, Hato Paora, Turakina, Queen Victoria, Waimārama.

• Te Aute anomaly: visionary teacher offered advanced syllabus to Āpirana Ngata, Maui Pōmare, Peter Buck → produced national leaders.

Achievement Gaps & Research

• $1960$s – Harold Lavigne & C. Laugrove: When background factors equalised, Māori & Pākehā achieved similarly → gaps are social, not innate.

• $1990$s phrase “long tail of under-achievement”: international tests showed NZ overall high, but Māori & Pasifika persistently low.

• Systemic pattern, not an aberration → indicates lack of political will to change.

Critique of “Culturally Appropriate” Reforms

• Early $2000$s: influx of programmes framed as culturally responsive.

  • Core flaw: they changed pedagogy to use students’ culture but left dominant curriculum intact.

  • Lecturer: real struggle over knowledge, not merely style.

Bilingualism, Additive vs Subtractive Models

• Subtractive bilingualism myth: learning $L<em>2$ weakens $L</em>1$.

• Additive bilingualism reality: develops meta-linguistic awareness; eases further language acquisition.

• Anglo (EN) settler states are linguistic outliers: largely monolingual compared to multilingual world norms.

Māori-Medium & Multilingual Education

• $1980$s Kōhanga Reo → $1990$s Kura Kaupapa Māori / Wharekura expansion.

• Majority impact: revitalised te reo, reshaped national discourse.

• Limitation: still only ~$10\%$ of Māori children; $\approx 90\%$ remain in mainstream where disparities persist.

• Some kura add third languages (e.g., Spanish in Rotorua) → model of plurilingualism.

Re-Imagining Schooling

• Gilbert – “Catching the Knowledge Wave”:

  • Calls to rethink knowledge itself; dissolve traditional school structures; create community-embedded “learning nodes.”

• Alternative functions: beyond labour-market prep → civic responsibility, creativity, social cohesion.

• Michel Foucault perspective: schools historically double as child-minding enabling adult labour participation.

• Question raised: Does early streaming deny late-bloomers access to sciences & advanced study?

• Concept of “pluriversal” (vs universal) education: embrace multiple epistemologies & languages; reject one-size-fits-all.

Key Personalities, Scholars & Texts Mentioned

• Pierre Bourdieu – symbolic violence, capital.

• Linda Tuhiwai Smith – schooling as site of struggle.

• Bernard Spolsky & Joshua Fishman – language planning, Hebrew & Māori revival links.

• Sir George Grey – Education Ordinance Act, ethnography.

• Bruce Biggs – linguist, te reo decline stats.

• T. B. Strong – $1931$ policy advocating agricultural training.

• Āpirana Ngata, Maui Pōmare, Peter Buck – Te Aute alumni.

• Archer, Oppenheim, Carter, St George – satirical “Māori Otis Test” article critiquing biased IQ tests.

• Jane Gilbert – “Catching the Knowledge Wave.”

Ethical & Philosophical Implications

• Equity vs assimilation: historical policies show assimilationist intent disguised as benevolence.

• Corporal punishment & language bans = direct human rights issues.

• Ongoing assessment debates raise ethical question: Do tests serve learning or merely sorting?

• Multilingual, pluriversal approaches align with global realities and Treaty principles.

Numerical & Statistical Snapshots

• Te reo use: $1900:\;90\%$ fluent → 1975:<5\%.

• Māori in mainstream schooling today: $\approx 90\%$.

• Bilingual benefit: research shows additive effects on cognitive flexibility (qualitative but widely supported).

Take-Away Questions for Exam & Reflection

• In what ways do curriculum, pedagogy, and language each act as arenas of political struggle?

• How does Bourdieu’s concept of symbolic violence illuminate persistent achievement gaps?

• Evaluate the strengths & weaknesses of $\text{NCEA}$ vs traditional exams in light of equity & knowledge diversity.

• Could Gilbert’s community-node model realistically replace conventional schools? What barriers exist?

• How might additive bilingualism and pluriversality reshape NZ’s future workforce and civic life?