Te Ao Maori

Thirty two years ago, a study of Maori ceremonial gatherings, ended with an epilogue that sets a context for the focus of this lecture today, in this course focusing on Te Ao Maori.

The challenge issued by the author on her final page was:

“If an explosive disintegration of race relations is to be avoided in New Zealand, Maori culture should be accorded respect, and actively fostered in the cities”.

The book was of course 'Hui' by Distinguished Professor Dame Anne Salmond.

It is indeed an honour to be invited to take part in this special course – which is all about according respect to Maori culture.

Respect, I am sad to say, which has been progressively chiselled away by current Government actions.

For if we are to assess how far we have come as a nation, in preventing an “explosive disintegration of race relations”, one only needs to consult the report from the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, released on 15 August 2007.

That report noted, amongst other things:

the Government has not formally endorsed the New Zealand Action Plan for Human Rights, which also refers to race relations issues;


that Government actions serve to diminish the importance and relevance of the Treaty and to create a context unfavourable to the rights of Maori.


that recommendations made by the Waitangi Tribunal are generally not binding, and that only a small percentage of these recommendations are followed by the Government.


But what do these reports on paper actually mean?

I want to share just two examples of how such action – or more to the point inaction – affects tangata whenua.

The first, is through the learnings that many Maori students pick up within schools. Te Kotahitanga, a study of Maori students in mainstream secondary schools, reported that in the eyes of the majority Maori students, school was a negative experience.

They spoke about being constantly reproached in behavioural terms; and how infrequently they were spoken to about their learning. They yearned for positive recognition and acceptance of their culture and they gave specific examples of what this would mean – things like correctly pronouncing their names; being able to wear their taonga; their culture included, their own experiences valued. One student shared a common perception:

Like people look at us like we’re suppose to be some big tough people but then if something happens…it’s all of us judged for that happening. Like if it’s good then, “Oh, they’re being good,” and if it’s bad, then it’s like, “I wonder if they’ve all got something to do with it.”

Is it any wonder then, with such perceptions being tagged to Maori, that so many of our people head across the Tasman to become, what some are calling, Ngati Skippy, the Maori who live in Te Ao Moemoea.

A report released just this weekend gone, Maori in Australia, gives a vivid picture about the respect to which Maori culture is accorded. A commonly cited reason for leaving Aotearoa was what survey participants described as racism and discrimination that kept Maori “in their place”.

The survey, of over 1200 Maori living in Australia, included perceptions which were brutal in their honest assessment of Aotearoa in 2007. One man in Canberra when asked about New Zealand, said:

“The media’s always full of negative stories about Maori. People are always thinking the bloody Maoris”.

Prejudice against Maori was described by another man in north Queensland being revealed in Maori being “kept drugged and drunk to keep them down”. And across the state in Melbourne, another man wrote that:

“having a flash car in Australia isn’t even a head turning exercise but if a Maori owns a flash car in New Zealand he or she is automatically assumed to be involved with drugs”.

The report is conclusive in its evidence that for Maori, Australia, Te Ao Moemoea, appeared to be a land of opportunity and freedom, in contrast to their own turangawaewae, Aotearoa. A woman in Melbourne described her belief, and I quote, that

“Maori in Australia are better off and we don’t like what is happening at home – Pakeha promote the lack of unity to continually keep Maori oppressed and in a rut – which is where they always want us to be. The seabed and foreshore policies are just one example of how to divide Maori”.

Even more depressing was another comment from another woman in Melbourne

"It is paramount that the New Zealand Government begin to recognise that Maori are achieving and are successful when living away from New Zealand, and they have to be asking themselves why is this not happening in New Zealand.

To oppress a people and manipulate politics to achieve their own means will only see more Maori recognising that they do have a future and they can be successful…..and still retain their Maoriness, unfortunately they have to leave New Zealand to do it".

How bad is that? Is this the future for Te Ao Maori? That we, tangata whenua, people of this land – have to leave our land to be successful?

I have chosen to come upfront and to share these thoughts with you because they are a part of the reality of Te Ao Maori that we can not ignore. They are the voices of our future – our tamariki at school. They are the voices of our whanau – those who have fled these shores. They are the voices of Maori.

But there are other voices which also shape Te Ao Maori. One of these voices is from this very institution – Dr Paparangi Reid, the TÅ«muaki, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, The University of Auckland; who said:

"People ask, what’s the Maori way, or the Maori perspective, or whatever. It’s plural, it’s diverse, it’s multiple, it’s flexible, it’s changeable. We must resist people trying to make us into museum exhibits of past behaviours. We are complex, changing, challenging and developing – as is our right".

And so, when I think, what is our right as tangata whenua, what are the key foundations of being Maori in today’s world, I can think of many incredible individuals, amazing initiatives, inspirational leaders and mentors and examples of what I know of, as being Maori.

Being Maori to me – is carrying the legacy of my mother, Ruiha, my grandfather, Paora Kopukau Niania, being mokopuna of Te Kikiri o te Rangi – the eponymous ancestor of the sub-tribe Ngai te Kikiri o te Rangi.

Being Maori to me is knowing, living, honouring my whakapapa back to Toi Kairakau my ancestor; who lives still, in me.

Being Maori is proud to know that on the 24th June 1840, my tupuna, Ngai Te Whatuiapiti kinsmen Te Hapuku and Harawira Mahikai, signed Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

Being Maori to me – is also remembering my childhood in Takapau – being poor, living in a shack with no electricity, sleeping in coats wrapped against the cold – but with the richest of memories of all our adventures with our cousins in the shearing sheds, down the creek, eeling or just generally making mischief.

Being Maori in my life, has also been through the transformation Te Aute provided. An opportunity to be together as Maori. It was also the opportunity for me to learn te reo rangatira. Most of the boys who attended Te Aute spoke te reo, and so to cover my shame, I made myself learn it, and have never looked back.

Being Maori to me, has driven me to qualify with my PhD in anthropology and linguistics, thirty years ago this year; and to spend eight years as Professor of Education at this very campus.

Being Maori to me, was in contemplating a vision of nationhood, in my role as CEO of the inaugural Race Relations Office in 1972.

Being Maori is represented in my dream in building an intertribal marae for urban Maori – our world at Hoani Waititi – complete with kohanga reo, kura kaupapa Maori, whare kura, wananga.

Being Maori to me is working with gang leaders, with youth offenders, with victims - trialling Hui whakapiripiri, - having a hui where there is no judgement, but to seek reconciliation and healing. It is about restorative justice, work that we initiated at Hoani Waititi with the support of Judge Mick Brown – it’s about facing up to your own whanau, recognising your wrongdoing, being accountable.

Being Maori is every year for the last 32 years, composing, designing, choreographing, leading and participating in Te Roopu Manutaki cultural group.

Being Maori is facing up to my mokopuna who came to me, telling me “Poppa, you’re going to die because of your cigarettes”. So I went auahi kore overnight, my dedication to quitting smoking being, as the ads said, “all about whanau”.

Being Maori is taking my part in the hikoi of 2004 – fighting the act of oppression that would see our foreshore and seabed redefined, our rights to justice denied, our access to the courts rebuked.

Being Maori is about living my life driven by kaupapa and tikanga Maori – honouring the dreams and aspirations of tangata whenua which have been passed down from our ancestors.

Kaupapa Maori is the foundation of Maori culture and is derived from this Maori world-view. It inspires me, it drives the Maori Party forward, it is our staunch ambition to give life to these values and to uphold our commitment to Te Tiriti o Waitangi as the founding document of this nation.

All of these experiences, all of these facets are just but opening the door to te Ao Maori – as it is expressed in my life.

If you were to ask my colleagues, Hone Harawira, Te Ururoa Flavell or Tariana Turia, their story would be a completely different one – as rich in its diversity as it is strong in its commonality.

For in te Ao Maori, our cultural emancipation, our wellbeing as whanau, hapu and iwi are immersed in the knowledge of our korero tuku iho.

Ko wai ka hua ka tohu? Our future lies in the strength of knowing that those who seek and learn will bear fruit in their time.

Te Ao Maori is about being alive in a world in which cultural identity thrives, in which cultural knowledge flourishes, and in which the wellbeing of our language, culture and values is demonstrated in everyday usage.

I have every confidence that the negativity of the stories I shared with you at the onset of this lecture, can be addressed through our shared commitment to invest in the wellbeing and health of tangata whenua in the cities and the country, in the universities and in the homes, in the malls and on the sportsfield, in te Ao Maori.

Te Ao Maori is to be respected, to be cherished, to be loved – for it is the very essence of this nation, Aotearoa.

And so I leave the final word to another old boy of Te Aute, Te Rangihiroa, who said

Kaua e waiho ta tatau taonga i a tatau anake engari tukua ki waho hei matakitaki ma te ao

Do not leave our treasures to ourselves alone, but release it for the world to view.