In recent years considerable emphasis has been placed upon the education of the Maori. This is not in itself a new development, but instead, one which has been accentuated by the rapid growth in Maori population, the marked drift to the cities which has continued unabated since the end of the second world, and the general realisation of the fact that large reservoir of human potential remains untapped when the interest of a dominant culture are not reflected in those of minority groups.

Whole document restricted, see Access Instructions file below for details of how to access the print copy. / This is an archaeological study of Maori occupation along the lower Waihou River, Hauraki from the time of first settlement at about 1450 until 1850 AD. It identifies changes in the environment, economy, settlement distribution and demography over time, and details four pre-contact and three post-contact phases of occupation with differing economic, social, political and spatial responses. These are brought together in a developmental framework describing a series of cultural changes, thereby enabling the underlying processes to be ascertained. This research makes several arguments. Firstly, that Maori material culture has to be understood in the light of the functional and socio-political context in which the objects were made and used. Secondly, that regional analysis of this type employing a range of detailed environmental, settlement location, historical and excavation data are necessary in order to provide an historical developmental framework. Thirdly, that New Zealand settlement distribution studies have to adopt a more flexible approach using models more appropriate to Maori society. Fourthly, that cultural processes can best be analysed through the underlying ideological concepts of the society whose culture is being studied. The thesis concludes that the people of Hauraki displayed a range of dynamic socio-political responses to a variety of natural and human induced events that occurred over a four hundred year period.

Whole document restricted, see Access Instructions file below for details of how to access the print copy. / This thesis is a regional study using several kinds of evidence, The focus of the work is the South Kaipara peninsula, on the west coast north of Auckland and the successive Maori peoples whose home it was, There are four major sections: the social environment, the natural environment, archaeological research and, drawing these three together, a multi-disciplinary approach to analysis. The first section comprises three chapters. Chapter 1 traces the doings of the ancestors, using traditions and whakapapa gathered during the latter part of last century. Chapter 2 studies early eyewitness accounts, the advent of Europeans and the changes they effected. Chapter 3 considers the serious consequences of nineteenth century land alienation on the Maori inhabitants of the peninsula, and of population decrease through warfare, European diseases and economic change. The second section contains two chapters. Chapter 4 provides a background to subsequent chapters and covers geomorphology, soils, climate, flora and fauna. Chapter 5, using ethnographic material, explores the resources which would have been important to the Maori people, and the impact which successive groups made to the environment over time. Section 3, of two chapters, describes the archaeological research undertaken on the peninsula since the late 1950s. Chapter 6 includes results of the intensive site recording which began in 1975, and was largely completed in 1978. An overall analysis of the different kinds of sites and their locations is made in relation to soils, topography and height above sea level. Chapter 7 describes and analyses a midden sampling project which produced radiocarbon dates, palaeoenvironmental and shellfish species studies, and a detailed examination of the common cockle which occurred in all middens. The fourth section, Chapter 8, analyses settlement patterns. Because of the very large number and concentration of sites, the peninsula is divided into 14 geographic units so that aspects of these could be compared. Included are 1) landscape and topographic features, 2) historical settlement information, 3) the recorded sites and their frequencies, and 4) site type locations and frequencies. The findings for the areas are compared and conclusions drawn to suggest an overall culture history of the Maori people of the South Kaipara Peninsula.

The Maoris today occupy a unique position in the wider New Zealand society. On the one hand, following over a century of intensive contact and political integration with the people of European origin, they now form an inseparable part of the national society. But on the other hand, they also constitute a distinctive minority in the country accounting for 6.9 per cent of the total population of 2.4 million (in 1961). Their distinctiveness may be described in various ways, some qualitative and others statistical. However, in the overall socio-economic scene of the country, the position of the Maoris is far from static. Social and cultural changes are continuing processes and one can notice important trends in contemporary Maori life.

Recognizing the continual restructuring of Pakeha-Maori relations as dominance and subordination, this thesis sets out to gain an understanding, through a critique of ideology, of the place of schooling in the securing and maintenance of those relations. Theoretically, it draws mainly upon the concept of ideology as interpreted by Jorge Larrain but also upon Gramsci's concept of hegemony, the notion of social amnesia as presented by Jacoby and the concept of resistance as developed by Giroux. It also examines the historical development of the concepts of 'race' and 'culture' which are employed ideologically to rationalize educational policies concerning the Maori. Tracing the progression of policies and practices in Maori education from the 1830s to the present day, the research shows the schooling of the Maori to have contributed significantly to the securing of Pakeha economic and political dominance in the nineteenth century and to the maintenance of that dominance through much of the twentieth century. Of particular significance has been the control of Maori access to knowledge. With Maori resistance playing a considerable part in the shaping of these policies and practices, the school is recognized as one of the sites of Maori-Pakeha struggle. Widespread underachievement of Maori within education - revealed in 1960 by the Hunn Report - is recognized as an outcome of these processes. Taking account of policies in recent years directed at improving Maori educational achievement, the thesis examines fieldwork research conducted within Auckland primary and secondary schools, in order to understand the extent to which current policies and practices of schools contribute towards overcoming the asymmetry in social relations. Focussing upon teacher perceptions of Maori children and their needs, the way schools sort and classify their pupils, provisions for a Maori dimension in schooling, including 'taha Maori', and the place of history in social studies programmes, the research finds that the struggle still continues, with tensions surrounding the efforts of the minority of teachers and other educationists working within the education system towards Maori interests. While a significant number of teachers, particularly in primary schools seem concerned to implement the 'taha Maori' policy and other aspects of 'multicultural education', these efforts are not matched by a concern to address the problem of Maori educational under-achievement, with teachers either explaining away the problem or accepting it as a quasi-natural state of affairs. Over all the research shows that schools in general continue, in a variety of ways, to control and limit Maori access to knowledge-power and thereby help to maintain the asymmetry in Maori-Pakeha relations. Maori children who do succeed within the education system are seen to do so primarily because they and their families have learned to deal with the system. The multicultural policies of education as presented by the Department of Education are recognized as ideological responses to Maori resistance and challenges, creating an appearance of change and of commitment to Maori interests while, in essence, functioning to maintain the asymmetry in social relations. / Whole document restricted, but available by request, use the feedback form to request access.

This thesis uses a discourse analytic approach to the language used by Pakeha in talk about Maori in Aotearoa/New Zealand. The research begins with an assay of a large body of public submissions and, using the finding of common themes and patterns of ideas, images and usages running though the data, proceeds to examine texts arising from other contexts in order to comment on the generality of the original results. It is suggested that the commonalities described amount to an ideological and linguistic resource base for the construction of a powerful "standard story" of Maori/Pakeha relations, which underpins and legitimates the oppressive status quo. Further extensions of the investigation examine changes in the discourse in the contemporary setting and pursue origins of the themes in historical texts arising from the period of contact between Maori and Pakeha prior to the colonisation of the country.

The thesis will show that a distinctive New Zealand voice in the arts may be found not in an "essence", as has sometimes been suggested, but at chronologically specific intersections of discourses. Each of the six works I examine has been made in New Zealand and is a mixture of music and language. As generic hybrids, combinations of music and language make appropriate objects of study for a thesis that explores a specific local dialogue between the 'mixture' and the 'essence', the 'hybrid' and the 'authentic', the 'indigenous' and the 'exotic', the 'local' and the 'imported', the 'centre' and the 'periphery.' Like acquisitive magpies, New Zealand artists constantly collect and select their material. They sift, save, reject and synthesise, and in so doing they create new combinations out of old ingredients. One of the characteristics of New Zealand poetry is that it has often been combined with music. There have been many collaborations between poets and musicians since colonial times. These collaborative texts occupy a complex space between art forms, just as New Zealand artists negotiate between orientations, positioning themselves between different cultural traditions. In its own process of selection, the thesis selects six works for close analysis which represent not only different periods but also different forms of synthesis. Each work represents 'New Zealand', yet what this means in practice is different in each case.

The Maoris today occupy a unique position in the wider New Zealand society. On the one hand, following over a century of intensive contact and political integration with the people of European origin, they now form an inseparable part of the national society. But on the other hand, they also constitute a distinctive minority in the country accounting for 6.9 per cent of the total population of 2.4 million (in 1961). Their distinctiveness may be described in various ways, some qualitative and others statistical. However, in the overall socio-economic scene of the country, the position of the Maoris is far from static. Social and cultural changes are continuing processes and one can notice important trends in contemporary Maori life.

The present research consists of an interdisciplinary approach which combines mainly sub-disciplines from the anthropological and psychological perspectives as theoretical background. Regarding the latter, from the cognitive anthropology perspective the research highlights Bradd Shore’s (1996) view on cognitive models, together with the theories put forward by the sociocultural approach in psychology based on Vygotsky’s school of thought. The main objective of the study is to achieve a broad view on the use of traditional korero paki and korero o nehera (Maori folktales/legends and myths) as pedagogical tools and as cognitive models. The latter includes a bibliographical review which covers the analysis of narratives and their usage from different areas, such as Maori epistemology and education, cultural psychology and cognitive anthropology. Being a research stemmed from an anthropological concern –how do people from different sociocultural backgrounds construct and transmit knowledge- it considered as a fundamental element an empirical or “fieldwork” approach to the matter. Therefore, the research analyses –based on semi-structured interviews- the perspectives and understanding of the usage of traditional Maori narratives as educational tools of scholars in the Maori studies/education field and of a sample of Maori teachers, most of them connected to a Kura Kaupapa Maori school, constituting a “study case” for this qualitative study. A period of complementary participant observation was also carried out, focusing on the pedagogical practises and styles of the participant teachers. Through this, the research aims to contextualise the bibliographical and theoretical findings, considering the contemporary applications, limitations and understandings encountered through concrete experience.

The present research consists of an interdisciplinary approach which combines mainly sub-disciplines from the anthropological and psychological perspectives as theoretical background. Regarding the latter, from the cognitive anthropology perspective the research highlights Bradd Shore’s (1996) view on cognitive models, together with the theories put forward by the sociocultural approach in psychology based on Vygotsky’s school of thought. The main objective of the study is to achieve a broad view on the use of traditional korero paki and korero o nehera (Maori folktales/legends and myths) as pedagogical tools and as cognitive models. The latter includes a bibliographical review which covers the analysis of narratives and their usage from different areas, such as Maori epistemology and education, cultural psychology and cognitive anthropology. Being a research stemmed from an anthropological concern –how do people from different sociocultural backgrounds construct and transmit knowledge- it considered as a fundamental element an empirical or “fieldwork” approach to the matter. Therefore, the research analyses –based on semi-structured interviews- the perspectives and understanding of the usage of traditional Maori narratives as educational tools of scholars in the Maori studies/education field and of a sample of Maori teachers, most of them connected to a Kura Kaupapa Maori school, constituting a “study case” for this qualitative study. A period of complementary participant observation was also carried out, focusing on the pedagogical practises and styles of the participant teachers. Through this, the research aims to contextualise the bibliographical and theoretical findings, considering the contemporary applications, limitations and understandings encountered through concrete experience.