Don’t think inside the box
“The reo Māori petition and every learner and speaker of the language since September 14, 1972, has overturned one of the most damaging status quos suffered by our people.” — Tainui Stephens.
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Tag: te reo Māori
Tokenism and te reo Māori: Why some things just shouldn’t be translated
“From a Māori perspective of the interconnectedness of things, there is a particularly isolating, divisive tendency in English, which diminishes full Māori meanings.” — Professor Carl Mika.
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My mum, my mountain: Hana Te Hemara
“Mum was an articulate, visionary, and fearless woman. She was the biggest driver of the petition for reo Māori to be included in the school curriculum . . . She did all that organising from her kitchen table.” — Ramari Jackson.
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Toby Curtis: A paradox of success
“I have always wondered how our Pākehā counterparts would have fared if they were taught solely in te reo Māori, a language that was not spoken in their homes.” — Tā Toby Curtis.
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Ensuring access to te ao Māori
“We’re here to pass on our mātauranga Māori, and to lift each other up.” — Āwhina Kihi.
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When the reo settles into your heart
“Once you’ve started to kōrero Māori with your kurī, there’s no going back.” — Siena Yates.
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We don’t see te reo as ‘Māori nonsense’
“Te reo Māori is endangered in the land it comes from. It is a language that is native to this country and like an endangered bird, its future depends on what we do.” — Professor Rawinia Higgins.
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Embrace the taniwha
“I vowed that I wouldn’t allow myself to be shamed by my ignorance again. As I think back to that long ago hui, part of me realises that all I had to do was get over myself.” — Tainui Stephens.
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Waiata mai
“I think you might be able to classify Māori as one of two kinds: whakamā and katakata. The test for which kind you are is whether or not you do skits.” — Aaron Craig.
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For the love of the language
“I believe that the music will continue to help us heal, so we can celebrate the new cultural narrative of Aotearoa, and be proud of the diverse cultural heritage we all share.” — Hinewehi Mohi.
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Korohere Ngāpō: Hauraki is my magnetic north
“I most certainly believe there is power and mana in the karakia that were performed. Our Māori spirituality is a big thing. It always has been and it always will be.” — Korohere Ngapo.
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The shame is gone
“With the help of caring people, through a lens now tinted with aroha, I could embrace the experience of speaking re reo Māori and let it melt my heart.” — Shelley Burne-Field.
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Privilege and language trauma
“As the dust settles following Te Wiki o te Reo Māori, I feel like I’ve been through all the stages of grief. I’m unsure what part I play now.” — Vini Olsen-Reeder.
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We must be brave and use the reo
“Everything I say in the courtroom now is said in te reo Māori. All of my submissions, every written document.” — Alana Thomas.
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My complicated relationship with te reo Māori
“At the age of five, I was already consciously distancing myself from the Māori world. I already knew that to be Māori was to be less than. The same way that my son knows that pink is not an acceptable colour for boys to like.” — Moata Tamaira.
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The making of a Māori town: Ōtaki
“There is an indigenous spirit in Ōtaki that is unapologetic and proud. By definition that spirit is also loving.” — Tainui Stephens.
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Calling in on The Godfather
“I sometimes get: ‘Kei te takahi koe i taku mana’ — you’re trampling on my mana. And I think to myself: ‘Well, you’re murdering my language. Which one is it going to be? Murdering my language or your mana?’” — Tīmoti Kāretu.
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Alison Jones: When Pākeha acquire te reo
“I worry that te reo, like land, may be in the process of becoming yet another thing that Pākehā can acquire from Māori, like a unique new jacket that we think suits us.” — Professor Alison Jones.
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This doesn’t make us less
“We can be Māori and reo-less at the same time. It’s not ideal — especially in the hidden places we never talk about — but we can keep our heads held high. This doesn’t make us less.” — Shelley Burne-Field.
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Talking with Tame
“Being a short-arse, I got bullied hard by people. So I had to learn how to move, to look after myself.” — Tame Iti.
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Reading the signs on a journey into Māori law
“Up until my early 20s, Māori people and language had never really been normal at all to me. Māori concepts and ideas were not normal either, except in the most abstract and safe way.” — Māmari Stephens.
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Te ika me te marara rīwai he mea kīnaki ki te reo
Anton Matthews e pā ana ki te mahi whakatupu tamariki kōrero Māori me te whakahaere pakihi reorua — me te wawata kotahi kei roto.
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A whānau affair
“We have almost four generations of te reo Māori speakers in our family. My goal in life before I leave this earth is that those teachings will funnel down to the next three generations after my children.” — Eli Smith.
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Peter-Lucas Jones: Storing our reo treasures
“In spite of all the opportunities in the mainstream Pākehā education system, having access to native speakers of te reo Māori is much more beneficial.” — Peter Lucas Jones.
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Celebrating our reo warriors
“When the Māori Language Commission first opened its doors in 1987, te reo was viewed by many New Zealanders as something that would divide us. Māori language proponents were often seen as the enemy.”
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Rawinia Higgins: Regenerating the reo
“My greatest aspiration for the future of te reo is to have a mokopuna, so I can speak Māori to that mokopuna every day.”
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Timoti Karetu: A stickler for standards
“All the Māori students at Victoria wanted to be lawyers and accountants, but I only ever wanted to be a teacher.” — Sir Timoti Karetu.
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One reo to rule them all?
“If the best resources on offer for our children aren’t in our dialect, then how the heck does dialect survive?” — Quinton Hita on the unintended consequences of the project to translate titles like ‘Harry Potter’ into Māori.
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Meng Foon: A journey in te ao Māori
“When I told Mum I was going to take Māori, she said: ‘Waste of breath.’”
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Waihoroi Shortland: Great. I’m gonna live in a castle
Waihoroi Shortland tells Dale Husband about the paths he has travelled in a working life as a community officer, journalist, actor, politician and reo Maori advocate.
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