MAORI IDENTITIES AND VISIONS: POLITICS OF EVERYDAY LIFE IN AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND

 MAORI IDENTITIES AND VISIONS: POLITICS OF EVERYDAY LIFE IN AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND 

Natacha Gagné Department of Anthropology McGill University 

April 2004 

A thesis submitted to the Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies Office In partial fulfillment of the degree of Ph.D. 

Natacha Gagné, 2004

2 ABSTRACT

 Indigenous peoples around the world have been involved, especially since the 1970s, in nationalist or sovereigntist movements, as well as in struggles for decolonization, selfdetermination, and recognition of their rights. Maaori of Aotearoa/New Zealand are engaged in just such processes and, particularly since the 1960s and 1970s, as part of the Maaori cultural renaissance. Since about 70% of Maaori live in urban areas, cities Auckland in particular have become important sites of affirmation and struggle. This study, which falls within the field of urban anthropology, is an investigation of what being Maaori today means and how it is experienced, in particular in the city. The sense of place of Maaori living in Auckland and the appropriation of space in the urban context are important dimensions of this study. It explores the complexity of Maaori relationships to the urban milieu, which is often perceived as an alien and colonized site; the ways they create places and spaces for themselves; and the ongoing struggles to (re)affirm Maaori identities and cultural aspects considered important elements of these identities. The focus of this research is on everyday life and ordinary Maaori (in contrast to elites). It reveals the significance and importance to Maaori affirmation and resistance of the extended family and certain types of city houses which are based on traditional marae (Maaori traditional meeting places) principles. In contrast to many studies that have stressed the assimilation pressures of the urban milieu and global forces on indigenous societies, this research underlines processes of (re)affirmation. It shows how indigenous visions, and ways of being are maintained and even strengthened through changes and openness to the larger society. Coming to understand these processes also led to the exploration of Maaori realms of interpretation or figured worlds, the heteroglossic and complex ways people engage in or relate to these figured worlds, and to figured worlds of the larger society. This study is, thus, at the very core of today s debates concerning decolonization, political autonomy for indigenous peoples, and the study of nationalist movements or movements for self-determination. ii

3 RÉSUMÉ Partout dans le monde, surtout depuis les années 1970, les autochtones se sont engagés dans des mouvements nationalistes et souverainistes et dans des luttes en faveur de la décolonisation, de l autodétermination et de la reconnaissance de leurs droits. Les Maaori d Aotearoa-Nouvelle-Zélande ont pris part à ces mêmes processus, surtout depuis les années 1960 et 1970, avec la «renaissance culturelle» maaori. Puisque environ 70 % des Maaori vivent en milieu urbain, les villes en général, et Auckland en particulier, sont devenues des sites importants d affirmation et de lutte. Cette étude, qui se situe dans le champ de l anthropologie urbaine, s attache à ce que signifie être Maaori aujourd hui et aux façons dont les identités maaori sont vécues, en particulier en ville. Le sens du lieu et l appropriation maaori de l espace urbain y sont d importantes dimensions. Sont explorées dans cette recherche, la complexité des relations maaori en ville, un milieu qui est souvent perçu comme colonisé et non maaori; les façons de se créer des lieux et des espaces maaori; et les luttes incessantes pour (ré)affirmer des identités maaori et des dimensions importantes de la culture liées à ces identités. L étude de certains aspects de la vie quotidienne des Maaori «ordinaires» (plutôt que des élites) montre l importance de la famille étendue et de l organisation de maisonnées basées sur les principes du marae (lieu traditionnel de rencontre maaori) dans les processus de (ré)affirmation des identités. Alors que plusieurs études ont mis l accent sur l impact des pressions assimilatrices exercées par le milieu urbain et les forces globales sur les sociétés autochtones, cette recherche fait ressortir les façons dont les visions et les manières maaori d être autochtones sont maintenues et mêmes renforcées à travers les changements et l ouverture à la société plus large. L étude de ces processus est aussi basée sur une exploration des univers de sens maaori ou mondes figurés, des façons complexes et hétéroglossiques à travers lesquelles les gens s engagent dans ces mondes figurés ainsi que dans ceux de la société plus large. Cette étude se situe donc au cœur des débats actuels sur la décolonisation, l autonomie politique pour les peuples autochtones et les mouvements nationalistes et d autodétermination. iii

4 À mon amour, mon printemps iv

5 TABLE OF CONTENTS 

LIST OF TABLE AND FIGURES... viii 

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS... ix INTRODUCTION... 1 Outlines of chapters... 5 CHAPTER I: HISTORICAL AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK... 8 Theoretical Framework... 9 Globalization as a general context... 9 Dialogism: a multidimensional interpretative framework Everyday life and the lived worlds of actors Figured worlds A Multiplicity of figured worlds Agency and Creativity The global: historical structures, stereotypes and the politics of positioning The power of space and place A historical overview Aotearoa/New Zealand in the world The Decolonisation period: 1975 and after The seventies The eighties Aotearoa/New Zealand policies and Maaori today Review of the literature about Maaori CHAPTER II: DISCOVERING NEW REALITIES, FINDING THE PEOPLE: METHODOLOGICAL CHOICES Entering the field Making contact with the people Research methods The limits of the sampling Confidentiality issues A Note on the usage of Maaori words CHAPTER III: MAAORI LIVES IN AUCKLAND Maaori living in Auckland Migration to the city: a physical and cognitive shift The traditional marae Conclusion v

6 CHAPTER IV: WAYS OF LIFE IN A WHARE MAAORI Everyday life in a whaanau My house is like a marae : The foundations of the whare Maaori The whare Maaori: a gathering place A children s kingdom Cultural inheritance and grandparents: Tamariki bonds The importance of the collective: Us as one united family The whare Maaori: this is our kaakano, our seed The temporality of the whare Maaori Finding space for everyone Marae and whare Maaori: further discussion Conclusion CHAPTER V: THE WHAANAU, PAST AND PRESENT Te Whaanau The impact of colonization and urbanization Maaori visibility in the city Whaanau changes with life in the city Relationships between rural and urban milieus The journey back to one s people Genealogy gives one a place, but An emotional voyage Te whaanau: a crucial Maaori figured world Conclusion CHAPTER VI: FIGURED WORLDS IN PRACTICE A case study: the whaanau dilemma The figured world of the whaanau in the larger world Unbalanced relationships between figured worlds: the economic reality Unbalanced relationships between figured worlds: the political facet The whaanau and/or the family The extension of the figured world: whakapapa- and kaupapa-based whaanau Problems within the whaanau Te whaanau : at the centre of a politics of differentiation Conclusion CHAPTER VII: «BEING COMFORTABLE» MAAORI RELATIONS WITH THE CITY AND SOCIETY AT LARGE Theoretical background (Dis)comfort in Auckland The Dreamtime vi

 

7 (Dis)comfort and (in)security The city: a cold place for real Maaori Urban (dis)comfort and rural connections We ll be there to awhi you! I know where I come from (Dis)comfort: a question of access? To speak or not to speak te reo Maaori (Un)ease in the Paakehaa or mainstream world Engagement, home, and (dis)comfort Places and power Spiritual and everyday homes Comforting places elsewhere in the city Feeling places / place feelings Maaori and Paakehaa relationships Conclusion: Negotiating comfort, or when (dis)comfort is dialogic CHAPTER VIII: CONCLUSION INTERCONNECTED PLACES AND SPACES OF AUTONOMY The openness of the whaanau and the whare Maaori Inward and outward flows Concluding remarks APPENDIX A: Map of Aotearoa/New Zealand APPENDIX B: Maaori and English Versions of the Treaty of Waitangi APPENDIX C: Profiles of the interviewees (formal interviews only) APPENDIX D: North Island tribes APPENDIX E: Maps showing degrees of deprivation Auckland APPENDIX F: Diagrams of traditional marae APPENDIX G: Diagrams of the residents of 30 Aroha Street APPENDIX H: Ethics Approvals APPENDIX I: Consent forms and participant information sheets GLOSSARY REFERENCE LIST vii

8 LIST OF TABLE AND FIGURES Table 1: Maaori representation in Aotearoa/New Zealand at a glance Figure 1: The Whaanau net -work Figure 2: Maaori engagements in multiple sites of struggle viii

9 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My doctoral research has been facilitated by doctoral scholarships from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) and the Fonds pour la Formation des chercheurs et l aide à la recherche (FCAR). The FCAR also gave me financial support for remote training and research at the University of Auckland. My heartfelt thanks go to McGill University for several awards granted to me throughout my doctoral studies, namely, a Faculty of Arts Graduate Recruitment Award, a Social Sciences Research Grant for field research in Aotearoa/New Zealand, four Alma Mater Student Travel Grants to present my research at national and international conferences and a Graduate Studies Fellowship for the final phase of writing up my thesis. I owe a great deal to the staff and Faculty members of the Department of Anthropology at McGill University who consistently supported me vis-à-vis the Faculty of Graduate Studies. I would also like to thank the Centre for Society, Technology and Development (STANDD) at McGill University, which financially supported my field research and my participation in several conferences. I have presented some sections of this thesis in the STANDD seminar series, at the Fellows seminar series of McGill University s Centre for Developing Areas Studies (CDAS) and at the Pacific Island Group Seminars (PIGS), attended mainly by participants from Concordia University and Université Laval. These discussions all contributed to the present form of my thesis. I am grateful for the many comments and suggestions from my audiences, and in particular to Professors Colin Scott and John Galaty from STANDD, Professor Rosalynd Boyd from CDAS, and Professors Christine Jourdan (Concordia University), Pierre Maranda (Université Laval) and Sylvie Poirier (Université Laval) from PIGS. I am indebted to Karine Bates, Margaret Garrard, Pierre Minn, Beatriz Oliver, Isabelle Poulin, Jason Paiement, Rémy Rouillard, Jon Salsberg, Robbyn Seller, and Morgen Smith for their assistance at STANDD. I am grateful to the Canadian Federation of University Women (CFUW) for the Margaret Dale Philp Biennial Award for I would also like to thank the Canadian Anthropology Society (CASCA) for making me the 2002 recipient of the Richard F Salisbury Award, which is granted each year to a PhD student with outstanding academic record and an excellent research proposal with innovative scholarly import and social relevance. It includes a financial contribution. I would like to express my warmest gratitude to Professor Carmen Lambert, my supervisor, whose support, generosity, and encouragement have stayed with me from the very beginning to the very end of this research. Her professionalism and dedication have given me a true sense of direction. She has also provided me with an excellent model of graduate supervision that I hope to follow with my own students in the not-too-distant future. I also owe special thanks to Professor Jérôme Rousseau for his pertinent and precise comments, suggestions and critiques, which helped to orientate and enrich my work. I wish to extend my deepest appreciation to Professor Éric Schwimmer, whose ix

 

10 passion and intellect were a great inspiration. I would like to thank him for believing in me, for stimulating my intellectual curiosity and for spending innumerable hours in conversation with me. I also thank Professors Kristin Norget and John Galaty who helped me formulate my project. At the Department of Anthropology, I would like to thank Diane Mann, Cynthia Romanyk and Rose Marie Stano for their administrative support not to mention their warm smiles and reassurance throughout my time at McGill. I would have been lost without their willing and friendly help, especially during the many months that I was away from Montréal. I would like to thank Martha Radice and Kathleen Hugessen for reviewing the text. I am grateful for their comments and suggestions. Thank you also to Eve-Marie Houyoux for the revision of the bibliography. Any errors or ambiguities which may remain are entirely my own responsibility. I would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the University of Auckland which gave me ethics approval for my fieldwork. Special thanks go to the Department of Anthropology, where I was welcomed as a visiting graduate research student, and the Department of Maaori Studies, for its support throughout the field research. In particular, I would like to thank Professor Mark Mosko, who was the head of the Department of Anthropology while I was in Aotearoa/New Zealand and who made my visit possible. A special thank you goes to Professors Julie Park, Judith Huntsman, Karen Nero and Christine Dureau from the same department. Thank you also to Marama Muru-Lanning, a graduate student at the Department of Anthropology and a great friend who guided me throughout my research in the field. I was fortunate to be able to present my research at seminars in the Department of Anthropology, which allowed me to share my early analyses and receive feedback from anthropologists and Maaori participants in my research while I was still in the field. In the Department of Maaori Studies, I have a special appreciation for Professor Ngapare Hopa, head of the department on my arrival, and Professor Margaret Mutu who was in that position when I left Aotearoa/New Zealand. Special thanks to Professor Deanne Wilson who gave me much practical advice before and throughout my visit as well as to Professors Hugh Kawharu, Hineira Woodart, Edward Te Kohu Douglas, and Miki Roderick. I wish to recognize the skills of Erana Foster, Hineira and Deanne who taught me te reo, the Maaori language, so well. Thank you also to Mere Gillman and Rangimarie Rawiri for their practical advice. At the James Henare Maaori Research Centre, my thanks go to Dr Merata Kawharu, Arapera Ngaha, and Hori Pirini for their help and support. I am greatly indebted to Hohipere Sophie Tarau who translated my research documents into Maaori and gave me valuable advice and comments throughout my time in Aotearoa/New Zealand. I would also like to thank Professor Linda Tuhiwai Smith who was, at the time, Director of the International Research Institute for Maaori and Indigenous Education at the University of Auckland, for her guidance. Thank you also to Professor Ranginui Walker, whom I had the good fortune to meet at the end of my fieldwork. Special thanks to Professor Witi Ihimaera, Professors Albert Wendt and Reina Whaitiri from the English Department for their comments and for allowing me to x

11 participate in their graduate seminar on Maaori and Pacific literature. I also appreciate the help of Professor Andrew Sharp from the Department of Political Sciences. I am most grateful to Professor Joan Metge, who was at the Anthropology Department of Victoria University of Wellington until her retirement, for her lengthy and detailed comments on my work, for her assurances that I had not lost my way and for her remarkable generosity. Above all, I would like to thank all the Maaori in Auckland and elsewhere who participated in this research and who so generously shared their time with me for discussions, explanations and interviews. I am particularly grateful to the Maaori organisations, Maaori groups, and marae representatives who opened their doors to me, as well as the kapa haka groups that kindly allowed me to join them in learning, practising and performing their arts. In order to maintain confidentiality, I cannot greet you personally, but I know that you will recognize yourselves. He mihi nui teenei ki ngaa taangata katoa i tautoko, i awhi mai i ahau i roto i taku mahi. Ko te tuumanako ka tangohia e koutou eenei mihi aroha e tuku atu nei au ki a koutou katoa. Thank you so much. A very special thank you to the families who welcomed me into their homes and helped me in so many ways. My deepest thanks to Kiri, Andrew, Rangi, Manuka and all the other whaanau members for giving me a home and a family or really, a whare Maaori and a whaanau. I am particularly grateful to Rangi and Manuka who were also my research assistants. Many thanks to my Maaori friends for their deep support and for believing in me and my research; I will preserve your anonymity, but I am sure, Rewa, Donna, Pita, Kiri and Whetu, that you will recognize yourselves throughout the thesis. Agnes Brandt, a foreign anthropology student like myself, was there to share the joys and troubles of fieldwork away from home. Thank you also to Véronique Gagné Bergeron who reminded me of the taste of Québec in Aotearoa. Merci pour ta fraîcheur! Many friends and colleagues have played crucial roles in this research. En particulier, j aimerais remercier de tout mon cœur pour leurs encouragements et les échanges passionnants Claude Bariteau, Karine Bates, André Campeau, Hélène D Aoust, Sabrina Doyon, André Fournier, Eve-Marie Houyoux, Annie Jaimes, Christian Levesque, Martha Radice, Geneviève Riopel, Andrea Rodriguez, Sonya Trudeau et Bruno Viens. J offre aussi des remerciements très chaleureux à Denise Veillette et Jean-Paul Rouleau. Par-dessus tout, je tiens à remercier mes parents, Solange et Claude, pour leur confiance sans limite et leurs encouragements quotidiens. Merci pour m avoir donné le goût d apprendre, pour avoir répondu à tous mes «pourquoi?» depuis que je suis toute petite et pour m avoir appris à rêver. Merci aussi à leurs conjoints respectifs, Gervais et Lise, pour être là pour moi. Je dois beaucoup à mes sœurs, Marie-Ève et Stéphanie. Merci pour les fous rires, les pleurs, la complicité. Enfin, une pensée spéciale pour mes grands- xi

 

12 parents, vivants et décédés, que je porte en moi et qui me portent quand la rivière est haute ou quand le sable est trop chaud. J aimerais encore dire merci à mon compagnon de vie, Sébastien, pour sa présence, sa patience et ses folies. Sache que j apprécie la liberté que nous nous donnons. Merci d être avec moi dans tout ce que j entreprends. Merci d avoir partagé mon aventure du terrain. xii

13 INTRODUCTION 

Indigenous peoples around the world have been involved, especially since the 1970s, in nationalist or sovereigntist movements, as well as in struggles for decolonization, selfdetermination and recognition of their rights. These struggles have taken place in nationstates where distinct political cultures coexist, autonomist claims and tensions between the state and the populations of indigenous origin are a pressing reality, and certain forms of political, cultural and administrative autonomy have been recently discussed and now appear as real possibilities for some indigenous peoples. These struggles have also taken place on the international stage, through forming links with each other, assertion of their common rights and affirmation of the importance of their cultures to the world community. These issues were articulated in the United Nations Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (1994), which has not yet been ratified. Indigenous peoples also participate in diverse international conferences on cultural, educational, political, legal, social and environmental issues. They are also participants in the United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations and the recently founded (2002) Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues at the United Nations. The issues that are discussed do not focus only on traditional territories and communities, but also on current issues including globalization, the creation of new nation-states and inter-state alliances and indigenous intellectual property rights. Also at the centre of the discussion are issues of increased urbanization. This last concern is related to a global context in which there is a worldwide continuous and increasing migration of indigenous people to urban centres for various reasons, including the search for better employment and schooling opportunities. In certain places, indigenous people form a significant proportion of the total urban population, and they are able to find their place in the urban sphere, affirm their ways and resist assimilation. It is a matter of empowerment by means of, among other things, affirming their identities, cultures and languages, and maintaining relationships among indigenous city-dwellers as well as with communities outside the city. 1

14 In fact, in recent years, urban issues have been recognized by research organizations as a research priority for better understanding the problem of identity and struggles for the autonomy of populations defined as indigenous. The city is a particularly interesting setting to see processes of indigenous affirmation, socio-cultural renewal and decolonization at work, since it is defined as a universe where cultural and social complexity can be found at their most intense. The city is also the location of the principal state authorities and is a crucial node in regional, national and transnational networks. Maaori of Aotearoa/New Zealand are engaged in just such processes of decolonization and affirmation of their rights and ways of being. Their efforts have intensified since the 1960s and 1970s with the Maaori cultural renaissance. They have been fighting in different arenas: 1) for the recognition of their land rights and other rights as indigenous people; 2) for the acknowledgement by the state of the Treaty of Waitangi, which was finally recognised in 1975 through the Treaty of Waitangi Act, and for renewed links to the state and forms of participation in state affairs; 3) for the pursuit of socio-economic agendas aiming at redressing the disparities between Maaori and the mainstream population; and 4) for the affirmation of their identity through actions in the cultural sphere and in Maaori education, in particular the assertion of the importance of the Maaori language. Since about 70% of Maaori live in urban areas, cities Auckland in particular have become important sites of affirmation and struggle. In fact, it is where important Maaori social movements have their roots. This study, which comes within the general field of urban anthropology, is an investigation of what being Maaori today means and how it is experienced, in particular in the city. The senses of place among the Maaori living in Auckland and the appropriation of space in the urban context are important dimensions of this study. It explores the complexity of Maaori relationships to the urban milieu and the ongoing struggles to (re)affirm Maaori identities and preserve aspects of the culture considered important elements of these identities. It pays special attention to the ways Maaori experience the city, which is often perceived as an alien and colonized site, and the ways 2

 

15 they create places and spaces for themselves. Understanding these processes involves looking not only at how Maaori negotiate engagements in different places and spaces, build networks and relate to Maaori and non-maaori, but also at how people express their senses of place and their identities. This study is grounded in an examination of practices and experiences. An ethnography of everyday life allows for a detailed analysis of expressions of identities, and for highlighting the multiple and diverse effects unequal power relationships between Maaori and wider New Zealand society have on the life of families and individuals. In regard to indigenous populations, it is in this interplay between the agency of people and external forces, such as the state, that culturally-situated meanings emerge and unfold. By focusing on everyday life, this research reveals the significance and importance to Maaori affirmation and resistance in the city of the extended family, the whaanau, and certain types of city houses which are based on traditional marae (Maaori traditional meeting places) principles. In contrast to many studies that have stressed the assimilation pressures of the urban milieu and global forces on indigenous cultures and societies, and consequently, the processes of what they call culture loss, this research underlines processes of (re)affirmation. It shows how indigenous worlds, visions and ways of being are maintained and even strengthened through change and openness to the larger society. Maaori living in Auckland constitute a diverse population characterized by different tribal affiliations, social classes, levels of formal education, types of employment and levels of participation in city life and in the broader society. Some of them are leaders in Maaori movements for self-determination, some are also well-known public figures defending particular political positions, while others are not actively involved in political activities or on the public scene. The discourses and public activities of the leaders are well known. This study aims to understand how ordinary Maaori live their engagement in the urban milieu, express their Maaori identity and conceive the objectives of political and cultural autonomy. I am well aware that because of diversity in the Maaori urban population, individual people engage differently and in complex ways in various aspects of city life and interact differently with the larger society. This research was not intended to show the 3

16 range of variations. The objective was rather to understand processes of engagement and of (re)affirmation of Maaori identities, as well as the links between these processes. This study, because of its focus on everyday life, has led to an understanding of the mechanisms involved in both expressions of Maaori identity and openness to participation in the larger society. By revealing how the Maaori extended family and city houses are central sites in negotiating relationships with the larger society and engagement in multiple universes of meanings, it shows the paths followed to create Maaori places in the urban milieu and to build spaces for Maaori in the various sectors of the larger society. Coming to understand those processes also requires exploring, in the urban setting, the ways Maaori maintain and remodel their visions of what it means to be Maaori, that is, their realms of interpretation or figured worlds, and how they also engage in or relate to figured worlds of the larger society. An examination of narrative practices and actions centred on identities and relations to places allows for an understanding of the many lenses through which many senses of places and many conceptions of identities are articulated, and through which Maaori engagement in different figured worlds is possible. Unlike many studies that have tended to look at indigenous and other minority populations in urban settings in the framework of their own communities only, this research aims to throw light not only on movements of resistance to assimilation but also on participation, as Maaori, in the larger society. This study is thus at the very core of today s debates concerning decolonization, political autonomy for indigenous people and the study of nationalist movements or movements for self-determination, as it addresses issues of the redefinition of power relationships between indigenous or minority populations, majority populations and states. It also tackles important issues of multiculturalism, biculturalism and national coexistence and participation in multiethnic states. Moreover, this thesis is a contribution to studies of Maaori. In particular, it sheds light on areas of Maaori realities which have been neglected, such as their contemporary situation, 4

17 their experiences of the city, their participation in different sites and places in the urban context, and their day-to-day strategies for survival, affirmation and struggle. At the same time, this research contributes to the fields of urban anthropology and the anthropology of places and spaces, by showing processes of integration or participation in urban public sectors and urban activities while also showing the distinctively Maaori processes of place- and space-making, and the to-and-fro movements between Maaori places and public places. This study also emphasizes the importance of studying everyday life to show mechanisms and processes which are at work in the coexistence and interrelations between diverse figured worlds and different types of places and spaces, private and public. The focus on life as lived then becomes interesting for urban anthropology since it allows it to penetrate the intimacy of the urban-dwellers and to cross the boundaries between private and public spheres, a perspective that has not often been explored. Finally and more generally, by this very focus, this research also aims to address the deficiencies of two major trends in social sciences, one macroanalytical and the other microanalytical. Focusing on everyday life allows the actors, their experiences and practices, and larger scale forces and structures to be taken into account. Outlines of the chapters In chapter I, I first present globalization as the general framework for this thesis. I then outline the theoretical framework for this research, which is based on a theory of practice, dialogism, which serves as a guide for the theoretical analysis of identities and autonomy as lived. Looking at everyday life and interrelationships, the concept of figured world stands out as a promising avenue for the analysis of diversity, complexity and heteroglossia. I finally underline the importance of paying close attention to places and spaces in looking at Maaori life in the city, affirmation and engagement in the larger society. I chose to present the analytical framework before the history section so that the description of the Maaori situation and experiences will then flow from one chapter to the next. In the second section, I present an overview of Maaori history, which briefly outlines the colonization process, but mainly focuses on the period of urbanization, from World War II to the present day. Among other things, this overview aims to highlight the 5

18 role of the state in the current Maaori situation, but also the ways Maaori have reacted to it and struggled from colonization to the present. The third section is a review of the literature about Maaori, in which I identify the areas that call for investigation and I show where my study fits in. Chapter II intends to clarify my methodological approach. I explain how my research interests and preoccupations, as well as the strategies and methods, have been adapted to fit closely with the reality encountered in the field and the directions indicated by the participants in this research. I also present detailed information about the data gathered. In chapter III, I introduce the readers to the diversity of Maaori in Auckland, to life in the city for Maaori, and to how the city, in particular Auckland, is generally experienced. I also begin my examination of places and spaces which are significant for Maaori comfort, affirmation, and resistance. I therefore look at the rhetoric about real vs. urban Maaori, but also at the marae, the traditional Maaori meeting place. The focus in chapter IV is on everyday life in the whaanau (extended family) with whom I lived for a great part of my fieldwork. I then look at their house, their whare Maaori (Maaori house), and other city houses which function like theirs as another significant place for Maaori survival and (re)affirmation in the urban setting. In chapter V I examine of the different definitions of the whaanau. The chapter gives an account of the historical evolution of the whaanau through colonization and urbanization. I explore the continued significance of the whaanau in the city, but also its importance as a link between rural and urban milieus, and thus between places and spaces. I also discuss the journeys that some Maaori undertake to renew links with their whaanau network. I then examine the major values and principles that whaanau support, and I suggest that they serve as the guiding principles for an important Maaori figured world or realm of interpretation. 6

19 Chapter VI constitutes a case study of a whaanau dilemma that helps illustrate how the guiding principles of the figured world of the whaanau emerge and unfold in practice as the dilemma is resolved. In this chapter, I also look at the coexistence and interrelation between figured worlds, as well as at examples of engagement in multiple figured worlds and the negotiation and heteroglossia that multiple engagements involve in practice. I also show the fluidity of boundaries between the so-called Maaori and Paakehaa (New Zealanders of predominantly European ancestry) worlds. In chapter VII, I take a closer look at the notion of comfort as used by Maaori to speak of their relationships to others, Maaori or not, and their relationships to places, including urban ones. We see how the notion of comfort helps to clarify Maaori engagement with different places and figured worlds, and helps Maaori to understand their place in the Maaori world and in the larger society. This notion also throws light on the importance of places and spaces for Maaori identities, but also for Maaori engagement in figured worlds, autonomist processes and in the larger society. Finally, in chapter VIII, the concluding chapter, I specifically focus on how some places and spaces like whare Maaori, marae, and the figured worlds of the whaanau are central to survival and comfort, and to Maaori mobilization and engagement in the larger world. I also look back on how the anthropology of everyday life and experience and the anthropology of ordinary people allow for a better understanding of the struggle for Maaori affirmation of particular identities and traditional figured worlds, resistance to the larger society, and participation in today s world on their own terms. I examine how participation in the greater society is achieved through supporting Maaori identities, cultural practices, and figured worlds. This reveals a particular Maaori type of engagement in the larger society, which also gives a particular colour to autonomist, selfdetermining and decolonizing processes, mechanisms and visions. 7

20 CHAPTER I HISTORICAL AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK This chapter first presents the theoretical bases for my analysis of the data: globalization is the general context, while dialogism is the particular theoretical framework. I then show how the study of everyday life, figured worlds, agency, larger structures, and power relationships is essential. A brief historical overview which aims to allow for a better understanding of today s Maaori experiences and practices in the city follows. This historical summary will focus mainly on the period following the urban drift of the postwar years until today. It aims to highlight the role of the New Zealand State in the Maaori situation throughout history, as well as today, its relationships with Maaori including power relationships, and its impact on Maaori search for greater autonomy. It is clear that the state and its policies have a direct impact on its populations, and on social dynamics in society at large, and in the urban contexts in particular. 1 Global forces and the force of the market or global capitalism are also important (Appadurai 1996; Friedman 1994, 2003a; Hannerz 1996; Rata 2000). In this short summary, I will also try to give some indication of the situation of Aotearoa/New Zealand in the larger world. Throughout this thesis, the emphasis is on contemporary Maaori, because this research area needs investigation since so much has been written and continues to be written on traditional Maaori culture and society (among others, Belich 1988 (1986), 1996; Best 1922, 1924, 1929, 1952, 1976 (1924), 1982 (1924); Hiroa 1949; Firth 1929, 1951, 1959; Salmond 1990, 1997; Smith 1910; Taylor 1855, 1870), while we know very little about Maaori lives and experiences in today s world, biculturalism, and everyday negotiations of the contradictions resulting from the colonial experience and life in urban conditions. 1 For clear illustrations and arguments about the importance of the state on internal ethnic and social dynamics, see, among others, Alonso (1994), Brodkin (2000), Chan (1998), Dusenbery (1997), Dyck (1985), Eller (1999), Foster (1991), Haines (1999), Kearney (1997), Nelson (1996), Oliven (2000), Olwig (2003), Simpson (1994), Synnott and Howes (1996), Williams (1989). 8

21 This is also true in the case of Maaori city dwellers, as we will see in the review of literature about Maaori in the second section of this chapter. Theoretical Framework Globalization as a general context Numerous articles and books have been published in the last decades about globalization, 2 which marks the present period of the world history. However, there is no agreement about the history, nature, and impact on local populations of globalization. As it is in this particular context that the present study was conducted, I will briefly summarize here my position vis-à-vis some current theories of globalization, outlining the theoretical framework adopted. In my view, globalization is the result of more complex processes than those described by some scholars. It is not made only of transnational connections, nor it is only an economic phenomenon within the logic of the neo-liberal orthodoxy. My approach to globalization is critical of strictly economic and geopolitical conceptions of globalization (among others, Barber 1995; Wallerstein 1990 (1983), 1984), which are often too simplistic in their explanations. My approach is also critical of culturalist conceptions, which interpret the phenomenon of globalization as a cultural diffusionism, a view which limits its understanding to flows of cultural substance. As Friedman writes, in this cultural globalization approach [the] very idea that it is culture that flows around the world is a seriously essentialized assumption in which the human practice of meaning is simply erased (2003b: x) (see Appadurai 2000; Hannerz 1999 for examples of this approach; see Friedman 1999a, 1999b, 2000, 2003a; Tsing 2000 for a critical account of this tendency). Globalization is neither a total fragmentation cultural or ethnic in nature a completely disjunctive situation, nor a total homogenization or cultural standardization. 2 For a summary and an analysis of the work of five anthropologists (Arjun Appadurai, Jonathan Friedman, Michael Herzfeld, Ulf Hannerz, and Éric Schwimmer) who address issues of local/global relationships and other questions related to the globalization processes between 1989 and 1999, see my master s thesis (Gagné 1999) as well as Gagné (2001). 9

22 In both cases, gender differences, socio-economic differences, and other factors of differentiation and of unequal power sharing are obscured. It is, thus, essential to combine both approaches, i.e., politico-economical and culturalist approaches. It is also important to add an analysis of global forces and structures, as well as actors, their relationships to others, and the lived world of everyday life. I will explain in the next section how I intend to take into account both the local and the global in my analysis. My approach, moreover, does not see globalization as a stage in a linear evolution of the world history. Rather, I consider, like Fernand Braudel (1984) and Jonathan Friedman (1994, 2003a), that globalization has a systemic nature. Globalized tendencies occurred at some point in the past and were replaced afterward by opposite tendencies, which are more prevalent again. Some authors have looked at globalization as new phenomenon (Brecher and Costello 1994; Featherstone, Lash, and Robertson 1995). However, when globalization is understood as a network of transnational contacts, it cannot be seen as a new process. If we think about, among other historical events, conquests, the great explorations, Christianization and Islamization, the crusades, slave trafficking, movements of migrant workers, we can agree that globalization processes have been operating for a long time. The consciousness of others is not new either. Societies have never been in complete isolation and have always been part of a broader universe. However, what is new in the present period of globalization is the scale of the phenomenon, its speed, its intensity, its diversity, and the way it is felt as penetrating and intrusive by persons and groups who also have a greater capacity for and ease of movement. Because globalization is not a uniform process, I prefer to speak of globalizations and the diverse experiences of globalizing forces. Sampson specifically referred to various global waves (2003: 311), noting that the empirical question is which group jumps on which wave (2003: 311), that is, how people make sense of, react to, readjust to, or resist what comes from the global. In fact, the aim of the present study is precisely to address the issue of how Maaori who live in the city make sense of that highly diversified 10

23 universe, and then how they react to the new realities and pressures of diverse global forces (from regional, to national, to international forces); how they readjust and negotiate their positions, and how they resist these forces or aspects of these pressures; and how they affirm particular identities and ways of being. This thesis does not assume that globalization is the end of localisms (a vision defended by a certain globalized intellectual elite), since, for local populations, if globalization certainly means new challenges and threats, it also entails new opportunities and possibilities for reaffirming particular identities (Schwimmer 1999). Often, the global becomes a threat only for those who are incapable of grasping the possibilities coming from the international scene and, until now, this has not the case for Maaori. One should not forget that the local is made of actors (persons and groups) and these actors can use global as well as local resources for their own needs and ends, thus reacting to the global as well as engaging in the process of globalization. It is, thus, necessary in any analysis to consider the power relationships of which the local populations are part (see below for details on power relationships). Not only local and regional forces or entities are diversified, but states themselves. States are not undifferentiated and, thus, act and react in different ways following different strategies. They are not static or passive. In fact, saying they are disappearing in the global turmoil is not sufficient. The capacity of states to reorganize themselves has too often been forgotten. Certainly, in the present context of globalization, the states have been transformed: under the influence of outside pressures, the balance of power and the models of sharing of resources have changed in many cases (for better or worse); diverse ethnic and diasporic processes have been at work; but, again, these processes are not completely new. Some suggest the unifying force of states is less important today; others speak of a less perfect match between state and nation (for example, Appadurai 1990 and 1996; Turner 2003); yet others speak of the disappearance of the nation in favour of local groupings (Hannerz 1996). From my own research, 3 it stands out clearly that the state is still an important force and that this is even more true in the colonial context, as is the 3 See footnote 1 for a list of researchers who also recognize the persistent importance of the state. 11

24 case in Aotearoa/New Zealand, even if the state is also inserted into global power relationships which push it to react in certain ways. In fact, states are part of regional, inter-state, and global structures of power, and they cannot disregard these forces or power relationships in their internal management and for their own future as members of diverse multinational and transnational organizations and coalitions. Maaori have, in fact, been very successful in using the global scene for, sometimes, embarrassing (Dyck 1985) the New Zealand State, and affirming their presence and particular views; and, thus, to bringing about changes in their favour. In contrast to what Hannerz (1996) emphasizes in his work, I believe that the nation also remains important since people do not withdraw totally and simply into the local. In the Maaori context, persons and groups engage in traditional networks and forms of relationships such as the extended family, the sub-tribe, and the tribe, but they also engage in different ways in the larger society and on diverse scenes at the regional, national, and global levels. Moreover, the actual phase of globalization asks for more transparency at all levels due to more penetrating scrutiny, through the media, of states internal businesses by world organizations, other states, and ordinary people. Because of this scrutiny, certain processes of decolonization have been made possible. However, globalization also brings about new, complex, and sometimes more pernicious processes of colonization. The study of the lived world and of everyday practices, combined with the study of larger and more global forces is certainly a promising avenue for a better understanding of the changing world. It is high time that more complex analyses of the globalization phenomenon were undertaken. These analyses, while recognizing the multiplicity and diversity of the global as much as of the local, must stop seeing local groupings, states, and actors from different spheres as undifferentiated and passive in the face of broader global forces. This has been my position in analyzing Auckland Maaori identities and struggles for autonomy. 12

25 Dialogism: a multidimensional interpretative framework Within a general context of globalization an important guiding principle for this thesis I chose a multidimensional interpretative approach, which takes into account diversity, particular positioning and agency, as well as power relationships and structures in the context of colonized and/or globalized time and space. I have then used a practice theory framework, dialogism (e.g. Bakhtin 1981; Holland, Lachicotte, Skinner and Cain 1998; Holquist 2002 (1990)). This framework is centred around actions and meanings as they arise in encounters with life, that is, in the process of social interaction. Dialogism allows us to address the weaknesses of both a culturalist view, which credits an asocial emphasis on cultural logics, and a constructivist view, which emphasizes the calculus of social position by actors (Holland et al. 1998: 275). It permits us to consider simultaneously the subjects or actors, their experiences and their practices (e.g. Jackson 1989, 1996, 1998; Hastrup 1995; Ingold 1996), as well as the larger and even global structures of which they are part (Friedman 1994, 2003a). The actors, their experiences and practices, thus do not disappear under large-scale structures and processes, as is the case in most works about autonomy and the nation-state (e.g. Couture, Nielson, and Seymour 1998; Venne 2000; Anderson 1983; Gellner 1983; Greenfeld 1992; Smith 1986, 1991, 1992). This research also aims to overcome the deficiencies of two major trends, one macroanalytical and the other microanalytical. I suggest that, as a multidimensional framework, dialogism addresses the weaknesses of both the phenomenologist or interactional approach, which often stresses descriptive accounts a sort of ethnographic tourism ; and the structuralist or symbolic perspective, which too often generates abstract models of stable and invariable organizing structures. 4 A multidimensional dialogic framework resolves the contradiction between these views by treating structures and practices as two aspects of the same reality: overall structures and collective states-of-the-world emerge through social acts and relations between actors (Barth 2003: 203). This approach, then, has a subtle and versatile capacity to 4 See Hoëm and Roalkvam (2003) for an attempt to combine both perspectives. 13

26 analyse the dynamic interaction of subjective meaning and social organization (Barth 2003: 206) and demonstrate the degree to which the societies of [e.g.] Oceania are integral and not invented, part of the modern [ 5 ] world, but organized in strongly localized ways (Friedman 2003d: 11). Taking this perspective, I stress the importance of looking at everyday life, lived worlds, and practices of Auckland Maaori. Everyday life and the lived worlds of actors The approach taken in this thesis is phenomenologically and empirically grounded, without being empiricist, and the generalizations and theorization are informed by the social reality of the lived world, sensory and social experiences, agency, and practical politics, in order to avoid attributing an objective or omniscient status to generalizations (Jackson 1996). I here follow the position taken by Herzfeld: The vital task is to sustain the microscopic focus of field research at the same or even greater intensity, but to do so in ways that illuminate the overlapping partially concentric larger entities in which it is embedded (2001: 50). I am interested in the lived world, which is not considered as a unitary domain where social relations remain constant and experiences stable, but rather as a domain of turmoil, ambiguity, plurality, resistance, and struggle. To use Jackson s words, the lived world is the domain of everyday, immediate social existence and practical activity (1996: 7). Experience is always co- or inter-experience and it is also continually adjusted to and modulated by circumstances at local, intermediary, and global levels. A dialogic framework, like the one that I propose to use here as my interpretative framework, is precisely and fundamentally rooted in interrelations and social experience. In this framework, sentient beings always exist in a state of being addressed and in the process of answering (Holland et al. 1998: 169). The I or the we of the sentient beings then unfold in the unique place that the I or the we occupy. This place is made 5 I prefer to refer to the contemporary world, since, in this world, there are traditional, modern, and post-modern or hypermodern components, depending on the analyst s points of view. I will, in fact, speak of the coexistence of diverse figured worlds and, among them, the figured world of the whaanau (which can be described as contemporary, but relying on Maaori traditions) and the figured world of the modern (and/or postmodern) family. 14

27 of social relationships, and of physical and socio-cultural contexts. In this way, people make meaning through coexistence, through mutual orientation in practice: So long as I am in existence, I am in a particular place, and must respond to all these stimuli either by ignoring them or in a response that takes the form of making sense, of producing ( ) meaning out of such utterances (Holquist 2002 (1990): 170; emphasis in original). Persons, groups, identities, and conceptions of the world(s) develop through engagement with others and with the world (Jackson 1989; Hoëm and Roalkvam 2003; but also Holland et al. 1998). Then structures, that is, collective states-of-the-world, realms of interpretations, or figured worlds (see the next section), emerge and unfold in practice in continuity with the past, but also in a constant dialogue with present space/time (plural) and this, in a continuous process of change. Following authors such as Jackson (1989, 1995, 1996, and 1998), Hastrup (1995), Ingold (1996), Casey (1996), and Friedman (1998), I see experiences as central to all thoughts and all practices. Ingold summarizes this as follows: Knowledge of the world is gained by moving about in it, exploring it, attending to it, ever alert to the signs by which it is revealed. Learning to see, then, is a matter not of acquiring schemata for mentally constructing the environment but of acquiring the skills for direct perceptual engagement with its constituents, human and non-human, animate and inanimate. (1996: ) Experience, which is lived with all senses on alert, imbues the subject s body, emotions, and intellect. Ingold writes that [e]nvironments are constituted in life, not just in thought, and it is only because we live in an environment that we can think at all (1996: ). I wish to add here that the body is one of the loci, if not the principal locus, of internalization of the collective states-of-the-world or realms of interpretation, that is, the structure and power relationships. In the play, in practice (Bourdieu 1977), figured worlds are incorporated, transformed into habitus, and reproduced. Bakhtin then speaks of the chronotopic unconscious, which is a set of unspoken assumptions or normative ideas which serve as coordinates for experiences (Holquist 2002 (1990)). If general conditions stay the same, the figured worlds stabilize. The acceptance or rejection of the 15

28 figured worlds or certain of their dimensions is only partially verbal. It is also and above all translated into actions or inaction. The multidimensional approach I put forward in this thesis is precisely a stance joining vigilance to language and its use, as well as to actions and practices (Herzfeld 1997) (see also chapter II on methodology). Thus, the figured worlds and the improvisations which emerge through practice and everyday activities are the basis for subsequent events and become part of the convention/culture/structure. Possibilities for change are always there. A to-and-fro movement thus exists between fossilization/continuity and possible expansion to other social spheres, and imagination/reformulation/change of the figured worlds through experiences and practices. I agree with Holland et al. (1998): cultural production and change are continuous. Changes are not only produced from one generation to another, but in the continuous appropriation/(re)formulation of meanings and cultural (or practical) artefacts which are cultural resources such as objects, symbols, gestures, and language and by social agents who do not simply answer to their environment, but who are also critical in their use of artefacts and meanings, and appropriate them for themselves. The development of culture/structures is thus heuristic. It is, however, a slow process and sometimes a very erratic one; abrupt changes are only possible in times of revolution (Bernier 1990). Changes are often only perceptible over a relatively long period because, most of the time, they are minimal. I think, however, that it is through these minimal changes that persons and groups can better exercise their agency. This is revealed in this analysis of the everyday struggles of ordinary Maaori for autonomy and affirmation in the city context. Figured worlds In my examination of Maaori engagement in multiple universes of meanings or realms of interpretation, I draw mainly on Holland et al. s book Identity and Agency in Cultural Worlds (1998) in which, referring to theorists such as Vygotskty, Bakhtin, and Bourdieu, they propose the concept of figured world. This concept is useful for looking at the 16

29 principles which guide people in their actions, everyday interactions, engagement in places and spaces, and the ways in which they make sense of their world. In this thesis, I explore Maaori participation in multiple figured worlds: the traditional figured worlds of the whaanau and marae, but also a diversity of figured worlds available to citizens of today s cities and states who also travel overseas or are in contact with the world through the media. Holland et al. define the concept of figured world as a socially and culturally constructed realm of interpretation in which particular characters and actors are recognized, significance is assigned to certain acts, and particular outcomes are valued over others (1998: 52). Figured worlds assign precise roles to particular persons, attribute meanings to certain actions, prescribe behaviours, and establish their own goals. I prefer the concept of figured world 6 to concepts like model, since figured world assumes that the realm of interpretation or universe of meanings has a more dynamic, flexible, and changing character. I do not interpret the word world in the concept figured world as something well-defined and delimited, but as a universe of meanings or realm of interpretation which is fluid, flexible, and open to a certain degree, as we will see, for example, in chapter VI. The concept also gives importance to imagination, creativity, and, thus, to reorchestration and improvisation. Holland et al. (1998) elaborated their concept of figured worlds) from Lontiev s (1978) notion of activity, which helped them establish five major points which summarize the heuristic development of identities and their meanings. First, figured worlds are historical phenomena, to which we are recruited or into which we enter, which themselves develop through the works of their participants. Figured worlds, like activities, are not so much things or objects to be apprehended, as processes or traditions of apprehension which gather us up and give us form as our lives intersect them. Second, figured worlds, like activities, are social encounters in which participants positions matter. They proceed and are socially instanced and located in times and places (...). Some figured worlds we may never enter because of our social position or rank; some we may deny to others; some we may simply miss by contingency; some we may learn fully. 6 In literature, the domain in which Bakhtin elaborated the dialogic approach, Bakhtin (1981) rather use the concept of chronotope. 17

30 Third, figured worlds are socially organized and reproduced (...). They divide and relate participants (almost as roles), and they depend upon the interaction and the intersubjectivity for perpetuation. (...) Fourth, figured worlds distribute us, (...) by giving the landscape human voice and tone. (...) Cultural worlds are populated by familiar social types and even identifiable persons, not simply differentiated by some abstract division of labor. (...) Figured world then provides a means to conceptualize historical subjectivities, consciousness and agency, persons (and collective agents) forming in practice. (Holland et al. 1998: 41 42, emphasis in original) Figured worlds develop simultaneously as identities, cultural forms, positioning, and particular contexts. Showing flexibility and multivocality or heteroglossia, they are the products of history, cultural continuities, and social contingencies and improvizations which are in emergence through interrelationships, use of cultural resources, and practices. Persons and groups identities and agency are also dialectically and dialogically formed in these figured worlds. Figured worlds are produced and reproduced by persons and groups through experiences and practices, and are also formed through them. Because of this ever-present dialogism, figured worlds are understood as historical poetics (Holquist 2002 (1990)). Each particular form is historical: it has a particular meaning in a particular situation, since it is deformed according to how time and space relate to each other in a particular culture at a particular time (Holquist 2002 (1990): 116). If current expressions of long-enduring or earlier forms are never precisely the same, their connection to their previous identities can still be more or less recognized: continuity is made possible through changes. This is exactly what I argue, discussing the figured world of the whaanau: it has changed through colonization and urbanization, but it is still alive and well. Practices in a particular space/time under particular power relationships, memories and choices, values and judgments, as well as participant s agency (see below) are very important. A figured world thus cannot be referred to in general : it is the figured world of someone for someone about someone (Holquist 2002 (1990): , emphasis in original). The particular space/time must then be taken into account. In this thesis, I speak of the central importance of the figured world of the whaanau for Maaori who live in 18

31 Auckland and, more generally, in Aotearoa/New Zealand, at the beginning of the twentyfirst century, in an urban and/or globalized context. I will also show how Maaori persons and groups engage in other figured worlds of today, and negotiate their participation in diverse places and spaces. Figured worlds also serve as guide for future actions. According to Holland et al. (1998), people are more or less conscious of themselves as actors in socially and culturally constructed figured worlds. However, the conceptions that they have of themselves, their relationships to others and to the larger world, and their possible future and possibilities in these figured worlds allows for a kind of semiotic mediation, an agency or a control on their behaviour. In fact, figured worlds offer possibilities for expression, for the understanding of and for themselves (Holland et al. 1998: 4). Figured worlds and their cultural artefacts have, then, a pivotal role in self-realization and the (re)making of different structures. Artefacts are seen as mediators in human action. They invoke the world to which they are relevant and position the persons in relation to those worlds. The understanding of the figured world in which people play is then necessary to comprehend the meanings of their words, narrations, actions, symbols, and the techniques or the means used to reveal oneself. These signs, symbols, and techniques are collectively developed through interrelationships and practices, and are made into artefacts by giving them meaning in particular figured worlds. They are used, for example, to indicate belonging to particular groups and engagement in particular figured worlds, to express identities, and to assert one s rights, presence, or engagement in particular spaces and places. I address these issues in particular in chapters VI and VII, and show how an understanding of the diverse figured worlds in which people engage among them what I call the figured world of the whaanau is revealing of people s choices, uses of symbols, and reactions in their relationships with others and in particular contexts. 19

32 A Multiplicity of figured worlds As we saw in a previous section, coexistence and interrelation are a necessary mode of existence and this is also true for figured worlds. Numerous figured worlds coexist, interrelate, and confront each other. Figured worlds sometimes have common elements, for instance, certain social categories like gender, ethnicity, and social classes which are also positional identities which can cross a plurality of figured worlds (Rethman 2000). Sometimes, figured worlds have incompatible aspects which create dilemmas for the persons and groups who engage in them. In this thesis, after giving an overview of the Maaori situation in Auckland today (chapter III), everyday life in a whaanau (chapter IV) and bringing out the principal values of the whaanau (chapter V), I discuss a specific example of a conflict and its resolution in a whaanau (chapter VI) as a basis for reflecting on the larger figured world of the whaanau, which extends to Maaori life today in the city and beyond. In chapter VI, the discussion is done precisely with a view to analyzing the interactions and articulations between different figured worlds (a problem that is not really explored in Holland et al. 1998), and to reflecting on the larger and even globalized contexts and structures of which Auckland Maaori are part. I take here as a premise the idea that persons and groups are composites of multiple and sometimes contradictory internalized figured worlds, but also of identities and selfunderstandings, as suggested by Holland et al. (1998). It is through these internalized figured worlds that people make sense of their world(s), act and speak in heteroglossic ways in practice and through their engagement with the world (internal dialogism). Then, like figured worlds, identities and meaning activities do not appear as simple, monolithic, stable, permeable, and clearly delimited (Cohen 1994). This position also allows the view that there is not one primary or strictly dominant identity among persons and groups: identities are changing depending on contexts and figured worlds. Identities, meanings, and understandings are thus changing in interrelationship. The position or perspective is always complex since persons are inserted and participate in/are imposed on (external 20

33 dialogism) 7 many social relationships, contexts, and figured worlds at the same time (Holland et al. 1998). In the case of Maaori living in cities today, the presence of different figured worlds or realms of interpretations brings about different complex situations which are not always easy to negotiate in practice. We will see examples of this in chapters VI. We will also see how certain spaces and places in the city are central to everyday negotiations and engagements within multiple figured worlds (chapter VIII, in particular). There is no necessary coherence between the multiple and complex aspects and principles of figured worlds which cohabit in one person (Holland et al. 1998), nor between one s beliefs and actions (Rousseau 1995). This flexibility, multiplicity, and instability allow for personal ease and agency (Holland et al. 1998). Belonging to or participating in different figured worlds which supposes the incorporation of different codes or realms of interpretation opens a space for freedom, play, dialogism for the persons and groups to express their agency. I should not, however, overstate the fluidity and malleability of personal agency. Certain aspects of identity are essentialized (see below), and certain biological characteristics, such as skin colour or racial purity, impose important limitations on personal choice and freedom. In chapter VI in particular, I explore those limitations, looking at how and when Maaori display different identities, present themselves differently, and use different ways of speaking or different names to introduce themselves. If the limits of a particular figured world are judged too constraining for certain persons or groups, or if the figured world ceases to correspond to how they see and define themselves, they can engage in other ones. Certainly, the limits imposed by power relationships between persons and groups prevent or strongly restrict people intending or 7 As a clarification of the difference between internal and external dialogism: when the same person incorporates divergent perspectives, that is, when multiple figured worlds are all part of the actor s personal world view or internalized by the same person, this could be termed internal dialogism. When a person, through practice, is in dialogue with new or alien figured worlds, or with perspectives that are not part of his/her world view, then we can call this external dialogism. We can speak of internal dialogism again if the person has slowly internalized these perspectives of figured worlds. Note that, in any case, the figured worlds or perspectives or the persons themselves are always part of power relationships which affect the internalization and the dialogist processes. See below for details of global structures and power relationships. See also chapter VI for a case study. 21

34 choosing to leave, partially or completely, one figured world for another. This is not explored in Holland et al. (1998), but my fieldwork among Maaori convinced me that constraints exist which permit people to join different figured worlds, and which could also lead actors to limit or put an end to their engagement in certain figured worlds (see also Goldmann 1970 and Rousseau 1995). For example, it would not be viewed favourably for certain people to engage in the figured world of the whaanau. One has to prove one s Maaoriness before receiving approval and acknowledgment (see chapter VI). Bourdieu (1980) also reminds us that the effectiveness of the presentation of ideas with reference to a particular project is linked to the situation in which people propose these ideas. Thus, effectiveness depends on a global time (Giddens 1987; but also Ortner 1984) that is a particular space/time. Returning to the present context of globalization, Appadurai (1996) remarks that many more people in the world today are able to consider a larger number of possible lives and, thus, figured worlds since, among other factors, the media present an everchanging range of possibilities. Displacements and migrations are other factors which intensify this phenomenon. Knowing people who belong to other worlds also activates, according to Appadurai (1996), people s imagination. This observation does not mean that life is necessarily seen as better, but that even people who live in worse conditions can now use their imagination and the diverse possibilities of the present phase of globalization to think about other possible lives or futures. Holland et al. (1998) add that in today s complex and large societies, possible figured worlds are much more numerous than before. This is also the case in cities (Sökefeld 1999; Hannerz 1980). In fact, in the field of urban anthropology, the city is considered to be a universe where cultural and social complexity can be found as its richest. This universe also involves a large degree of opening, and constitutes a knot in regional, national, and transnational networks. Appadurai (1996) adds that, in the global world order, neither the images nor the consumers are part of circuits which are easily delimited within local, regional, and even national spaces. Media, images, and people from afar are 22

35 now easily accessible and have an enormous power of influence on the local context. Friedman, however, warns against seeing cosmopolitanism, multiculturalism, décloisonnement, and hybridity as possibilities equally open to all: To the extent that these representations resonate with a significant proportion of the populations of the West, they become naturalized and self-evident. This has been the case for many of those for whom they make immediate sense. Academics, artists, media intellectuals, and others who identify themselves as the new travelers, have been instrumental in the production of discourses of transnationalism and hybridity, border crossing, and a number of antiessentialist representations of reality. (2003c: 16) Global flows interact with fragmentation processes, often creating new hierarchy or stratification at the local level. Among indigenous people, a travelling group of tribal leaders contrasts with the actors of the grassroots, leading to a new set of internal or class conflicts, according to Friedman (2003c: 18), but also Rata (2000) in the Maaori case. So, if everything is in circulation, certain images or persons are still very localized. Their experiences and everyday conditions of existence set the possibilities for engagement in different figured worlds, and for exercising their agency or their power of authoring and improvisation. Agency and Creativity In the previous section, I noted that the flexibility, multiplicity, and instability of figured worlds allow for personal ease and agency. Here, I offer some clarification of agency. The body is the locus of internalization of figured worlds and, thus, of the structure/culture. The body is also an important locus for engagement in the world and agency, that is the capacity of (re)making sense of the world and the possibility to bring about changes in the structures through improvisation or reorchestration (Holland et al. 1998): one does not have a body, one is a body (Hastrup 1995: 90, emphasis in original). Hastrup adds a dynamic dimension to the mindful body as described by Scheper-Hughes and Lock (1987): body is not only a vehicle for collective social memory but also, potentially at least, for creative action and culture transformation 23

36 (1995: 78). It is only by locating experience and everyday practices at the centre of analyses that people can be seen as active agents in cultural reproduction and transformation. 8 This is the position I put forward in this thesis. It is in the process which consists of making sense of the world that the agents author the world. The space of authoring, reorchestration (Holland et al. 1998), or agency is precisely located in the dialogism which always supposes that the beings exist in a state of being addressed and in the process of answering (Holland et al. 1998: 169). The answer is given in relation to the structures, the positions, and the figured worlds of which a person and/or a group is part. In dialogism, identities and meanings are thus in continuous formulation (Holland et al. 1998; Bakhtin 1981). Identities and meanings put forward in particular situations depend on experiences and practices which calls the person with his/her entire body. The habitus or the incorporation of a figured world, which is the result of accumulated experiences through social practice, plays an important role in pushing for a particular identity or self, but there is always or almost always a place for improvisation. Hastrup uses the expression body-in-life (1995: 94) to refer to a motivated activity ((in)actions or narrations) which is not necessarily intentional. Depending on circumstances, the choice between different identities, meanings, figured worlds, or elements of figured worlds is more conscious, the person being able to enjoy greater agency. The person and her/his actions and intentions are constantly linked to the modelling and constraining 9 power of the culture/structure/society. However, as mentioned by Cohen (1994) and Holland et al. (1998), the existence of common understandings and meanings cannot be taken for granted even among members of closely knit groups. The social world is composed of active agents. Culture and society are produced and reproduced by way of constraints, but also by intentional practices. Taking into account people s capacity to think about their own behaviours and representations, and to use their 8 Hastrup (1995) reminds the reader that cultural reproduction, like cultural production, also needs some efforts. 9 Ortner (1994) underlines, justly, the fact that the thinkers of the theory of practice (e.g., Bourdieu 1977; Foucault 1980b; Rabinow 1975) see mostly the constraining facet of structure s/culture s modelling power rather than also seeing the implied possibilities. 24

37 creativity and power of reorchestration throughout everyday practices, actions, and narrations, becomes extremely important in understanding the cohesion and conflicts between actors in society. The power of authoring resides in the I of the persons or the we of the groups, even if the words and symbols they use to express themselves are drawn from the collective experience and depend upon one or many figured worlds. Agency, as I said earlier, is then not the characteristic of only one person or group; it is the result of all of the persons who live with and within her/him/them. A person can only engage in the play of authoring by being part of a collective. Identities the I are formed within social spaces. The space of authoring is always a political game and always remains a contested space, a space of struggle. Similar to the process of acceptance/internalization or rejection of figured worlds, in the process of self-authoring, certain authors put the emphasis on actions (Scott 1985, 1990), while others put the emphasis on speeches and discourse (Rapport 1997). I am more inclined to draw on De Certeau (1980): speeches and narrations are also a kind of practice and another important aspect of agency. Like Rousseau (1995), I think we should reject the idea of an opposition between thoughts and actions. Thinking is an activity like acting, speaking, and even perceiving. The activity/practice becomes, then, the point of departure in the analysis of the emergence of identities or meanings, since it is in the activity that organisms activate themselves and exist. Like action, according to Holland et al. (1998), narrations and personal stories are part of an active process of identity construction and make possible the learning and internalization of the figured world(s) in which persons and groups participate (see also, among others, Rapport 1997; and Ochs and Capps 1996). But we need to remember a fundamental dimension of persons: their capacity to project themselves into the future and onto other social scenes. Imagination is, thus, an important locus for agency (among others, see Holland et al. 1998; Sökefeld 1999; Battaglia 1995, and Rapport 1997). I believe that the imagination of figured worlds where power 25

38 relationships are rearranged, for example, accompanied by certain actions or a play with the heteroglossia of cultural artefacts can produce the ground, a structure of disposition, for social movement or social change to take place. An action/behaviour is agentic when one shows imagination without contradicting the constraints forced upon one by cultural rules and social forces. A play is even more possible when people are conscious of their own limits: 10 the more the actors master the rules of the figured world, the more they develop an expertise at playing with the cultural artefacts, and the more they are engaged, agentic, and motivated. Expertise develops through new experiences which are repeated in everyday life and embodied in people s habitus. As I said earlier, habitus and social practice give competency at using the cultural tools of the inhabited place, 11 and to appropriate and personalize the cultural artefacts in order to affirm certain world visions, identities, traditions, and memories. Emotional involvement also plays on expertise, the latter being both a question of cognition and emotions. Like identity, agency is also a process. For each persons and group, the possible play is different, since each one possesses different experiences and, thus, competences and dispositions. Each one also imposes personal limits on herself or himself. These limits can be part of a moral universe (Hastrup 1995; Giddens 1987; Willis 1977), which is also social, part of one or many figured worlds. Social positions are not delimited in a mechanical way: the social space can be interpreted in many different ways which offer supplementary play. In this play of positions there are also numerous zones of vagueness and blurring which present interesting avenues for personal expression. It is, moreover, important to consider agency as being not only individual, but also collective (Holland et al. 1998; Willis 1977; Giddens 1987; Cohen 1994; Giles 1993). 10 Cohen (1994) mentions that certain experiences can contribute to increase the consciousness of oneself and one s limits. Rites of initiation, for example, because they are passages of boundaries, open a zone of reflection about who one is and who others are in a process of formation/transformation of oneself. Today, more frequent movements and transnational media also help in opening up new zones of consciousness in meeting with others (Appadurai 1996). 11 I want to remind the reader here that the place, as described by Casey (1996), is not pre-cultural or acultural, but is at once psychic, physical, historical, and social. 26

39 Persons and social groups can develop an expertise in their world which allows them to (re)formulate their position. Cohen (1994) insists on the fact that there is no loss of personal agency even if a person participates in a collective agency. According to him, the explanation of collective behaviour should be sought among the individual participants. However, there is often friction between persons and the groups to which they belong, and, by implication, between personal and group agency. In the city, as in the Maaori case, it is not always easy to combine engagement in many figured worlds or to answer to the demands of the whaanau and of other figured worlds of today. The global: historical structures, stereotypes and the politics of positioning The particular contexts, figured worlds, and relationships in which persons and groups participate suppose particular balances of power at the general society level and within the particular social field(s) (Bourdieu 1984, 1985, 1992) to which they belong/in which they engage. It is, thus, important to take into account the socio-historical context and the particular position which is the effect of the social constraint. The following expands on these notions. According to Bourdieu (1977), social forces or power relationships in which people are inserted push them to act in certain ways. It is important to note that gender as well as socio-economic characteristics are important positional identities to consider (Rethman 2000). Certainly, the power linked to these positional identities differs according to sociocultural context, time, and the combination of positional identities. Social position also affects one s perspective 12 on social and cultural institutions, social relationships and one s subscription to values, engagement in figured worlds, places and spaces, and interpretations promoted in the larger group or society/culture (Holland et al. 1998). Knowledge and power themselves cannot be divorced from position. 12 I am aware that words such as perspective and point of view may emphasize sight over the other senses. I use these words only because they are commonly used but, to my mind, a perspective, a point of view, or a position is developed with all the senses alert and through practice. We will return to the importance of the different senses in Chapter II. 27

40 Stigmas, classifications, and stereotypes are important instruments of power. These are historical and part of global relationships. They are imposed on groups and persons, and are then embodied by them. Stereotypes and classifications aim at decreasing the power of the targeted group on the public scene, but also the agency of the persons involved. This is possible because all stereotypes or categorizations are reductive by nature. They always emphasize the absence of a supposed desirable quality. They are instruments of power which actively deprive the other of an attribute (Herzfeld 1992b, 1992c). Stereotypes and classifications tend to naturalize differences, after which it becomes extremely difficult to affirm something else or to affirm oneself as different from others image of one. According to Herzfeld (1992c), stereotypes generate certitude supporting the prejudices by appearing unambiguous and semantically stable. Stereotypes are a cruel way to make things with words, gestures, or images, and those things have real and tangible consequences (Herzfeld 1992c). Nevertheless, it is important to remember that, even if stereotypes serve the people in power, they imply the possibility of subversion and are sometimes used to that end. They can, at least, be consumed 13 or used in ways which are not always compatible with their first intended meaning (Schwimmer 1994; Hannerz 1992, 1996). Stereotypes and categorizations are also closely linked to essentialism, the process by which categories and classifications are reified and dispossessed of their dynamic aspect, giving stereotypes and categorizations a natural and durable character. That is why Herzfeld (1997) stresses the importance of looking at any kind of essentialism as a strategy and as the product of the presence of agency. Essentialism is very revealing and must be considered in the analysis. The apparent fixities of categories and classifications are the products of the very things they deny: action, agency, and usage. Essentialism and agency are, then, two sides of the same coin (Herzfeld 1997). Essentialism can, for example, be a useful and powerful tool used by minority members or colonized groups to justify claims, stabilize group boundaries, and define precisely what and who is part of 13 This word is borrowed from De Certeau (1980: 78 79) who differentiates the rationalized, expansionist, centralized, spectacular, and noisy production of meanings from a different type of production of meanings that he calls consumption. This type of production is characterized by its ruses, and its clandestine, quasiinvisible, and tireless nature. Consumption is the characteristic feature of minorities (in opposition to dominant groups or populations). 28

41 the group and who is not. The rhetoric around real vs. urban Maaori plays precisely on/with essentialism (see, among others, chapter III). There are additional power relationships that are (re)formed/defined within the group, since people are dealing with the power to define and include/exclude others. This is an important point in dealing with Maaori identities, and in talking about cultural, intellectual, and land rights (see, for example Rata 2000). Another important point that should not be neglected is the essentialism of the two worlds Maaori and Paakehaa. It is then important to look at the discrepancies between rhetoric and practices (see chapter VI). Unified images of figured worlds or symbols which make sense in these worlds are, therefore, powerful political tools (Duany 2000; Handler 1984, 1988; Cohen 1994; Herzfeld 1992c, 1995b, 1997). Persons or groups in power, by conveying unified images of their group and of others groups, create the illusion of control over their own group and over others. It is a way to create and maintain social cohesion and order. As Herzfeld (1992c, 1997), De Certeau (1980), and Scott (1985, 1990) showed, there is always some sort of resistance here and there, even if not always visible at the first glance. The everyday forms of resistance (Scott 1985, 1990) are one of the possible options. In the long run, multiplied many times, actions aiming at individual and immediate ends like the satisfaction of vital needs, actions centred around oneself and the immediate group of belonging (such as the family) can have important consequences on the state and on the elite in power. I will explore this potential among Maaori. According to Scott, real resistance is not only (a) organised, systematic, and co-operative, (b) principled and selfless, (c) has revolutionary consequences, and/or (d) embodies ideas or intentions that negate the basis of domination itself (1990: 437). Everyday resistance is a process of constant test and renegotiation of the relationships between the people in power and the oppressed. Everyday resistance, also called by Scott (1990) weapons of the weak or by De Certeau (1980) l art du faible, contrary to the power of the structure and its discipline (Foucault 1975), uses trickery against the structure of power, creates surprises and improvises 14 (Holland et al. 1998). The weapons of the weak are very often a 14 Improvisation always take place in the flow of activities and within specific social situations, specific time/space. 29

42 practice without discourse, a tactic directly linked to action which create unforeseen effects in practice. The power of persons resides precisely in this creativity, in this improvisation, which slips into the cracks of the structure/culture (De Certeau 1980; Comaroff and Comaroff 1991). De Certeau (1980) speaks of l art de l entre-deux, the art of the interim. Scott (1990), however, warns against exaggerating the power of the weapons of the weak. They can only have marginal or relatively strong effects, but unanticipated since the intention is almost always survival and persistence. In fact, because of its calculated prudence and it s discrete character, everyday resistance preserves, for the most part, the on-stage theatre of power which dominates public life (Scott 1990: 435). Nevertheless, everyday resistance, contrary to formal organizations of resistance, has the advantage of having no identifiable centre, leadership, or structure which could be neutralized by its adversary(ies). Flexibility and persistence replace the lack of centralized coordination. Thus, [their] individual acts of foot dragging and evasion, reinforced often by a venerable popular culture of resistance, and multiplied many-thousand fold may, in the end, make an utter shambles of the politics dreamed up by their would-be superiors in the capital (Scott 1990: 417). Oppressed groups or groups with little power do not have the monopoly on this form of resistance. It is also found among state officials when policies are not to their advantage (Scott 1990; Herzfeld 1992c). It is important, then, to pay particular attention to the way power is socially distributed (Holland et al. 1998; Comaroff 1987), as well as to the larger context of the distribution (see chapter VI). Power, like resistance, is diffuse and difficult to define in any precise way (Herzfeld 1992c). It is made of a complex set of individual and collective forces, subjective and objective processes. Power distribution should be looked at on all levels. This is also true in the Maaori case: family or whaanau, groups and associations, hapuu, iwi, the state, New Zealand as a country. Foucault (1975) shows clearly how discipline and power are reproduced in and by the state and its ramifications, but also in cultural artefacts. The analysis of the context will 30

43 then be done with the aim of revealing the sorts of constraints and relationships that it creates for the actors involved (Cohen 1994). It also helps to understand their motives and the projects they plan in order to negotiate their situations (Ortner 1994). The recognition of different social positions is also necessary in order to correct the censors of those who lack power and privileges (Holland et al. 1998). This is probably the case for many of the participants in my research, since other Maaori often considered them urbanized, acculturated, and disconnected from their tribe and extended family. Access to artefacts is not free: it depends on social status, gender, and other factors in relation to wider social forces (Aucoin 2000). People have certain possibilities, but the structure/culture imposes limits. A certain common content is characteristic of collective symbols: they do not only possess a common form (Cohen ). Language and symbols are, thus, not separable from their uses, which are profoundly rooted in the social and in practice (Hastrup 1995). And, precisely because their life is social, they are also open to different uses. Language, words, symbols, memories, elements of the past, and other cultural artefacts are not unitary. They have the potential for heteroglossia (Bakhtin 1981). They can speak in many voices, take different meanings that are diverse and conflicting depending on time and place (Holquist 2002 (1990)). They are consummated, digested, adapted to the specific life circumstances and tactics 16 of the person (De Certeau 1980). This is why, in dialogism, it is always important, when invoking consummation, to question the position by asking: consummated by whom and for whom?, consummated where? and consummated when? (Holquist 2002 (1990): 150). Because official power suppresses ordinary social discourse (Herzfeld 1987: 100), it is important to examine cultural consumption in the light of power relationships at different levels, that is, structures of power between persons, between groups, and also institutionalized structures of power such as social classes, gender, state power over its populations, the structural power of the market, regional forces, and trans-national forces (Herzfeld 1987, 1992c, 1997; Friedman 1994; Hannerz 1996; Schwimmer 1994, 1999, 15 Cohen did not make this nuance in his previous works (1985a, 1985b, 1996). 16 De Certeau (1980) establishes a fundamental distinction between tactics and strategies, the former being fashioned by the persons, the selves, and their agency, and the latter being used by those in power. 31

44 2004a; Rata 2000; Rethman 2000). Cultural artefacts incorporate controlling dimensions, and possess in themselves discourses and disciplines (Foucault 1975). Ambiguities are seen as a powerful resources by Schwimmer (2004a), Sökefeld (1999), Holland et al. (1998), and Herzfeld (1997). In fact, in everyday life and practice in the city, ambiguities are very important for negotiating particular circumstances. We will see, particularly in chapter VI, how whaanau members play on the flexible character of whaanau principles and values, as well as on their potential for polyphony and heteroglossia, to deal with difficult dilemmas within the whaanau, but also in relationships with people and the figured worlds outside it. The power of space and place The concepts of space and place open interesting avenues in examining how certain sites, like marae and certain types of city houses, are central to Maaori identities and social relationships, but also to the internalization of Maaori figured worlds. These concepts are also useful in exploring the penetrating power of the city, in particular, how certain places limit or allow Maaori self-expression. I use the notion of place to refer to concrete locations, such as city houses, marae, traditional lands, and Maaori schools. These places have cultural, historical, social, emotional, and psychic, in addition to physical dimensions. I also use the notion of space to speak of symbolic, political, and metaphorical sites. I speak, for instance, of a space in the nation, a political space, a space of affirmation, a space of resistance; these spaces also have physical dimensions. We will see how, for example, certain locations or places allow Maaori to have more space for themselves (physically and symbolically or politically) in the city and in the nation. I do not conceive space as preceding or as being a precondition of place (or the reverse), as some suggest (see Casey 1996 for a theoretical and philosophical account of this stance). Seeing space as a pre-existing and empty precondition of place is a rather 32

45 constructivist view (for a critique of such approach, see Ingold 1996, Radice 2000, and Thom 2000). This perspective is paradoxical and somewhat untenable since it is impossible to grasp the raw stuff of space, prior to its transformation into constructions (Radice 2000: 11). Ingold adds that real reality recedes as fast as it is approached (1996: 120). My position, following Ingold (1996) and Casey (1996), is that places and spaces exist only, or at least essentially, as experienced their meanings unfold through interactions between people and their environment. Places become meaningful through practical and perceptual engagement, immersion, and narrations. In this perspective, places, but also spaces since both are complementary are in a continuous state of emergence. This conception of place and space is in line with our practice theory framework, dialogism, in which meanings and structures unfold and emerge through practice. It also recognizes the central importance of the agency of actors: through practice, through their engagement in multiple figured worlds in the urban setting and in today s globalized world, Maaori negotiate new places and spaces for themselves in everyday life, but also as members of the larger society. Through practice, places and spaces emerge and are reaffirmed, but they are also modified in meaning, shape, extent, or importance by the actors who engage in them. At the same time, people are reciprocally constituted by their engagement in places and spaces. As Radice writes, [this] is a significant departure from the constructivist model, in which people are the sole generators of meaning and confer it upon places (2000: 14, emphasis in original). In fact, the place and its conditions have great influence on social practice and the acquisition of the habitus (Bourdieu 1977, 1980). Casey (1996) explains that, at the basis of the habitus, institutions, practices, and the increasing power of the place itself penetrate the body of the subjects (sujets sentant) in a given place. Place is, then, both constituted by and constitutive of cultural processes, cultural practices and ideas, and people. Casey adds that knowledge is not subsequent to perception, but perception is an ingredient of knowledge as such: to know is first of all to know the places one is in (1996: 18). Since meanings are embedded in places, people from the same milieu show numerous similarities; this is a basis for coordinated and collective actions. In the following chapters, I show how certain places, like city houses and marae, 33

46 are particularly critical in the embodiment of Maaori cultural principles and values. It is precisely in this work in progress that people acquire an expertise or a mastery of specific environments. As Maaori experience the city and engage into diverse places and spaces, they acquire the expertise that allows them to feel more comfortable, and to open, enlarge, and (re)affirm new and not-so-new spaces and places. It is in this perspective that, in chapter VII, I explore the notion of comfort, as used by Maaori, to speak about their experiences of places, home, and interrelationships with Maaori and non-maaori in diverse contexts. Sarup (1994), Casey (1996), Foucault (1980a), and Shields (1991) contend that power relationships and disciplines are inscribed in places, and places are charged with emotional content, and gather experiences and historical significance. People who dwell in these places embody or internalize the power relationships which are, themselves, inscribed into or which emanate from places. Places organize and orientate people s behaviours, narratives, experiences, and feelings, as well as relationships (see, for example, Rodman 1992, Foucault 1980a, Lindstrom 1990), but people, through their engagement with places, also have the power to organize places and to change power relationships over time. This process is of great interest, in particular when looking at Maaori everyday engagement in urban places and spaces. Places are also powerful because they are a source of spiritual power, or ancestral agencies and essences (Munn 1996; Myers 1991; Poirier 2004). This is true in the case of Maaori, for whom certain places and spaces are clearly the domain of their ancestors, and whose cosmogony emphasizes the interconnectedness of everything in the universe (Salmond 1990; Pere 1997; Patterson 1992). For Maaori, but also for other indigenous peoples around the world (among others, see Basso 1996), places are a repository for memories and stories, personal and collective, and an important resource in teaching, informing, and persuading. Places organize people s memory (Cruikshank 1990; Myers 1991), as well as group history and sentiment (Morphy 1995). Places are an anchor for personal and social identities (Feld and Basso 1996). Maaori identities are directly related to diverse elements in the landscape, or to places, like rivers and mountains; and to 34

47 particular traditional places, like marae, urupa (cemeteries), and papakaainga (ancestral settlements) (Chapter III). We will see how new spaces and places in the city also serve as anchors for Maaori identities. While most of the literature about place and space has dealt with traditional relationships between people, places, and spaces, including traditional ways of relating to places, connections to the land, customary tenure systems, naming practices, cultural inheritance, and traditional knowledge (see, among many others, Basso 1988, 1996; Cruikshank 1990; Feld 1996; Ingold 1996; Morphy 1995; Munn 1996; Myers 1991; Poirier 1994, 2003; Tonkinson 2003), this study focuses instead on the emergence of new spaces and places in urban areas, and in society as a whole in the context of colonized and/or globalized time and space. The new spaces and places that emerge in the urban setting are not (at least, most of the time) in opposition or contradiction to traditional land and places. New spaces and places are far from being disconnected from traditional places and spaces. I explore, in chapter VIII, how city houses become significant places for the affirmation of Maaori identities, ways of being, ways of relating to each other, and ways of belonging to places. City houses are solid bases for (re)establishing and affirming connections with traditional territories, reclaiming traditional lands and resources lost during colonization, and for affirming new ways and a renewed presence. Places are not dissociable from, among other things, people, cultural and physical resources, memories, and imagination. New places and spaces in the city are essential in upholding links between 1) people city dwellers and rural dwellers, tribal and pan-tribal people, people from different tribes; 2) places; and 3) diverse figured worlds. This points to the interpenetration, interconnection, porosity, and openness of places and spaces as argued by Gupta and Ferguson (1992), Malkki (1992), and Casey (1996). Finally, the theoretical framework outlined here thus allows us to look at Maaori diversity, and to be sensitive to the complexity of the urban and globalized contexts; of the relationships with others in Aotearoa, and to places and spaces; and of the power relationships at different levels, with Maaori or others, as well as the larger space/time. 35

48 A historical overview Aotearoa/New Zealand in the world Aotearoa/New Zealand is a country of 3.88 million inhabitants (2001 Census), located in the Pacific, southeast of Australia. It was colonized by Great Britain during the nineteenth century. Maaori originally came from Polynesia, but they had been in Aotearoa for about 1,000 years at the arrival of the British (Davidson 1984; Belich 1996). Bouchard (2000) is one of the rare authors who positions Aotearoa/New Zealand in world history. He describes New Zealand as being the most recent and the newest of the nationstates created by European settlers (Allen 2002). It is the most recent because it is where colonization began most recently, that is, not before 1830, when British colonization became more intense. It is also the newest because, until very recently, it embodied the model of the motherland; it is only in the last half of the twentieth century that New Zealand acquired a distinct character through distinctive literary and artistic expression. Very briefly, the whole colonial situation began to change in New Zealand, as well as elsewhere in British colonies, following World War II (Bouchard 2000; Allen 2002). In fact, New Zealand was completely independent by virtue of the Westminster Status of 1931, even if this independent status was only recognized by the New Zealand State almost two decades later, in But the process of rupture and distancing from Great Britain was in fact a very slow process. Even though Great Britain withdrew from Aotearoa/New Zealand after the war, Belich (2001: 425) situates this process in the period from 1965 to 1988 and, more narrowly, from 1973 to 1985; 1973 being the year Mother Britain joined the Franco-German commune known as the European Economic Community (EEC). Throughout these years, many elements also began threatening the traditional representation of New Zealand society: Maaori became more militant and active in the practice of democracy, they affirmed their presence; immigration rose and became more diversified with intensified connections with Asia following the retreat of 36

49 New Zealand from ANZUS 17 in 1984 because of anti-nuclear convictions and its involvement in the SEATO (South-East Asia Treaty Organization) (Bouchard 2000). While the development of a national identity after 1880 was always associated with an imperial fidelity, in the 1960s and 1970s, Aotearoa/New Zealand altered its relationship with Great Britain. However, to show the everlasting symbolic importance of Great Britain, there is still a vice-king in New Zealand and God Save the Queen has survived in parallel with the New Zealand national anthem God Defend New Zealand. Today, there are also Maaori words to the anthem, but the two songs are not translations of each other. The Union Jack is also still on the national flag. Aotearoa/New Zealand, then, is situated within the framework of continuism (Bouchard 2000), clearly differing from the United States which developed from a rupture with Great Britain. According to Bouchard (2000), other countries of the Commonwealth, such as Canada and Australia, fall somewhere between the two in their relationship with the motherland. In the last year, Aotearoa/New Zealand has reoriented its international relationships and network, and is now developing more in the Asia-Pacific region. Aotearoa/New Zealand was pressured to adjust its historiography and identity paradigm during the period of the forced rupture with Great Britain, in the 1960s and 1970s (Bouchard 2000). The mere presence of Maaori, and Maaori artistic and literary expression were part of this new national character (Bouchard 2000; Allen 2002). In fact, Maaori artistic and literary expression has been put forward as a distinct characteristic of Aotearoa/New Zealand and, since the 1970s and 1980s, biculturalism has been highly valued 18 (Bouchard 2000; Rata 2000; Schwimmer 2004a). I will come back to biculturalism later. 17 Agreement of military protection between Australia, New Zealand, and the United States. 18 Rata (2000) attributes the bicultural project to liberal guilt and the subsequent emancipative idealism characteristic of the new middle class in postwar New Zealand. 37

50 The colonisation period: 1769 to Early contact with Aotearoa/New Zealand was made in a race between several European countries and the United States, and, according to Belich [that] Britain monopolized early New Zealand contact with Europe is clearly a myth (1996: 121). From 1769, in comparison with the preceding 127 years of occasional contacts, expeditions came thick and fast (Belich 1996: 121). James Cook, who more thoroughly and carefully investigated Aotearoa/New Zealand, played a significant part in the myth of the British monopoly on Aotearoa/New Zealand and Britain s later control of its colonization. Cook visited Aotearoa/New Zealand five times on three voyages: , , and 1777 (Belich 1996: 121). Many other English as well as French, Spanish, Russian, American, and Austrian expeditions followed. 20 As a result, Aotearoa/New Zealand was at first conceived of as an economic annex of Great Britain in the Pacific. It was also seen as a solution to the problem of overpopulation in the mother country. Contrary to Australia, Aotearoa/New Zealand has never been an exile for convicts, except for a small number who escaped there from Australia. According to Bouchard (2000), the people who were chosen to immigrate to Aotearoa/New Zealand were part of the elite of the British working class and petite bourgeoisie. 21 The goal, at least in the formal myths of settlement, was to reproduce Britishness as its best or better: New Zealand was to be the Britain of the South, Better Britain, Greater Britain (Belich 1996). The Aotearoa/New Zealand population was, thus, very homogenous for a long period of time. In 1920, the Immigration Restriction Amendment Act was adopted, and had important repercussions throughout the first half of the twentieth century, and even as late as the 1970s and 1980s. Because of it, Asian immigration was almost non-existent until fairly recently. Anti-Chinese feeling was common and linked to the so-called Yellow Peril of the gold rush period ( ) 19 In our historical division, we follow Schwimmer (2001b). 20 See Belich (1996), in particular chapters 5 to 11, for a detailed history of the European discovery of New Zealand and its colonization by the British. 21 Belich (1996: ) adds some nuances and show how, finally, the migrants were much more varied than some claimed: brides, governesses, carpenters and other craftsmen, gentry, invalids, and investors. These different people were, in fact, attracted by different aspects of the myths of settlement (see Belich 1996 for details). 38

51 and was a feeling that persisted (Bouchard 2000; Fleras and Spoonley 1999). Neighbouring Australia was, at the time, also seen as a threat because of an anti-british trend which manifested itself there, and also because Australians were too Irish, too convict and too digger (Belich 1996: 317). Thus, until the mid-twentieth century, New Zealand tried to preserve its homogeneity and cohesion through discrimination and exclusion, sometimes violent, principally against Maaori, but also against Asians and other strangers. In 1840, British and Maaori signed the Treaty of Waitangi. (See appendix B, for the Maaori and the English versions of the Treaty of Waitangi). It confirmed the existence of two nations (Pearson 1991; Durie 2001b) or two peoples 22 (Sharp 1995). Many chiefs signed the Maaori version of the Treaty, but the meaning was significantly different from the original English version. 23 In the English version, Maaori sovereignty was given up to the Crown (Durie 1998; Walker 1996) 24, which is not the general meaning of the Maaori version in which only the governance (kawanatanga) is lost. 25 The Treaty was violated 22 Referring to Maaori, I will use the word people which avoids the debate and which is used extensively by Maaori themselves. The idea of nation has always been problematic, since the term has a Western origin and refers to a different cultural experience (Williams 1997). Durie (2001b) recognizes this, but still insists on the legitimacy of the word nation in speaking of Maaori. 23 For a summary and a discussion of both Maaori and English versions of the Treaty of Waitangi, see Schulte-Tenckhoff (1999). For a linguistic analysis of the Treaty, see Biggs (1989). For more general discussions of the Treaty s historical context, its interpretation in an international framework, and its consequences, see, among others, Durie (1991), Kawharu (1989), Kelsey (1990, 1991), Orange (1987), Renwick (1991), Sharp (1991), Meijl (1994), and Walker (1989b). 24 In October 1835, a Declaration of Independence was signed by 34 Maaori chiefs, aimed at establishing a national Maaori body representative of all tribes (e.g., Cox 1993; Durie 2001b, Belich 1996). Even though it is not clear whether the declaration was mainly the product of an initiative of the British Resident James Busby or of the ongoing efforts of a number of Maaori chiefs, [not] only did it proclaim New Zealand s independence and assert Maori title to the soil, it prescribed a Maori parliament able to frame laws for the promotion of peace, justice and trade (Durie 2001b: 464). However, Britain s proclamation of sovereignty over New Zealand in 1840 put an end to any ambitions for a Maaori legislature. 25 This ambiguity is at the very earth of controversies around the Treaty (Durie 1998). Some explain the difference between the versions as a deliberate strategy of the colonizers. They think that if Maaori chiefs could have read that they were giving up their sovereignty, their mana (see chapters V and VI for an explanation of the concept mana ), by signing the Treaty, they would have never signed it (Awatere 1984; Durie 1998; Mulgan 1989; Walker 1996). Interpretation problems persist today and create different expectations according to parties (Levine and Henare 1994; Kawharu 1990; Williams 1997). However, despite the highly questionable translation, the Treaty was sufficient to give to the Crown the necessary authority to establish and administer laws, and establish a constitutional government in Aotearoa/New Zealand. 39

52 not long after its signature and Maaori minorization began. 26 In 1877, a judgment of the Court made the Treaty a simple nullity (Walker 1996: 69). 27 The English version of the Treaty of Waitangi was only officially recognized in 1975 in an annex to the Treaty of Waitangi Act, while the Maaori version was not recognized until 1985 when the annex was revised. During the nineteenth century, Maaori lands were either bought at low cost by settlers 28 or were confiscated under armed menace by the army when necessary. Maaori were then dispossessed of the majority of their lands, capital, and power (Schwimmer 1995). 29 The Native Land Act 1872 and the creation of the Native Land Court in 1865 further undermined the collective social organization of Maaori by individualizing land titles and by accelerating the alienation of tribal homelands (Sullivan 2001; Belich 1996). [By] 1911, Maaori held only 7 millions acres, a quarter of the North Island. By 1920, they held 5 million acres, most of it leased to Pakeha, and only a fifth usable for Maori agriculture (Belich 1996: 259). 30 During the land invasion, however, the British were faced with opposition and had to deal with a strong Maaori resistance (Belich 1988 (1986), 1996; Walker 1990, Durie 1998). From 1845 to 1872, there were several and important armed uprisings against the British 26 Note that, in spite of the multiple negations of the Treaty of Waitangi, the New Zealand state sought on different occasions to increase the strength of nationalist feeling and to find a symbolic expression of it in the Treaty of Waitangi (Durie 1998; Douglas 1991). Among other events, in 1940, the centennial of the Treaty was marked by the opening of a carved meeting house; in 1960, February 6 was declared the National Day; and in 1973, the New Zealand Day Act 1973 declared Waitangi Day a public holiday. However, before the Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975, the Treaty had no legal validity. 27 This assertion was only explicitly questioned in 1986 dans l arrêt Te Weehi qui réhabilita la capacité du droit coutumier maaori de définir des droits autochtones relatifs à la terre ou aux ressources (Schulte- Teckhoff 1999: 81-82). 28 The period between 1846 and 1853 is qualified by Belich as the golden age of Paakehaa land buying (1996: 225). 29 The colonisation had a supplementary effect on Maaori women who were and still are doubly marginalized and oppressed (for example, see Awatere 1984; Greenland 1991; Johnson and Pihama 1993; Pihama 1998; Salmond 1990; Smith 1999). Incidentally, [r]angatiratanga has generally been interpreted in English as meaning chieftainship and sovereignty, which in colonialism was a male thing (Smith 1999: 46). 30 Belich warns against the picture of naive Maori victims succumbing to legal chicanery and the blandishments of cunning Pakeha land buyers and storekeepers (1996: 259). Rivalry for mana (status, prestige, authority) among Maaori was a good reason for selling, and one that persisted with the Land Court itself as an arena. 40

53 invasion: the New Zealand Wars. They were not, as is sometimes suggested, storms in a teacup or gentlemanly bouts of fisticuffs, but bitter and bloody struggles, as important to New Zealand as were the Civil Wars to England and the United States (Belich 1988 (1986): 15). Maaori opposition went together with an increasing fervour for greater autonomy. In 1884, however, Maaori were unsuccessful in attempting to have a native rights bill discussed at the House of Representatives, on the basis of the Declaration of Independence, the Treaty of Waitangi, and the New Zealand Constitution Act In 1891 Tawhiao, the second Maaori King, established his own Convention for Chiefs, the Kauhanganui (Durie 2001b) 31. In 1892, another Maaori institution, Paremata Maaori, gathered together many unrelated tribes, a number of which had been enemies previously. This institution sought Crown recognition of it as a separate Maaori parliament. The government responded with the Maaori Council Act 1900 which allowed state-appointed Maaori leaders to administer some Maaori affairs at a local level (Durie 2001b). Durie writes that [by] the beginning of the twentieth century, both tribal authority and Maori nationalism had been silenced, leaving few obstacles to an assimilated future; indeed with the total Maori population reduced by then to some 43,000 (2001b: 466). In 1859, the Crown ruled that Maaori communal land tenure disqualified them from the right to vote (Sorrenson 1986, app. B-17 in Sullivan 2001: 479). The measure prevented them from voting until 1867, when property qualifications for voting were abolished. The Maaori language as a language of instruction was banned in 1867 through the Native School Act (Sullivan 2001). From 1920 to 1960, according to Bouchard (2000: 342), it seems that between 20 and 40 percent of the Maaori children born were taken from their families for adoption by white families. By the 1920s, the land remaining under Maaori control became insufficient to provide an economic base. In 1933, this condition, together with the Depression, resulted in threequarters of the adult Maaori male population being unemployed. Once again, relief 31 The Convention was intended to unite all Maaori chiefs, but was adopted mainly by those close to the Kingitanga movement. The Convention also apparently did not have a national cause (Durie 2001b: 465). The Convention was a form of government drawing on Westminster principles, having a written constitution and making provision for a judiciary. The Convention was created in reaction to the proposal for a Legislative Council of Chiefs, which was rejected by the Native Minister of the time. 41

54 payments discriminated between Maaori and non-maaori: Maaori were paid a lower rate and many non-payments were justified by the argument that unemployment was a normal situation for Maaori (Sullivan 2001). A number of Maaori religious movements and prophets appeared at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth century (Elsmore 1999 (1989); Belich 1996; Binney 1995; Walker 1990, 2001). Among these were the Pai Marire religion, also known as Hauhau; and many religious movements including the movement of Te Whiti and Tohu of Parihaka, the movement of Titokowaru and Te Kooti, the Tariao and Pao Miere movement, and the Te Maiharoa s movement. They each had a different approach to the problems facing the Maaori. For example, during the Depression years, the leader of the Ratana Church Tahupotiki Wiremu Ratana made an alliance with the Labour party in order to improve the extent and quality of welfare payments to Maaori. In 1935, the Labour government equalized Maaori and non-maaori unemployment benefits; old age and widows pensions, however, were still lower for Maaori (Sullivan 2001, based on Orange 1987 and Sorrenson 1986). Improvements were also seen in the areas of Maaori health, housing, and education. During the 1940s, with the end of World War II, urban labour requirements created a movement of Maaori into the cities in search of employment. This urban migration, also called the urban drift due to its intensity, has not, however, been researched seriously. Nothing or almost nothing is known about those who migrated with the exception of work by Metge (1964) and Walker (1970, 1975, 1990) that is, about who they were, what kind of relationships they maintained with their people in rural areas, how they found their way into the city, how they interacted with the mainstream population, and how they were integrated into the employment market. A few novels (Grace 1992, 1998; Ihimaera 1973, 1974) and short stories (Grace 1980; Ihimaera 1972, ; Te Ao Hou ), as well as collections of personal life stories (Broughton et al. 2001; Ihimaera 1994, 1998) give some insights into the period of the urban drift, and the relationships between rural and urban dwellers. No systematic analysis of these stories has, however, been published. 42

55 The policy of assimilation continued until the 1960s. In 1960, this policy became one of integration (with, in retrospect, the same assimilative goals) following the report of the Department of Maori Affairs, which became known as the Hunn Report. From that time on, diversity was to be tolerated as long as it did not interfere with the governing framework (Sullivan ). The Maori Affairs Amendment Act 1967 allowed for the sale of the remaining remnants of Maori land on the pretext they were needed for economic use. The policy denied cultural values as well as collective ownership (Sullivan 2001). The Decolonisation period: 1975 and after The seventies The decade of the 1970s was memorable for the establishment of the Waitangi Tribunal (1975). The year 1975 has been described by many as the beginning of the miracle of decolonization (Schwimmer 1999). 33 At first, the power of the Tribunal was limited to claims arising after In 1985, Judge E.T. Durie extended the jurisdiction of the Tribunal, through the Treaty of Waitangi Amendment Act, to address claims going back 32 Sullivan (2001) identifies four phases in the relationship between the New Zealand government and Maaori: 1) from the conquest until the beginning of the 1960s, assimilation; 2) from the beginning of the 1960s until 1984, integration; 3) from 1984 until 1990, devolution; 4) 1990 to the present, mainstreaming. 33 However, the creation of the Waitangi Tribunal was seen by some as a tool serving mainly the interests of the state (Webster 1998; Melbourne 1995; Durie 1998; Kelsey 1991). For Kelsey, this judiciary initiative corresponded to a shift from over contempt to a much more subtle and pernicious form of subjugation, and the evolution of the Waitangi Tribunal as a panacea which helped stabilize, and later actively legitimize, the Pakeha state (1991: 108). This tendency became more visible with the imposition of the fiscal envelope in 1994 (Durie 1998; Kelsey 1996; Cheater and Hopa 1997; Schulte-Tenckhoff 1999; Sharp 1997; Sullivan 1997). Note that the fiscal envelope was forgotten as soon as Labour became the government in Compensation payments follow the same norms as before, but without artificial limits. Sometime in the 1980s, the Tribunal became a real threat to the New Zealand State and to Paakehaa generally. The government therefore changed its strategy and tried to bypass the Tribunal to engage in direct negotiations with Maaori: more and more, negotiations are direct and do not pass by the Waitangi Tribunal. This approach proved disadvantageous for smaller iwi/whaanau (tribes/extended families) with less money. It also led to important disagreements between tribes over resources (Durie 1998, Melbourne 1995, Webster 1998, Sullivan 2001) 43

56 to The Tribunal redirected attention to the Treaty of Waitangi and biculturalism 34 (Schwimmer 2004a), which led to the 1990s treaty settlements (Sullivan 2001). The decade of the 1970s also marked a new rise in Maaori activism and is recalled notably for: protests by the activist 35 group Nga Tamatoa, the Land March of 1975, the occupation of Bastion Point (1978) (see Mita 1981 documentary) and Raglan Golf Course (1979), and the disruption of the Springbok Rugby Tour (1981) to draw attention to Paakehaa hypocrisy in fighting for justice overseas but ignoring apartheid-like inequities at home (Fleras and Spoonley 1999: 45). This period is often called the Maaori cultural renaissance (among others, see Allen 2002; Belich 2001; Webster 1998; Walker 1990). This political engagement, which continued in the 1980s, led to, among other things: the birth of language revitalization movements; the creation of Te Kohanga Reo (1981) 36 and Kura Kaupapa Maori (1986); and to a series of events and initiatives including the Maori Education Development Conference (1984), the Maaori Economic Development Conference (1985), and the museum exhibition Te Maaori which travelled in 34 For a discussion on biculturalism in Aotearoa/New Zealand, see, among others, Schwimmer (1999, 2004a), Sissons (1992, 1993), Kelsey (1989, 1990, 1996), Sharp (1995), Mulgan (1989), Pearson (1991, 1994, 1996), Webster (1998), Levine (1999), Durie (1995), Rata (2000). 35 Throughout this thesis, when referring to activism and activists, I mean active involvement in social and political groups or movements at the community or broader levels. I do not imply, like certain New Zealand media, that activists are people who whose actions are illegal; though some may be, they are certainly the exception. 36 Te Kohanga Reo or language nests for preschool children (kindergarten) based on Maaori principles are popular initiatives in Maaori language and culture (See, among others, Durie 1998; Smith 1999; Smith 1997; Smith and Smith 1996; Schwimmer 1999; Walker 1996; Webster 1998). The Kura kaupapa Maaori are the equivalent of those preschool classes, but at the primary and secondary school levels. The kohanga reo were at first the initiative of parents, but the New Zealand State later accredited them. These programs are based on whaanau principles to which I will return later. These programs pursue three principal objectives: First, they aimed to provide a vehicle for the promotion of Maori language; second, they wished to stimulate whanau centers which offered quality child care within tikanga Maori; and third, they sought to maintain a totally Maori environment by using immersion modes of learning (Durie 1998: 64). The Maaori language is seen as an important symbol of the Maaori cultural renaissance and is very important in the Maaori search for self-determination. See, among others, Sissons (1993), Maaka (1994), Cheater and Hopa (1997), Smith (1997), for other initiatives linked to the promotion of the Maaori language by Maaori, but also by the state. 44

57 Aotearoa/New Zealand and to the United States 37 (Greenland 1991; Pearson 1991; Poata- Smith 1996; Smith 1999; Sullivan 2001; Mead 1984). This Maaori political activism of the 1970s and 1980s, according to Poata-Smith (1996), should be seen as linked to a worldwide movement following the collapse of the postwar economic boom: a resurgence of class conflicts; the apparition of a new Left, the growth of a student political activism, the movement in the West against the Vietnam War, the Black movement in the United States, the national struggles for liberation in different parts of the world, the rise of American anti-imperialism, the women s liberation movement, various environmental movements, the movement for the rights of gays and lesbians, and antiracist movements. No doubt, the urbanization of Maaori and the disproportionate concentration of Maaori workers in the primary and manufacturing industries made their poverty and marginalized condition more apparent, and stimulated Maaori mobilization (Pearson 1994; Sissons 1993; Meijl 1997; Webster 1998; Walker 1996). The rhetoric of Brown Power, which represented the rejection of New Zealand racist colonial institutions and values, was important during those years and remains so today. From the mid-1970s, Maaori have also been inspired by liberation movements in both the Third World and the so-called Fourth World (Greenland 1991). These included, among others, the struggles by indigenous peoples to create international forums and to have a voice in international organizations. 38 Maaori were, of course, concerned by the debates around issues of the right of indigenous peoples to be recognized and by the definition of indigenism (Allen 2002; Durie 2003; Fleras and Spoonley 1999; Smith 1999). The 37 Arts and literature were also important symbols of the Maaori renaissance and still have an important place (Allen 2002; Williams 1997; Schwimmer 2004a; Webster 1998). Many traditional arts are thought in the whaanau, marae, and schools such as kapa haka (performing arts), waiata (songs), taiaha (traditional weaponry), and carving. Meaningful books and documentaries also came out during the period of the Maaori renaissance: among others Grace (1975, 1978, 1980, 1986), Ihimaera (1972, 1973, 1974, 1986, 1987), Hulme 1986 (1983), Mita (1981). All these writers benefited from international recognition. See an analysis of these novels and documentary by Allen (2002). 38 At the international level, 1975 saw the creation of the World Council of Indigenous Peoples (WCIP), which was established by the National Indian Brotherhood of Canada and was the first indigenous NGO at the UN (1969) (Smith 1999; Minde 1996; Allen 2002). In Aotearoa/New Zealand, the first nationwide Maoori organization, the Maori Women s Welfare League, was created in 1951, followed by the Maori Council in 1962 (Walker 1990). 45

58 United Nations (UN) working definition of indigenous peoples first applied only to the original inhabitants of European settler nations, where a differentiation was usually made between the original inhabitants, and the settlers and other ethnic or immigrant minorities (Schulte-Tenckhoff 1997). Peoples recognized as indigenous were American Indians from North America, Central America and South America, Inuit from the Nordic areas, Aborigines from Australia, Maaori from Aotearoa/New Zealand, and Kanak from New Caledonia. Later, the Sami from Scandinavia, indigenous peoples from Siberia, and the Ainu from Japan were recognized as indigenous peoples. The situation is less clear for tribal peoples from Asia and Africa, although the term indigenous is sometimes used to classify them and is used by the International Labour Organization (ILO) (Schulte- Teckhoff 1997; Schulte-Tenckhoff and Horner 1995). The qualifier indigenous does not, therefore, have an absolute definition: it was first defined by a specific configuration of power, and then by the fact that indigenous peoples were the last people to be colonized. Since 1972, in recognizing indigenous peoples, the UN has been guided by the definition set forth in the study of the problem of discrimination against indigenous peoples (articles 379 to 383) under the direction of José Martinèz Cobo. Maaori were thus immediately recognized as part of the indigenous world. However, Poirier (2000), Bowen (2000), and Smith (1999) have warned of the inherent dangers of the notions indigenism and indigenous rights. Smith writes [the] term indigenous is problematic in that it appears to collectivize many distinct populations whose experiences under imperialism have been vastly different (1999: 6). She argues, thus, in favour of the expression indigenous peoples as a means of reminding us of their heterogeneity, diversity, and multiple experiences and identities. Bowen (2000) and Poirier (2000) also underline the fact that Western conceptions of indigeneity are often too static and ahistorical, focusing on genealogic descent and traditional modes of life. The theoretical framework adopted in this thesis addresses these criticisms at two levels: 1) by showing how Maaori experience is inscribed in a particular history of colonization, and 2) by stressing diversity among Maaori themselves by revealing their complex, diversified, and multiple identities, ways of being, and engagements in figured worlds. 46

59 Maaori have been involved in the transnational indigenous movement almost since its beginning (Smith 1999; Allen 2002). Minde (1996) writes that, with American Indian leaders, Maaori leaders are among those principally fighting for indigenous selfdetermination and control over/guardianship of the land and sea. 39 Land 40 is at the very heart of Maaori identity and Maaori sense of continuity. Turner writes, [for] Maaori, the basis of right and their claim to justice is the concept of taangata whenua (people of the land), which expresses their original occupation of the land and their distinctive relationship to it (1999: 410). We are the land, writes Rika-Heke (1997: 174). 41 The land is also the symbol of Maaori alienation, colonization, and political subjection to the Paakehaa (Walker 1990, 1992; Greenland 1991). The eighties During the 1980s, the different Maaori political movements in Aotearoa/New Zealand focused on rediscovery and revitalization of Maaori culture (Meijl 1994, 1997). Poata- Smith writes that rather than channelling Maori into greater political involvement, the introverted emphasis on Maori consciousness alone tended to lead Maori away from political activism (1996: 107). Douglas (1991) attributes to the Waitangi Tribunal the shift from public protests, sit-ins, marches, and demonstrations to a more introverted period of conciliation and dialogue between the two parties, Maaori and Paakehaa. Sullivan writes that [overall], the 1980s can be characterised as the decade of recognition and litigation. Historical grievances were recognized and legitimised by the state (2003: 39 Minde adds the following point: The Indian organizations focused almost entirely on the rights question, whilst their counterparts among the Sami came little by little to give most attention to cultural issues (1996: 227). 40 During the year 2003, the sea (foreshore and seabed) also became an important issue in the Maaori struggle for more autonomy, as well as an important symbol of Maaori affirmation, since Prime Minister Helen Clark proposed a change to reassert state ownership of the foreshore and seabed, reversing the Appeal Court s ruling that iwi [tribal] groups could assert customary rights through the Land Court (Collins 2003). At the time of writing this, the proposed law has not been adopted yet, but it aims to ensure that no one could hold private title to the foreshore and seabed while allowing Maori to pursue customary rights (Llwellyn 2003). 41 Note that the word whenua also means the afterbirth. We will come back to these different meanings of the word in chapter III. In 2003, the Associate Maaori Affairs Minister Tariana Turia, later supported by, among others, Ranginui Walker and Patu Hohepa, called for the use of tangata whenua as more appropriate than Maaori since Maaori is a word to describe the collective of their people that came into use after the arrival of the colonizers (see, for example, Thomson 2003). 47

60 228). Unfortunately, that introverted phase has not yet been researched with a focus on the day-to-day life and experience of Maaori. A study of this period and the analysis of the actions and discourses of the different groups of the time could be fruitful in getting a better understanding of this introverted phase. It would be interesting to look not only or mainly at public and highly educated persons who, for the most part, were also involved in the previous public period, the extrovert Maaori cultural renaissance. Since the so-called introverted period seemed to have promoted conciliation and dialogue, 42 serious study could throw light on the relationships between Maaori, between Maaori and Paakehaa, and between Maaori and other groups in New Zealand society. Much needs to be understood about ordinary people, that is, people who are not usually involved in public debates and on the public scene through political organizations, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), social movements, and other activist groups. Urban revolutionaries, those new intellectual leaders 43 who were also highly educated, were an important force in the pan-maaori reaction to impoverishment and marginalization (Rata 2000; Allen 2002). No serious studies, however, have looked at them (Walker 1990 gives some details about who they were, their ideas, and their actions). There are a few books which give them voices (King 1975, 1978; Melbourne 1995; Ihimaera , 1994, 1998), but only rare efforts at theorization have been made to better understand their discourses, and to reveal their motivations, their particular ideas and claims, and their personal/social characteristics, the exception being Schwimmer (2004b). Webster (1998), Rata (2000), and Friedman (2001, 2003c, 2003e) emphasize the importance of questioning, for example, the class interests of those leaders. 42 Since 1999, it has generally been recognized that conciliation and dialogue have also been promoted under Prime Minister Helen Clark of the Labour Party. 43 Note that a first generation of intellectual leaders, among them the well-known Ngata, Hiroa (Buck) and Pomare, did a great deal for Maaori in the early nineteenth century. However, the context being different at that time, they were directly indebted to the Paakehaa culture and people, were in a position of compromise, and were less directly Maaori-oriented that the later urban revolutionaries (Allen 2002). 48

61 Aotearoa/New Zealand policies and Maaori today In the 1980s, in reply to calls for Maaori autonomy/self-determination and biculturalism in Aotearoa/New Zealand, the government rethought its Maaori policy and administration along devolutionary lines (e.g. Barcham 1998; Durie 1998; Fleras 1989; Fleras and Spoonley 1999; Schwimmer 1995; Meijl 1997). These devolutionary commitments dovetailed with the government s structural adjustment program, most notably in the restructuring of New Zealand s public sector along the market-driven lines of privatization, deregulation, and corporatisation (Fleras and Spoonley 1999: 123). In fact, since the 1980s, New Zealand has been seen as a laboratory for neo-liberalism, with the state s economic objectives of reducing the bureaucratic management and government protectionism in the aftermath of the oil shock of the mid-1970s (Belich 2001, Laliberté 2000, Sullivan 2001). According to Schwimmer (1995), the devolution system was also instituted following realization by the state that its systematic integration/assimilation policy of Maaori, pursued since 1845, had been a great failure. Barcham (1998) speaks of this period in terms of re-iwi-ization, since iwi (tribes) became, under the new government policy, responsible for the local management of services such as the distribution of social benefits and numerous other services which were previously assumed by the state. 44 According to Sullivan, the re-iwi-ization provided Maori with an opportunity to limit state paternalism, partly through a functional transfer of power from government to the tribes (devolution) and partly by limited self-determination (2001: 482). By the end of the 1980s, the Treaty of Waitangi had outlined a direction for a restructuring of the relationships between iwi and the government according to bicultural principles. In 1984, at the Hui Taumata, a government-sponsored economic summit, Maaori advocated for tribal control and delivery of services. Two programs were implemented with the aim of 44 Note that there is a distinction between administrative and moral responsibilities. If iwi are now responsible for different services, it does not mean that they are equally active in their role as guardian of Maaori values and traditions. We will see throughout this thesis that whaanau (extended families) are now mainly responsible for the transmission of Maaori values and of culture more generally. 49

62 giving some control to individual tribes over delivery of services to Maaori: 1) the MANA Enterprise Scheme aimed at providing funding for entrepreneurial development and, thus, Maaori employment opportunities, and 2) the MACCESS Scheme which aimed to provide Maaori Trust Boards with the means to set up and deliver skills-training programs to the unemployed (Sullivan 2001). Some of the reforms made by the Labour government from 1984 to 1990 seemed to answer Maaori claims for self-determination and self-management. 45 In 1990, the Labour government passed the Runanga Iwi Act which provided the necessary legal authority for tribal entities to enter into formal contractual arrangements with the state (Sullivan 2001: 483) or the private sector (Fleras and Spoonley 1999: 124). However, it was pointed out that, in practice, there was a wide gap between theoretical and real devolution: the tribes did not have enough competent people to answer to their diverse clientele, they did not have enough money, and they did not receive the promised support during the transition. Furthermore, because the guidelines of the transition itself were not clear, the Maaori and the government expectations differed (Fleras 1991; Maaka 1994). In fact, the iwi devolution consisted of decentralising delivery structures to the community level without leading to any fundamental change in the prevailing distribution of power in society (Fleras 1991: 186). 45 Note that there were dissensions about the Runanga Iwi Act 1990 due to the eligibility criteria defining the tribes (iwi) as legal corporate entities, and as legitimate inheritors of traditional resources and knowledge. There was an important representation issue regarding tribal, pan-tribal, traditional, and urban Maaori organizations. Since 1995, urban Maaori have challenged traditional tribal entities through the courts, up to the Privy Council in London, in order to have their organizations recognized as tribes (See Durie 1998; Rata 2000; Schwimmer 2001a; Schwimmer, Houle and Breton 2000; Sullivan 2001; Walker 1996; Webster 2002). Sullivan (2001), Rata (2000), Barcham (1998) see the proliferation of tribal organizations competing with one another for limited resources as a direct result of the devolution and mainstreaming policies of recent years. The continual reference to the iwi by the government contributed to giving them a fixed form, which ignores the flexibility and changing nature of the traditional tribe (Maaka 1994; Schwimmer 1990). The static and rigid form the government gives to the iwi also ignores new urban organizations. The government is supported by many Maaori tribal leaders who welcome the opportunity to reinforce their tribal authority, and to extend it to tribal members now living in the city (Meijl 1997). This authority was not always consciously pursued, but new class structures within the tribes were an effect of retribalization combined with the setting up of Maaori tribal capitalist enterprises (Rata 2000). Cheater and Hopa (1997) write that the government chose some specific leaders with the precise goal of achieving its agenda. It thus followed a practice of indirect rule, which is new neither in Aotearoa/New Zealand (Webster 1998), nor elsewhere in the former British Empire (Bariteau 1998). 50

63 The national government, elected in 1990, rapidly did away with the Runanga Iwi Act of 1990 and put in place new processes to limit tribal control, initiative, and autonomy over service delivery (Sullivan 2001: 483). This period is seen as one of mainstreaming of Maaori affairs. Devolution was replaced by contracting, which was seen as a delegation of power rather than a real control, as it delimited power and implied considerable supervision from the government. Under this arrangement, the state contracted service delivery programs in health, education, and training with organizations such as the Maori Women s Welfare League, Maori Trust Boards, the New Zealand Maori Council; and with some urban Maaori organizations and authorities (Sullivan 2001) such as Te Whaanau o Waipareira in West Auckland and the Manukau Urban Maaori Authority (MUMA) in South Auckland. By 1994, in various development initiatives, there had in fact been an increasing call for the emphasis to shift again to smaller groupings, like hapuu and whaanau, that is, a move from iwitanga (the way of the tribe; vertical structural ethic) to whanaungatanga (the way of the extended family; horizontal kinship principle) (Durie 2001a who quotes Puketapu 1994 and Dyall and Wauchop 1994) (see chapter three for details of Maaori the social organization). We will explore, in this thesis, how the whaanau became a central site, not just for development initiatives, but also for the affirmation of Maaori identities and presence in the city and in the larger society. In the 1990s, the mode of representation of Maaori at the parliament was also modified. Before entering into a discussion of the new system put in place, here is short historical overview of the Maaori representation in the New Zealand government since colonization, based on Sullivan (2003): 51

64 Table 1: Maaori representation in Aotearoa/New Zealand at a glance 1852: New Zealand Constitution Act provides the franchise to all males (Maaori included) over the age of 21 years and registered as individual property owners. 1867: Four designated seats in Parliament for Maaori 1868: First Maaori parliamentary representatives are elected 1870: Secret ballot election for non-maaori; Maaori vote with a show of hands until : The franchise is extended to women, including Maaori women, and the right to vote requires the same qualifications as for eligible men 1896: Abolition of property qualifications; all Maaori adults are eligible to vote in the separate Maaori electorates, and only half-maaori blood or less have the choice of voting and standing in either the Maaori or general electorates 1910: Maaori have to vote by declaration in front of a returning officer and witnessed by another Maaori : Maaori cast their votes the day before the general election 1927: It is compulsory for all eligible non-maaori to enrol on the general roll 1937: Maaori get the secret ballot 1940: Article 3 of the Treaty of Waitangi guarantees Maaori the same rights and privileges as British subjects. 1951: Maaori vote the same day as non-maaori 1956: It is mandatory for Maaori to enrol on the Maaori roll 1956: Electoral Act which consolidates electoral provision and s34 of the Act provides for the four Maaori electorates, which could be overturned by a simple majority of Parliament 1967: Amendment to the Electoral Act allows Maaori to stand for election in the general electorates (and non-maaori in Maaori electorates) 1975: Two parliamentary candidates of Maaori descent are elected in general electorates (total of six members of Parliament) 1975: Treaty of Waitangi Act 1984: Amendment, Treaty of Waitangi Act 1987: Maaori Language Act establishes Maaori as an official language 1992: National referendum to change the electoral system 52

65 1992: First major economic treaty settlement: Treaty of Waitangi Fisheries Settlements Act : Second referendum binding government to electoral change 1993: Electoral Act establishes the mixed-member proportional system (MMP) and increases the number of members of Parliament (MPs) from 99 to : Second major economic settlement: Waikato Raupatu Claims Settlement Act : Change from a simple majority electoral system (first-past-the-post or FPP) to a mixedmember proportional system (MMP): First MMP election and Maaori seats increase from four to five (out of 65; total of 15 Maaori MPs) 1998: Third major economic settlement: Ngai Tahu Claims settlement Act : General election: Six Maaori seats (out of 67; total of 15 Maaori MPs) 2002: General election: Seven Maaori seats (out of 69; total of 19 Maaori MPs) The new system of representation, introduced in 1996, is a mixed-member proportional electoral system (MMP), a two-vote system that elects electorate parliamentary representatives as well as providing a second vote so that political parties can be represented proportionally according to their share of the [nationwide] party vote (Sullivan 2003: 229). Under this system, nearly half of the 120 members of Parliament (MPs) are drawn from party lists, the rest being voted into office by electorates (Maaori and general seats). Maaori seats are in line with their proportion of the population, at least with the proportion of Maaori who choose to be on the Maaori electoral roll. During the 1993 referendum, a large proportion of Maaori favoured the MMP system mainly because the power sharing was almost nonexistent in the previous system, based on one person, one vote, Maaori being a minority in Aotearoa/New Zealand (Levine and Henare 1994; Levine and Roberts 1997; Meijl 1998). MMP has also introduced New Zealand to coalition governments. Changing the electoral system has radically changed the make-up of New Zealand governments. Previously, single parties (either National or Labour) controlled government, and party members, including Maaori, were required to support their respective party s policies. ( ) For the Maaori MPs, this was a position of potential conflict between 46 For details, see, among others, Durie (1998), McCan 2001, Sullivan (2003), and Webster For details, see, among others, Hopa (1999), Mahuta (1978, 1995a, 1995b), and Meijl (2003). 48 For details, see, among others, Fleras and Spoonley (1999), Kelly (1998), Sissons (1995), and Waymouth (2003). 53

66 their Maaori constituency and their political party. ( ) Post-1996, governments have been determined by a coalition of the highest polling political party and a minor party. As a result, MMP governments have had to accommodate some of the demands of their junior partners. The Maaori seats at the 1996 and 1999 elections were pivotal in the formation of a government and the Maaori members potentially had considerable influence. Both governments appointed more than one Maaori to the executive an unusual occurrence for New Zealand governments. (Sullivan 2003: 230) In 1996, in the first election under MMP, there were five Maaori seats occupied by Maaori MPs. With other Maaori members of Parliament from different parties, a total of 15 Maaori MPs were elected. In 1999, the number of Maaori seats was adjusted to six, for a total of 15 Maaori MPs. In 2002, the number of Maaori seats was adjusted again to seven; with other Maaori MPs, a total of 19 Maaori was then elected. Moreover, in the 1990s, treaty settlements became a priority. Sullivan (2001) explains that the 1994 treaty settlement envelope of $1 billion for full and final resolution of all Maaori grievances relating to the Treaty of Waitangi, with a timeframe of the year 2000, 49 fit well with a policy of fiscal responsibility, 50 and was the outcome of successive governments liberal economic policies. The tribes unanimously condemned the package and, later (Sullivan 2001; Durie 1998), the National-New Zealand First coalition government refrained from referring to the $1-billion envelope of for treaty settlement. It seems, however, that all settlements from 1996 to 1999 did appear to fit within the parameters of the $1 billion package (Sullivan 2001: 484) (see also Gardiner 1996). It must be noted, however, that the Tribunal of Waitangi has been widely criticized for its poor productivity. In fact, [at] the time of writing [2001] there are approximately 850 claims registered with the Waitangi Tribunal. To June 1999, the Tribunal had produced initial and final reports on seventy claims, and had reported on an aspect of a further fifteen claims (with additional claims settled by direct negotiation or mediation). To 30 June 1999 there were 129 claims in hearing. (Hayward 2001: 495) In 1999, a new coalition government, the Labour-Alliance government (McLeay 2001), was elected. The idea of the fiscal envelope was not reintroduced. 50 In order to reduce uncertainty about future fiscal management, in 1989, the government passed the Reserve Bank Act and, in 1994, the Fiscal Responsibility Act. 51 However, Hayward (2001: 495) warns that these figures could be misleading in their raw form even if, in the past, there has been room for criticism of the Tribunal s productivity. 54

67 Review of the literature about Maaori Very few works deal with contemporary Maaori, in general, and present-day New Zealand society. Many books focus on the pre-contact and contact periods, and on traditional Maaori society (e.g. Cox 1993; Salmond 1990, 1997; Sinclair 1991 (1959); Turner 1999). They are rather macroanalytically oriented and are mainly preoccupied with the structures and main marking points, rather than with the actors, their agency, and their experiences. In fact, much has been said about the traditional or classic (Metge 1995) Maaori whaanau (extended family), hapuu (sub-tribe), and iwi (tribe). The various accounts are well summarized by Metge (1995). Works by Best (1924), Firth (1959), and Hiroa (1949) describe the classic social organization, the whaanau, hapuu and iwi, of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, that is, the pre-contact and immediate postcontact period. In the 1950s and 1960s, four studies described the contemporary whaanau of that time, essentially in rural communities: Metge (1964), Winiata (1967), Hohepa (1964), and Kawharu (1975). Metge (1964) also considered the ties maintained with their family by emigrants from rural areas who were living in the city. All those analysis were rather concerned with structures and organizational principles. Metge writes: Trained in British functionalism, a theoretical approach which emphasised functional relationships in the present and undervalued historical depth, Winiata, Hohepa, Kawharu and I concentrated our energies on describing the whaanau in its contemporary form in our different communities. We accepted the model of the classic whaanau as background without examining it critically and without attempting to chart the process of change over the intervening years. (1995: 44) From the late 1960s, researchers have taken an increasingly critical approach to the study of the Maaori social and economic order (Webster 1975, 1998; Orbell 1978; Schwimmer 1978, 1990; Metge 1990; Salmond 1991; Durie-Hall and Metge 1992; Ballara 1998). All, including Metge (1995), succeeded in finding a better way to acknowledge and explain changes and processes, mainly in whaanau and hapuu. Ballara (1998) was more preoccupied with hapuu and iwi dynamics, mainly from 1769 to In all these studies, we learn about general principles and processes, but we know very little about the everyday working of those principles, crisis, negotiation with other worldviews and 55

68 possibilities, as well as personal and collective agency. Very little is known about everyday whaanau and hapuu life outside occasional hui (assembly, gathering, meeting) (Salmond 1975; Metge 1995). We know very little about whaanau in the urban setting, among other things, since the researchers, including Metge (1995), mainly based their studies on typical rural whaanau. Moreover, nobody has investigated the migration to the cities since Metge (1964), and nothing has been written about urban/rural relationships and the way people maintain links with the rural area once they are established in the city. No one spoke about the emotions, jealousy, conflicts, and joy involved in those urban/rural relationships. No one, besides Metge (1964) and Rata (2000), spoke of efforts and actions taken to maintain links with the larger whaanau networks, including those living away, or to limit relationships in order to benefit from more freedom. Among other researchers, Barcham (1998), Durie (1994, 1998, 2001a, 2003), Fleras (1991, 1989), Maaka (1994), Metge (1986, 2002), Rata (2000), Schwimmer (1995, 1999, 2004a), Smith (1999), Meijl (1995, 1997, 2003), Walker (1990, 1996), Waymouth (2003), and Webster (1998) have began to reflect on contemporary Maaori, but it seems that this trend is still very subtle, mainly for socio-historical reasons. Webster (1998), talking about researchers from the University of Auckland, thinks that this situation is partly due to the particular interests and orientations of the chairs of the departments of Anthropology and Maaori Studies. Webster also attributes it to the political situation, and a general respect for Maaori desire for the silence of the Paakehaa with regard to research about Maaori in a period of Maaori affirmation. Having myself participated in university life and in conferences in Aotearoa/New Zealand, I found that the tendency is for Maaori research topics to be studied mainly by Maaori themselves and by overseas researchers like me. Joan Metge and Ann Salmond are two noticeable exceptions in this field who, it seems, developed credibility among both Maaori and Paakehaa through their deep personal engagement with the community as well as their professionalism. Maaori public denunciation of the abuses of the Western sciences and their claim for control over 56

69 research has played a great role in this trend. One of the important protagonists in this debate is Linda Tuhiwai Smith (1999). Other studies are about Maaori and Paakehaa today, but they mainly focus on governmental policies and measures taken to improve the situation of Maaori. Those studies are principally about the Treaty of Waitangi, the Waitangi Tribunal, and the politics of biculturalism (among others: Durie 1991, 1995, 1997a, 1998, 2001a, 2001b; Fleras 1991; Kelsey 1990, 1991, 1996; Levine and Henare 1994; Miller 1997, 2001; Pearson 1991, 1994, 1996; Poata-Smith 1996; Sharp 1997, 1991; Stokes 1992; Sullivan 2001, 2003; Walker 1991; Wilson 1995; Wilson and Yeatman 1995). There are many repetitive elements in these works, but they are useful in developing a good understanding of the actions taken to redress the situation in favour of Maaori. Very little attention is given to the people who benefit from those policies and measures, their agency and the role they play in the policies implementation, their experiences, their satisfaction and critiques, and the people involved in implementing those measures. One exception is Rata (2000), who looks closely at one example of personal and whaanau agency, balancing her analysis by looking first at wider and even global structures and processes. Very few studies have been done of the general situation of Maaori living in urban areas today. A few works were published in the 1960s and 1970s (Chapple 1975; Kawharu 1968, 1975a, 1975b; King 1975, 1978; Metge 1964; Schwimmer 1968; Walker 1975a, 1975b, 1979) about the Maaori urbanization, but they have been the only substantial studies of Maaori living in urban areas until recently (Belich 2001; Durie 1998; James Henare Maaori Research Centre 2002; Maaka 1994; Schwimmer 1999, 2004a; Walker 1975a, 1975b, 1990, 1996; Webster 1998). Only Metge (1964) and Walker (1970, 1975) did serious research about, among others things, urban migration and its reasons, the expectations of the newcomers, the first arrangements in the city, the relationships of the newcomers with others in the city, Maaori and Paakehaa, their participation in voluntary associations and community life, and living arrangements. There are also relatively few works written about urban and/or pan-tribal marae (Barcham 1998; Durie 1998; James Henare Maaori Research Centre 2002; Philllips 1999; Rosenblatt 2002; 57

70 Schwimmer 2000c; Tapsell 2002; Te Hoe Nuku Roa 1999; Walker 1975b, 1987, 1989a, 1992; Webster 1998) and other Maaori organisations/groups (Walker 1975b, 1990; Sharp 2002, 2003) in the city. When such studies exist, they are more of a description of the groups/organizations as such: their structure, the services they offer, the socio-economic characteristics of the population/clientele they serve. There is very little information about the reasons for involvement in such groups/organizations; the relationships between the persons and groups involved; the effects on the larger Maaori networks; the relationship between those groups/organizations/marae and their neighbours, Maaori or not; or the innovations and changes they have brought about. Furthermore, few studies have been conducted on city planning or on city and national policies, such as the pepper-potting policy aiming at scattering Maaori households among Paakehaa neighbourhood (the only explicit reference being Trlin 1984), and other subsequent housing policies, and the way these affected and still affect Maaori life in the city (Cram and Pitama 1998; Morrison 1995; Walker 1979; about Auckland Samoan see also MacPherson 1997). Unfortunately, I could not do this in this thesis, but these issues need to be addressed. In short, there is little written about everyday life in general (the exception being Makareti (1986 (1938)), personal and group experiences, agency and struggles, narratives and discourses. One can find a whole series of statistics, reports, and other works about, among other things, Maaori urban deprivation, criminality rates, and poor health conditions, but the ethnography has not really been elaborated. I will not burden the reader by quoting these works here, because they are so numerous. Most of these studies, however, make generalizations about the situation of Maaori living in urban areas, not looking at their diverse experiences and everyday life, the exception being Metge (1964) who speaks about her research participants experiences of the city. Metge s (1964) and Walker s (1970, 1975a, 1975b) works, however, are the only currently available references for the period

71 A few edited books group together the opinions of quite well-known Maaori involved in the political scene (King 1975, 1978; Melbourne 1995; Ihimaera 1994, 1998), but very little has been done to know what ordinary Maaori think. Some books have also been written about prominent Maaori individuals, such as Te Kooti (Binney 1995), King Pootatau (Jones 1959), Te Puea (King 1977), Eruera Stirling (Salmond and Stirling 1980), Amiria Stirling (Salmond and Stirling 1976), and Apirana Ngata (Walker 2001), to name only a few. One can find very few details about the consequences of particular policies and measures on Maaori as persons, whaanau, groups, and iwi; or on the relationships between Maaori, Paakehaa, and the other groups who now live in Aotearoa. This reveals a need for studies about Maaori everyday lives, experiences, and practices, in particular in the urban setting. Finally, as mentioned in the introduction, part of my contribution is to fill important gaps in the literature and, more precisely, to shed light on everyday experiences and practices of today s Maaori who live in the city, in particular on how Maaori create new spaces and places of affirmation, imagination, cultural transmission, resistance, and transformation. 59

72 CHAPTER II DISCOVERING NEW REALITIES, FINDING THE PEOPLE: METHODOLOGICAL CHOICES This chapter outlines the way in which the research project was designed before entering the field, and how it evolved in contact with the reality of Auckland and through my engagement with Maaori people living in the city. While exploring some of the difficulties of doing anthropological work in an urban setting, it also describes the methodology and strategies developed not only to interview Maaori people from various sectors of the society, but also to participate in the everyday life of Maaori families. Entering the field I arrived in Auckland at the end of February 2001, intending to investigate how Maaori who live in Auckland conceive of and live their identities, and how they conceptualize their projects for autonomy, which I saw above all in political terms. More specifically, I had planned to examine how the Maaori struggle for autonomy was part of everyday life, and how and in what terms they were contesting the validity, authority and legitimacy of mainstream institutions. The research was to focus on ordinary Maaori people, their multiple identities, agency, and personal as well as group everyday negotiations and adjustments. Leaders and other members of the Maori elite active on the public scene are used to talking about Maaori autonomy or self-determination and Maaori politics, and their discourse is easily accessible through the media and in numerous books, as we saw in chapter I. Moreover, when meeting community leaders, I realized how difficult it was to discuss certain themes or ideas with them in depth; they tended to limit their comments to the official position that they had taken. Ordinary people are usually less pressured to defend an official position, more open and free for discussion, and acknowledge complexities, diversity and ambiguities more easily. Furthermore, their voices are often 60

73 silenced by those who wield greater power; this is the case for Maaori women and the socalled urban Maaori, that is, those who have no or limited connections to their tribe(s) and traditions. However, in certain circumstances, political correctness may prevent ordinary people from expressing themselves freely, for instance, when they discuss issues with a white outsider or have a precarious position in their own whaanau (extended family) and/or other kinds of groups. Moreover, according to Smith, [the] connection of knowledge with mana [authority, power, prestige, psychic force] could mean that an informant is not going to reveal too much, is not going to admit lack of knowledge but, conversely, is going to assert influence or a picture of dominance (1999: 174). The first obstacle I faced was the fact that the ordinary Maaori with whom I was discussing and explaining my research project did not express any interest in the main topics of this research and, by and large, were not keen to discuss politics. Furthermore, most of them did not seem to have clear positions with regard to the government s political agenda, particular policies or structures. Although they often talked about the need for greater autonomy for Maaori, it was always in general terms, never pointing out specific projects. It soon became apparent to me that autonomy is not considered only and mainly in political terms; autonomy at the personal, whaanau (extended family), and community levels is far more important. This was later confirmed through participant observation and interviews with various informants. If issues of political autonomy are important, these are most often the preoccupations of Maaori who are more socioeconomically stable and better educated. Specific sociopolitical circumstances also play on preoccupations with political autonomy. I became intrigued by the way people often spoke of their family, and by the way they used the term whaanau to designate different groupings and to qualify their relationships with others, Maaori or not. I developed an interest in the importance and functioning of kinship ties in the urban milieu, in the organization of Maaori city houses, and in the ways people talked about these places as central to their everyday life, their sense of belonging 61

74 to a group, their identification as Maaori, and their comfort as persons, as part of a whaanau, as city-dwellers, and as citizens. As I gained a better knowledge and understanding of the life of Maaori in the city, the focus of my research changed quite significantly. Existing ethnography on urban Maaori is quite limited (see chapter I), so I tried to ground myself as much as I could in people s words and actions, and thus let the research topics and, ultimately, the conclusions unfold from the data. This research project was constantly reworked to correspond closely to the observed/experienced situation and to people s preoccupations. This is how I started to focus on kinship relationships and everyday life in city houses. It is also how the notion of comfort, discussed in chapter VII, emerged from the data. Making contact with the people Since I was concerned with the great diversity of points of view and identities among Maaori living across the whole urban setting, I faced significant methodological problems due to the city s configuration Auckland being a very spread-out city as well as certain characteristics of the Maaori people. Auckland is, in fact, considered one of the largest cities in the world in terms of surface area, because most of its one million inhabitants live in one-storey, one-family houses. I intended to examine how Maaori identities, autonomist creativity, and engagement in multiple figured worlds are linked to personal and social experiences and conditions, structures of social relationships, and everyday practices. Running through this was a further concern to properly represent the agency of the persons involved. This meant that I not only needed to interview people living across the whole urban setting of Auckland (helped in this task by a variety of sampling methods), but I also needed access to their everyday lives. This underscored the importance of paying attention to people s actions and reactions, to stories told from different points of view, and to the contexts in which they were articulated. Furthermore, it meant according great importance to interactions between people and to the meanings of these interactions, as they were highly revealing 62

75 of the principles, values, and general figured worlds at work in practice, the expression of identities, the creation of Maaori places and spaces in the city, and the day-to-day working of the whaanau. Chapter VI of this thesis, for example, describes the importance of being attentive to interactions, actions, and experiences through practice. I enrolled in Maaori language courses at the University of Auckland and this gave me the opportunity to meet Maaori faculty members and students. I had some interactions with the students in the breaks between classes. However, as they tended to leave the university as soon as classes ended, it was difficult to engage in lengthy conversations about topics that were of importance to both them and myself. Before going to Aotearoa/New Zealand, I had imagined myself walking in the streets of Auckland every day, along a regular itinerary, meeting people on my way. I had imagined that those people could introduce me to their world. But, as I have said, the city is too big and the Maaori are not café kind of people. When I asked Maaori where they met, they replied things like: We are not public people, We meet at home. My house is like a marae (traditional meeting place). There are always many people at home. However, nobody invited me to their places. That would have been too easy... I can still hear my Maaori friends laughing when I told them about my difficulties meeting Maaori and integrating into Maaori networks. One of them told me it is true; they are not café kind of people, they prefer drinking a kapu tii (cup of tea) together at home or at their friend s or cousin s place. It was only after a few months in Auckland that I was first introduced to Maaori family life by being invited for dinner at the family house which was to become my home in South Auckland for an important part of my fieldwork (see below). I knew that, in certain places such as at the different marae (traditional meeting places) in Auckland, a number of people gathered together on a regular basis, but I did not feel at ease going there on my own. I waited until someone took me there or until I was personally invited for a visit. Moreover, the people who frequent these places constitute a distinct group. In fact, about one-fifth of the Maaori in Auckland have no recourse to visit a marae, and only a third do so on a regular basis (Durie 1999: 352). I would add that some people who still visit their tribal or family marae in the country on a regular 63

76 basis do not need to visit urban marae, or do not have and do not necessarily want the connections to do so. These places are not easily accessible to someone who does not know people from there or people participating in the activities. Among Maaori, someone like me has to be patient and prove herself before being listened to, talked to and, sometimes, integrated into their whaanau. According to Smith (1999), this is a common and normal reaction of people who have been over-researched. One cannot just show up; one needs to be introduced by a member of the group. This is also part of the way Maaori work. Even when I had good contacts and was introduced through the right channels, I first had to show my honest intention to learn what they had to teach me, as I said earlier. In this, I was simply following the basic Maaori cultural codes of conduct identified by Smith (1999), or whaanau values or principles identified by Metge (1995). In fact, I took great pleasure in just being with them, listening to them, helping them quietly in what they asked of me peeling potatoes and kuumara (sweet potatoes), chopping cabbage. People were quite suspicious at first. I first became involved in the life of the university marae: kapa haka (Maaori performing arts) practices, study waananga (traditional school of learning), graduation ceremonies, morning or afternoon tea, and other activities. As the months passed, I also established a good relationship with a tribal marae and its people in the east part of the city, and I participated from time to time in their activities. By the end of my stay, I also attended another marae in West Auckland a few times a week. During my time in Aotearoa/New Zealand, I also occasionally visited other marae in the city and in the country for various reasons: waananga, hui (assembly, gathering, meeting), twenty-first birthday, wedding, family visits, friend visits. Moreover, I tried to discover the Maaori world in the city: art galleries, markets, conferences, festivals, talks, waananga, hui of all kinds. As described by Radice, I made a point of venturing to places Maaori people talked about, and sought to participate in key public events (...) I immersed myself in general street life, and listened out attentively (2000: 150) for Auckland and Maaori stories and news. I also travelled out of Auckland and visited villages, towns, and sites all around the country that people had 64

77 mentioned to me. When I felt more comfortable, I began to do some interviews with the people around me at the time, people I had known for a few months. I thus decided to take the necessary time to establish relationships with some Maaori people. I continued to attend Maaori language classes and take morning tea with my classmates. I must say that I am indebted to many people from my te reo (Maaori language) classes at the University of Auckland. They were mainly arts students, still uncertain about which kind of degree they wanted to do. Many of them were mature students who were going to university for the first time or who were returning to university after a long period of time. Many of them were thinking about doing a degree in law, which is not surprising since many were learning te reo in order to help Maaori, and one useful and obvious to help was by advocating for Maaori in the courts. Others were doing a joint degree, with a major in Maaori studies and a minor in history, music, anthropology or another social science. There were very few students in my classes studying natural sciences, medicine, engineering, technology or commerce. In fact, at universities in general, Maaori are under-represented in these disciplines (Durie 2001a: 9). These students, as well as the lecturers, were my first real contacts with Maaori worlds and some of them accompanied me all the way through my field research. They patiently answered my questions, they introduced me to their whaanau, they supported me in my presentations and seminars, they laughed with me and even at me. Some who were very close to me also cried with me, and they were angry and understanding, too, when I went through difficult experiences. I realize that I have been very lucky to have them as my friends. I am very privileged to have shared with them what was for them quite a stressful experience: going to university for the first time or going back to school often after many years as parents and workers. University is not always an easy world for Maaori, as we will see. 65

78 After I had spent eight months in the field, a Maaori mature student from university, Kiri, 52 invited me to live at her place in South Auckland. I accepted with great pleasure since it was an excellent opportunity for me to learn more about and be myself part of a place, a whare Maaori (Maaori house) (see chapter IV), that people had been talking about for so long and in quite intriguing terms, comparing their houses to a marae or describing their house as similar in many ways to a marae. It was only as I became integrated into the daily life of Kiri s family that I really began to learn about the everyday worlds of Auckland Maaori, the working of the whaanau, and the centrality of certain places in Maaori city experiences. I lived with them from November 11 to mid- December 2001, and again after a short sojourn in Québec from February 1 to mid-april 2002 (see chapter IV for a detailed description of the whaanau and daily life in the house). I was in the field for 15 months from the end of February 2001 to the end of June I came back to Québec for a month, from December 2001 to January 2002, to spend the New Year s holiday with my family, and to discuss my research with the members of my PhD committee and other professors and students at two seminars I gave during that period. This time in Québec allowed me to distance myself from the data, reflect on the work done, readjust my research project and set clear objectives for the last five months of fieldwork. That interlude allowed me, I think, to take a step back and get some perspective on the work I had done so far. During the fieldwork period, I also participated in two conferences outside Auckland, one in Melbourne, Australia, in September 2001, and another in Palmerston North, Aotearoa/New Zealand, in November The papers I gave then, in addition to the seminar I gave in March 2002 at the Department of Anthropology of the University of Auckland, were great opportunities to discuss the research at its different stages and to receive feedback on my preliminary analyses from anthropologists and the Maaori participants in my research. I lived in another household in West Auckland from mid-april 2001 until I left Aotearoa/New Zealand at the end of June I moved there because I felt that it was 52 Kiri is a pseudonym as are all the personal names used in this thesis. 66

79 important for my research to experience Maaori lives in various parts of the city. I wanted to compare experiences of West Auckland to experiences of South Auckland and of the Central part of the city, where I had first lived in a self-contained apartment with my partner who accompanied me during the first eight months of my fieldwork. I was living in West Auckland as the roommate of a Maaori man, Manuka, who was in his late 40s. Our relationship was like a daughter-father relationship. I found him through paanui (a public notice) that I posted at university and in many places in West Auckland. Manuka saw the paanui and telephoned me to know if I was interested in renting a room at his place. From the beginning, he was willing to help me in my research by introducing me into his world and to his people, taking me with him to his Maaori language classes on a pan-tribal marae in West Auckland and practicing te reo with me. He also wanted to orient me towards things he thought I should know or should better understand. In my paanui, he said, he saw an opportunity to influence my research, that is, to make sure that I had Maaori supervision and a more holistic understanding. All the people in the two households where I lived gave me much important practical advice and personal support. They also collaborated closely with me on the research proper, as I asked one person from each of these two households to become my research assistants. Both of them had aptitudes for and some experience with research, as well as a strong interest in research about Maaori. They did not just carry out technical or office work. Rather, they helped shape the research, as we discussed the best avenues for its progress, the things they thought I should learn, and the issues I should address. They corrected and commented on my work in progress, and assisted me in interviewing people. They took me around the city and even to the country, to visit family and friends. All along, we talked about our ideas as well as my personal learning and new understanding. This collaborative process was both relevant to my research and very enjoyable, and I am highly indebted to both of them. Moreover, we are now keeping in touch by , letters, and phone calls. I let them know where I am in my work and they still sometimes comment on it. 67

80 These privileged relationships enabled me to incorporate principles of collaboration with indigenous people and recognition of indigenous knowledge into my field research, as suggested by the well-known Maaori researcher, Linda Tuhiwai Smith, in her book Decolonising Methodology (1999). She also proposes that non-maaori researchers should play the role of mentor for indigenous research assistants in order to empower more Maaori and other indigenous people, so that they can conduct research for their own benefit. Thanks to the different awards and fellowships I received, I was able to employ two Maaori research assistants, Rangi and Manuka, during the last months of my Aotearoa/New Zealand stay, on standard local rates of university pay. Their help enabled me to maximize my work, filling some gaps in the data and touching on areas of research that I would not have had time to cover on my own. It allowed me to collect comments, critiques, and suggestions from people who were directly participating in my study. All this has been immensely useful for checking data and validating certain analytical tacks. Finally, it was also a way for people around me to benefit directly, to some degree, from my research. During my time in Auckland, I was always on the move, accompanying people, visiting their whaanau with them, participating in their activities everywhere they took me. In this way, I came to meet a variety of people and to integrate myself into diverse networks. In this, I was inspired by Hastrup (1995), De Certeau (1980), and Rapport (1997), who all plead in favour of an important change in anthropology: a passage from a semantic and fixed vision to a pragmatic vision, a vision inspired by people in movement, by itineraries which cross spaces and networks, rather than by maps with fixed coordinates. I thus followed the members of the first whaanau with whom I lived, as well as Manuka and other Maaori I met under different circumstances in their everyday itineraries. Research methods The methods I used in my research combined participant observation, unstructured and semi-structured interviews, and informal conversations from different perspectives with actors in a variety of social positions and contexts. My field research can be seen as a 68

81 dialogue (see Radice 2000) between Maaori involved in their milieu, with others, and with the city and myself, a Québécoise anthropologist interested in identities, whaanau relationships, and places and spaces of comfort and autonomy as conceived and experienced by ordinary Maaori. Herzfeld (2001) warns against the limits of purely verbal channels of inquiry. In fact, I realized that is was important that participant observation and, sometimes, observation only at first, precede or be done in parallel with what people were telling me. It was a means of gaining a better understanding of the whole situation since actions reveal a lot about people s motives and thoughts (Rousseau 1990, 1995). Observation of behaviours, practices, interactions, and actions also allows a grasp of what is not necessarily conscious, explained, or explainable in words. However, Herzfeld (2001) also warns about the disproportionate importance that is often given to sight in the well-established expression participant observation in anthropology. For this reason, I always tried to be attentive to other senses and non-visual signals in an effort to de-emphasize the visual. This is even more important in research with Maaori, because they have an acute sense of non-visual signs and often speak about their feelings, thoughts, and dreams, as we will see in the following chapters. Maaori even perceive themselves as having more than five senses, which indicates how important it was that I distance myself from the visual. This became easier as time passed and as I learned more about Maaori ways of being and doing. In fact, embodied experiences became a crucial point for my analysis of Maaori identities, social relationships, and connections to places/spaces, and the way all this is discussed in terms of (dis)comfort (see chapter VII). Because the subject of my studies was the people themselves, their experiences and practices, and because I favoured listening, feeling, and observing everyday life and social interactions over interviews whenever possible, I gained an understanding of the affective dimensions of identities and the impact of particular contexts, experiences, practices, and networks on people and their interactions, actions, and narrations. Sharing the daily and whaanau life of some participants in my research was an important way to achieve my research goals. 69

82 Holland et al. (1998) emphasize the importance of talking with research participants often and for long periods of time, in order to encourage them to speak about their experiences and preoccupations in their own terms. This is what I tried to do with a limited number of participants. Informal discussions were always at the very centre of my research. Semidirected interviews with 76 persons served to deepen my understanding, and permit discussion of specific points or themes, and consideration of the viewpoints of a wider group of people who were not part of my everyday networks and who had different characteristics and positioning. As I said, I first met people at university where I was enrolled in language courses. I then followed their chains of relationships or networks. However, I made particular efforts to follow chains of connections starting in other places and among different profiles of people: different parts of the city, different kinds of places, traditional or mainstream, different socioeconomic milieus. In this way, by including participants from different social settings, I got to know more about Maaori diversity in Auckland and Maaori places and spaces in the city, escaping the potential disadvantage of the snowball technique, that is, being caught in the same kind of social circle (Radice 2000: 21). Doing so required much effort and energy on my part, and it was stressful since each new setting called for me to pull myself out of the box, as Aroha or Rewa would say, or out of my comfort zone, as many others would say. It would have often been easier to stay within the networks that I came to know well. But I was motivated by my preoccupation with diversity and my desire to hear voices across many divides, as much physical, tribal, and rhetorical (see, for example, chapter III on the rhetoric about real vs. urban Maaori). That is also the reason I moved from South Auckland to West Auckland. This strategy proved fruitful. Penetrating networks allows the researcher to analyze different meanings and forms of meanings which are produced in social relationships (Hannerz 1980, 1992, and 1996). In complex situations, as in complex cultures and big cities, individual and collective versions of socially organized meanings are influenced by network experiences. According to Hannerz (1996), in the new world order, the construction of collective structures of meaning is done through networks which can even be transnational. 70

83 Sometimes, I was subtly pressured not to meet such-and-such a person because the people around me did not appreciate his or her way of being Maaori, past actions or involvement in particular networks. From time to time, I had to explain that I needed to know different points of view and, therefore, it was important for me to meet certain persons in particular. Sometimes, I just did not tell some people that I was to meet someone, and at other times, I restricted myself to certain networks, knowing that the people around me approved of them. These pressures were themselves very interesting and highly revealing for my understanding of Maaori interrelationships, Maaori politics, and Maaori spaces in an urban context. Sometimes, however, it made it difficult for me to know who was right, who was wrong and when, and in which context. I sometimes used information received from other persons in an anonymous way, certainly to create reactions or to know the points of view of other people. I always had to be careful not to reveal anything personal or confidential and to protect the anonymity of the people I met since everything is easily known by everybody or almost everybody in the small world of Maaori; it is like the kuumara vine, it runs everywhere (see chapter VII). This is, in large part, due, I think, to the fact that there are only Maaori (2001 Census) and that they have a good knowledge, in general, of their whakapapa (genealogy), and thus of their whaanau networks. Since creating and maintaining kinship links are very important for Maaori, people trace relationships with (almost) everybody very easily. I purposefully sought to include in my sample people from different tribes, different age groups and of both sexes. I interviewed people newly arrived in the city, born in the city, and second-generation urban residents. I also sought to interview people from different socioeconomic milieus and different backgrounds and work experiences. The participants varied in their knowledge of the Maaori language and tikanga (custom, rules, traditions). Getting the opinions of different categories of urban residents allowed me to incorporate diversity into the analysis. See appendix C for profiles of the participants (only those interviewed) in the research. For the thesis, I selected a limited number of interviewees voices, chosen on the basis of the complexity of relevant information, and the way they could throw light on Maaori engagement in different figured worlds, Maaori identities, and Maaori creation of places and spaces for themselves in the city. The narratives or 71

84 quotes selected for this thesis are fairly representative or typical of widely shared Auckland Maaori experiences. I recorded a total of 180 hours of formal interviews, but most exchanges were informal. I made daily notes on these informal conversations, in addition to taking notes about my observations of people s interactions and actions and writing a diary of my own experiences and feelings. At the end of my field research, I conducted a second semidirected interview with a small number of participants who were close to me and whom I met regularly during my stay in Aotearoa/New Zealand. It was interesting to see how the people I had first met at university, while they were at the beginning of the process of learning their language and going back to school, spoke of themselves, perceived changes in their engagement with the world(s), and had an altered sense of comfort, more than a year later. Usually, it took time before I could have a deep discussion with a person. Importantly, many of the participants in my research, particularly kaumaatua (in this context, male elders) and kuia (female elders), needed first to teach me things they wanted me to know and to verify what I already knew. Moreover, I made it a point of honour to provide as much time as people needed to teach me specific things, and I was, in fact, very interested in their teachings. I was unwilling to pursue specific questions aggressively or to conduct highly structured interviews. My approach, however, limited the extent to which I could study certain topics systematically. I had some themes I wanted to address, but I was also very attentive to what Maaori wanted me to know without, but at the same time I was too naive about what they were telling me. It was clear, in some circumstances, that they were strategically escaping my questions or that they were keeping silent on subjects that were extremely important. I was not the only one with important aims in mind in agreeing to discuss certain issues and to enter in relations with them! Some of the participants in my research were clear about that: it was not a free act, nor an act of pure generosity, for some at least. The participants in my research presented a persona to me, the anthropologist, as I also presented myself in a certain way to them (Abu-Lughod 1999 (1986)). They were in self-control (at least, I like to believe, the great majority of them 72

85 were) and they were very conscious of this, and some of them even talked to me about this control. Aroha told me that anthropologists are very naive if they think that the people they study will tell them everything after only a few months shared with them, that people will speak with them like open books. Limits of the sampling Although I tried as much as I could to incorporate a wide range of voices, the methodology and the study are not without biases and limitations. I had difficulty in participating closely in urban Maaori organizations or authorities, that is, organizations working for and representing Maaori who live in cities and who are totally or in part divorced from their tribal networks. I was not always sure why, but I felt that the situation was highly politicized and that being white or being a stranger was not necessarily the best thing to be in these places. I was explicitly told once that they did not want tauiwi (strangers) there, and they explained that it was important for them to have some spaces for themselves where they could be among Maaori, since everything else and any other spaces today was shared with Paakehaa and others. I understood that position, I respected it, and I did not insist. Maaori working as professionals are not well represented in my interview sampling, but for different reasons: those I tried to contact were always very busy, but I also now realize that I probably did not make as much effort in trying to get in touch with some of them. The network of participants that I developed was above all made up of Maaori who still have some (sometimes strong) connections with their iwi in the country, and who still travelled there from time to time. If the ties were not so strong for some of the participants in my research, they were involved in Maaori networks and activities in the city or elsewhere. For many of them, they were just coming back to their taha Maaori (Maaori side) by taking Maaori language classes or by being interested in tikanga after many years, without paying particular attention to Maaori things, even if they were still part of and participated in a whaanau to different degrees. I heard about so-called disconnected people, young and not so young, who did not know much about their 73

86 Maoriness, except the fact they had brown skins. In fact, statistics show that a certain percentage of Maaori do not know (or do not want to identify with) their iwi or hapuu (see chapter III for details). However, I never met anyone who knew he/she was Maaori, but did not know his/her iwi or hapuu. A small number of participants in my research did not know a lot more about their whakapapa, but at least they had a basic idea of where they came from. They also had some whaanau resources. Some of them made a particular effort in the recent years to connect back with their people and to research their origins. Some have even made extensive research and became a resource-person in their family. Many of the participants were, in fact, in an exciting if sometimes emotionally difficult phase of discovering and going back to their roots, their language, their traditions. Many of them were also in a more advanced stage of implementing some Maaori ways in their work environment or of participating in their rural home life regularly by being a member of their marae committee, for example, or by doing research in order to make a family land claim. I was able to develop a network of participants due to a combination of conditions, among others: 1) luck; 2) making my first contacts at the university where people were actively engaged in learning their language and traditions; 3) attending a language program on a West Auckland pan-tribal marae; 4) meeting other people through kapa haka which demands a certain level of commitment, since there are regular rehearsals and people are under pressure to learn the songs and movements; 5) meeting serious and deeply involved kaumaatua still connected to their iwi in the country. I could have used a deliberate strategy to include voices of non-maaori. In fact, I only did one interview with one Paakehaa. It would have helped me to understand better the interfaces and negotiations between worlds in a city which is highly multicultural in character. I could also have done more formal interviews with people living outside Auckland, even though I did interview ex-auckland residents who now live in the country and I had informal discussions with many country-dwellers. This would also have improved my understanding of rural/urban interrelationships. In the same way, even if I tried to represent men and women equally in my interview sample, I did not really discuss identities, whaanau relationships, and the making of places and spaces in the city from a gendered perspective. I am also well aware that, in my analysis, I left out many factors 74

87 and sociocultural practices which affect the ways in which people identify, relate to each other and engage in different places, spaces, and figured worlds such as religious practices, the mass media, sexual orientation. I will keep all these biases and limitations in mind for future research. Even if my view is limited, however, I think it is nonetheless representative of certain widely shared Maaori worlds and experiences. As Abu-Lughod wrote so well in her book Veiled Sentiments, nothing is worse than my own frustration at the way I had not been able to convey as richly as I would have liked the quality of life as lived (1999 (1986): xvii). But I do not think that the specificity of my research makes my observations less valid. Confidentiality issues For reasons of confidentiality, I have given pseudonyms to all research participants referred to in this thesis. The address of the house to which I will refer in the next chapters is fictional. Moreover, I do not reveal any precise tribal affiliations. When I refer to someone s tribe(s), I speak only about a general geographic area. For example, I will say that someone is from a tribe from the north part of the North Island or simply a northern tribe, meaning a tribe from the geographic area north of Auckland (see appendix D for a map of the principal Maaori tribes). None of the formal participants in my research were from tribes from the South Island, even if I met and had informal discussions with people from there. There are simply not many in Auckland. For this reason, when I speak about the northern, southern, eastern and western tribes, I am always referring to North Island tribes. In quoting research participants, I have also taken care to alter details which might identify the participants, for instance, place names, tribal names, names of marae. 75

88 A Note on the usage of Maaori words I tried to avoid overusing Maaori words in this thesis, but I think that they are important in understanding Maaori and Aotearoa/New Zealand worlds, ways, and experiences in today s world. In fact, Maaori use Maaori words quite extensively when speaking in English and many of these words are also in current use by many non-maaori New Zealanders. They give a special colour to the language and reveal, to some extent, the place Maaori occupy in New Zealand society. It is difficult for me to speak of my research and my experience in Aotearoa/New Zealand without using Maaori words. I will follow the Maaori spelling of Maaori words, indicating the long vowels by writing the vowels twice (some authors indicate the long vowels by using macrons, dieresis, or circumflex accents). This is a purely technical choice and does not indicate a politicolinguistic position about the best way to lengthen vowels. The lengthening of vowels (by any of the aforementioned ways) affects not only pronunciation, but often the meaning of the words. The only exceptions to this rule will be Maoriness, Maoridom, and Pakehafied, which are English words formed from Maaori words. For this reason, I opt for an English spelling of the Maaori part of these words, with no doubling of the vowels. These English words are not in italics in the text, in contrast to all the Maaori words, with the exception of Maaori, Paakehaa, and other proper nouns. When quoting authors who do not italicize Maaori words, I do not italicize them either and I reproduce the quotes without changes. When quoting authors who use macrons, dieresis, and circumflex accents in their texts, for purpose of standardization as well as for technical reasons, I will change them to double vowels. For those who do not mark the long vowels of Maaori words, I do not mark them either, and I reproduce these quotes without changes. Because Maaori words often possess many layers of meaning, they are not easily defined by an equivalent word or short phrase in English, and the ontological status of translations varies with the mother tongue of translators (see Schwimmer 2004a). I use the translations given by different Maaori analysts in their texts, glossaries, and footnotes, 76

89 principally Walker (1990), James Henare Maaori Research Centre (2002), and Tauroa and Tauroa (1986). I also use Metge s (1995) glossary when necessary, since she is widely recognised by Maaori as a reference and very often quoted as such. I also consulted Ngata s (1995 (1993)) and Williams (2000 (1971)) dictionaries. At the first use of a Maaori word, I give an English translation in parentheses after the word. Thereafter, I will give the English translation only when I judge it necessary for the flow of the reading or when the previous appearances were much earlier in the text. Readers can find a glossary of all Maaori words used at the end of this thesis. Most Maaori nouns do not change to become plural (unlike English). The few exceptions to this rule are contained in the small set of words referring to people. Here are two such words that I use in this thesis: tangata (man, person) becomes taangata (people) and tipuna (ancestor, grandparent) becomes tiipuna (ancestors, grandparents). A last note, for readers own information: the Maaori wh is pronounced like the English f, and the Maaori ng is pronounced like the French gn in my family name Gagné, i.e. roughly like the middle consonant represented by the ni in onion. 77

90 CHAPTER III MAAORI LIVES IN AUCKLAND This chapter is an introduction to Maaori life in the city. I look firstly at Maaori diversity, particularly in Auckland. Secondly, I probe Maaori experiences of the city and show that it is often felt to be an alien and colonized place. I then begin to explore how Maaori engage in certain key sites in which they affirm Maaori identities, ways of life and points of view, and resist the Paakehaa and the West in general. I examine in detail two such sites: the first is located in Maaori discourse and narratives rather than their geography, and consists of the rhetorics of so-called Maaori authenticity ; the second is the marae, the traditional Maaori meeting place. Maaori living in Auckland Over 70% of Maaori live in urban centres, 53 and one-third of these (or about a quarter of the entire Maaori population) live in the greater Auckland area (Durie 2001a: 7). The city is multicultural in character, with large Asian and Polynesian populations. Auckland is spoken of as the Polynesian capital of the world because it has the largest Polynesian population outside of Polynesia. It is also considered to be one of the biggest cities in the world in terms of surface area, because most of its one million inhabitants live in singlestorey, one-family houses. There is great heterogeneity among Maaori who live in Auckland. As Durie rightly says, Maaori do not conform to a typical presentation either physically or psychologically (2001a: 4). Smith explains that Maaori are not a homogenous whole in terms of their social, economic and cultural situation, nor are they of a single mind in respect of their 53 Some put forward percentages such as 75% (Webster 1998 and Sharp 1997) and even 80% (Barcham 1998), but some think rather that the reality is closer to 70%. According to some of the participants in this research, the overestimates could be related to urban planning forecasts that expected a greater Maaori urbanization than that which actually occurred. In recent years, there has been quite an important movement of return to the country (Rata 2000). In each case, the definition of who is Maaori could also have had a certain impact on these figures. 78

91 aspirations related to things Maaori (1995: 18 in Cram and Pitama 1998), a fact that is not immediately apparent in much research, which tends too often to generalize about the Maaori, giving the image of a rather uniform group (except for Cheater and Hopa 1997; Cram and Pitama 1998; Durie 1998, 2001a, and 2001b; Durie, Black et al. 1994; Kawharu 1975a; Metge 1964, 1995; Schwimmer 2003, 2004a; Walker 1996; Webster , all of whom have explicitly acknowledged Maaori diversity). 55 Two Maaori authors, Cram and Pitama, write our diversity has gone unnoticed by anyone other than ourselves: we have been seen as Other in the eyes of a colonizing group that now exists in the majority in this country of ours (1998: 131). This situation is not unique to Maaori: Herzfeld (2001) reminds us that the myth of the homogeneous other is deeply entrenched and has a durable influence on anthropological theory. Throughout this thesis, I will try to demonstrate that the lived reality of Maaori is far more complex than the homogenizing literature would suggest. In Auckland the Maaori population is highly diversified. Maaori come from different whaanau, iwi, and hapuu. These traditional social structures merit closer examination. First comes the extended family or whaanau. The whaanau is the focus of most of this study, which looks at everyday life in a urban setting. Nowadays, as we will see in chapter V, the word whaanau can be applied to an increasingly wide variety of categories and groups. Persons and whaanau then belong to the iwi, meaning peoples or persons composing a community, tribe, or nation, but for the purpose of this thesis, I simply translate iwi as tribe. Iwi are socio-political groupings defined by descent from a named ancestor. Ballara explains that descent groups are ambilineal among Maaori: Maaori reckon their descent through a system that recognises either a male or a female as the founding ancestor of the descent group, traces descent from that ancestor among the descent groups to which any one individual belongs the hapuu and iwi of both parents, all four grandparents, all eight great-grandparents. Ties even further removed are sometimes recognised. Maaori could opt to regard themselves as members of one or several of their potential descent groups through which these descent groups were part at different times of their lives. (1998: 32) 54 Webster warns against considering Maaori culture as a whole way of life (1998: 21), a perspective that ideologically obscures contemporary Maaori cultural changes as well as colonial and recent histories. 55 Poata-Smith (1996) and Spoonley (1991) affirm that this also applies to Paakehaa. They too are greatly diversified socially, economically, and ideologically. They are not a homogenous group confronting Maaori in a uniform, unified and hostile way. 79

92 The traditional social structure also includes hapuu: le hapuu n est strictement définissable ni comme groupe local, ni comme groupe de descendance, et ( ) les liens maternels y jouent un rôle explicable surtout par des considérations politiques. Fédération d éléments hétérogènes, qui se fait et se défait au hasard des migrations et des guerres, le hapuu se fabrique une généalogie pour des raisons d opportunité plutôt qu il n est engendré par elle. C est donc une formation dynamique qu on ne peut définir en elle-même mais seulement par rapport à d autres du même type, et en les situant dans leur contexte historique (Lévi-Strauss, 1984 : 221). Schwimmer has argued in 1978 and 1990 that hapuu subtribe is not just a segment of a larger iwi tribe but rather a subset of iwi members, domiciled in the same place or places, whose genealogies have been restructured so that all descend from a more recent, localized eponymous ancestor (1990: 297). He also shows the pertinence of a model of hapuu membership which starts from a nucleus of local residents linked by descent to a common ancestor, but which admits in addition some other specifiable classes of associates. Such associates would include not only cases of migrants ( ), but also participants in a wide range of activities, sometimes including socio-political decision-making in a plurality of villages. (1990: 299) Schwimmer (1990) adds that hapuu formation was and still is a very complex process of fission and fusion of existing hapuu as well as periodic restructuring of the genealogical basis, depending on historical challenges. Salmond also stresses the great flexibility of Maaori groupings, attributing this feature to four principles: The unity of all phenomenal life through genealogical connection; the complementarity of male and female; the principle of primogeniture; all of which can be overcome by a fourth principle of competitive striving expressed in a language of war (Salmond 1991: 337 in Metge 1995: 46). Looking at Kawharu s case study (1975a), Schwimmer identifies mana (spiritual power, authority, prestige; mana is in part inherited and in part achieved, see chapter VI) as a criteria for opening up (1990: 299) the hapuu or joining together to enhance solidarity or status and predominance. In today s context of greater ease of movement, Schwimmer (1990: 309) also points out the looser correspondence between residence and descent. In fact, as we will see throughout this thesis, my data support a greater emphasis 80

93 on residence today in the city (see, for example, in chapter VI, the section about whaanau kaupapa). In this thesis, I will translate hapuu as sub-tribe, in order to conform to general usage in Aotearoa/New Zealand, although Ballara (1998) has recently suggested that clan would be better since it avoids the structural connotations of sub-tribe. Webster (1975) and Ballara (1998) have both emphasized the fact that most ethnologists have obscured spontaneous Maaori usages of whaanau, hapuu, and iwi through their own bias, according to which whaanau become hapuu through normal growth and hapuu become iwi. They also point out that it is equally mistaken to say that iwi are divided into hapuu which are divided in turn into whaanau. This last conception seems to imply that the larger groups, iwi, existed prior to hapuu and whaanau and were a centralised political body or a corporate group. In fact, it seems that iwi have not always existed first (or at least, serious doubts have been raised about this assumption), and nor are they a unified corporate group, since the membership is quite changeable (see the quote from Ballara 1998: 32 just below). Metge explains: Since the 1970s, ( ) this usage [translating hapuu as sub-tribe ] has increasingly come under attack from scholars, who suggest on the basis of historical and linguistic research that the hapuu was the key organisational group in Maaori society until the mid-nineteenth century and that iwi did not become fixed groups of paramount importance until late in the nineteenth century in the course of dealings with the Crown (Orbell 1978: ; Metge 1986: 36-37; Ballara 1995). During the 1980s national Maaori leaders initiated a drive to establish the iwi/tribe as paramount in the Maaori social order, as a result of which this view was entrenched in the politics of government departments. In the 1990s, however, this interpretation is being challenged on the one hand by hapuu and on the other by pan- Maaori organisations such as the Ratana Church, the Maaori Women s Welfare League and various Maaori urban authorities. (Metge 1995: 317) Salmond adds that in pre-contact time, whaanau and hapuu were sometimes used imprecisely, as is apparently still the case today. This is due to a constant negotiation between an array of genealogical possibilities and the necessity of practical choice, especially at the life crises of birth, marriage and death (Metge 1995: 46, summarizing Salmond 1991: 343). In fact, Metge explains the multiple meanings that this word can take depending on context and particular circumstances in a book devoted to the 81

94 whaanau, New Growth from Old: The Whaanau in the Modern World (1995; see chapter V). Finally, Schwimmer (1990) points out the inherent and traditional flexibility of the Maaori social system. Ballara argues along the same lines, saying that the Maaori political and social system was always dynamic, continuously modified (1998: 21). Looking again at Kawharu s (1975a) case study, Schwimmer (1990) highlights two different principles which are at work in various circumstances and histories: 1) whanaungatanga, which is an inclusive kinship ethic and unites people horizontally as a collective factor and 2) whakapapa, an exclusive descent ethic or vertical principle which makes restructuring and thus the definition of boundaries possible or necessary depending on circumstances. This cyclic model can be applied to hapuu and iwi as well as whaanau. In chapter I, I identified a present-day shift from iwi to whaanau (Durie 2001a). The data used in this thesis, which are drawn from Maaori everyday life in an urban context, support this emphasis on whaanau among Maaori today. However, iwi and hapuu complement whaanau. As Durie explains, iwi and hapuu have greater relevance in connection with broader collectivities and issues of wider community impact resource management, marae encounters, waananga (learning institutes), service delivery, tribal politics, negotiations with local and national authorities, and the settlement of Treaty of Waitangi claim (2001a: 189). Whaanau, though, are more within the grasp of persons and groups through day-to-day experiences in the city, Auckland being typically one to eight hours drive or more from their tribal home(s) if on the North Island (and further if on the South Island). Schwimmer adds that [there] never was full independence of any politico-economic unit because the moral principles of whanaungatanga and whakapapa pervade the entire culture, including both hapuu and iwi (1990: 313). Whaanau, hapuu, and iwi are thus linked in a cybernetic (in contrast to a mechanical) type of system which is in dialogue with historical conjunctures (Schwimmer 1990: 314). As Metge (1995) rightly says, the process of change and transformation continues, but even today, continuity remains and the system is reaffirmed in a cyclic way. 82

95 Some iwi are today very large (Ngaa Puhi has members, Ngaati Porou has and Ngaati Kahungunu ) while others are quite small; about 50% of all tribes have less than 1000 members (Durie 2001a: 13). A certain number of Maaori who live in the city or outside their tribal areas do not know to which tribe(s) and sub-tribe(s) they belong and do not have connections to a particular papakaainga (ancestral or village settlement). Some suggest that 15.4% of the Maaori adults in Auckland do not know (or do not want to identify) their tribe (Te Hoe Nuku Roa 1999: 88), while in the 1996 Census, some 20% of all Maaori respondents did not identify their iwi of origin (Durie 2001a: 189). These percentages are contested by many who think they could have been manipulated by urban Maaori trying to be recognized as a legitimate tribe. Still, a certain number of Maaori who live in the city and in Auckland in particular really do not know their tribe(s) of origin, although I myself never met anyone who was in that position. Such individuals usually have a much more restricted family network than others. Some Maaori also belong to tribes that have their papakaainga (ancestral or village settlement) in Auckland, some belong to tribes that have been displaced (Belich 1996; Stone 2001; George 2001), and others are from tribal areas outside of Auckland. Some Maaori have been in Auckland for two or three generations, while others are just arriving or are in transit. Some therefore have a large whaanau network in the city, while others are on their own or have to establish a new network. Some keep strong relationships with their people in the country, while others do not or cannot rely on those relationships. Not only does the level of involvement with the whaanau vary, but also its quality. People are also differently involved in diverse kinds of groupings such as 1) traditional kin groups like the whaanau, hapuu, and iwi; 2) Maaori voluntary associations like urban iwi ; and 3) other types of organizations, not necessarily Maaori. 56 Moreover, Maaori come to live in Auckland for different reasons, and their educational background, health status, incomes, and work experiences also vary. Maaori who live in Auckland will hold varying statuses or mana in their hapuu and iwi and they are also variously positioned in the Paakehaa stratified system. Maaori have diverse degrees of 56 See Sharp (2002) for the different principles of association behind the diverse kinds of Maaori groupings. 83

96 knowledge of tikanga Maaori (Maaori traditions) and te reo Maaori (Maaori language) and rely in diverse ways on this knowledge in their everyday life. In Auckland, Maaori are mixed in with the rest of the population and live all over the city. However, Maaori are residentially concentrated in certain areas depending on such things as their living standards, economic conditions, ways of living, shared networks and world views. In the north of the city one can find Maaori with higher living standards, who are bicultural in the professional sphere (see chapter VI). In the south of Auckland live the Maaori who, generally, have lower levels of formal education, are economically disadvantaged to a greater degree, and face major social problems in their everyday lives. In the west, one can find Maaori who are more stable economically and are at the forefront of the renaissance of urban Maaori consciousness. For example, many of the Maaori community action projects in education, health, and general culture have been set up in this sector of the city. In the city centre are the churches and universities, bases for the community action in which Maaori students and others members of Maaori social and political movements are heavily involved. Near the city centre also live the Ngaati Whatua ki Orakei, the taangata whenua, that is, the people who have ancestral rights on that part of the territory of Auckland. Other taangata whenua from the Tainui/Waikato iwi live in the southern part of Auckland. Taangata whenua rights are also accorded to and recognized in other groups in other parts of the city. In general in Aotearoa/New Zealand there are important socio-economic disparities between Maaori and non-maaori. Even though Maaori are highly diversified and there are significant differences among Maaori individuals and families, the James Henare Maaori Research Centre (2002, 1: 6-9) has found that, in the domain of education, for instance, Maaori make up 45% of those suspended or expelled from schools in 1998; by the end of the 1990s, about 40% of Maaori still left school without any qualifications; and only about 20% of Maaori students will go on to tertiary education compared with 40% of non-maaori. Maaori are much more likely to be unemployed than non-maaori, constituting 32% of all registered unemployed in Maaori household incomes are generally NZ$ per annum lower than non-maaori households, and over one-third 84

97 of Maaori are beneficiaries of social welfare transfer payments. In the field of health, there is roughly an eight year gap in life expectancy between Maaori and non-maaori, and Maaori also have a higher incidence of cancer, diabetes, flu, pneumonia, suicide, and motor vehicle crash injury. These disparities between Maaori and non-maaori populations hold as true in Auckland as they do elsewhere in Aotearoa/New Zealand. Appendix E includes two maps of deprivation for Auckland by Crampton, Salmond and Kirkpatrick (2000). The deprivation index that they use, based on data from the 1996 Census of Population and Dwelling of Statistics New Zealand, takes into account incomes, access to a mean of transportation and to means of communication, home ownership, employment, qualifications, and social support. Migration to the city: a physical and cognitive shift Many Maaori do not recognize the city and its institutions, and Auckland in particular, as Maaori places, because for one thing they do not look and feel Maaori. The city is clearly experienced by many, including some of those who were born in the city or have lived there for years, as a colonized place where Maaori in general feel alien and powerless, with little or no control on either their environment or their lives. They find the cost of living to be exorbitant, they face difficulties in seeking jobs, and they often have no alternative but to depend on social benefit payments. Moreover, they do not always have a choice in their area of residence, since they must live with relatives, or are assigned state-owned social housing, or are restricted to areas where rents are low. The city is clearly experienced by some Maaori as somewhere that is not theirs, a place in which they have no place. This feeling is most probably accentuated by the fact that power relationships here between Maaori and the Paakehaa majority are inscribed in places, and places are charged with emotional content and gather experiences and historical significance to them (Sarup 1994, Casey 1996, Foucault 1980a, Radice 2000, Shields 1991). As we saw in chapter I, places organize and orientate social relationships and people s behaviours, narratives, experiences and feelings (see for example Rodman 85

98 1992, Foucault 1980a, Lindstrom 1990). For these very reasons, many Maaori do not develop a sense of home in the city, especially in Auckland. Moreover, a majority of Maaori migrants, at first at least, do not feel good in the city, because even if they have moved there geographically and socially, they have not necessarily moved there cognitively, or only partially so (Rapport 1998: 78). They dream of the homeland, the home marae (traditional Maaori meeting place), the papakaainga (ancestral or village settlement), the idyllic and idealized country life, and they keep alive and hold on to those memories or ideas of a pre-colonization and/or pre-migration dreamtime (which takes on nuances of a pre-exile or even pre-exodus idyll for some), in ways very similar to transnational migrants. 57 This is not only true of new migrants, but also for some of those who belong to the second or third generation born in the city: they still hold on to ideas of the dreamtime, at least in certain (political) contexts (see chapter VII for more details). For most of the participants in my research, the refusal to make a home in the city is also linked to Maaori politics about what a real, proper, authentic Maaori is. It can be a way to prove one s true Maoriness in face of the rhetoric about urban vs. real Maaori. For many Maaori who live in the city, the power and impact of this rhetoric of real vs. urban, Pakehafied or plastic Maaori in their daily lives has intensified in the past 20 years. This is due to the juridification of Maaori property, a complex process which has involved the recognition by the New Zealand State of tribes as legal corporate entities and the concomitant active participation of the tribes representatives in retribalization, the reinforced authority and legitimacy of the tribes as inheritors of traditional resources and knowledge, and the subsequent new emphasis on blood and ancestry as criteria for access to properties and benefits (see chapter I for details). This essentializing or stereotyping process has further intensified as retribalization has progressed with its claims settlements, the capitalization of traditional means and modes of production, and the bureaucratization of genealogy For details, see works on transnational migrants including Sarup (1994), Rapport (1997 and 1998), Rushdie (1988), Olwig (1997), Bhachu (1996), and Clifford (1994). 58 See Rata (2000) for more details. 86

99 Urban Maaori appealed to the Courts of Justice in order to establish their own rights to ancestral resources, thereby challenging the exclusive legitimacy of the tribes that had become established since the Runanga Iwi Act of 1990 (see chapter I). The Fisheries Case is a well-known and ultimately, for the urban Maaori, unsuccessful example of that process (see, among others, Durie 1998; Rata 2000; Schwimmer 2001; Schwimmer, Houle and Breton 2000; Walker 1996). Urban Maaori were disadvantaged by the Treaty of Waitangi Fisheries Settlements Act 1992, because Te Ohu Kai Moana (the Fisheries Commission), which carried the burden of constructing an allocation formula, agreed that urban Maaori had no rights to a fishing quota, leaving only the traditional tribes as beneficiaries. Urban Maaori s claims then became increasingly forceful and they appealed to the New Zealand Courts. In April 1996, the Court of Appeal ruled in favour of urban Maaori that iwi did not have exclusive rights to fishing quotas. Te Ohu Kai Moana then went to the highest arena of appeal, the Privy Council of London, in The case involved the definition of iwi and allocation of Maori fishing quotas. The Privy Council objected to the Court of Appeal s failure to define the word iwi (tribe), as the whole case hung on this, and therefore sent the matter back to the New Zealand High Court trial judge for further hearing. The High Court ruled that the Maori Fisheries Act 1992 had defined the word iwi unambiguously so as to exclude any urban organizations and required the commission to provide solely to iwi, or bodies representing iwi, when distributing the assets. In October 1999, the Court of Appeal decision confirmed the August 1998 High Court decision. A case involving the same issues went to the Privy Council again in This time, the Privy Council dismissed the appeal and confirmed the New Zealand court s definition that iwi meant traditional tribes only. Distinctions have thus emerged and fossilized between tribal Maaori on the one hand and those who identify as Maaori but not with a particular tribe on the other. The essentializing rhetoric of what a real Maaori is becomes an orientational device (Ramstad 2003) for those who live in the city, but want to differentiate themselves from urban Maaori, that is Maaori who do not know where they come from and have lost their connections to their iwi and hapuu in the country. In this context, experiencing the city as a cold and alien place is considered to be an authentic and normal feeling for 87

100 real Maaori, that is, Maaori who know where they come from and who still have connections to their whaanau and iwi back in the country. Therefore it is also not right, if it is even possible, for real Maaori to consider the city an exciting place to live, although they may more or less secretly actually like some aspects of the city. It is felt that there is something suspicious and superficial about Maaori who like city life too much or feel too comfortable in Auckland and other big cities. Such a norm can give rise to ambiguous emotions and a good deal of stress for many people. Thus, many Maaori nurture a dream of returning to the tribal area while also critically distancing themselves from the new place and refusing to make a home for themselves there. The rhetoric about real vs. urban Maaori is one important site of resistance to Paakeha and more generally to Western dominance, but it is not the only one. It also allows for ambiguity, which makes people realize that life in the city is not necessarily damaging for some Maaori belonging to particular categories of persons, such as artists and activists, as long as they manage to balance relationships with their whaanau and iwi with their citydweller social network. On the contrary, it is widely recognized that the city is an important place for Maaori artists to gain support and recognition, and also for Maaori activists to be effective, since the city is an important locus of state power. This does not prevent these people from also supporting the rhetoric about true Maoriness. More generally, the status of real Maaori is easily accorded to any Maaori who successfully balances his/her engagement with the city and his/her people in tribal areas. For example, during tangihanga (funerals), these people will manage to support their urban fellows by having the tangi on an urban, pan-tribal marae, and will then take the body to the tribal marae in the country and thence to the urupa (cemetery) of the ancestors, which is of profound symbolic significance in the Maaori tradition. In this way, the mana (spiritual power, authority, prestige; see chapters V and VI for details) of both the city-dwellers and the country-dwellers is reinforced, while authentic Maaori ways are respected. The rhetoric about real vs. urban Maaori is thus ambiguous and leaves much space for heteroglossic interpretations and actions. So, not all Maaori experience the city as uncomfortable. Some really enjoy the city, feel 88

101 very comfortable there and develop a home in it. In any case, it is important to consider people s diverse reasons for migration to the city, which often combine many issues and have a major impact on their experience of the city and feeling of comfort in it (see chapter VII for details). The choice is often linked to economic factors, with Auckland apparently offering higher salaries or better work prospects and conditions. Auckland can also be seen to offer other opportunities such as better schooling for both children and grownups, and a greater diversity of activities in the cultural and artistic fields. Others leave the rural area because of tribal politics or whaanau disagreements. Others feel under too much pressure to conform to whaanau or iwi norms of behaviours or ways of life. Others leave to escape abuse by a partner, parents or other relatives. Others will simply be looking for novel experiences. However, if one thing is clear in spite of such great diversity among Maaori, it is that life in the city brings about important changes for them. We will come back to theses changes in detail in chapter V, but for the moment let s just say that in the city it becomes increasingly difficult to meet obligations associated with whaanau (extended family) and to share in whaanau activities. But once again, there are no strict distinctions between those who feel comfortable and those who feel uncomfortable in Auckland. The city can be experienced as a good place to live in certain contexts, but not in others. Broader discourses and social positions are also important in considering people s comfort in the city as elsewhere. Metaphorical or symbolic sites of affirmation as Maaori and resistance to the Paakehaa and the West more generally are also diverse and interrelated in complex ways. People are usually active in certain sites but not all of them, although they may well support more sites than they actively have time for in a passive or indirect way. The rhetorics about real versus urban Maaori that I have just discussed is one such site; the marae, the traditional Maaori meeting place, is another. 89

102 The traditional marae Many books and articles have been written about traditional marae, from early anthropologists such as Best (1924, 1952) and Hiroa (1949), to contemporary anthropologists like Salmond (1975), amd Neich (2001). Basically, The marae is a local ceremonial centre, dedicated to the gatherings of Maori people and to the practice of traditional rituals. Each marae has a meeting house, a dining-hall and other small buildings set in about an acre of land and fenced off from surrounding properties (Salmond 1975: 31). Sometimes one can find a church, an urupa (cemetery), a kura kaupapa Maaori (Maaori school based on Maaori principles), a kohanga reo (kindergarten based on Maaori principles) or other buildings on a marae or nearby. See appendix F for diagrams of traditional marae. Traditionally, the term marae or marae atea (ceremonial courtyard) was used to designate the expanse of lawn directly in front of the meeting house, an open space reserved and used for Maori assembly (Metge 1976: 227 ). The functions of the marae atea are thus to welcome manuhiri (visitors), exchange speeches, and express points of view (Tauroa and Tauroa 1986: 59). Most of the powhiri (welcome ceremony) takes place on the marae atea, but it can also be held inside the meeting house when it rains or during the cold season. People use the appellation marae proper today to distinguish it from the whole complex of buildings, which is also referred to as a paa (fortified place or village) (Salmond 1975; Tauroa and Tauroa 1986). This first meaning of the word marae is the definition still given in the Williams Dictionary of the Maori Language, that is an [enclosed] space in front of a house, courtyard (2000 (1971): 180). The marae is first and foremost a meeting place, but, as Tauroa and Tauroa write, [it] is the family home of generations that gave gone before. It is the standing place of the present generation and will be the standing place for the generations to come (1986: 19). This standing place from which people take their rights is called the tuurangawaewae, the connection to the land, to Papatuuaanuku, the Earth Mother, who is represented by the marae atea. Through their tuurangawaewae, Maaori gain rights as tangata whenua, as 90

103 people of/from the land. Note that the word whenua means both land and placenta. Marsden and Henare explains the relationship between Maaori and the land in this way: The Maori thought of himself as holding a special relationship to mother earth and her resources. The popular name of the earth is whenua. This is also the name for the afterbirth. Just as a foetus is nurtured in the mother s womb and after the baby s birth upon her breast, so all life forms are nurtured in the womb and upon earth s breast. Man is an integral part of the natural order and recipients of her bounty. He is her son and therefore, as every son has social obligations to fulfil towards his parents, siblings and other members of the whanau, so has man an obligation to mother earth and her whanau to promote their welfare and good (1992: 17, quoted in Waymouth 2003). The tuurangawaewae is also the connection to the ancestors who came before, who walked and cried on the marae, and who are now buried there. The tuurangawaewae, then, according to Durie (1999: 362), is about identity, an identity that goes beyond a particular land and embraces wider environments distant in time, space and understanding. It is thus also about interconnectedness and unity: connections over time, connections between tribes and peoples, connections which link secular and spiritual, temporal and ethereal (Durie 1999: 359). 59 It is the spiritual home and thus a sacred place (Tauroa and Tauroa 1986: 23). The tuurangawaewae is figuratively a base, a stronghold (Metge 1967: 180). When valued as tuurangawaewae, the marae becomes a place which can complement a personal identity and lead to a greater sense of purpose and continuity (Durie 2001a: 79). The tuurangawaewae gives the right to participate in determining the kawa of the marae; to determine what functions can be held and when they might best be held; to define roles on the marae; and to ensure that hospitality is provided to others (Tauroa and Tauroa 1986: 38). On your own marae, no-one can boss you around (Salmond 1975: 60). It also gives rights to shares in the land, that is rights in the marae as opposed to rights on the marae, which are the aforementioned privileges in its use (Metge 1967: 179). There are different types of marae, but in the case of marae dedicated to one descent-group, the rights in the marae are inherited through whakapapa, through both male and female lines (Metge 1967: 174; Salmond 1975: 60). The people who have those rights are also called taangata whenua or people from the 59 According to Durie (1999: 359), karakia (prayers), in particular those taking place on marae, emphasize the sense of interconnectedness and unity with a wider reality. 91

104 land, in opposition to manuhiri (visitors). Whakapapa gives rights, but also responsibilities and obligations as kai tiaki (guardian) of the land and the marae. These rights must be kept warm by means of residence or frequent visits, known as ahi kaa (a fire kept alight), in order not to lose them (Salmond 1975: 60). The meeting house, which is the extension of the marae atea, is used for sleeping and speech making when the weather is bad or at night-time. The meeting house and the marae atea are symbolically in a relation of opposition, but this opposition is complementary. Tuu, the god of mankind and war, is associated with the marae proper, while Rongo, the god of agriculture and the peaceful arts, is associated with the meeting house. These associations are a symbolic way of referring to the marae atea as the place where hostilities between tangata whenua and manuhiri should be resolved through debate while harmony reigns inside the meeting house. This ideal in fact does not always hold true, and one can often witness the most heated and exciting debates inside the meeting house (Metge 1976: 231). The mahau, the porch of the meeting house, is a liminal zone, linking both areas. It is often used as an extension of the marae atea: kaumaatua (elders) frequently sit there during powhiri and in some places the coffin rests there during tangihanga (funerals). The meeting house can take different names depending on both tribal area and usage. It can be called whare puni or whare moe (sleeping house), whare whakairo (carved house), whare nui (big house), whare hui (meeting house), and whare ruunanga (council house) (Salmond 1975: 35 and Tauroa and Tauroa 1986: 90). It can also be called whare tipuna, the ancestral house. In fact, the whare is usually named after an ancestor. 60 The whare also represents the ancestor in a symbolic way: it is his or her body (Metge 1976: 230). Tauroa and Tauroa (see appendix F) summarize very well how: the tekoteko (carved figure) on the roof top in front represents the ancestor s head. The maihi (carved pieces from the tekoteko extending toward the ground) represent the arms of the ancestor, held out in welcome to visitors. The tahuhu or 60 Most meeting houses are called after a male ancestor, except on the east coast of the North Island where, according to Metge (1976: 229), every second whare tipuna is named for a woman. To symbolize the complementarity of the whare tipuna and the whare kai, the latter, that is, the kitchen or dining-hall, often bears the name of the wife, sister or husband of the ancestor of the whare tipuna. 92

105 tahu (ridge pole), which runs down the center of the whare from front to back, represents the backbone. The tahuhu is a very long and solid piece of wood, for when the backbone is strong the body is strong. The heke or wheke (rafters), reaching the tahuhu to the poupou (carved figures) around the walls, represent the ribs of the ancestor. The poupou usually represent ancestors from the tangata whenua and other tribes. A person with an understanding of whakapapa (genealogy) will identify the relationship between the tribal poupou and the tangata kainga (people from that marae). The pou tokomanawa (uprights) of which there may be two in the whare whakairo support the tahuhu and represent the connection between Ranginui, the Sky Father, and Papatuanuku, the Earth Mother. The act of entering the house is interpreted symbolically as entering into the bosom of the ancestor. (1986: 91) Inside the whare, one is surrounded and protected by one s ancestors and by the gods (Allen 2002: 48). The house and the ancestor are considered as living beings and in whaikoorero (speech making), the house is even addressed as a living elder (Allen 2002: 48), as we can see in this example of greeting: Te whare e tu nei, The house that stands here, Tena koe. I greet you. (Tauroa and Tauroa 1986: 114) When Maaori address a whare tipuna, they use personal pronoun and refer to him or her. They consider the meeting house as a contemporary living person and not only as a distant ancestor. If the house is carved and/or painted, all the forms represent various significant ancestral figures, people or elements. 61 Whereas the house symbolizes a specific ancestor and events of the past, each of the carved slabs within the house represents a slightly more recent figure in tribal history, or offshoots from the main descent-line. ( ) The final presentation of ancestral figures in the house are the portraits hung about the walls, which represent the most recent kin of all. (Salmond 1975: 39-41) 61 In urban pan-tribal marae, the motifs often represent all the different iwi or waka (great canoes of tradition that voyaged to Aotearoa from the ancestral home, Hawaiki; federation of hapuu and iwi), as is the case at Te marae o Waipapa, at the University of Auckland marae. 93

106 The meeting house, then is an architectural history book of the people concerned (Salmond 1975: 39). In the short story The Whale in Ihimaera s book Pounamu, Pounamu, the kaumaatua (elder) says to his niece: - This meeting house, it is like a book, Hera. All the carvings, they are the pages telling the story of this whanau. The Pakeha, he says they re legends. But for me they are history. And page by page, panel by panel, he had recounted the history (1972: 117). Traditional carvings, reed panelling (tukutuku), and rafter patterns (kowhaiwhai) decorate the façades and interiors of many whare tipuna, but they are not essential features, as Metge underlines (1967: 177). In Northland (North of Auckland) and Taranaki (an area on the west coast of the North Island), for example, only a few whare (houses) are so decorated. Because of its ancestral and highly symbolic character, the whare tipuna or the meeting house as well as the marae proper is tapu (sacred), whereas the whare kai (the kitchen or dining-hall) is noa (free of religious restriction, ordinary). The urupa (cemetery) is the most tapu place and for this reason it is kept separate and fenced off from the marae complex (Salmond 1975: 42-43). The concepts of tapu and noa are also important within the meeting house itself. Tapu and noa are opposite but complementary principles, which cannot and must not be kept separate or singly (Metge 1976; Salmond 1975: 42). Moreover, the comparison between things tapu and things noa should be seen as a matter of relativity and not as absolutes (Metge 1976: 232). The English word sacred is often used to translate tapu, but this definition does not fit all contexts. The Williams Dictionary of Maori Language defines tapu as: 1. a. Under religious or superstitious restriction; a condition affecting persons, places, and things, and arising from innumerable causes. Anyone violating tapu contracted a hara [offence, sin], and was certain to be overtaken by calamity. As a rule, elaborate ceremonies were necessary to remove tapu and make anything noa. ( ) 2. Beyond one s power, inaccessible ( ) 3. Sacred. (mod.) 4. n. Ceremonial restriction, quality or condition of being subject to such restriction (2000 (1971): 385). 94

107 Noa is sometimes translated in English as common, but its meaning is also much more complex than this simple word. The Williams Dictionary of the Maori Language defines noa as: 1. a. Free from tapu or any other restriction ( ) 2. Of no moment, ordinary ( ) 3. Indefinite ( ) 4. Within one s power ( ) 5. ad. denoting absence of limitations or conditions, to be translated variously according to context. (a) Without restraint ( ) (b) Spontaneously, of oneself ( ) (c) Gratuitously ( ) (d) Without consideration or argument ( ) (e) At random, without object ( ) (g) Fruitlessly, in vain ( ) (k) Quite ( ) (l) Just, merely ( ) (2000 (1971): ) People, places, objects and actions, according to Metge (1976: 58-59) and Salmond (1975: 42), can be described as tapu and noa, but their degree of tapu-ness or noa-ness varies from mild to intense and also according to context. Both tapu and noa possess positive as well as negative values or aspects, one being positive when the other is negative. Metge gives the following examples: Where tapu implies the presence of supernatural power (whether good or evil) and attracts attention and respect, noa implies the absence of such power and attracts neither attention nor respect. On these counts noa has negative value while tapu is positive. But tapu also stands for danger, restrictions on freedom of action, and anxious introspection to detect slips. Noa on the other hand is safety, freedom from restriction, and relaxed, out-going warmth. On these counts it is tapu that has negative value and noa that is positive (1976: 60). Durie (1999: 356), drawing on Hiroa (1949), also underlines the utilitarian view of the tapu/noa distinction by saying that dangerous activities or locations can be declared tapu in order to prevent accidents, calamities or misfortune. In contrast, noa is used to denote safety. Durie (1999: 357) also speaks about the laws of tapu as having a function of social control, control that is great on marae 62 where most of the activities and behaviours are sanctioned by rules. So, the whole marae complex is tapu in relation to the outside world, while a series of tapu and noa parts in relation to each other are found within its boundaries. And each of these sectors is differentiated again into tapu and noa parts. Strict measures are in place to make sure that no tapu is infringed. For example, alcohol is prohibited on most marae, 62 Maaori generally say on rather than in or at marae, because the marae traditionally refers to the land immediately in front of the meeting house itself. I have endeavoured to follow this use of prepositions wherever it does not impinge upon the readability of the text in English. 95

108 cooking and ceremonial activities are kept strictly separate, neither food nor shoes should be taken into the whare nui, and women and certain categories of men (the young, the insignificant, younger brothers, and sons of a living father; Salmond 1975: 45) are forbidden to speak on the marae atea (except in the East Coast districts where women of high rank are allowed to speak as honorary men ; Salmond 1975: 44). In relation to the outside world, taangata whenua (people of the place, people connected to the marae) are tapu and in caring for their guests, they engage in both tapu and noa tasks. As explained by Metge (1976: 234), the tapu tasks karanga, whaikoorero, wailing are carried out on the marae proper or in the whare nui by people of mana 63 like kaumaatua, also called the taangata kei mua (the people in front). The noa tasks are undertaken in the dining-hall, kitchen, and toilets behind the scenes by the taangata kei muri (the people at the back). Noa tasks are as essential as the tapu ones to the success of the event, and they are valued and acknowledged as such. Manuhiri are also tapu in relation to their hosts, in particular those described as waewae tapu ( sacred feet), who are visiting that particular marae for the first time. The welcome ceremony will modify the tapu and will allow for social contact between manuhiri and taangata whenua (Metge 1976: 234). There are also important tapu/noa distinctions inside the whare nui 64 which differentiate the right side from the left side. So, marae constitute an ordered domain highly regulated with precise protocols. According to Durie (1999), for example, space and time on a marae are used to determine relationships and establish boundaries (taangata whenua vs. manuhiri; tapu vs. noa; right vs. left; men vs. women). The welcome on a marae is a very formal process which consists of the following sequence of actions: te wero (the challenge), te karanga (the call), te powhiri (the welcome), te whakaekenga (the moving on ), ngaa mihi (greetings), 63 Metge (1976: 64) distinguishes two sets of meanings for the concept of mana. Firstly, it is often translated into English as prestige or standing which implies power in a purely social and political sense. Secondly, and most importantly, relying on Schwimmer (1963), it signifies power beyond the ordinary possessing and possessed by extra-ordinary individuals (Metge 1976: 64). Mana can be inherited from the ancestors, depending on seniority of descent, sex and birth order in the family, and it can also come from direct contact with the supernatural (Metge 1976: 64). Both individuals and groups can have mana. (see chapter VI for more details) 64 From now on, I will always use the expression whare nui to speak about the meeting house. This is only a personal preference based on my experience in Aotearoa where, at the time of my visit and among the people with whom I interacted, whare nui was the word the most in use. 96

109 ngaa whaikoorero (speeches), te koha (the gift), te tutakitanga (the physical contact) by means of hariru (shaking hands) and hongi (pressing noses). 65 Once the whole sequence of welcome on a marae is completed, the manuhiri tapu (tapu of the visitors) is lifted and visitors are free to move everywhere on the marae and to take part in the welcoming of other visitors (Tauroa and Tauroa 1986: 89-90). Each marae has its own kawa (protocol) which might vary. For example, the kawa determine the exact places where different people (visitors and locals, men and women, elders and young people) sit in the whare nui and on the marae aatea and this varies from tribe to tribe (for more examples and a discussion, see Karetu 1978). The whare kai (kitchen or dining hall) is very important on a marae. As explained by Tauroa and Tauroa (1986: 28), it is the symbol of service to others, from which mana is bestowed through shared acts of service or manaakitanga, which Durie describes as the process whereby mana (power, authority) is translated into actions of generosity (1999: 358). Mana is above all associated with collective responsibility rather than individual brilliance, so it is that all marae members join together in their efforts (Durie 1999: 358). When Maaori were living in villages surrounding or close by the marae, it would be used as the extension of their living quarters, but nowadays the vast majority of Maaori do not visit or do activities on marae on a daily basis (Metge 1967; Durie 1999). This is all the more true for city-dwellers who often live some hours away from their marae. In fact, [a]bout one fifth of the participants in a study of Maaori households, Te Nuku Roa, for example, have no recourse to visit a marae, and one third do so on a regular basis (Te Hoe Nuku Roa 1998). However, because it is likely that within wider whanau (family) networks other members of the family are more regularly involved, their lives will not be totally divorced from marae. (Durie 1999: 352) Even in the country, most people do not go to the marae every day. Rather, they will use it from time to time, and in certain cases quite rarely, for special activities such as large hui (meetings), tangihanga (funerals), and 21 st birthdays. Metge explains that [no] longer a village living-room, the marae is used, firstly, for the same purposes as other local halls: for club and committee meetings, recreation and money- 65 For a detailed description of these processes, see Salmond (1975) and Tauroa and Tauroa (1986). 97

110 raising, for church meetings and services where there is no church, for political meetings, welcomes and farewells, and discussions of local issues. But it is also used for two distinctively Maaori purposes: for staging gathering that attract large numbers of visitors to stay for several days (hui), and for the temporary accommodation, between hui, of touring sports and concert parties, stranded strangers, and the temporarily homeless. Of all the gatherings held at a marae, the tangihanga is the most important. (1976: 235) Some people are chosen or volunteer to take care of the marae and are part of the marae komiti (marae management committee). They may be the only ones to visit the marae on a daily basis. However, there are some exceptions: participants in particular projects still visit marae regularly, including students of Maaori language programs that take place on a marae, or children and their teachers who attend a kohanga reo (kindergarten based on Maaori principles) or a kura kaupapa (Maaori school based on Maaori principles) based on a marae. The apparent decline in everyday attendance on marae does not mean that marae principles and values are disconnected from most people s everyday lives. In fact, as we will see in chapter IV, some Maaori apply the marae principles and values to their house in the city and the country. Traditionally, marae were of two types: 1) whaanau or hapuu marae, which are mainly used by the direct descendants of the person who founded it, and 2) iwi marae, which are used by all the people from a particular tribal area. Today, these types of marae can be found on Maaori land, mainly in rural areas, but some traditional marae are also in urban or suburban areas where a whaanau, a hapuu or an iwi have ancestral rights on the land and still own a greater or smaller number of acres of it. Since the 1960s, however, new types of marae have been built, following the urban drift which led to most Maaori living too far from their own marae to visit regularly, and with few places to meet for tangihanga (funerals) and other gatherings. The first marae of the new type were urban marae that could be either tribal or pan-tribal. Tapsell (2002) establishes an additional distinction between taangata whenua marae, that is tribal marae belonging to the home people, the people who have the rights on the land, and taurahere marae, that is non-tribal and immigrant-tribal marae. In Auckland, the first urban marae 98

111 opened in Mangere, South Auckland, in 1965 and was named after Te Puea, a distinguished female ariki (paramount chief) from Waikato (Walker 1990: 201). This marae is a traditional Waikato kin-based marae, but it is open to all urban Maaori migrants, whatever their tribal affiliations. Another important urban marae is Ooraakei marae, which has a long history of struggles with the Crown, since the marae is located on land that is among the most desirable real estate in Aotearoa/New Zealand (see Waitangi Tribunal 1987; Kawharu 1975a, 1989; James Henere Maaori Research Centre 2002; Tapsell 2002). In 1980, Hoani Waititi marae, an important multi-tribal marae and the first of its type in Auckland, opened in Glen Eden, West Auckland (Tapsell 2002, Rosenblatt 2002). 66 Some of these urban marae are also linked to a religious denomination, that is, they are run by churches. A Catholic marae, Te Unga Waka, opened in Epsom in There, church affiliation takes precedence over kinship principles, as it does on Te Whaiora marae at Ootara, South Auckland, also Catholic, and Tatai Hono in Khyber Pass, Central Auckland, which is Anglican (Walker 1990: 201). Salmond gives a clear description of how one church-based marae, Te Unga Waka functions: The Centre is run by a marae committee for the benefit of all Maoris in Auckland, but it is tacitly regarded as a Catholic marae. Because the Centre has no open space or marae aatea, and because its architecture bears little resemblance to a traditional marae, it cannot be considered a marae in the strict sense of the term, but a wide range of hui including tangi are staged there, and guests can be housed overnight. Traditional decorative elements are included in the decor to mark Te Unga Waka as a Maori place, and the Catholic Society functions as an adapted form of taangata whenua. The key personnel are a priest, a female caretaker and a female warden, all of whom are members of Northern tribes, and Te Unga Waka has Northern as well as Catholic associations. The marae is fully-used, and as well as tangi, dances, receptions, twenty-first birthdays, weddings, conferences, acclimatisation courses for newcomers to the city and the meetings of many clubs are held there. ( ) Because the senior dignitary of the marae is the priest, the role of visiting kaumaatua (elders) is sometimes uncertain, and for many ceremonious occasions, Auckland elders of different tribes are invited in instead to act as taangata whenua. Despite these minor difficulties, Te Unga Waka functions successfully as a marae, because it provides all the facilities of a traditional marae except the open speaking- 66 See the following web site for a list of the marae in the greater Auckland area today: Kamera Raharaha, Marae in Auckland, New ZealandGenWeb, [on-line], (Page consulted on February 18, 2004). 99

112 ground, and hui can be staged there without too many radical changes from the rural pattern (1975: 87-88). This description clearly shows that people can accommodate arrangements of buildings that do not conform to the traditional marae complex of a meeting-house, a whare kai and a marae aatea, even if they do greatly prefer the traditional form (Salmond 1975: 89). It also shows that the values, protocols, ways of doing things are not so different to those on traditional marae. Traditional Maaori values, principles and identity are reaffirmed in the urban context even if changes are introduced by the church and the membership is not (necessarily) kin oriented. This is also true for the other types of non-traditional urban marae. The second new type of marae are those constructed in larger institutions, which are multi-tribal and used by the staff and students or other users of the establishments. Since about 1970 (Webster 1998: 189), this type of marae began to be built by Aotearoa/New Zealand institutions like hospitals, ministries, and especially educational establishments like schools and universities. According to Webster (1998: 189), most universities have a marae or symbolically equivalent place(s) for Maaori students. For example, the plans for Te marae o Waipapa at the University of Auckland were hatched in 1976 and the whare nui (carved meeting-house), Tane-nui-a-Rangi, officially opened in Here is the official raison d être of the marae, as given by the university: Waipapa marae is the meeting house on the University campus, and is symbolic of Mäori in the University. It reflects participation by Mäori students and staff in the University. Although Waipapa is the University s marae, the control over the process of the marae is laid down by the tangata whenua (local people of the land), Ngäti Whätua o Orakei. The marae is used for a variety of purposes, such as hui (meetings), powhiri (ceremonial welcomes), noho marae (overnight stays), Mäori culture club practice, and tangihanga (funerals). It is also used by other departments and faculties of the University for various teaching purposes and functions (The University of Auckland ). 67 The University of Auckland, Maaori at university in the University of Auckland, [on-line], (Page consulted on February 18, 2004). 100

113 The marae itself not to mention the several years of struggle with university authorities to have it built opened new doors to both cultural and career opportunities for Maaori. 68 The marae today is above all a meeting place and home for all Maaori students. (I will come back to this last idea in chapter VII) What is also special about Te marae o Waipapa is that it is not only pan-tribal the captains and priest-navigators of the canoes that brought the ancestors of the different tribes to Aotearoa/New Zealand in the fourteenth century are carved in the whare nui it is also pan-pacific. Indeed, Tangi ia, an ancestor who connects the major islands of the Pacific with Aotearoa/New Zealand, features in the carvings of the house. Durie (1998: ) groups all these different types of marae under three main categories. 69 1) Marae tiipuna are for the use of whaanau sharing a common ancestor, are governed by marae trustees, and serve as a focus for tribal activities and planning. 2) Marae-a-rohe are for the use of Maaori people living in a particular vicinity (usually urban), regardless of tribal origin, are governed by a marae management committee, and serve as a cultural enforcement for Maaori urban dwellers. 3) Marae tautoko kaupapa are for the use of Maaori participants in non-maaori institutions, are governed by governors of the parent institution, and serve as a support for Maaori and others who use the institutions. In the case of marae tautoko kaupapa, Durie (1998: 223) highlights the potential intrusion of the state or other non-maaori authority into the control, management, and disposal of the marae and the other cultural resources associated with it. Drawing on my own data, I would however add that the marae can be a powerful place and symbol for the assertion of the Maaori presence, for group solidarity in the face of the controlling authority, and also for engagement in society, with Maaori, Paakehaa, and others. Salmond underlines that [w]herever paakeha are placed in positions of leadership 68 For the specific and highly political history of Te marae o Waipapa, the marae of the University of Auckland, see Webster (1998: chapter 7). 69 It seems that a new kind of marae will soon open: one is under construction right now in Kaitaia, in the Northland of Aotearoa, designed especially for the enjoyment of tourists and to educate them about Maaori meeting houses and culture (Carter 2003). A tour operator is building the marae because he says he had trouble with the availability of traditional marae in the area, as they can be booked at the last minute for tangihanga (funerals) or other meetings. The project is highly controversial and some argue that a marae can only be truly traditional if its main raison d être is to serve a particular group of people. As the head of the University of Auckland Maaori Studies department, Margaret Mutu puts it, If you can t have a tangi, then it can t successfully fulfill its role (Mutu quoted in Carter 2003). 101

114 in urban marae, resentment inevitably results (1975: 90). She also adds that by its very nature, a marae require some sort of founding taangata whenua group. This group cannot be replaced by a European-style board of trustees with a diverse membership. This is also a problem in the case of pan-tribal marae: [f]actionalism and struggles for leadership mark their history, and it is dubious whether the ideal of integration should ever be applied to the marae (Salmond 1975: 90). Although Anne Salmond wrote her book Hui in 1975, when urban marae were really still quite new, her assertion is still true today: factionalism and struggles along tribal or whaanau lines persist on the urban marae (plural) where I carried out fieldwork. Today, there are more than 1000 marae in urban, tribal and institutional settings (Te Puni Kokiri 1997 in Durie 1999 : 352). The principle of affiliation, identification or belonging to marae is the same as the principle that traces membership to whaanau, hapuu, and iwi. Maaori can opt to regard themselves as belonging to one or several of the marae of their parents, grandparents and great-grandparents. In the case of urban marae, both pan-tribal and tribal, regular participation in marae activities becomes a crucial criteria for belonging or identifying with one or several marae. Allen (2002: 72) asserts that the essential spiritual and political functions of marae proper are to connect living kin with their ancestors and to provide individuals as well as the community as a whole with a place to stand. Tauroa and Tauroa, for their part, explain that [T]he marae is the wahi rangatira mana (place of greatest mana), wahi rangatira wairua (place of greatest spirituality), wahi rangatira iwi (place that heightens people s dignity), and wahi rangatira tikanga Maaori (place in which Maori customs are given ultimate expression). (1986: 17) In fact, the marae is said to be at the very heart of the Maaori culture, and in the 1920s, Apirana Ngata, an influential Maaori leader, 70 put the focus on the meeting house as the symbol of Maaori identity, mana and tribal traditions in the cultural renaissance which was then just beginning (Walker 1990; Metge 1967, 1976). Salmond suggests that from 70 Apirana Ngata was the first Maaori to obtain a university degree. He was a Member of Parliament from 1905 to 1943, and Minister of Maaori Affairs from 1928 to

115 the early 20 th century to the present day, marae seem to have increased in sanctity: a marked revival in population and also cultural activity has occurred [following the announced extinction of the Maaori], and leaders of the Maori people have fostered marae construction as a symbol of the renewed vitality of Maoritanga [Maoridom] (1975: 50). This can also be seen through Maaori novels written during the 1970s and 1980s by Witi Ihimaera, Keri Hulme, and Patricia Grace. They all present strategies for reclaiming a Maori self that necessarily involve re-creating or reforming, in a sense redefining, the Maori community. This end is achieved by the physical act of rebuilding the whare tipuna, the ancestral house, on the protagonists home marae. ( ) To rebuild the ancestral house means literally to rebuild the community s ancestor its significant past and the community s self its significant present and possible future (Allen 2002 : 147). In these novels, the rebuilding of ancestral houses is a collective rather than individual endeavour. As in Ihimaera s novel Whaanau, reconstruction revives the community by providing it with a common purpose (Allen 2002: 153). The same is true in Grace s novel Potiki (1986). In Keri Hulme s novel, The Bone People (1986 (1983)), [it] is only after Kerewin [the main character, a somewhat isolated and antisocial artist] rebuilds the whare tipuna on her home marae that she can reclaim her Maoritanga, rebuild her own house, and reunite with her family (Allen 2002 : 151). The marae is also considered to be a symbol of continuity with the ancestral past. For our people, marae are places of refuge that provide facilities to enable us to continue with our way of life within the total structure of Maoridom. We, the Maori, need our marae so that we may pray to God; rise tall in oratory; weep for our dead; house our guests; have our meetings, feasts, weddings and reunions; and sing and dance. (Tauroa and Tauroa 1986: 19) The marae offers to Maaori a place to meet among themselves, apart from mainstream society. In 1972, Ihimaera wrote in his short story The Whale in Pounamu, Pounamu: He sits, this old kaumatua, in the darkness of the meeting house. He has come to this place because it is the only thing remaining in his dying world. ( ) This meeting house has been his heart, his strength. ( ) In this place lie his family and memories. (1972: 115) 103

116 Probably, this old kaumaatua would not see his world as dying now, at the beginning of the 21 st century, considering the successful revival of the Maaori language and traditions and the establishment of Maaori schools. However, the marae is still seen as one place where Maaori maintain their distinct identities and traditional culture in episodic subcultures which carry over from one special occasion to the next (Salmond 1975: 210 quoted in Allen 2002: 10). According to Tauroa and Tauroa, it is when gathered on their marae that the Maori most fully express themselves as a people (1986: 14). Conclusion It is important to remember that even if many Maaori experience the urban setting as a difficult, alien and colonized place, many sites exist where Maaori can affirm Maaori ways, visions and struggles against assimilationist forces. Marae are important places and spaces of affirmation and resistance for persons and groups, on a practical level as much as on the symbolic level. Marae themselves, as buildings, are also an important site of affirmation of the Maaori presence in the city and in mainstream institutions. The marae is in fact widely recognized as a symbol of the vitality of Maaori culture and the continued Maaori presence. One may ask why, given the obvious importance of the marae, statistics regarding marae frequentation are so low. In fact, one third of all Maaori have little or no contact with a marae, as has been revealed in a longitudinal study, known as Te Hoe Nuku Roa, which is tracking 700 representative households over a twenty-year period ( )(Durie 2001a: 55-56; mentioned above). Even if people tell anthropologists and other researchers that marae are the roots of their identity and the basis of Maaori communities (Durie 2001a: 74), what does that actually mean if many people never go there or do not go there as often as they would like? In the following chapters, I will explore how the marae culture (Durie 2001a: 71) or the traditional Maaori figured world is perpetuated and reaffirmed in the city in places other than traditional marae which are also important sites of Maaori affirmation and resistance. In chapter VI and VII, I will discuss reasons that could explain not only the low frequentation of marae, but also the continuing 104

117 symbolic and practical importance of marae for Maaori life today. In chapter VIII, I will show how Maaori places like marae open doors to Maaori engagement in the larger world on their own terms. The most crucial element here is probably the need to negotiate engagement in multiple figured worlds and places, but issues of comfort at the personal and collective level are also vital. First, however, in the next chapter, I describe everyday life in one of the whaanau with whom I lived, and examine the significance of their house as a crucial site for upholding the whaanau in the urban setting. 105

118 CHAPTER IV WAYS OF LIFE IN A WHARE MAAORI As I explained in chapter II, after eight months in the field, I was invited by a Maaori mature student from university, Kiri, to live at her place with her family. In total, I lived there for about five months. In the following pages, I describe whaanau life as experienced in this family. I also explore the centrality of their house in the life of the whaanau members, which enables their survival in the urban setting, gives them a strong sense of belonging and support, and allows them space for simply being Maaori. Everyday life in a whaanau A couple of months after I had moved in with Kiri s family, her sister Rangi told me, She [Kiri] invited me for dinner one night and next day I moved everything into the shed and I was here to live (Rangi). I think I felt quite like that when I first moved in to 30 Aroha Street in South Auckland, with a family that would become in some way mine, in a house that would be my refuge, as it was for most of the whaanau members. One Sunday evening, early in the Aotearoa/New Zealand summer of , I parked my apple-green 1987 station-wagon in the driveway of 30 Aroha Street. The car was full of my books, my foam mattress, my shaky desk and wobbly chair, my clothes and my sole houseplant, a gift from a Maaori friend. Since the door was wide open, I entered the house without knocking. Everybody was at home, except for Kiri who was still at work. Rangi and her husband Hoani were visiting. Some of the children were watching TV, while others were playing in the back yard. Andrew, Kiri s Paakehaa husband, said hello and began chatting with me while he prepared dinner. I asked two of the boys, David and Richard, to help me with my stuff. Andrew showed me which room would be mine, and there I was, to live. This seemed to be just normal for them: there was no formal welcome and no explanation of the rules of the house, which I 106

119 would have to learn by myself. I was just there, and from that time on I was made to feel part of the whaanau. I should add that I was already related to Whetu and Mereheni, who lived at number 30; I was Mereheni s auntie, because I had been by Whetu s side in hospital when she had given birth to Mereheni three months before. But that s another story altogether When all my boxes and belongings had been unloaded and stacked in the room, I joined Andrew to help prepare dinner. When everything was ready, Kiri arrived home from work. She said Kia ora!, we put everything on the table, everybody took their share and we sat around the table and ate. As it was to be for the next six months, we all exchanged our news of the day, we laughed and we had moments of silence. The children ate quickly and returned to the TV or went out in the back yard, coming back when the adults asked them to clear the table and do the dishes. From one dinner to another, there could be anywhere from six to fifteen of us around the table and sometimes even more. The children and teenagers often ate on the steps in front of the house or in the living room. David and his father, William, often had their dinner in the shed behind the house where they had their living quarters with their two camp beds, a couple of chairs, and their personal belongings. When I first moved in with Kiri s whaanau, there were in total nine people living there, including me. Appendix G shows diagrams of who these people were and how the household membership changed just before, during and just after my time there. To go into further detail about the whaanau genealogy and links to tribal areas, on Kiri s mother s side, that is on Tera s side, both grandparents are from the north, from two different northern iwi (tribes). On Kiri s father s side, that is on Hiko s side, both grandparents are from the same tribe on the west coast of the North Island. Rangi and her brother Roopata have a different biological father who was from the same northern tribe on both sides. However, Rangi acknowledges Hiko as her real (social) father. 107

120 All four grandparents were born in their respective tribal areas. Tera s father has always lived up north with Tera s mother, but when he died, Tera s mother moved to Auckland with Rangi, Tera s daughter (her granddaughter), that she whaangai (was bringing up), but they travelled a great deal around the motu (island), attending church meetings. Hiko s mother and father lived for some of their adult lives in the city. Hiko s father, Rongo, even stayed at 30 Aroha Street for various periods while working in Auckland. Hiko and Tera are the ones who first bought the house. At that time, the house was new and stood on the street with just two other houses in a new development, and there was a farm nearby. However, the city did not take long to grow around them. Hiko and Tera were young adults when they migrated to Auckland. Tera already had a son that she took with her in Auckland. She also had a daughter, Rangi, that she left in her mother s care up north. In fact, Hiko and Tera met in the city: they were both members of a kapa haka ropuu (Maaori performing arts group). They married and had all their children Nina, Hana, the twins Ani and Kiri and Hohi in South Auckland, on Aroha Street. In the early days, Hiko worked as a bus driver while Tera took care of the children and the house. Rangi moved with them when she was 11 or 12 years old. She recalls: Nan died when I was 11 so in all that time I did not realize she was my nan, I always thought she was my mum until at the tangi [funeral] they told me who my mum was. All a bit of a shock, and worse to find out that I had sisters and a brother. ( ) So I was 12 or 11 when I came to stay with the new whaanau and it sure was tough not having things to myself and having to share with others as a whole. (Rangi) Rangi lived in Auckland for a while and then moved to Wellington with the father of two of her children, a man of Maaori and Chinese ancestry. She then moved back to Auckland. When she married a Maaori man from the East Coast, Hoani, they went to live there in his tribal area. Rangi had five children in total: one born in Central Auckland, two born in South Auckland, one born in Wellington, and another one born on the east coast. Rangi and her family have travelled quite a lot between Auckland and the east coast. For a time, she worked on the east coast in farms and then in a kohanga reo. Since Rangi wanted to get a 108

121 teaching diploma, her husband obtained a transfer to Auckland and they moved back there, but Hoani later returned to the east coast for work and because he did not like Auckland very much. Rangi stayed in Auckland because she wanted to get her teaching qualification, and it was at this point that she moved back to 30 Aroha Street (see below). Kiri s story is rather less complicated. She has lived all her life in South Auckland, except for a brief stay in Central Auckland and four months work in the far north when she was 26. She has had three children from previous relationships who are of Maaori descent. Today she is married to a Paakehaa man, Andrew, who now lives at 30 Aroha Street. Andrew has also lived all his life in the surrounding area, and in fact grew up just a couple of streets away. All Kiri s children were born in Auckland. Kiri s daughters Whetu and Mahora were living at number 30 while I was there, and Paul, her son, was living with his father on the east coast. At the time of my fieldwork, Andrew was working as a storeman in South Auckland. Kiri was working in a hospital as a care assistant. Their total income a year was in the NZ$ NZ$ bracket, and they were paying off a mortgage on the house. When I got back from my Christmas holidays in Québec on February 1 st 2002, one of the main changes was that Rangi and her daughter Stephanie had just moved into the garage behind the house when Rangi s husband had to go back to his home town, six hours drive away from Auckland. It was a nice surprise to see them living with us, but at the same time I was wondering if Rangi and Hoani had split up, since the change was as usual taken completely for granted, and nobody told me why Rangi and Stephanie had arrived. I only learnt about it by chance in the course of everyday conversations. It made quite an impact on our domestic organization, since Rangi took on the role of cooking most of the dinners and caring for the children by supervising their breakfast, homework, and after-school activities around and about the house. William, who must have felt rather intruded upon in the shed, was also present much less often. Dinner was the main time of the day when everybody was doing the same thing at the same time. The rest of the time, Kiri, Andrew, and the other adults were working and the 109

122 children, or at least most of them, were at school. As well as working, Kiri was also taking university courses towards a bachelors degree. During the first few months of my stay, Whetu stayed at home with her baby, and then went back to school while the baby was sent to a kohanga reo, a Maaori day-care centre. In the morning, Andrew was up around 6:30 and left for work at 7:00. The children got up around 6:45 or 7:00, took a shower, had a small, swift breakfast, did their chores, and by 8:00 had left for school. Rangi left with them once she had moved in to the house. When her work and university schedule allowed, Kiri used to sleep later than the others since she often worked far into the night, the only time when she found the peace and quiet to concentrate. William never came into the house in the morning, but we knew that he had usually left for work by 7:30 or 8:00. Some people stayed at home most or part of the day, like Whetu and Rangi s son, Richard, when he did not have a job. He and Whetu watched TV, took care of the baby and did chores when they were asked. Whetu went back to school full time in February 2002 and Richard went away to live with his biological father for a couple of months. Usually, Kiri was at home one day a week. This was a time for her to enjoy playing with the baby, do some housework, go grocery shopping, study for university and see friends or other members of the whaanau. As she often said, she had no time for social life during the weekend because she was always working then. On her free day, Kiri also organized cultural activities for her Maaori and Pacific Island clients at work. This day was very enjoyable for me, since I got the chance to meet and talk with many people and just relax with them over cups of tea. By 3:15 in the afternoon, the children were all back from school and were looked after by Whetu. If Whetu was not available, Kiri, Rangi, Riria or occasionally somebody else, including me, would be there. Until dinnertime, the children played outside or watched TV in the house or in the shed. Andrew, and later Rangi, was mainly responsible for preparing the dinner, but I was assigned days to cook too. 110

123 The time between 4:00 and dinner was quite busy; it was then that Andrew or the older boys did some of their chores like mowing the lawn or cleaning the house. It was also the time when people came for a visit after work. Before she moved in, Rangi often used to come after school to look after the children and talk about what was happening at school with Kiri and the others. Sometimes a cousin, a friend or a neighbour would come over for afternoon tea. Ani, Kiri s twin sister, would also sometimes drop by after work on the way home to her North Shore house. She usually had her son and her partner s daughter with her, and sometimes they stayed for dinner. After she moved in to 30 Aroha Street, Rangi often came back with Vanessa, the kaiawhina (teacher s assistant) from school who sometimes joined us for dinner. They would talk shop about school, discussing children s behaviour, performances, activities, and so on. Rangi sometimes brought one or two pupils with her for dinner. They were generally children that she knew were not having a good time at home right then. One would sometimes stay over for the weekend or go with her on a trip to visit her husband down south. After dinner, once a week, Rangi and Vanessa left the house for a Maaori language and history class. On other occasions, Rangi gave a reo (Maaori language) workshop at Vanessa s place for her pupils parents. Then there were Rangi s and Vanessa s parents hui (meetings), or meetings to plan fundraising activities to finance a school trip to rural marae. Most of the time they were very busy and very involved in school activities and planning, but sometimes for a treat on a Thursday or Friday night they would go out to housie. 71 We generally ate dinner between 7:00 and 8:00 in the evening. Afterwards, the children were responsible for clearing the table and doing the dishes. Once their chores were done, they were sent to bed, since it would already be late. Sometimes they had an extra few minutes to play when Kiri or another adult relaxed their vigilance. When it was the children s bedtime, I enjoyed spending time with Paua, Kiri s eight-year-old nephew, listening to him read stories to me. 71 New Zealand term commonly used for bingo. 111

124 After dinner, Andrew always made coffee for Kiri and the other adults, and when the weather was warm we drank it on the steps outside the house. That was also the time for a cigarette, a chat and a gossip. Sometimes we would carry on talking inside, but when everyone was busy, we just returned to our respective work or study for a couple more hours before going to bed. The less busy ones might relax or watch TV, and Andrew spent most of his evenings on his computer playing games or surfing the internet. Once a week, or more often just before performances or competitions, Kiri had a kapa haka practice which I would always join in with. Sometimes, she also had meetings with colleagues from university or work. Weekends were quite relaxed: Andrew usually did not have to work, or at least only on the odd Saturday morning. He was at home with the children, doing work around the house, playing computer games, watching movies and relaxing with John, his best mate. John in fact was over very often and slept at our place most weekend nights. He was Paakehaa but seemed to fit in quite well with the Maaori ways of doing things, and was pretty much part of the family for most of my stay. At one point, he did not in fact have any place to stay, so he lived full time at number 30 until he left. As for Kiri, she worked at weekends as a care assistant, since she was at university during the week, and the family needed her wages to cover the mortgage, her schooling and all the whaanau s expenses. Kiri had taken on the family house quite recently, because she was the only one able to buy it and keep it in the family and open to everyone. Rangi, Richard, William and myself paid a very reasonable price for our board (food, rent, bills and other expenses included). This contributed to the financial security of the household and helped Kiri and Andrew make ends meet, which they could still sometimes do only with difficulty. About once a month, Kiri s parents, Teria and Hiko would visit from Hiko s tribal area in the country further south. These visits were an opportunity for everybody cousins, aunts, uncles, and friends to come over and find out what was going on in the whaanau 112

125 and in the countryside. They were also a chance to obtain advice in relation to tikanga (custom, rules) or ancestral knowledge, if anyone needed it. Sometimes, their visit was just a stopover in a longer trip to Teria s tribal area up north for a whaanau or tribal hui (meeting). At other times, their visit to Auckland was their chance to enjoy the city and have some entertainment. The trip might also be a good opportunity for Kiri s youngest sister, Hohi, to come to the city with her parents and her daughter to see her son, Paua. Often, Teria and Hiko also would bring the twin granddaughters that they whaangai (bring up) since their mother, the eldest daughter, had gone to live overseas. These two girls are William s daughters and David s sisters. Weekends were also the time when the children could have their friends stay over or could go themselves to visit their cousins or aunts for a day or two. Mahora, Kiri s daughter, often visited her cousin Stephanie and her auntie Rangi for weekends until Rangi moved in. Because of her baby, Whetu stayed at home most of the time, but she often would have a friend to stay over, who was usually someone who was somehow related. The children were sometimes given money to go to the movies or go shopping, and they usually all went together. Even Whetu, who was 16 years old, would take her ten year-old sister and seven year-old cousin with her when she went out with her friend(s). On rare occasions, she was allowed to go to a party at a friend s place. Generally, Whetu had a lot of help in taking care of the baby. When people came home from work during the week, there was always someone to feed and look after the baby if Whetu was out in the street chatting with neighbours. During the weekend, she could always count on someone to look after the baby for a few hours while she took some free time. Everybody seemed to enjoy taking care of the baby. In fact, for many months she was the main attraction in the house for friends and kin from different branches of Whetu s whakapapa. Rangi regularly called in before she lived at the house just to see the baby and feed her. At some point, however, Kiri, Rangi and the other adults decided that Whetu was relying too much on other people, so they decided to leave her more often to assume her responsibilities herself. 113

126 Friday and Saturday nights were also good times for Andrew and Kiri to invite friends over to play cards or chat. Andrew s mother and father, both Paakehaa, and friends often came round on cards nights. Sunday evening dinners were also an important occasion in the week when everybody would gather together for the usual pork roast. Even after I left to live in another household in West Auckland, I always came back for Sunday dinner. In fact, they only let me leave on the condition that I would come back at least once a week on Sundays! It was not difficult to keep my promise During the winter half-term and summer holidays, Kiri s son, who usually lives with his father in a town about six hours drive from Auckland also visited for anywhere from a few days to a few weeks, as did Rangi s daughter who lives in the same city with her father Hoani or, from time to time, with other Maaori relations. Occasionally, the children of Kiri s other sister came for a few days or more in their holidays. Richard, Rangi s oldest son, lived at Kiri s place for a couple of months before Rangi moved in, having had a disagreement with his parents. Likewise, some of the children from number 30 would go off elsewhere during their holidays, or sometimes if they had had a disagreement with one of the adults. (Metge (1995) writes about this special relationship with a favourite aunt or uncle. She adds that [often], children sought refuge with an aunt or an uncle of their own accord, when they were in strife at home (Metge 1995: 192). She also speaks of the mutual caring relationships between mokopuna (grandchildren) and tiipuna (grandparents). Riria and Whetu have this special bond with Tera and Hiko. In fact, it seems that they were chosen at an early age and have been exposed more than the others to tikanga (custom, rules) and various Maaori teachings, sometimes in direct ways, sometimes in more subtle ways. Metge also mentions this practice (1995: ). Paua, Kiri s youngest sister s eldest son, who lived at 30 Aroha Street for most of my stay, sometimes visited his mother who was living at her parents place in their tribal area, or he would stay with his Tongan father who lived in another part of Auckland. On a few occasions, he even stayed with his mum and his grandparents for many weeks and was registered at the school there, but his bad behaviour at school and at home got the better of his grandfather and he was taken back to 30 Aroha Street, since Kiri and Rangi were worried about him. 114

127 Long holidays and, to a lesser extent, weekends were also good opportunities for the people from the house to go back home to the country and visit relatives. Rangi and her daughter Stephanie went away from time to time to visit Rangi s husband (Stephanie s father) in another town down south. Kiri, Andrew and the children visited Kiri s people down south in Kiri s father s tribal area, where he and her mother now live, at least once a year on the summer holidays. They also made the trip there for tangihanga and other important hui. More rarely, they went up north to Kiri s mother s tribal area, usually for tangihanga and celebrations like 21 st birthdays and weddings. Very occasionally, Kiri, Andrew and the children would do a special activity all together at the weekend, like seeing family or friends, going to a restaurant or a movie or visiting one of the city s attractions like a museum or a park. Everyday life, however, is not always easy in the whaanau. It is made up in part of fights and disagreements (see chapter VI for a case study). There are always many problems to solve: personal problems, problems in relationships with kin, problems due to money. Many worries are also related to the growing children, who are ever more exposed to the outside world and its potential dangers, like bullying at school, violence, cigarettes, drugs, alcohol, and sex. My house is like a marae : The foundations of the whare Maaori When I moved in with Kiri and her family, I began to discover the fascinating world of the whare Maaori that people had told me about. Many people spoke to me about their city houses and compared them to a marae. They told me things like: we meet at home, and my house is like a marae. This allusion to a marae when speaking about city houses really excited my curiosity at the beginning of my field research, and for this reason, I was particularly keen to move in with Kiri, who had spoken to me about her house in these terms. For the purpose of this thesis and following Aroha s suggestion, I 115

128 will call the type of city house that I describe here a whare Maaori, 72 an expression which can be translated literally as Maaori house. Now, I want to give you an idea of what kind of place a whare Maaori is by listening to its members. Kiri talks about her house at 30 Aroha Street as a marae, as do her siblings and children. As illustrated in the previous section, the house is open on a daily basis to everybody who comes to have a chat, share a meal, ask for advice in relation to the tikanga (traditions), help in the chores, or look after the children. Kiri s sister, Rangi, explains here why the house is like a marae: The feeling in the house pretty much like a marae. Everyone just becomes one. It is like a real unity, unity place. (...) (...) I think that the main characteristic is just the feeling inside it... and the people. The first one will probably be how everybody respects the house by taking off their shoes. Pretty much like a marae basis. Everyone is sharing the jobs in the house. It is also a marae basis... Everything is shared in the house. Yeah, pretty much like a marae basis: jobs, house duties, the looking after one another ( ). Everybody belongs to everybody in the house. (...) If there is tension, it is mainly talked about, pretty much what happens on a marae. If there is a raruraru [trouble] it s brought to you know to the rangatira [chief] or whoever in the whaanau and it is talked about. Pretty much here, in this case. If I got a raruraru, I will take it inside and I will sort it out there. ( ) to the point that where it has been blessed at our whare nui [meeting house]. When dad got the place blessed, it was blessed the whare nui. (...) our house is pretty much a whare nui. It has open doors to anyone. It is just full with aroha [unconditional love] yeah, it is our whare nui. (...) We have had grandparents come through here. We have had aunties and uncles, cousins, nieces and nephews lived here, social welfare kids, sisters-in-law, brothers-in-law, we are still here... Yeah, I think it s just the way the house has been. Open to be. (...) it has been like that as far as I can remember. (...) We had family that would come from Wellington and like we had a 21 st or we had a tangi [funeral] that was up north, this place will probably be the centre for everyone to sleep over, catch up and you know travel on (Rangi). 72 At first, I called this type of house house-marae. However, I realized that many Maaori strongly reacted to the idea of hyphenating these two words which seem, at first, to belong to two completely different universes of meaning. In particular, mixing the sacred aspects of marae with the profane connotations of house was shocking to them. I therefore decided to speak instead of whare Maaori, a term suggested by Maaori friends. This term is a lot more general than a term like house-marae and could describe almost any kind of place where some Maaori principles are at work, but I consider that it is useful all the same in this study. 116

129 Whetu, Kiri s daughter, also stresses the idea of the house being a home for many people: Everyone is welcome in this house. It is like it s a homely house. (...) It s like a marae, where there are people coming and going. (...) You know how people like go to marae and they stay there. They are from there and sometimes they are not from there, but it is like their home, it is like where they feel safe and where they gather to see whaanau and tangi [funerals] and stuff. It is just like this house apart from the tangi laughter. People come here and it is very homely here for them. It is like another home. (...) This house is a home for a lot of people. (Whetu) For Kiri, her siblings and the children who have grown up in that house or lived there for a time, 30 Aroha Street is home, a place to which they all return at some point in their lives. For those who have returned to Auckland after living for a few years in another town, 30 Aroha Street is the only place where they feel comfortable, where they feel safe. After coming from the country. Like Hoani and I how we started off on our own when we came back to Auckland and we stayed in another house, it was very lonely. And like the only time that felt united was when it was a birthday or something and we came to visit. Yeah Pretty much otherwise, it s lonely out there. Especially when you have been brought up as one, united family. ( ) if I was financially able to cope with a house, I was financially less able to cope with food and travelling to and from school. And I did not want to put my baby at risk by going out and having a flat (...). I don t think I ever asked her Kiri, she invited me for dinner one night and next day I moved everything into the shed and I was here to live. (...) Just me and Stephanie and having no husband here, I think I would have felt insecure. Just... Knowing the city, I don t think I would have been able to sleep. (...) I think, when it comes to the crunch, a lot of family will probably end up doing that, to survive. ( ) If you have a big family that have come from the country to the city, you will find, majority of the time, they will stay with someone until they are able to cope by going out, living on their own. I have been out there and I don t like it, on my own. I find more security living with whaanau. (Rangi) For Rangi, the whare Maaori thus represents a way of coping with city life. The whare Maaori: a gathering place One characteristic that seems to stand out clearly in Rangi s and Whetu s description of 30 Aroha Street as similar to a marae is the fact that the house is open to everybody: 117

130 We have whaanau going in and out of the house. You know, they come and stay just it s like everyone gathers. Our whaanau come and gather and you know, catch up with what s go on with the rest of our whaanau. Everyone is welcome in this house. (...) It s like a marae, where there are people coming and going. (Whetu) The whare Maaori is thus a gathering place, a meeting place where information and news are shared. My house is a hui [meeting] point, said Tauni, who also describes his rented house in West Auckland as a whare Maaori. This is particularly true when grandparents are there for a visit or when there are visitors, cousins, uncles or aunts from the tribal area in the country, or when someone is just back from a trip there. Many people seem to come over at that moment to find out about the happenings and gossip among kin in the country. More formal hui are also called from time to time to discuss whaanau, hapuu or iwi lands, waters and marae, and to establish the whaanau position to be taken to tribe meetings. On their way back from tribe meetings, the whaanau representatives in Kiri s whaanau, Hiko and Teria, and sometimes, aunts or uncles will also stop by to report to the whaanau on what happened. Tui, a mother of eight children and grandmother of fourteen mokopuna, has a whare Maaori in South Auckland and makes sure to have meetings with them and other relatives in the city (brothers and sisters, aunts, uncles and cousins) from time to time to catch up on what is happening with everybody, what is going on in each one s household, and also to keep everybody informed about what happens on the marae back in the country, since she is on the marae committee there. Whare Maaori are thus meeting places to discuss serious issues, but they are also important places for relaxation and fun. People come around to hui [meeting] at home and we ve got a social life and we play a lot of games at night, Tauni said. Christine added: We are quite sort of easygoing in our home. And we always sort of entertain people at home. So, whare Maaori are good places for entertainment. However, activities are not always planned: people just turn up at the house to relax, watch TV and chat with the others. 118

131 A children s kingdom Whare Maaori, then, appear to be quite central for social life, and this is particularly true for the children who are forever in and out (Christine). For Tauni, The house is yeah, totally for the kids, all about the kids. In Christine s whaanau, they even organize whaanau activities in order to be with the kids: Quite often, we have sports days. The family gets together and we organize sports. We play alongside them. We don t play apart from them. We ll play with them. They love it! When we have them all there, we probably have about 40 children and that s just immediate family! For Joanna, the fact that the children are very important in the house, that s what makes our children be safe. She went on to explain that the children are considered everyone s children and are cared for as such, collectively, and that this is a good way to prevent children from being abused. Everybody is responsible for them. This was particularly salient at 30 Aroha Street: Mereheni did indeed seem to be everybody s baby. 73 Tauni s house is the children s kingdom since I d rather have my kids at home with their mates so I know where they are than having my kids out and not knowing what they do, so I guess that s the principle behind it. (Tauni) 73 Metge (1995) confirms that because anyone s children are everyone s children, whaanau most of the time constitute safe environments for children. In case of crises or abuses of different natures, [I]ntervention often took the form of a relative coming or being sent, without waiting for a request, to stay in the home and help until the crisis was over (Metge 1995: 259). If necessary, the whaanau will call a meeting to discuss and deal with the internal problems. And, still according to Metge (1995: 269), if whaanau make no move or are unable to stop a problem, the wider community will step in. Metge (1995: 277) specifies that in some cases whaanau do not have the skills or courage to deal with problems, and this is especially true when the offender(s) are people of high mana. If (an) offender(s) and his/her/their whaanau is merely ostracized by the wider community, as is perhaps easiest if the offender(s) has/have high mana, children may be left unprotected from abuse. Durie (1997b, 2001a) identifies four whaanau types that may be unable to take corrective action without external help to ensure the safety of their members: 1) whaanau tuukino (unsafe family) characterized by abuse, violence, and disregard for others; 2) whaanau wewete (laissez-faire family) characterized by limited guidance, lack of limit-setting, and over-flexible or non-existent standards; 3) whaanau poohara (marginalized family) characterized by poor access to goods and services and cultural poverty; and 4) whaanau tuu-mokemoke (isolated family) characterized by alienation from society and Maaori networks, and low societal participation (Durie 2001a: 211). For details, see Durie (2001a), chapter 7 in particular, and Durie (1997b). I will only add here that many whaanau problems are created through the confrontation of different figured worlds: the traditional figured world of the whaanau and the Paakehaa or mainstream figured worlds. See chapter VI for a detailed analysis of this confrontation. 119

132 Cultural inheritance and grandparents: Tamariki bonds Whare Maaori are also places of learning, in which grandparents are extremely influential. 74 Metge notes that [w]hether Maaori speak Maaori or English, the terms tiipuna or grandparent, grandmother and grandfather are usually given a much wider range of reference than the English terms generally have. As well as a child s parents parents, they are used to refer to a child s parents siblings and cousins, to the latter s spouses, and to relatives from the previous generation if still living (1995: 176). It is principally these people who teach their mokopuna (grandchildren) about tikanga, whakapapa, whaanau history and marae, waiata and karakia. Grandparents see this as a matter of responsibility: I make it a responsibility. Yeah, we talk about how they can conduct themselves when they go to different places to different marae, that there are certain differences going on. ( ) Like at one stage, we were going to go down to the east coast, my husband s cousin s son had his 21 st birthday. Some of our kids wanted to go too, so we talked about roles (Tui). In fact, according to Metge, [g]randparents rather than parents bear the responsibility for teaching children who they are, how they are related to particular relatives and how to behave toward them (1995: 187). And that is achieved through teaching whakapapa (genealogy) and tikanga (tradition) knowledge to the children. While I was at 30 Aroha Street, each time that Hiko, Kiri s father, came over, he made sure to go through at least one karakia (prayer) or waiata (song) with the tamariki (children). He also sometimes made them recite their whakapapa and spoke to them a little bit in te reo (Maaori language) so that they could practice it. When he visited, he also took on the responsibility of having a koorero (serious talk) with any of the tamariki (children) who needed advice or a reprimand. He also made a point of congratulating those who had behaved well or performed well at school, at kapa haka (Maaori performing arts) or in sports. 74 Grandparents may either live at the whare Maaori or just visit it from time to time. In 1996, one in five Maaori (19 per cent) lived in multi-generation households compared to only 7 per cent of the non-maaori population (Durie 2001a: 194). 120

133 The whare Maaori then symbolizes at its best the bond between grandparents and grandchildren, as well as cultural inheritance (Allen 2002; Ihimaera 1972). The importance of the bond between grandparents and mokopuna (grandchildren) is present throughout Ihimaera s work, in particular in Pounamu, Pounamu (1972) and The Matriarch (1986), as underlined by Allen (2002). It is also central to The Dream Swimmer (1997), Ihimaera s sequel to The Matriarch (1986), as well as to his play Woman Far Walking (2000), which was performed from 2000 to 2002 throughout Aotearoa/New Zealand as well as in the USA and the UK. Metge (1995: 176) also shows the importance of the privileged relationship between grandparents or tiipuna and grandchildren for Maaori. According to her, this relation is often remembered as warm, close, comforting, and as a source of love and support. While grandparents do set strict standards for behaviour, especially concerning tapu (loosely translated as restrictions) and tikanga (custom, rules), they are generally also more patient and more gentle in their corrections than parents can be. Grandparents are also remembered for their interest in their mokopuna s achievements, and for building up their self-esteem with praise and affection (Metge 1995: 182). Whetu and Riria each experienced that very close relationship with their grandparents, Teria and Hiko. In fact, they were both whaangai (brought up, looked after) by them for some years when they lived up north in Teria s tribal area. For both of them, that area is their tuurangawaewae, the spiritual home where they have their marae. This is different for Kiri, Whetu s mother, who identifies more closely with her father s home area down south, since she visited whaanau there more regularly than the whaanau up north when she was young. As I emphasized in the previous chapter, identification with marae, and also with tuurangawaewae, relies heavily on each person s particular life experiences and on his/her relationships with the different whaanau members. When Whetu had her baby, her grandmother rather than her mother was with her in the delivery room, because of this special bond; her mother was with me, impatiently waiting outside. Today, Teria and Hiko whaangai William s twin daughters as well as another granddaughter whose mother, their youngest daughter, still lives with them. They also take Paua from time to 121

134 time. Whetu still visits them frequently and even stays for longer sojourns when things are not going so well between her and her mother. Maaori teachings are also passed on to the children by their parents. Kiri often teaches what she learns at her kapa haka practice to Whetu and Mahora. She learns the different actions for a song s words with them and then they all practise the movements together. At Christine s whare Maaori, We use the Maaori language in the home as much as possible. We have karakia, we have We should do this every night, but at least once a week we get together as a whaanau and there is no TV allowed and we have karakia and hiimene and we have our children do their whakapapa and then we do waiata and we do that for about two hours, usually on the Monday night. (Christine) Tui s house becomes a marae during those special moments when she has whaanau meetings, when everybody gathers at the house. My house is a marae when we have family meetings ( ) once a month ( ) Yeah, everybody comes and then my house is like a marae. Very much so, everybody is everywhere. ( ) It s because it s full up with people, people coming and going, and the kids all bring up something. They usually bring up it s the pride of what I am bringing. It becomes a marae, because everybody comes and goes, everybody brings something, contributes and it really helps. (Tui) This last quote raises two important ideas: 1) whare Maaori, like real marae, are all about sharing and the community, the group, the whaanau, and 2) like real marae, whare Maaori are not necessarily part of everyone s experience every day, so a house is not necessarily in a permanent state of being a whare Maaori, either. The importance of the collective: Us as one united family One thing that people consider central to the whare Maaori is that everything is shared in the house (Rangi). The whare Maaori is about sharing, it is a joint effort (Tui). J: For me, it s just about it s just the common duties: respect, aroha, you know that word, love, just having love and respect and appreciation for people. And it s about giving what you have to others, to those who don t have as much as you have, so you It s the interaction, sharing of resources intermingling of families 122

135 N: Sharing of resources, which resources? M: Any resources. Food. J: A home. M: Ya, it s everything. J: Financial. ( ) J: My sister Gloria, what was the first thing she did when she came in? ( ) Usually the first thing she does is go to the fridge. She always does and the children do it now too. They will do it at my sister s place too, they do it here I ll go to her house. That sort of stuff. (Joanna and Mihi) While people will usually bring extra food that they have, for example, when they visit, there is no immediate obligation to reciprocate. You re not obligated to take something or you don t have to (Mihi). However, people expect to treat their visitors in the same way that they were treated when visiting them, and it can bother them if they do not see any chance for some sort of reciprocation in the long run, as in the following situation. Young people who come to the city intending to find a job will often stay for weeks with a whaanau until they earn enough to live out by themselves (Metge 1964: 245). This is also true of nieces and nephews who come to stay when they are on bad terms with their parents. These guests can become both a financial burden and an emotional or moral worry, since their parents will hold the hosts responsible for them. The young people then often move out to live in single rooms in an apartment or hostel and are therefore unable to reciprocate the hospitality. They are also often travellers or distant relatives with whom the hosts would not consider staying. Metge (2002: 317) explains that the imbalance created by the delay in returning the generosity keeps the relationship going in a cultural context where there is an obligation to return and indeed to give more than what one has received. So, gift exchanges of all kinds forge and maintain social bonds. In that, Metge s understanding differs from the visions of Salmond (1991), Patterson (1992), and Sahlins (1965) who insist rather on the importance of balanced reciprocity. Metge, drawing on Firth (1959), stresses the importance of the imbalance via the practice of making a delayed return. In fact, Metge 123

136 (2002: ) sees a close connection between utu, 75 the principle of reciprocity, and mana, spiritual power and authority. She explains that [in] pre-colonial Maaori society and to a varying extent in later years, there was a metaphysical dimension to the need for individuals and groups to continually strive to increase their mana by generous giving and to protect it against loss by repaying negative gifts in kind. (Metge 2002: 321) This quote also underlines the fact that utu has a negative as well as a positive side. On the negative side, one (person or group) can suffer sanctions if one fails to return a gift, and bad things can happen such as losing the chance for future exchange, losing one s reputation and mana (Metge 2002: 321), or even falling victim to maakutu (sorcery) (Firth 1959: 417 quoted in Metge 2002: 318). I did not hear about any maakutu as such during my field research (but then, nobody fell ill). However, it is clear that if they do things that are wrong or do not fit with tikanga, people do fear negative consequences from the supernatural world, or at least some kind of warning from their dead tiipuna. But, in spite of the principle of utu, some people take advantage of others generosity, which can cause conflicts and disagreement. The context of sharing thus implies responsibility and obligations. The return does not need to be of the same nature. If one is hosted for a while at a relative s place, one can reciprocate by helping as much as possible around the house, giving a financial contribution towards the running of the house, or making one s car available for a collective use, for example. The workings of utu can sometimes create tricky situations for home-owners, particularly those who own a house that has been in the family for generations and where all the siblings have been raised. Even if the family house is now owned or rented by one of the siblings, others might still consider that they have the right to come and go as they please. Some tend to take advantage, arriving whenever they like and staying as long as they like without necessarily contributing to the day-to-day running and maintenance of the house. This issue was raised by Metge (1964), many of whose Auckland informants complained 75 Metge (2002: 320) argues that Mauss went beyond the evidence in his Essai sur le don (1925) in interpreting the concept of hau as a purposive entity of retrospective aims. She rather suggests the concept of utu as the underlying concept of Maaori gift exchange, as first suggested by Firth (1959) (see Metge 2002 for details). 124

137 that their country kin stayed with them for weeks at a time without making any economic contribution. Their rural cousins, however, also complained that urban residents made a convenience of them, getting a cheap holiday at the busiest times of the rural year, Christmas and Easter (Metge 1964: 245). Still, staying with one s kinsfolk is also common sense when one first moves to the city, as Rangi explains: I think, when it comes to the crunch, a lot of family will probably end up doing that, to survive. ( ) If you have a big family that have come from the country to the city, you will find, majority of the time, they will stay with someone until they are able to cope by going out, living on their own (Rangi). The whare Maaori then becomes a transitory place, a place of passage. It is also a safety net in the city, which is sometimes experienced as an alien or dangerous place, a place not Maaori. (...) if I was financially able to cope with a house, I was financially less able to cope with food and travelling to and from school. And I did not want to put my baby at risk by going out and having a flat (...). I don t think I ever asked her Kiri, she invited me for dinner one night and next day I moved everything into the shed and I was here to live. (...) Just me and Stephanie and having no husband here, I think I would have felt insecure. Just Knowing the city, I don t think I would have been able to sleep. (...) I have been out there and I don t like it, on my own. I find more security living with whaanau (Rangi). When visitors become a burden on the people of the house, it can be very difficult to tell them to leave. It goes against any Maaori whaanau principle of hospitality: among other things, it is against whanaungatanga (strengthening and enriching the bonds of family unity) and manaakitanga (showing respect and kindness, befriending, hospitality extended to visitors), utu, and mana (see chapters V and VI for more details on the whaanau principles). In fact, infringing these principles risks creating conflicts not only between the persons directly involved in the problematic situation, but also among other members of the wider family, thanks to the very same principles, which include dimensions of mutual aid and reciprocity. 125

138 Even Whetu explains that yes, her mother owns the house, but in practice, the house is not really hers: it belongs to everyone, and if her mum were to leave and sell the house to someone else in the whaanau, she would stay, because for her it is home. She added: People come here and it s very homely here for them. It is like another home. ( ) This house is a home to a lot of people. ( ) It s quite hard to explain why ( ) I don t really know, but I know it s like a marae to a lot of people Because it s like their home as well as ours. (Whetu) Everyone also takes on a particular role in being part of the whaanau. (...) I think that in the home, everyone... if there is a task that needs to be done, if you are capable of doing that task or capable of doing that role then you do it. It is the same as on a marae. If there is a role that needs to be filled and there is no one else to do it, it is your responsibility to do it. (Matiu) Rangi explains how they have been brought up to know their role in her family: ( ) I had the role ever since we were growing up. Being the eldest, my job was to cook, clean and care. ( ) ( ) She [Kiri] has a financial head, when it comes to making sure that bills are paid, there s food in the cupboard, where I will take the role of caregiver, caring for the kids, feeding the family, we sort of have our roles. So, she does take a big part on the financial side and I think me being able to take a part in the caregiver side, take a lot of pressure off her too. (Rangi) The family house itself is considered to belong to everybody: My house is their house and their house is my house. We sort of have this collective stuff going on. It s not about individuals. I could have something in the fridge that I bought especially for me and if somebody eats it, I will probably be a bit grumpy, but that s what happen when you have it within the fridge [laughter]. That s the purpose of it, that s what I mean, those values and beliefs: it s for everyone. So you buy for everyone. (Joanna) As Joanna s quote shows, even if sharing is the normal thing to do in a whare Maaori, it is not always easy. Sometimes, there are tensions between the collective and the individual in today s world where Maaori principles and the tikanga of the marae are confronted by the figured world of the Paakehaa. 126

139 Joanna goes on to say: I mean, the doors are always open. ( ) Sometimes it s really difficult. Oh, just sometimes, I mean, I just don t want to do anything, I don t want to see anyone. You don t have that luxury, you don t have the luxury of just lying on the couch and just relaxing because people will visit. ( ) I mean, usually, I feed them and things like that. ( ) But it s good, I mean, I do like it. (Joanna) Even if Christine also appreciates living close by her family and always having a lot of people at home, she sometimes finds it quite difficult. We live closely together but living so close together hasn t been that great in some ways. It has been great for the kids because they have got friends all the time, but I suppose constantly being, you know, being around each other, sometimes it got quite stressful and things that perhaps my sister and her husband will do with their children, I did not agree with it because they are my nephews and nieces, you know, I become quite upset about it and vice versa, you know. ( ) Of course mum and dad are stuck in the middle and they don t agree with any of it, you know, they got quite upset about things that happen at home with grandchildren. ( ) There are some advantages of living like that, but on the other hand it hasn t all been that great. And I do have a sister that unfortunately has been a drug abuser and that has brought major problems. ( ) We always try to pick her up, but you get to a point where you you just can t take it anymore. It gets too much ( ) It s nice on Thursdays because we always share a meal on Thursdays and special occasions. ( ) When we first got our house there, we have been at mum s for breakfast and then at sister s for lunch and at my place for tea and then we ll have the children going back and forth Actually it got too much. And we chose ( ) we will have our own meals and things. But, ya, on special occasions, we ll always get together and have a meal. But the kids just come and go. ( ) They are forever running in and out. It s all right. I love having the kids around. (Christine) Aroha also told me about how difficult it was to study when she was living at her parents place: It was like a train station!. Everybody was coming and going, there was always someone at home and that also meant working to care for the visitors. When parents are occupied with visitors, they cannot give much attention to their children s studies, either. Aroha thinks that this can cause many troubles for students, preventing them from studying. At least, this was the case for her when she was young and I myself could observe that having a lot of people around often disturbed the children and young people in what they were doing, whether it was homework or housework. Given her own experience, Aroha is not surprised that Maaori students do not succeed very well at school or do not finish their degrees. In fact, even if Maaori are making gains in their educational achievement, over a third of all Maaori children still leave school without 127

140 any qualification (Durie 2001a: 8). An over-busy home life is one reason why Aroha chose to do her degree at a university some distance away from her whaanau, leaving her tribal area for Auckland where she now lives with her husband and her two children. She often has visitors, but not on a daily basis, since she lives a bit too far from most of her whaanau members for that. She does not describe her house as a whare Maaori, nor does she want it to be one, for the sake of her children s achievement at school and her own achievement at work. Nevertheless, this does not prevent her from maintaining very good relationships with her whaanau in the country and visiting them regularly, as often as once or twice a month depending on what is happening in her own life, at the marae and in her whaanau back home. Aroha is not the only one in this situation. Aroha is not the only one to have thus rejected the whare Maaori model of living; two other participants in my research did the same. The whare Maaori: this is our kaakano, our seed A whare Maaori is a place where one really belongs. As Rangi puts it: It s like this is our kaakano, our seed. So, whenever we are stuck or we have a hiding or we are in trouble we always come back to the seed. Yeah, it s about the best that I can describe it... coming back to our seed. (Rangi) The whare Maaori is thus about identity and going back to who one is, and can be at the very core of people s identities. It is about whaanau, real or imagined: it is about the tiipuna who have been there before oneself; it is about memories kept alive in the house. Whetu recalled a lot of people who come to 30 Aroha Street and always say things like: Remember the memories in that room. She went on: This house has been in our family for years and it s like a treasure as well. You know how a marae is a treasure to the people, yeah, that is just exactly like this house (Whetu). The house is the manawa, the heart of the family (Ihimaera1972: 38). It stores memories, but also tangible family treasure like photos and family taonga. In fact, in the whare Maaori I visited, one could always find important family pictures, taonga like patu (weapon) and pounamu (greenstone), old kete (woven flax baskets) and other pieces of flax, genealogy books, and so forth. 128

141 People also care for it like they care for a treasure. Some, like Kiri, feel a distinct responsibility to keep it in the family, open to everybody. 76 Kiri bought the house a few weeks before the New Year 2002 from her parents, who had moved back to the country. Her other siblings could have bought it, too, had they had the money, the character or the desire to do so: I mean we all had our chance to have the place. My brother then he could not cope with it, it wasn t him. Then we had Nina and it wasn t in her to have it, and then Hana, then myself. Then I already married my own husband and he wanted to give me what he has from his family and not me give him what I have ( ) I guess because I worked too hard when I grew up here to bring up everybody and to look after everybody and I really don t want to end up here. Whereas Kiri, she s different, she doesn t want to let the place go, she wants to keep it in the family. (Rangi) Rangi speaks about the whare Maaori as her kaakano because the family house at 30 Aroha Street is the place where she first knew what it was to have a family, to be part of a family with a mother, siblings and, most importantly, a father: before her grandmother passed away, she lived alone with her, travelling the country to attend Ratana hui. 77 Thus, the house for her means family. The temporality of the whare Maaori Many people have had their house as a whare Maaori at certain times, but not at others. Why, how and when is a normal house turned into a little marae or conceived as similar to a marae? Some people told me that in the past, they used to have a whare Maaori; their house used to be open to everybody but was no longer. Keita told me: It used to be like that when my kids were here. Now it is just my husband and I and my daughter, but we are never home, like he is there and I am here and we are never home. So, people become 76 We will see below that the house is not literally open to everybody. It is open to whaanau members and friends who respect both the whaanau principles and the house itself. See also chapter VI for cases in which the whaanau was obliged to ask some of its members to leave the whare Maaori. 77 Ratana is a church founded by Tahupotiki Wiremu Ratana around Ratana s [aim]( ) was to provide a single Maori church which would unite the race and promote their welfare through a way of life based on biblical values (Elsmore 1999 (1989): 338) (See also Raureti 1978). 129

142 preoccupied with work, university, and other activities. They are at home less often now than when they had young children, who have a lot to do with the coming and going in a house. Children attract other children, as well as their parents and grandparents. When the children leave, the house will not usually be as busy as it was until the next generation of children is born. However, the arrival of a baby can also be a reason to cap the number of visitors. This was the case for Moana, who wanted a stable and safe environment for her daughter s new-born. Many people still live at Moana s place together, but the door is not quite as wide open as it used to be. For Tui, as we said earlier, her house is a marae only in certain circumstances: once a month, when they have family meetings and all eight children and fourteen mokopuna come together for the Sunday barbecue and activities. Yeah, everybody comes and then, my house is like a marae (Tui). This makes a difference from normal time during which My house, it s my castle (Tui). So it seems that a house can become a marae when it is full up with people coming and going, but one single party held on one isolated occasion will never suffice for a house to be considered as a marae. It is something that has to be in the spirit of the house and its people. In Tui s case, there are very practical reasons why her house is not like a marae on a daily basis: people know that her husband sleeps during the day because he works during the night. Now, people will ring them up first to find out if it s okay to visit. As she explained to me, it did not used to happen like that: people used to just show up. People also know that Tui is very busy with church as well as whaanau meetings in the evenings. During the week, they do not have a lot of visitors; sometimes their children will spend time with another family. Certain city houses can also be considered like a marae during specific occasions which are typically Maaori and traditionally take place on the marae, such as tangihanga (funeral). Unsurprisingly, these are only very infrequent events, and these city houses can be whare Maaori or not under normal circumstances. But we will come back to this idea later on. 130

143 The people who regularly visit whare Maaori are mostly whaanau members and friends who are considered to be part of the whaanau as well. The house is also open for those in need. For example, Kiri and Rangi s grandfather used to stay at 30 Aroha Street, bringing social welfare kids (young people whose families were in emotional and/or financial crisis and who were in the care of social services). Whetu, talking about her own grandparents, Teria and Hiko, said: They had a lot to do with people, also as a whaangai family looking after them. It just ended up that way [laughter]. I don t know, they brought up a lot of teenagers and family, like cousins ( ) who came over and stayed, some for ages [laughter]. (Whetu) Rangi does the same today with some tamariki from school who are in difficulty. Joanna s sister from another whare Maaori also used to bring residents of the geriatric unit where she works home for dinner. 78 Saying that the house is open to everybody is not exactly true, however. There is always some sort of filtering process in place. Rangi explained: You would not get a complete stranger walk in with conflicts, because they should not have been invited anyway. And Matiu said that: We have got not qualms with people coming in but it is sort of like a filtering process to be like that to ones that fit in with our lifestyle and the ones that don t. ( ) Basically any one can come into our house but if they don t fit in with us then they usually get the telly bye bye. ( ) more than often the people that come around here are Maaori and straight away it is a friendship connection. (Matiu) This filtering process become very clear to me on one occasion at 30 Aroha Street. One day, one of the teenagers brought home an unknown young Maaori man, probably around 16 years old. At first sight of him, Kiri immediately asked the teenagers of the house to come and have a private talk with her. She and Rangi asked them who the young man was, where he came from, if he had a place to live, where they knew him from and so on. Receiving only unsatisfactory answers to their questions, they asked the teenagers to tell the young man to leave, which they did not do at first. Kiri and Rangi then kept a very 78 These data reveal that the whare Maaori possesses a certain immanent sacredness, which is part of everyday life. 131

144 close eye on the stranger the whole time that he was around. Kiri felt him to be a danger for the girls, Whetu, Mahora, and Stephanie. Just before dinner, Kiri decided to speak to him and to give him a warning in no uncertain terms: if he was there to steal from them or just to get close to the girls, he was not welcome. She told him that he was being closely watched and if the TV or stereo happened to get stolen or the girls got hurt, she would find him and turn him in to the police. Then, she invited him to have a kai (food, meal) with them and to leave straight afterwards. After he left, Kiri warned everyone that she and the other adults did not want to see that suspicious guy around ever again unless they knew more about him and his whaanau, or unless he brought his aunt with whom he said he lived. So, when they have reasonable doubts, people make sure that those who come will respect the house and the people who live there: our home is open to anybody as long as you respect our home (Christine). Matiu, who is from another whare Maaori put forward much the same sort of idea: My house is a marae concept. (...) You know the marae protocols and processes, I think you try to apply that to your own personal dwelling, so, you know, people who come in, you offer them a kupa tii [cup of tea], they could say they don t want it, but you offer them a kupa tii anyway and make them feel relaxed and you give them a kai and yeah! My house is a marae concept. (...) It is the application of the things that you learn at the marae. Like you don t sit on the tables, like the tikanga that you learn on the marae, you use it in your home and Manaakitangata (...) Yeah, that s the marae concept that is used practically in the home. (Matiu) There are some rules that are respected in the house even if whare Maaori do not have nearly the same formality as real marae. For example, Mihi explains that they practise the concepts of tapu. But what does that mean? The precise practices explained in terms of tapu vary from one whare Maaori, or one ordinary house, to another, but many agree on the underlying principles and some of the behaviour. At 30 Aroha Street, as in many Maaori houses, everybody respects the house by taking off their shoes. Pretty much like a marae basis (Rangi). Rangi also insists on the importance of not washing tea towels, which touch noa food, with body towels. She became quite upset when a Paakehaa guest 132

145 trimmed his beard in the backyard and left the hair on the ground. What comes from the body hair, nails and blood is highly tapu and should not be left lying around. When one has one s hair cut, one has to keep it and then get rid of it in a clean and proper way. Rangi s favourite way to get rid of hair, for example, is to put it in a bag and bury the bag, which is not something that can easily be done in the city. She could also burn it, but that is not easy in Auckland either. So she chooses to put the hair inside a bag, rather than having it loose and dispersed, and puts the bag in a secure garbage bin. Some other tapu rules that I heard about were: don t put a hairbrush on the table; don t put a taonga or a tapu object like a whakapapa book, patu (traditional hand weapon), or a pounamu (greenstone) on a chair; and don t sit on a pillow. Salmond identifies some other tapu rules: [D]on t put your hat on the table (hat is tapu because it s been on your head; table is noa from food); don t leave toilet paper on the same shelf as food (toilet is tapu, food is noa); keep genealogy books out of the kitchen; never wash the baby in a basin you ve had dishwater in (baby is tapu; dishwater has noa food in it), and so on. (1975: 49) She goes on to add that most families no longer practise these rules. This was in 1975, and events from my fieldwork lead me to suspect that certain practices have been revived along with the language and the Maaori culture during the Maaori cultural renaissance. One night when I was in a night-club with a group of Maaori students from university, one of them politely asked a young Paakehaa woman not to sit on top of their table, since they were Maaori and it was important for them. She only moved off after considerable insistence from the woman from our group, and not without arguing. Not long after the beginning of my fieldwork, we had to leave in a rush for a marae and the bathroom was busy. I was told off by a Maaori woman for brushing my teeth in the kitchen sink. I should have known better and I did not make the same mistake twice. However, this shows that sometimes, knowledge (or lack of knowledge) of tapu rules can bring about conflicts or misunderstandings within the whaanau, which can be the case in mixed households or when Paakehaa or other non-maaori are visiting. Even Maaori do 133

146 not always know or practise the proper rules. Rangi had to explain to Andrew some of the rules about doing the washing properly so as not to violate any tapu. She told me: Sometimes, we have a little bit of conflict, but I feel comfortable to talk to him about things. ( ) Yeah, and it s good because it s open, it s an open house, you know, if something bugs him about me or about my child, he can tell me. (Rangi) And again: If there is tension, it is mainly talked about, pretty much what happens on a marae. If there is a raruraru (problem), it s brought to you know to the rangatira (chief) or to whoever in the whaanau and it is talked about. Pretty much here, in this case. If I got a raruraru, I will take it inside and I will sort it out there. (Rangi) This quote from Rangi, then, exemplifies that the marae and consequently the whare Maaori is seen as a forum for people s expression and a place to sort out conflicts, minor or major. When I asked how it happened that people s house became whare Maaori, they replied things like I mean, it just comes naturally in our family, we just welcome people into our home (Whetu). It just comes with your upbringing (Rangi). Debra said: If whaanau turn up, ya, it s like a marae, ya. I think that s just the way we are, very we don t mind things like that, whaanau turn up, doesn t matter what time, it s always open. The whare Maaori, most of the time, is not a single building or a single house. It is often a complex of buildings. In Auckland, Maaori who speak about their house as a marae often have a sleep-out garage in their backyard that can accommodate visitors. Some others have several houses on the same block or plot of land. Christine recalled how it happened that she, her parents and siblings came to live all together: We were living in our family house and then I got pregnant to my first child and so I said to mum and dad, give me a piece of land, I wanna build my house, so they did. At the front of them folks, because they have quite a large crop of land. ( ) So I built a house there. It was just a small two-bedroom home. (Christine) My sister and her husband and their children, they also built a house on the same section. So there is mum and dad s house, there is me and my husband and our 134

147 children in the front of them and then in the side of mum and dad is the house of sister and brother-in-law and their children. But, mum and dad have got a big batch up north and they are up there at the moment and my sister who is a solo mother, her and her four children have moved into my mum s house. (Christine) Christine s whare Maaori is thus a complex of houses on the same plot. But this complex is also part of a network of whare Maaori in the neighbourhood. Close by is her husband s family house as well as those of his siblings. Christine also has cousins, aunts and uncles who have their houses around and about. The other neat thing too is that my husband s family, the family home, have lived in that area as long as us. It s just across the park. The kids you know, just jump on their bikes and go over to nana s house. So, it s quite neat and all his nieces and nephews that I consider mine too. They all know my nephews and nieces and they all treat each other like cousins. (Christine) A similar thing happens at Vanessa s place: Whaea Vanessa[ 79 ] kind of lives like in her household, she stays with her older brother, the older brother and his wife and their daughter who had a child lived in the house and then they have a sleep-out garage that whaea Vanessa and her mother share and then they have a little unit besides the sleep-out shed that houses the son and his girlfriend. So they pretty much live on a marae basis. (Rangi) When I visited Vanessa, there was also a foreign cousin who had just moved there. Joanna s and Mihi s whare Maaori is also part of a network of similar whare Maaori on their street. First, Joanna s brother has a house on the same plot. Her sister lives up the road. Their Maaori neighbours from other tribes also have their house as a marae and it is open to them. So, Joanna explained: It s like recreating a marae in a rural area and then just to adjust it into an urban area. It s like having the same basic values and beliefs that what I do reflects on my whaanau and the same with my neighbours. And so if there is a death or celebration of some form in the neighbourhood, everyone goes to it. ( ) Like if somebody s child is turning 21, it s not only us who will go, it s most of the Maaori within the neighbours who will go cause we grew up together and our children grew up together, they grew up with them ( ) It was not about just being Maaori; it was about being a new community. (Joanna) 79 To show respect to persons of mana or simply to persons older than oneself, Maaori use terms of address like whaea (which can be literally translated as mother) for women and papa or matua (literally translated as parent and more precisely, father) for men. Certain other terms are also used depending on tribal area. 135

148 But with time, the community eroded as people moved back to the country, to other areas of the city or to other cities. When she speaks about her neighbours who are part of her little hapuu, Joanna speaks about people who have been there since the beginning when her parents bought the house 20 years ago or who have been there for at least 13 years. Kiri also used to have a wider network in her street, but many people have moved away. She still has a good relationship with the neighbours at the back, who have been there from the beginning, as well as with her next-door neighbours who are Maaori. They sometimes come for tea or for celebrations, but the network used to be much larger when she was young. Finding space for everyone In an article about urban housing for Samoan immigrants in Auckland, Macpherson (1997) examines a popular solution to the problems of limited space for activities central to Samoan social organization: the use of garages as extensions to houses. Macpherson (1997: 151) shows how housing in Auckland was designed to satisfy the needs of Paakehaa families, that is domestic groupings which typically correspond to nuclear family units, with a generally stable composition and only loose affiliations to diverse kinship and community groupings. Housing for typical low- and middle-income families was built to accommodate two parents (or one) and 2.11 children (Macpherson 1995: 155). Like the Samoan migrants studied by Macpherson (1995), Maaori are more likely to live in larger domestic groupings which often extend beyond nuclear family units. The composition of domestic groupings is also more changeable and more tightly associated with the extended kin group (see footnote 74). Like Samoan migrants, many Maaori have taken advantage of government policy that encourages private home ownership for all New Zealanders and gives assistance for this purpose to low-income groups: Families with low incomes and little or no savings were assigned housing in various state-owned housing complexes[ 80 ]. Rents in these complexes were related 80 Theses housing complexes were typically located in low-cost subdivisions developed on the fringes of many cities. In Auckland, one thinks of areas like Ootara, Papakura, Manukau, which are now among the areas with the worse disparity statistics(see the map of urban disparities in appendix). 136

149 to income and were typically much lower than in the open housing market. A series of government policies encouraged families placed in these homes to save money in order to buy them or to buy private housing. Families with some savings were offered several incentives to purchase new homes. First, low-cost, long-term (typically longer than twenty years) mortgages were provided by a government home financing agency, the State Housing Corporation. Second, families were permitted to obtain cash advances on social entitlement such as the child allowance to enable them to meet deposit requirements. (Macpherson 1997: 153) Houses designed for nuclear families soon created problems for Samoans, and also for Maaori. Houses built under the housing assistance programs were typically free-standing, single-storey, wooden, three- or four-bedroom homes with floor areas of around 100 square metres, set on a lot of between 750 and 1000 square metres. In the case of whare Maaori, frequent visits by whaanau members, and more importantly their longer stays, put pressure on the regular whare Maaori members since they often had to give up or share their bedrooms in order to accommodate visitors. At 30 Aroha Street a house which with its four bedrooms is bigger than the standard house, the children were the first to give up their rooms, according to status rules. In most cases, they were in fact happy to do so and sleep on the floor in the lounge. But the situation occurred so frequently that it created problems from time to time regarding the use of certain spaces, especially the lounge. Those who were sleeping there would have their sleep disturbed by the whaanau s regular activities, especially in the evening and the morning. When visitors came, there was a constant shifting of sleeping mats and bedding around the house: the lounge was cleared first thing in the morning to make space for daytime activities, and was packed again with mattresses at night. Mattresses were piled up in the rooms during the day. Of course, all this shifting put furniture and furnishings through considerable wear and tear: Kiri often complained about the deteriorating condition of her new couch and carpet. As in the case of Samoan immigrants (Macpherson 1997), the garage is seen as a solution to problems of space at 30 Aroha Street and at Vanessa s home. At both places, the garage is used as a sleep-out area and indeed is occupied permanently by certain members of the whaanau who have their living quarters there. They decorate the garage according to their taste: Vanessa put tukutuku panels (woven panels usually found in 137

150 meeting houses) on the walls; Rangi had her TV, stereo, computer, couch, and refrigerator in the shed. The only thing that was missing was a bathroom and, for cold nights, some kind of insulation. When there were too many visitors in the house, the garage could provide extra beds. Rangi also had her own guests in the shed, such as Stephanie s friends or students from the school who sometimes stayed the night. In Tauni s case, the garage is a hui place for adults social life and parlour games in te reo: The whare waka or the garage is ours. It s the adult place; the house is the kids, so the kids know when to come in the garage cause that s our official place (Tauni). The garage is also the place where they will smoke a cigarette or a joint with adult friends at night. At Joanna s place, sometimes her brother and nephew will also have a beer out in the shed. At the tangi of Joanna s father, the garage was used as a complete outdoor cooking facility in order to feed all the visitors, while all the furniture in the house was cleared and stored in one bedroom in order to welcome the body and all the visitors. Other space solutions can also be found. At one point, for example, Kiri and Andrew were thinking about buying a caravan in order to provide John with his living quarters and to free up the lounge for everyone s use. In fact, having John sleeping on the couch prevented Kiri from studying late at night in the dining room or lounge (there was no wall between the two rooms). She had to work in her own bedroom, which meant disturbing Andrew s sleep, while he had to get up at 6:30 each morning. In this particular case, John s departure sorted out the problem until the next whaanau member came to live with them. William and David even felt that the shed was overcrowded when Rangi and Stephanie moved in with them, and they put up a cardboard wall to divide the space. A mobile home was put beside Vanessa s sleep-out garage in order to lodge her brother and his wife. In Christine s whaanau, they resolved their space problem by building new houses on their parents plot. 138

151 Vanessa s garage was also used occasionally for school whaanau meetings to plan fundraising activities and school trips, for example. This is also where Rangi teaches te reo to her students parents. The garage can then become a language nest (Macpherson 1997: 168). So garages, mobile homes and caravans make useful and flexible extensions of the house. They are also quite cheap in comparison to buying a larger house or building an annex onto the existing house. As explained by Macpherson (1997: 160), larger houses were available in other districts but they were generally more expensive. Even if family incomes are sufficient to buy one of these houses, most Maaori, like Samoans, are reluctant to move to areas dominated by Paakehaa, and this is even truer for areas dominated by wealthy Paakehaa. The concentration of Maaori in certain areas of the city can be explained both by the low cost housing and by their preference for areas where there are other Maaori around. Most Maaori, or at least the majority of participants in this research, are not so comfortable in high-standard Paakehaa neighbourhoods. Indeed, at a seminar I gave about my research at the university, which about thirty Maaori attended, many reacted quite strongly to this particular quote from one of the research participants: When I drove through Remuera[ 81 ], everybody got a smile on their face and got a bounce in their walk, and I come to South Auckland ( ) no bounce in their walk. They are just existing, they are just here. (Kahu) Among other reactions, Matua thought that this participant was probably just idealizing Remuera. He added that if she lived there herself, she would probably not feel so good since she would be very different from the others in the area: she would be the only brown face around and she would be a lot poorer and less educated than everybody else. Tui thought that the person saw Remuera as a happy place because people have money. In fact, she said, Paakehaa who live there are not necessarily happier ; this could be just her perception of them and a rationalization of her own unhappiness. Moreover, Maaori in general like to live near or not too far from their whaanau. Their choice of place of residence, in fact, is greatly influenced by where other whaanau or iwi 81 Remuera is a rich residential area near the city centre. 139

152 members live. So, if there is pressure to create new households, some will respond by extending the living space to the garage or to a mobile home in the back yard, as we have seen. This kind of complex of dwellings is thus rather similar to traditional marae, where people s lives revolved around the marae while their house would either be on the marae land or nearby. In the city, for many Maaori, the community life revolves around a whare Maaori and, for some, this supplements visits, regular or not, to the real marae in the country or elsewhere in the city. By observing Maaori houses and living arrangements, one can learn a lot about changing whaanau and social relationships, as Rodman suggests in another Pacific context, Vanuatu. Like the social relations that produce them, houses change all the time (Rodman 1997: 222). Housing, then, is seen as an active process that changes along with social dynamics. So, when a family expands as new people arrive in the house, the house also expands by adding annexes such as garages, mobile homes or caravans. These annexes are part of the whare Maaori, but they stay peripheral to the house. The manawa or the hearth will always be in the house, and, I would say, is usually in the lounge, dining room and kitchen. The annexes are seen more as sleeping facilities, even if certain members spend a good proportion of their time there and perhaps only come to the house for meals and to use the bathroom. There is a certain aura of privacy around these sleeping facilities and other rooms, like the parents bedrooms, at least at 30 Aroha street, where Kiri and Andrew s bedroom is more or less off limits. The boundaries are not clear, but one senses that one cannot freely occupy these rooms. Furniture, objects and taonga in the house also express something about the whaanau and other social relationships. Ruka was explicit about this idea: Some of the stuff that I have around my house reflects my time here and on the marae as well, reflects relationships that I have had with students and that as they have reached the end of the year and that their time here with me or on the marae here, they get taonga and that and I have a lot of those taonga around my home as well. (Ruka) In some cases, other houses are built on a family house s plot of land, such that people are dwelling on the same site but under several roofs. As at Christine s whare Maaori 140

153 complex, the extra buildings are not primarily sleeping facilities. Each has its own manawa based on a nuclear family unit, although everybody comes together on specific occasions, for certain meals, and the children are free to move between houses. It appears to me that in this kind of complex, the members maintain a particular kind of attachment to the family house or the parents house or the house in which they all grew up, the place that has been home to everybody. The very manawa seems to stay there, as at Joanna s place, even if other manawa also emerge as the family grows. Marae and whare Maaori: further discussion Discussing this concept of whare Maaori with other people who could describe their own house and what happens there in terms of similarities with marae, one participant, Tauni, preferred to use the term paa (fortified place or village). Others make a distinction between a marae and a whare nui: for Rangi, 30 Aroha Street is a like whare nui, not like a marae, since there is one single house, one manawa or one kaakano, and not a set of buildings. Considering that she herself sleeps and spends a good part of the day in the shed, this reveals the importance given to the hearth, the manawa. Here, I must also add that not everybody likes to hear the word marae referring to a house. For many, there is a clear and significant difference between a house and a marae. One of the participants in my research wrote me an after having read one of my papers: It is still not clear to me how an individual property in a city can be described as a marae when in most cases in Auckland, for example, many Maori do come from this area - Ngapuhi, Ngati Whatua, Tainui. In my experience a marae is much more than a building. The concept includes - land including waterways, people - nuclear and non nuclear family - a hierarchy of marginalization, specific histories, related histories, sacred sites, sacred ceremonies, sacred traditions. How can such things be included within the property of an individual? (Roimata, January 11, 2004) I agree with her and I would say that all the people who spoke to me about their house as a marae would agree with her too. However, I will also say that when the research participants spoke about their house being like a marae, they were not speaking about the building as such or the particular plot of land, but about the spirit of the house, its wairua 141

154 and its people. The house, then, becomes a symbol for the whaanau, for the group. When they say that they belong to the house, they belong in fact to the whaanau that inhabits the house, and all the ancestors who are with and within the whaanau members even if their bones are elsewhere, at the traditional or real marae. The whare Maaori is a safe place, a comforting place in the city where one is not alone and one can be and is Maaori. There is no confusion with the real marae, but it can be conceived as an extension of the marae away from home and/or in everyday life, since the tikanga of the marae, without its highly sacred dimensions, is practised there on an everyday basis. The idea of the whare Maaori does not challenge the rights of the taangata whenua of the area, either. All the participants in my research, without exception, acknowledge the ancestral primacy of the taangata whenua in their area. What many challenge in turning their house into a marae is, rather, the Paakehaa way of being and the Paakehaa figured world(s), but I will come back to this idea in the next chapters. In the whare Maaori, everything is managed collectively and belongs to everyone in the whaanau, even if it is not actually owned in common in the legal terms of the Paakehaa figured world, because, for example, the demands of the work market and the capitalist economy mean that only one of the whaanau members can legally own the house. The group, the whaanau or the collectivity is at the very centre of everyday life and is the main principle or value in the house. In this colonized space/time and in a context of globalization, there are some fundamental similarities between the marae and the whare Maaori. When the two are likened, what is important is that both in the city and in the country, where some people also have whare Maaori, similar feelings can be expressed about both places, similar activities happen in both places, both places fulfil the same roles or functions in the life of the whaanau, and in both places similar values or principles are applied. For Manuka, what I call here the whare Maaori could be summarized by two Maaori principles: 1. whanaungatanga, which means strengthening and enriching the bonds of family unity (Manuka), and 2. manaakitanga, which means befriending holistically and demonstrating extreme kindness with the utmost respect (Manuka). The whare Maaori is also seen as a place in 142

155 the city where they can uphold marae values and principles while away from their own traditional marae (or if they feel like strangers on their own traditional marae). I must add that people who speak about their house as a marae or like a marae are not confused about what a real or traditional marae is. They see similar processes happening in both places, and both places seem to fulfil similar functions in the life of the group, the whaanau network in particular. The expression is used as a simile or metaphor: they say that their house is like a marae. Other analysts, in fact, have also suggested that places that are not real marae can be called marae or described as such under particular circumstances. Tauroa and Tauroa write that: many people use the term marae for any area on which they choose to welcome visitors, especially when they choose to use a format corresponding to that of a marae welcome. A room, therefore, may loosely, though acceptably, be referred to as a marae for the purposes of welcoming visitors. (1986: 141) The same could be said for a hall, an office, a school car park, for example, if there are karanga (the call of welcome) and mihimihi (exchange of greetings) (Tauroa and Tauroa 1986: 141). Like at Tauni s place, some people also do powhiri at their house when important visitors come or for special occasions. At the tangi of Maata s newborn baby in her back yard, a karanga, karakia and waiata were performed as well as whaikoorero. Some people present were also wearing leaves from a special tree as a protection against the contagion of death or maleficent influences (Schwimmer 1965: 155). The important thing in referring to a place as a marae, is that all such places belong to us, not to me. They are places where thoughts and ideas may be exchanged, and joy and sadness may be shared (Tauroa and Tauroa 1986: ). Nothing is mine ; everything is ours (Tauroa and Tauroa 1986: 106). And this idea was clearly expressed by the participants in my research: the house is home for a lot of people, everything is shared in the house, the whaanau feeling inside the house, the house is open to everybody who respect the house and its people, and so forth. In fact, the marae like 143

156 the whare Maaori symbolizes group unity (Salmond 1975: 31). The real marae connects the group, composed of living and dead people, who belong to a particular land, to a particular marae atea (Allen 2002: 47). The whare Maaori or other informal marae also connects people. These people do not necessarily come from the same land, but if not, they certainly share the same kaupapa (mission, plan, purpose, project) and consider themselves as a whaanau even if they are not related through blood lines (see chapter VI). With the concept of whanaungatanga, which is part of both marae life and whare Maaori life, everyone is responsible for the well-being of the others as well as the whole whaanau as a united group. Each adult becomes the parent of all the children of the whare Maaori and, as such, has important responsibilities. Metge explains how some Maaori Community Centres are marae manqué mainly because they are not available for tangihanga or the overnight accommodation of guests (1967: 184). Mutu (in Carter 2003) also seems to define a marae through its capacity to fulfil people s actual needs, and tangi appears to be the key event that determines how many people may need to be accommodated. So, according to Metge (1967), for a place to be considered a marae it should have the tangihanga as an absolute priority over any recreational functions, should be equipped to provide beds and meals to mourners and to large number of guests at hui, and should be an open place for the group to debate and resolve their problems as custom demands. Tauroa and Tauroa underline the fact that the marae is the place where [every] emotion can be expressed and shared with others shared not only with the living but also with those generations who have gone (1986: 18). This point was also emphasized by Rangi, as we have seen in a quote cited previously. So, whare Maaori also play this role, like marae. Thus, for Metge, what determines whether a place can be called a marae is the scope of its functions, and much less the form of marae buildings and the importance of inherited land ownership as the basis for status and authority on the marae (1967: 186). According to her, this has became even truer in an urban context where not everybody has access to a marae, and therefore if a local marae is lacking or unavailable, urban dwellers will use their city house or other premises as a little marae (Metge 1967: 183), for a tangihanga, 144

157 for example. Walker also refers to certain whaanau that respond to a death by turning their city home into a mini-marae (1990: 200). The latter then writes that [t]he living room cleared of furniture served as a meeting house where the body lay in state, and kinfolk and friends came to farewell the dead (Walker 1990: 200). According to what I understand from Walker (1990), tangihanga seems to be the only circumstance during which one can consider one s house as a mini-marae. He explains that since Maaori Community Centres in the city were not suitable for tangihanga, different groups formed to plan the construction of new urban marae. The lack of suitable places could also explain why Maaori turn their own homes into a little marae in everyday life, but in times of death, they will go to the real marae in the city since these are now available. Alternatively, with the impetus to renew links with their spiritual home, people increasingly take their dead to their traditional marae in the country. However, Metge (1967 and 2002), Walker (1990), and Mutu (in Carter 2003) are very functionalist in the way they define marae. This can be useful to understand what happens on a marae, but it is less useful for comprehending what a marae really is. In fact, most of the participants in my research would not agree with them, since they seem to believe that the marae is first and foremost a home, a meeting place where they feel good and safe among their whaanau. This could relate to the fact that with life in the city, the whare Maaori often becomes the only place where they can relax and where they find a whaanau or community life. 30 Aroha street has never hosted a tangihanga, but it does have the potential to do so. However, I must specify that Kiri and her whaanau still have very good contacts with their marae in the country, particularly since Kiri s parents lived in Teria s tribal area for a few years before moving down south to Hiko s tribal area. Both Teria and Hiko have secured connections to their tuurangawaewae for their children and mokopuna as well as themselves. Teria is also a trustee of her iwi Trust board. I also learnt recently that since the Aotearoa/New Zealand spring of 2003, all the girls of the whaanau, including Kiri herself, have become part of the kapa haka ropuu of Hiko s marae and everybody travels back and forth between Auckland and the marae fours hours drive south of Auckland 145

158 every weekend in preparation for the regional kapa haka competition. Rangi also goes to support them. So, to come back to our idea, the fact that the 30 Aroha street has never hosted a tangihanga does not stop its members from speaking about it as a marae on the contrary. The house is like a marae first and foremost because of the symbolic meaning that the house takes on. It is our kaakano, Rangi said. The house is the manawa of the whaanau, symbolically and practically. It symbolizes past and present generations, memories, histories, whaanau and cultural inheritance and thus, continuity through daily life. This is why Kiri felt such a great responsibility to keep it in the family. If the house had been sold to complete strangers, she thought that the continuity of whaanau relationships would have been endangered. Some of the whaanau would no longer have had any reason to travel to meet other whaanau members, and the whaanau might not have found another central place to meet, to discuss whaanau, iwi and cultural issues, to make collective decisions, to keep up to date with news and to care for each other. I myself am not convinced that the closure of a whare Maaori would necessarily disrupt a whaanau, at least not in all cases. I observed that when certain whare Maaori stopped being such places for the whaanau members, other houses in the whaanau network often took on the role of whare Maaori, usually before too much time had passed. Generally speaking, the whare Maaori is already part of an existing larger network of whare Maaori, open to the whaanau members. These other houses then, can take over and become the new link between the whaanau members in the city and those in the country, since whare Maaori are often the main link with the real marae, plural, for the many people who cannot afford a visit to the country for financial or emotional reasons. Some of my research participants whare Maaori have actually hosted tangihanga, Maata s place in Central Auckland and Joanna s and Mihi s place in West Auckland among them. 146

159 M. I only lived here for two months[ 82 ] and Joanna s brother passed away, so the whole family was here. They had the tangi here and out there, it was like I made sure that people were making up with all the facilities and everything out there Hundreds of kids there. So, yes! And I wasn t used to that. J. It s like everyone will go to a marae and M. They all set up. J. It was all done here. N. It was really like a marae. M. Yeah, the whole thing, the whole cooking was done out there people come in the house and speak N. How long did that last? J. Two days and then we took him back to our marae where we re from. ( ) J. What happened is that when he passed away, before they even came back, mum and that, the neighbours, all the neighbours had already set up a kitchen removed all of the furniture out of the house, they had actually turned it into ( ) a marae and then they prepared the marae for that s what they do here, I mean everyone in the neighbourhood. (Mihi and Joanna) Having a part of the tangihanga in the city before taking the dead to his/her marae is a practice that allows city friends to visit and pay their respect to the family. The whare Maaori, again, is an important link between whaanau members in the city and in the countryside, and thus a link between places. At Maata s baby s funeral, her back yard was used like a marae. Some people took kaumaatua responsibilities in order to do things according to the Maaori ways and were supported in their waiata and karakia by some of the people present. Some things were not done in a traditional way a male, for example, did the karanga but the acts of the tangihanga itself were more important than the exact way they were done. The important thing was to comfort each other by being together as a whole whaanau. Maata s back yard, then, really became a marae for many people not because there was a tangihanga there, but because of the feeling that emanated from the moment, the sharing, the feeling of being together in that difficult and sad moment since Maata s baby, everyone s baby, was born dead. Certainly, some people were not very comfortable with the way things were done and the presence of many Paakehaa, but the event tried to reconcile both world views and ways of doing things. I believe that whare Maaori are also places where different worlds meet, because they do not have the same formality as 82 Mihi is not related to Joanna. They met at university in Maaori language classes. Since Mihi was then looking for a place to stay, Joanna invited her to move in with her and her whaanau. She is now considered as part of the family along with her son who also lives there. 147

160 real marae. Paakehaa would not have necessarily attended a tangihanga on a real marae, but they felt able to be present at Maata s place. Because a whare Maaori is a less formal, more relaxed place, defined in a more open way, it is easier for everybody to feel comfortable there, Maaori or not. The whare Maaori is also important for the whaanau members because of the feeling of the house, the feeling of the place. It is the place where they feel good, safe, secure, relaxed, at home. Matiu will even say that this is like our refuge for us from the outside world. And in each case, it is not the building as such that is the most important, but the people. Because of the whare Maaori, its people feel they belong somewhere and to a group, to a whaanau in a city where one often feels lost, isolated, alien and deterritorialized. This has been expressed many times and in many ways previously in this chapter. I suppose that it is also this group feeling that makes many people say, in different movies or real life: The pub is my marae, the pub being their meeting place, the place where they find solace, the place where they find a whaanau. In 2002 Metge added to her definition of a marae that of a place where one can relax and recharge one s batteries. This dimension of the marae seems to fit quite well with what Tauroa and Tauroa write: Just as people wishing to express their religious beliefs will go to church or to a place of worship, so will Maori people seeking fulfilment and reaffirmation of their identity go to their marae. ( ) There is an awareness of one s heritage; an awareness that one is accepted. It is a place of security and comfort. An analogy in the Pakeha world might be that of arriving home after a particularly bury and harrowing day. There is the sigh of relief thank goodness I m home. ( ) Everything is familiar: the faces, the surroundings, the noises, the conversation. At last you can truly relax. This is your home, and you belong. (1986: 20) It also fits with what seems essential for the people who qualify their house as a marae. Church buildings and kohanga reo or whare kura (schools) can also be used as marae: they are meeting places where important decisions are taken, the members or the whaanau group can host guests for meetings or to sleep over, or they themselves can have 148

161 a sleep-in. They have a kitchen and all the necessary utilities to provide for guests as well as themselves but, most importantly, they are places where one finds a whaanau. Tui said of her church building: T. It functions every way like a marae, except we don t have a forum where only men can speak. Women and children have the right to speak in this building. We don t have. as in a marae, you have your dead, you bring your bodies there and you have things; we don t have that. We have memorial services ( ) N. Why is it similar to a marae then? T. Why is it similar? Because it has the same openness about who can come there, nobody is excluded, and it s Maaori and everybody has the right to speak. (Tui) Tui added that if it is like a marae, in many ways, it is not a real marae in many other ways: It doesn t have the same formality that marae do. And we are not restricted by tribal etiquette, kawa [protocol], those things the kawa in this place is the kawa of the church. Moreover, they do not perform a powhiri (welcome ceremony on a marae) for their guests on their church premises since it is not a real marae. If they need to powhiri visitors, they will go to the real marae nearby, which is an urban pan-tribal marae. But, what makes it a marae is the whaanau support: Everybody knows everybody else. It s not like something new in the Church. ( ) It s very much a family. ( ) and we always eat at the church. We have service and then we have a lunch. Everybody brings something, we share the lunch (Tui). Sharing and mutual support are then very important: We have reciprocal responsibility for many of our church members. Probably those who help me the most are the old aunties. I mean, some of the reciprocal stuff might simply be, my husband goes out fishing and comes home with half a dozen fish and we can t eat them all and I go and drop out two off, you know. As simple as that and it s not a big deal, but for some of them ( ) something like that, it s really cool (Tui). And she added: Support and comfort I think if we use the two words together Without support, I can t my biological family has always supported me ( ) and that is really good. And like my church family, most of them would help me with anything to do with the church or if I don t do something rights and the other things it that, they don t they will always offer some ways to do the things 149

162 differently. I think that s help to build comfort. It s not just criticism ( ) they re always there (Tui). Hiraina put the emphasis on the same whaanau feeling, sharing and support, when she said, speaking about the resting area just in front of her store at the shopping centre where she works, that s my marae!. She said that when she goes there, she is among whaanau: they share their problems, they support each other, they laugh together. It is the place where everybody converges; it is a good place to be and relax. Here, she told me, you can put your feet up and it s all right!. Conclusion Not everybody is involved with a whare Maaori. Some are not at ease with the idea of an open house where people come and go and where everything is shared. Some need a certain degree of privacy in order to succeed well at school or work, and so they voluntarily choose not to turn their house into a whare Maaori. Others simply do not have access to this kind of world (or figured world), either because their access to their whaanau network is very limited, or simply because it is not in their character to live in this way, they have not been brought up to live like that, or they do not associate with people who live like that. Others will be at ease with this kind of whaanau and marae environment, and will frequent kin or friends who keep a whare Maaori, but will not have their own house turned into a little marae. For many, however, as for most of the participants in this study, the whare Maaori is a site that is crucial to feeling good in the city, feeling that they belong to a group or whaanau and feeling supported. In the next chapter, we will see in detail exactly what the whaanau is today, how it has changed through colonization, and what the underlying principles are that form the basis of life both in the whare Maaori itself and in the important Maaori figured world of the whaanau. 150

163 CHAPTER V THE WHAANAU, PAST AND PRESENT The whare Maaori is a very important site for the maintenance of extended family relationships, and for the transmission of Maaori principles. These allow for continuities with the ancestral past, but also for changes. The whare Maaori is a place in the city where whaanau members converge, where connections to the past, to memories and ancestral worlds are secured; connections to the rural home are maintained; traditional knowledge and the Maaori language are transmitted; news and gossip about the people and the marae in the country are exchanged; and important decisions regarding family, children, land and politics are taken. Living with Maaori families has given me an understanding of the principles which guide people in their interrelations and actions. It also allowed me to understand that the word whaanau does not always mean the same thing and that the whaanau itself expands and contracts according to particular contexts, life stages, persons and sub-groups, as well as wider socio-economic structures, forces and conjunctures. Family networks can be sometimes quite restricted but sometimes very large. In this chapter, I explore what the concept of whaanau means. I also look at the historical evolution of the whaanau through colonization and urbanization. I then examine the reality and importance of whaanau life for people who live in the city today, including the maintenance of whaanau links between rural and urban milieus and also the journeys of Auckland Maaori who decide to renew contact with their whaanau. I will then identify the different values or principles that underlie the concept of whaanau and make the whaanau a significant figured world for Maaori today. 151

164 Te Whaanau The whaanau, as revealed through the exploration of the whare Maaori, refers to various different kinds of groupings whose meanings change depending on particular contexts. In fact, people and groups define the word in various ways and will switch from one meaning to the other in a given conversation. Apart from the fundamental meaning of the word whaanau, to give birth (Durie 2001a: 190) or to be born (Williams, 2000 (1971): 487), Metge (1995) identifies eleven other meanings for the word whaanau. Here are the traditional usages: 1. set of siblings, brothers and sisters born to the same parents but excluding the latter (p. 52). 2. all the descendants of a relatively recent named ancestor traced through both male and female links, regardless of where they are living or whether they know or interact with each other (p. 52). Using classical anthropological terms, this definition equates to a cognatic descent category. 3. those descendants of a relatively recent ancestor who act and interact together on an ongoing basis and identify themselves as a group by symbols such as the ancestor s name (p. 53). In the anthropology of kinship, one would speak about a cognatic descent group. 4. a descent group core with the addition of members spouses and children adopted from outside, a collection of individuals and parent-child families who act and interact together on an ongoing basis under a common name (p. 53). One might equally say an extended family. 5. descent groups of much greater genealogical depth, namely to hapuu and iwi ( ) Such a usage is a metaphorical extension of the fourth usage above, used rhetorically to remind hapuu and iwi members of their responsibilities and appropriate behaviour towards each other (p. 53). Added to these meanings are several new ones, which developed through the course of the 20 th century: 152

165 6. a small family consisting of one or two parents and their children (p. 54). This definition of the whaanau corresponds to the word whaamere, 83 a word which derived from the English word family ( wh in te reo Maaori is pronounced as an English f and r is phonetically close to the English l, which does not exist in the Maaori language), or the modern nuclear family. Durie (2001a: 194) speaks about the whaanau as households. 7. a group which is not based clearly on descent but is made up of kin related in a variety of ways, who act and interact for common ends, identify themselves by a common name and model themselves on the whaanau as extended family (p. 54) In her previous work, Metge (1964: 166, ) spoke about this sort of group as a kin-cluster. 8. elastic band. Maaori who would normally apply the word to a group of limited size stretch it elastically when it suits them to do so (p. 55). This use of the word could cover anyone from blood kin up to and including all Maaori. 9. to greet or refer to an assembly of people of like mind and interests gathered for a common purpose (p. 55). This usage is adopted to express feelings of solidarity on particular occasions. 10. ad hoc action-group mobilized on behalf of a particular person to support him or her in a testing situation: a job interview, a public speaking engagement (p. 55). This sort of group can include non-kin and even non-maaori friends. 11. groupings of people who are not connected by kinship, let alone descent. Radically new usages are continually emerging (p. 56). The adoption of the word whaanau is then used to stress whaanau values such as aroha, mutual support, cooperation and unity (p. 56). The term has been used, for instance, to identify a group of children and adults associated with a particular koohanga reo or kura kaupapa or a bilingual unit in a mainstream school, or a group associated with an urban marae, a sports team or another club, and so on. The word whaanau is then used as symbol and charter, a constant reminder of the whaanau values to which 83 I never heard the word whaamere during my fieldwork. It seems however that the use of the word whaanau for the parent(s)-child family is new and could be explained by the increasing success of the Maaori language campaign (Metge 1995: 54). The word whaanau has ousted the word whaamere in recent decades, according to Metge (1995: 54). 153

166 they aspire (p. 58). Durie (2001a: 192) then speaks about whaanau as comrades. Further distinctions appear in Metge (1995: 294) between whakapapa-based whaanau and kaupapa-based whaanau. Whakapapa-based whaanau or simply whaanau whakapapa are whaanau for which kinship and descent, that is whakapapa, form the fundamental basis of connection. The first seven meanings of the word fall in this category. Kaupapa-based whaanau or simply whaanau kaupapa are whaanau groups which are set up not because of a common heritage or a common descent, but to fulfil a common mission or a special purpose, that is, a kaupapa (Metge 1995: 294; Durie 2001a: 192; Cram and Pitama 1998: 149). This last kind of grouping could be covered by definitions 8 to 11, and will be examined in greater detail in chapter VI. The impact of colonization and urbanization It is difficult to make generalizations about whaanau life because there is a wide range of variation over time, places, groups or tribes. The meaning given to the word also varies from one person to another depending on personal and group experience as well as on particular contexts. It is all the more difficult to capture any general principles of whaanau considering Maaori people s diverse experiences of life in the city. Among other things, one can observe that different whaanau have different degrees of knowledge of and reliance upon whakapapa (genealogy) and tikanga (traditions) (Cram and Pitama 1998). The whaanau has evolved of late in order to meet the new circumstances of urban life, but it is none the less significant for it (Durie 1997b and 2001a), as my research has confirmed. In fact, living with Maaori made me realize, contrary to many analysts who see Maaori people and culture as completely dislocated and fragmented in the city, that the whaanau is still alive and well. It is even more active that many might think. According to Metge (1995: 17), the concept whaanau has become a powerful symbol of ngaa tikanga maaori (Maaori traditions, custom, rules) in recent decades, even for those who are not currently active in whaanau. This has sown the seed that has allowed new kinds of whaanau, such as whaanau kaupapa, to emerge (see chapter VI). Durie 154

167 (2001a) considers that the whaanau is probably the single most common affiliation among Maaori. Moreover, Henare (1988, in Pihama 1998) describes the whaanau as the basic social unit of Maaori society. Even though whaanau relationships are more often casual than formal, whaanau probably have a greater influence than anything else on cultural identity. In everyday life, people continually stress the importance of the whaanau in diverse contexts. The meaning of the word whaanau has changed with colonization and life in the city (Cram and Pitama 1998, Metge 1995, Durie 2001a). Major changes in the whaanau are firstly linked to historical changes. The British colonization of Aotearoa/New Zealand, through warfare, legislation and land confiscation, brought about important transformations in Maaori ways of life. The loss of land in particular was a determining factor, according to Cram and Pitama (1998: 137): Maaori were unable to sustain their whaanau, so they had to enter into the Paakehaa workforce to earn their living. Some chose to move to urban centres, planning to find jobs in factories. Others moved to other hapuu or iwi areas with protocols foreign to them. These moves led many Maaori to lose knowledge of whakapapa (genealogy), tikanga (traditions, customs) and kawa (protocols) and adopt new ways of life. The loss of land also brought about inadequate access to the tuurangawaewae (connection to the land), urupa (cemetery), and marae and thus, fewer places for Maaori to gather and discuss plans for survival. Moreover, with the loss of land, Maaori became increasingly vulnerable to diseases associated with poverty, malnutrition and overcrowding (Cram and Pitama 1998: 137). Christian missionaries also wrought changes on the structure of whaanau, and their policies and practices had a particularly devastating effect on the traditional role and status of Maaori women as well as on Maaori parenting practices. With the missionaries imposition of a patriarchal structure, Maaori women found their traditional rank and birthright, their mana and position of authority undermined. According to Cram and Pitama, the system of missionary schooling promoted: 155

168 nuclear families, with the woman as the primary caregiver, and each woman looking after her own children. This diminished traditional patterns of shared caring and parenting ( ) Men were less involved as caregivers as they often had to work long hours (often shift hours) to earn an income that would sustain them. (1998: ) These new patterns of parenting and re-division of domestic labour were based on a belief system which located women in the domestic and private sphere, fully responsible for the home and dependent on their husbands earnings (Pihama 1998; Novitz 1982; Binney 1968; Smith 1992). These patterns were also closely related to capitalism and industrialization. Meanwhile, British education policies, wrapped up in a cloth of superiority and racism (Cram and Pitama 1998: 141), set the conditions for the minorization of Maaori language, culture, knowledge and values, which has been another major factor of disruption of the whaanau. The marae is in fact recognized by Cram and Pitama (1998: 135) as one of the institutions that buffered the effect of colonization, in particular through the maintenance and reinforcement of whaanau links. I would add that the whare Maaori plays a similar role today in the city (see below). The Western bias of many scholars has led to much confusion of the nuclear family with the whaanau, when they do not in fact refer to the same kind of unit. As more Maaori migrated to cities, the term whaanau was applied to nuclear families or households because 1) the wider links did not appear to be active or were greatly reduced in intensity, and 2) there was no Maaori word to describe the small nuclear family. With urbanization, the networks of rural whaanau houses in close proximity to each other gave way to small family units in single households dispersed throughout the city. However, it is misleading to think that members of individual households are not part of a wider whaanau system. When there is a need for it for example in times of celebration or tangihanga (funerals) whaanau members cooperate and activate the extended whaanau network. At least, that is the case for a large proportion of Maaori who live in the city today. Whaanau relationships are also maintained, among other means, via the telephone, the internet, hui (meetings), visits to Maaori meeting places in the city, marae and whare Maaori. 156

169 Maaori visibility in the city Some analysts have also drawn mistaken conclusions about the (lack of) vitality of Maaori networks, due to the fact that Maaori are not really visible on the public scene or in public space. Not being café kind of people (see chapter II), their meetings are usually invisible to the general public. Even for Maaori, it is difficult to find and meet Maaori people when you do not already have a well-defined network in the city: It is very lonely in the city, said Rangi, and one has to seek other Maaori out. One can meet Maaori on the street, but one does not feel that one is walking through a Maaori area or a Maaori ghetto : the people are dispersed in the crowd and there are no visible signs of a Maaori neighbourhood besides marae which, although they usually have distinctive architecture and carvings characteristic of their whare nui, can also be situated in non-maaori neighbourhoods. In fact, in the 1960s, a pepperpotting programme was put in place in Wellington and Auckland by the Department of Maaori Affairs in order to relocate Maaori families throughout communities so that they could adapt better and faster to city life and Paakehaa ways (Cram and Pitama 1998; Durie 1998; Hunn 1961; Walker 1979 and 1990; Morrison 1995; Trlin 1984). This scheme did not prevent Maaori from being more concentrated in some areas than in others, but this is not visible from the outside for someone who is simply driving through the city or who is not familiar with the locality. In contrast to Chinese immigrants and their famously ornate Chinatowns all over the world, or the Italians in Montréal who depict Catholic scenes and saints on the façades of their Italian-style houses, to give two striking examples, Maaori do not mark urban space and do not affirm a political presence in it by this means. 84 Furthermore, Maaori do not live in Maaoritown or clearly defined Maaori districts: they live all over the city in one-family houses among the rest of the city-dwellers. It is still true today that Maaori are dispersed throughout the city, even if some of the effects of pepperpotting were cancelled out in subsequent decades by intensive building 84 On the other hand, it is important to understand the lack of correspondence between Chinatowns and lived Chinese identity. In Montréal, for instance, only a tiny proportion of the Chinese population lives in Chinatown, and only a small number of Italians do anything characteristically Italian to their houses. 157

170 programmes for low cost state homes to meet the needs of the growing urban Maaori population. This programme, coupled with a decrease in Maaori purchasing power, 85 resulted in many Maaori families, mainly from a working-class background, moving into state homes in new housing estates such as Ootara in South Auckland. 86 This had the effect of stigmatizing the southern suburbs of Auckland as ghettos in the mainstream press, which created racism in the urban housing market, and Maaori home ownership consequently declined (Cram and Pitama 1998: 146). Belich adds that the effect was reinforced by white flight in a cause-effect spiral (2001: 473). Difficult everyday conditions, often including inadequate housing, unemployment and the social stigma of being Maaori continually put the well-being of whaanau at risk. Paradoxically, it is also these very circumstances that have often led Maaori living in urban environments to forge links among themselves, to take on other responsibilities with new whaanau based on kinship or newly created connections based on a specific kaupapa, and/or improve their knowledge of cultural skills (Cram and Pitama 1998: 147). The dislike of Maaori ghettos dissuades some from living in stigmatized areas of the city. In rejecting the neighbourhoods that are labelled as poor, brown, and violent, some Maaori aim to choose freely their ways of life and to avoid stigmatization in the workplace and the Paakehaa figured world in general. Furthermore, not living in the ghettos is a way to inhabit the entire city, and to assert rights to certain spaces not usually occupied by Maaori or non-paakehaa. As much as some will not feel at ease in localities that are not predominantly Maaori or Polynesian, others will not feel at ease in those that are, and prefer to live in a more mixed neighbourhood. In my field research, Aroha, Mere, and Roimata felt this way and chose to live in Central and North Auckland, in neighbourhoods that were mostly Paakehaa and rather affluent. 85 Between March 1986 and March 1990 the Maaori unemployment rates rose from 8,5% to 20,6% and again to 24,2% in In comparison, the unemployment rate of the non-maaori population was 9% in 1991 (Poomare et al in Cram and Pitama 1998: 146). 86 In 1965, 65 percent of Ootara schoolchildren were Pakeha. In 1980, the figure was 12 per cent (Belich 2001: 473). 158

171 I must add here that social class also helps determine the choice of place of residence. Many professional Maaori live in predominantly Paakehaa neighbourhood where the standards of living and housing are usually higher. Maaori professionals are usually at ease with the Paakehaa environment, since they are familiar with mainstream figured worlds through their educational and professional achievements, and most of them are bicultural (Schwimmer 2003, 2004a). They are also often more integrated into the mainstream population and do not have daily contact with their whaanau network. These people do not, generally, turn their house into a whare Maaori since their occupations are usually rather time-consuming and thus, they are less often at home. Their standards of living are often higher and they tend to be more individualistic, so they like the privacy and the comfort of their homes. Mere, for example, likes to keep her house as a private space in order to keep the balance between the openness and sharing of the whaanau at her workplace and the privacy of her house, even though her home is open on invitation to her students who have no place to go. She needs to keep that balance because I do come from two backgrounds. I do come from a Paakehaa and a Maaori background (Mere). In the case of professionals, the choice of a place of residence is thus more influenced by social stratification than by tribal affiliation and whaanau network, which would be the case for those who need more support in their everyday lives. Mixed origins, mixed marriage and the milieu in which people grew up can add to or amplify the impact of social class on the choice of residence. Social class aside, the quality of local amenities in Paakehaa neighbourhoods where the housing and living standards are higher can be very appealing. Some people live for a while in areas where the rents are not too high in order to save money to buy their own house later, in a better neighbourhood with better schools and better services in general. Some people thus make compromises for a certain length of time with a view to bettering their and their family s living conditions and educational opportunities and thus, ultimately, their position and level of achievement in society at large. This is the case for 159

172 Rena, who lives in South Auckland but drives her children to a good school in East Auckland every day. Meanwhile, she and her husband are saving to move to the neighbourhood surrounding the school as soon as possible. As I have said, tribal affiliations and whaanau networks also have an impact on the choice of places of residence. Even though most iwi (tribe) are represented across the whole urban territory, it is well known that there is a high concentration of particular tribes in particular areas. It is likely that if one s tribal and whaanau network is concentrated in a specific area, then this will influence one s choice of residence. Those whose incomes are very limited or depend on social welfare payments will have no choice but to live in areas where they can benefit from a low cost state house or statesubsidized rental housing. R. I went into Housing New Zealand, and so I don t actually pay any rent, they just take it straight out of my benefit. I hate this place! It sucks! [laughter] Because you go outside and Mungo Mubs and Black Powers [two criminalized gangs] and N. Here in the surroundings? R. Yes and you got different nationalities and the kids there is broken glass out on the street and the rivers, the creek is just behind us, really dangerous And just the kids around here, they re so hard swear a lot, it s the area, you know, it s South Auckland and it s like the Bronx But people around here, beautiful people, but they struggle, they really, really struggle, and they re just like myself, they struggle and we never seem to further ourselves ( ) N. Did you have a choice when you chose this house when you re on the benefit R. No, they gave me three to choose from and the other two they showed us were big homes, more rooms, but when I went to look at them, the tenants that were there prior had trashed the place ( ) We decided to go with this one because it was the cheapest of the three and it was handy to the motorway. N. Were they all in South Auckland? R. Yeah, yeah. (Rua) Whaanau changes with life in the city Urbanization has brought about fundamental transformations in Maoori ways of living, although these changes have many diverse manifestations among Maaori living in Auckland. City life makes it increasingly difficult to meet obligations associated with whaanau and to share in whaanau activities. In the main, Maaori living in the city do not have enough time or money to be able to make the trip back home as often as they d like. 160

173 They are three times more likely than Paakehaa to live in poverty, to be unemployed, to be unhealthy, to be poorly educated, to be without satisfactory housing, and to be in gaol (Webster 1998: 25). According to Hohepa (1997 in Cram and Pitama 1998: 146), 60% of Maaori children belong to whaanau that struggle to meet their daily financial needs. Urban Maaori have to share their time with their new communities of interest or non-kin families in the city. They have new urban obligations linked to jobs, children s activities and schooling. Life is more expensive in the city, so they need to work harder and travel less. They then experience difficulties in fulfilling obligations of manaakitanga (showing respect and kindness, befriending, looking after people, entertaining) (Cram and Pitama 1998: 147). Their contact with Maaori language and culture is often reduced, a situation that can cause discomfort back home at the marae. Finally, city life also offers many alternatives lifestyles to whaanau life. Tangihanga (funerals) are one of the few times when people get to go back, and are important for them to maintain contacts, to reconnect with people that they have not seen for a long while, to find out what is going on, and to recharge their batteries. Nevertheless, the transformations experienced through life in the city are not important to the same degree for everybody. Experience of change also varies depending on the extent of comfort whaanau members feel in Maaori and Paakehaa worlds, 87 their access to each world, their capacity to adapt to the city and to build new relationships with Maaori and others, their socio-economic circumstances and degree of autonomy, their whaanau and support network in the city, and so forth. Another important factor in people s experience of change is the reasons that led them to migrate to the city in the first place, which can be diverse and are often a combination of several motives. The choice can be linked to pull factors, as Auckland is seen to offer better economic and other opportunities: higher salaries, better work conditions, more suitable jobs, better education for both children and adults, greater diversity of activities in general and cultural and artistic events, and so forth (Kawharu 1975a: 33; Metge 1964). 87 Here, I do not intend to essentialize the distinctions between Maaori and Paakehaa worlds. See chapter VI for a demonstration of the fluidity of boundaries between both worlds and their interpenetration. 161

174 Push factors can also be involved. Some leave the rural area because of tribal politics or because they feel under too much pressure to conform to whaanau or iwi norms of behaviour or ways of life. Some will have disagreed or fought with whaanau members and therefore decided to leave, while others leave following abuse of one sort or another from their partner, parents or other relatives. Others will simply be looking for new experiences and novelties. However, it is unusual, even for professional, city-dwelling, middle-class Maaori, to live entirely separately from wider family networks (Durie 2001a: 8). This means that each whaanau is inevitably represented across the whole social spectrum and that there is always someone in the whaanau who keeps on cultivating, even casually, relationships with the people in the country. The Maaori world is, relatively speaking, quite a small world; even in a city like Auckland with its one million inhabitants, people frequently discover that they are kin to people who seem at first to be complete strangers. Relationships between rural and urban milieus There is no strict dichotomy between the rural and the urban milieus; both generate complex and changing relationships. Because whaanau relationships in the city are activated when needed, connections with home are kept alive in the city and relatives keep each other informed of the happenings and gossip when someone goes home. The same is also true in the country, where everyone knows what is going on among the city kin. The following quote is quite illustrative of this phenomenon: N. How do you keep the links with your marae and your people back home? T. Through my sister. I have got a sister there. ( ) Yeah, and cousins come down, so we can catch up. The kuumara vine, family grapevine, kuumara vine, one person knows something and everyone knows. N. I know about that. T. So you learnt about the kuumara vine, did you? [laughter] It s alive and well. (Tui) Some tribes, like the Waikato/Tainui and the Tuhoe, even have a marae in the city where their people meet regularly. Other tribes or whaanau have regular meetings, performing 162

175 arts groups or sports teams in the city. People also stay in touch by phone calls and letters, and increasingly by . Some whaanau, hapuu or iwi even have a newsletter to keep everybody informed (Metge 1995). Iritana informed me of her intention to put one together for her whaanau when I interviewed her, because her new job as a tertiary program manager means she must travel a lot and she cannot make the trip back home as often as she used to. As we saw in chapter IV, certain whaanau also have a family house, a whare maaori or little marae in the city. This kind of place makes whaanau relationships easier to uphold. The whare maaori then becomes the heart of the family and symbolizes at its best the bond between generations (Allen 2002; Ihimaera 1972). Maaori also have all kinds of means of keeping in touch with their people. Keita explains her own strategy in order for her children to retain the links back home: K. To me, home is where I was born and bred that will always be my home because I will be going back there to be buried. N. Is your husband going to go with you when he dies? K. No. We have already talked about that. He will go back to his area and I will go back to mine. ( ) It helps our children to link back to our tribes by us going back to our own places. Like if I was buried with my husband, I don t think my grandchildren will bother finding out where I even came from, so it is a means to retain the links of my people. You may be separated in body, but you will always be together spiritually anyway, it is so my grandchildren will know both sides. ( ) I thought about why the land is so important to Maaori. I know when I go home, I know places and where my tiipuna are buried. I related to the land because all those ancestors are there so I said to my husband I won t come with you when I go and we talked about it how I said if we separate our grandchildren will connect to both areas and he agreed. (Keita) The journey back to one s people During the last few decades, several factors have encouraged many Maaori to renew their relationships with people back home in their tribal area, to visit their ancestral land more often, to do genealogical research, and even to move back there. These factors are: the pan-maaori cultural renaissance which began in the 1970s; the 1975 Treaty of Waitangi Act which recognized the treaty partnership between Maaori and Paakehaa and established the Waitangi Tribunal; the rise of biculturalism as an academic, popular and 163

176 state discourse; the 1985 Treaty of Waitangi Amendment Act which established the tribes as the social, political and economic institution of indigenisation (Rata 2000: 25) and backdated tribal claims for the restitution of lands and waters to 1840; and subsequent genealogical research, treaty settlements of the 1990s, and retribalization, that is the legal reinforcement of tribal entities. 88 Maaori have also been influenced by global forces such as the worldwide indigenous movement, other ethnic and nationalist movements, movements of localization in reaction to globalization (Friedman 1994, 2003b), and decolonization (see chapter I). At the personal level, particular events or experiences in many people s lives can raise their consciousness of their Maaori identity. The experience of being a parent or a grandparent seems to be a determining factor: it is a turning point and gives one a focus in life, as several research participants, including Aroha, Kahu, and Rua, told me. For others, learning about Maaori and Aotearoa/New Zealand history at university, or indeed just studying in general, brings about changes in their identity and prompts them to undertake genealogical research and a journey back home. Many Maaori education programs also emphasize the importance of knowing one s whakapapa (genealogy), which has pushed many students to find out about where they come from. One cannot learn te reo without learning the cultural fundamentals associated with it, such as how to recite one s whakapapa and how to say a karakia (prayer). Learning the Maaori language also implies learning the conception of the Maaori universe, to a certain extent at least. And sometimes, simple everyday experiences or confrontations with others raise people s consciousness of being Maaori: M. I do come from two backgrounds. I do come from a Paakehaa and a Maaori background and I always knew, not always knew between the two, but for the last ten years, I have. Before that it was mainly Paakehaa. I was brought up more Paakehaa because my mother is more Paakehaa than Maaori and in her attitude 88 Note that the process of retribalization has two complementary components. First, retribalization was a state programme of the early 1990s through which the tribes were recognized as legal entities and as suppliers of services. Retribalization, then, was synonymous with decentralization of the state. Second, retribalization also means Maaori revitalization of their culture and institutions through 1) ideological practices that question Maaori s vision of their own identity in the face of the contradictions of their everyday practices, and 2) cognitive practices of the learning and transmission of traditional knowledge (Schwimmer 2003). 164

177 N. And what happened to you for you to change? M. I think you just notice these gaps and I guess it happens to everybody. It is the wanting to belong and to identify as somebody, makes you want to go back, and if you have your whakapapa then you are established and that is you. Because otherwise, for me, there would not be any other way that I could have because I don t have the behaviour or the symbolism that shows that you are Maaori. (Mere) As we will see in chapter VI, having a non-maaori partner and travelling are also factors which raise people s consciousness of their Maoriness. Genealogy gives one a place, but Looking at access to resources and knowledge, traditional family systems worked at two levels, as Cram and Pitama identify (1998): 1) the generational level, which uses age group distinctions to allocate work, attribute differences in attitudes, and promote respect between the different generations; and 2) the family descent-line level which dictates land succession, genealogical rights including knowledge and protocol and tribal leadership. Not surprisingly, colonization and the implementation of Christian values and beliefs disrupted these transmission systems. For instance, Maaori women in particular found their mana and authority challenged. Traditional patterns of shared caring and parenting were undermined, as were traditional skills such as the art of massage for physical abnormalities and knowledge of traditional medicines (Cram and Pitama 1998: 138; Smith 1999: 46). Colonization and life in the city also make it more and more difficult for new generations of kaumaatua (elders), who are usually the eldest siblings, to assume their roles as cultural guardians and leaders: many have an insufficient knowledge of the language and the necessary protocols. It is often their younger siblings or even younger people from the next generation, who traditionally would not be of the right age to become kaumaatua, that replace the older ones, since they have had the chance to learn the language and traditions at university or in Maaori schools. The age distinction or the position in the family has thus become less important than it was a few generations ago, a situation which does not please many people and can lead to conflicts. However, it did also happen occasionally in the past that a younger sibling would take on an elder s role if the younger 165

178 one was more skilled for the task or if the eldest lacked the desire or personality for leadership. Even if Maaori today define the roles and status of each person in the whaanau and tribe less strictly, collective decisions about who should receive education in traditional skills, knowledge and history are still taken in many families. Decisions depend on personal ability, achievement and birthright, as well as signs received from the ancestors or the supernatural world. Certain persons are then invested with certain responsibilities and obligations on behalf of the group. To be chosen as caretaker of a specific kind of knowledge is a great honour, but it involves self-sacrifice. It demands compromise between one s personal achievement and the collective well-being in a wider world that is rather individualistic, and where one can be attracted or distracted by diverse other opportunities, particularly in the city. Individuals themselves also look for the approval of the whaanau in making decisions and undertaking different projects. For many of the Maaori graduate students I met at university, it was essential to have the approval of their whaanau and even iwi for their choice of topic if they were studying Maaori matters, and even other subjects like medicine or engineering. 89 First of all, if they did not have the agreement of others, nobody would help them and, if working with Maaori, they would not obtain the desired data. Secondly, it was also a question of respect for others and a question of allowing them to benefit somewhat more directly from the research. Such arguments are also put forward by those who argue in favour of kaupapa Maaori research, that is research by Maaori, for Maaori, in accordance with Maaori philosophy and principles (e.g., Smith 1999, Irwin 1994, Nepe 1991, Bishop 1994). Tensions, conflicts and disagreements also occur in the whaanau and the tribe. They can sometimes bring about reconfigurations as certain members or families decide to 89 The question of individuals rights is interesting. A Maaori student, like any other New Zealand student, has individual rights. He/she has the choice between working as an individual or working as a whaanau member. If he/she recognizes the authority of the whaanau, he/she also gives up certain individual rights. It is highly improbable that the whaanau would forbid him/her from studying, for example, Russian language and culture, but he/she might then have to choose between the whaanau and Russian studies. 166

179 deactivate certain branches of their genealogy, while activating others. Thus, whaanau relationships change, expanding or contracting from time to time, and they always involve a certain degree of ambiguity and flexibility (see chapter III about the dynamics of iwi, hapuu, and whaanau). At the very heart of Maaori identities lies the whakapapa (genealogy). The whakapapa ensures the continuity and transmission of institutions, values, practices, kinship roles and responsibilities to one s relatives, as well as one s place and status within Maaori societies (Waymouth 2003; Mahuika 1998: 219). Whakapapa also embody notions of status, authority that is mana and property (Waymouth 2003). Both traditionally and nowadays, Maaori introduce themselves by reciting their whakapapa. According to Weymouth, Whakapapa in its simplest definition is genealogies, or lists of names that act as keys to unlocking the way Maori understand the way the world operates and maintains stability. ( ) Everything in the Maori world, spiritual or physical, has a list of names that trace connections to a founding ancestor. The lists apply to humans and the physical world; things in the natural world such as trees, fish, rocks, stars, the winds, rain, sun, moon, seas and rivers; and the things in the spiritual world. All the thousands of whakapapa interact in some way and all the interactions take the form of relationships between families. The family relationships are communicated through stories of events that explain how the relationships began. The stories show why the names are in the order that they are in the lists. They indicate the organisational processes that needed to be carried out in order to maintain the relationships among families, persons and the natural world. (2003) 90 Today, in everyday situations, when people recite their whakapapa, they list their elders, sometimes more distant ancestors, iwi (tribe), hapuu (sub-tribe), marae, maunga (mountain(s)), awa (river(s)), and so forth. Here is a typical example of a whakapapa as taught at university, but also as learnt in Maaori workshops, seminars or waananga that I attended: 90 Note that the expertise of genealogy specialists is usually necessary in order to see and understand the relationships between different stories (Schwimmer, personal communication, April 2004). 167

180 Ko X taku ingoa. Ko Y taku papa. Ko Z taku mama. Ko B taku iwi. Ko A taku maunga. Ko C taku awa. My name is X. My father s name is Y. My mother s name is Z. B is my tribe. A is my mountain. C is my river. (Notes, Maaori 101 course, The University of Auckland, 2001) As we saw in chapter III, in most cases, the identification with iwi, hapuu, and marae is not singular, fixed or exclusive. The identifications and their importance change over time, depending on social and political contexts and on the intensity of ties. The spiritual home, the tuurangawaewae, the place to stand, the connection to the land, is thus part of the whakapapa. It is necessary to the upholding of one s identity as Maaori or as a member of a particular whaanau, hapuu or iwi. Again, the connection can be plural, depending not only on genealogy but also on experiences of a place, actual connections with the people, and parents or elders wishes. Maaori also articulate different parts of their whakapapa depending on the people with whom they are interacting. People can choose to affiliate to descent groups through links of either or both parents (Metge 1995); as I said earlier, the whakapapa is thus not gender marked, but a matter of choice. By knowing and reciting their genealogy, Maaori situate themselves in a particular universe. Nobody can question whakapapa if the evidence is there and well demonstrated. This has been even truer in the recent years of retribalization, claims settlements, capitalization of traditional means and modes of production, and the bureaucratization of genealogy. 91 In fact, the juridification of Maaori property, the recognition of tribes as legal corporate entities and the concomitant active participation of tribal representatives in retribalization have reinforced the tribes authority and legitimacy as the inheritors of traditional resources and knowledge, and have led to a new emphasis on blood and ancestry as criteria for access to properties and benefits. Weymouth adds that 91 See Rata (2000) for more details as well as chapter I. 168

181 Under the legislation [Runanga Iwi Bill 1990], the runanga were expected to establish beneficiary roles [sic 92 ][sic n est pas une abbreviation, donc pas de point, sic étant le mot pour ainsi en latin]to ensure that all members who met the criteria would be able to access the iwi s resources. In the Runanga Iwi Bill the criteria for beneficiary status was a person of the Maori race of New Zealand; and includes a descendant of any such person. This generalization of identity through ethnic descent stripped away the notion of kinship by descent that is tied directly to land [and] resources and managed through whakapapa relationships. The ethnic descent category provided an individual with a [sic] idea of being a member of an ethnic group without having to participate in the obligations and responsibilities inherent in a whakapapa relationship. (2003) Distinctions, then, have emerged between tribal Maaori and those who identify as Maaori, but not with a particular tribe. Urban Maaori, for example, appealed to the Courts of Justice in order to establish their rights to ancestral resources, but also to challenge the exclusive legitimacy of the tribes established since 1992 (Rata 2000). The Fisheries Case that I discussed in chapter III is a well-known example (Durie 1998; Rata 2000; Schwimmer 2001; Walker 1996). During this retribalization period, other significant distinctions have also been reinforced, such as those between genealogical members of the tribe on the one hand and their spouses and whaangai (adopted, fostered) children on the other. While the latter are accepted as members of the whaanau or the tribe for their commitment over the years and recognized as part of the group by people of status, their inclusion carries the possibility of exclusion and this possibility is emphasized when dealing with access to ancestral lands, waters and other resources. This creates very difficult and highly emotional situations between siblings or between parents and their children, for example, when one parent is not Maaori, or from a different tribe, or Maaori but with no particular tribal identification and is therefore excluded from certain parts of the whaanau or tribal life (Rata 2000). The ever-present possibility of exclusion can be quite stressful and prevent people from full involvement in the group. Issues of power can also keep some people under pressure and force them to conform. Specific struggles about power and control over resources and group leadership have clearly been at stake in the reinforced biological determinism and essentialism of recent years. 92 The correct spelling here should be rolls, meaning lists. 169

182 However, in practice, there are always places for claims and contestation. Many different factors are at play in claiming certain rights (to land, knowledge or identity, for example), but also in contesting a claim, such as (in no particular order): 1) (lack of) evidence of genealogical knowledge; 2) participation in family or tribal activities and chores; 3) history of the relationships within the whaanau or the tribe; 4) struggle for mana; 5) personal achievement and personal resources that have the potential to contribute to the family s or tribe s well-being; 6) scarcity of whaanau or tribal resources or, on the contrary, the sudden appearance of money linked to settlements of historical grievances; 7) jealousy and competition with one s other affiliations; 8) personal knowledge of genealogy, traditions, and protocols and demonstration of good faith and involvement; 9) emotional factors; and 10) signs from the ancestors or the supernatural worlds. Today, important issues related to the pair individualism versus collectivism are also involved in claiming rights and contesting a claim. The generalization of identity through ethnic descent has played in favour of individualism, as emphasized by Weymouth (2003) above, since it provided an individual with rights as a member of an ethnic group without having to participate in the obligations and responsibilities of any meaningful group within the ethnic group. Claiming rights to lands, waters or knowledge also implies the Maaori notion of ahi kaa, which can be literally translated as (keeping) a fire alight and actually means maintaining occupation of the land (Waymouth 2003). This concept was used in the cases of several land claims to the Waitangi Tribunal. So, for a tribe or a whaanau to be able to claim land, they have to demonstrate their continuous occupation of the land or at least their presence at certain periods, keeping the home fires burning, as it were. The same concept is sometimes used in the case of individual or whaanau claims inside or outside tribunals: they are expected to back up their claims with active participation in group affairs (Metge 1995: 77). People sometimes send home a child or grandchild to keep warm ( ) land inheritance and ( ) group membership (Metge 1964: 10). This was particularly common practice for women in the past, when patrilateral affiliation was more prominent. It is also common today to send the children to their grandparents or uncles and aunts back home during the summer holidays or for certain other times, so 170

183 they can come to know the people and the history and be known by them. Specific criteria of occupation are changing, though, and differ from one family or tribe to another. 93 Once again, there is always implicit a kind of ambiguity which allows for flexibility around personal and circumstantial considerations. However, as Fiona explained, keeping the fire going is not always easy: When you have lived in the city you find it very hard to go back to your own home and you were raised outside the area, it s very hard. You always identify, you whakapapa back to that area, but We have this concept that we call ahi kaa, ahi kaa means keeping the domestic fire alight and often it s very hard for us to maintain our ahi kaa. What happens is we have this concept of ahi maatao, it s when the fire is dying out, so you re always trying to get back but there is the thing of some people, they look down on you because you don t come back or they think you re better because you live in the city, and la, la, la But we feel stink cause we do want to go back, but there s no opportunity... It s one of the effects of urbanization, as Walker says, you know going for the big opportunity, money, work You gotta live your life! sigh of discouragement One of the consequences of living away from the tribal area. (Fiona) An emotional voyage When people decide to make the journey back home and make up with their people, after many years or a whole life in the city with little or no contact with the rural home, it is often a highly emotional experience. The move back home calls to mind painful memories embedded in the history of colonization, Christianization and Anglicization. It may also recall old personal or whaanau disagreements. It can be a very spiritual experience and some people will begin to have dreams, be attentive to signs from the ancestors and the supernatural worlds, and experience various pleasant or unpleasant bodily sensations. Going back home to one s people and one s marae can be a very stressful experience for those who do not speak the Maaori language fluently or have a strong English accent. It is stressful for those who do not know much about traditions and protocols and do not have someone there to guide them and introduce them to the others. Even if other people know about one s family and one s elders, this is not always sufficient for one to feel at ease. 93 According to basic Maaori values, learning history is part of the ahi kaa, but today legal procedures and provisions often prevail upon more fundamental traditional values and ways. 171

184 People back home may behave as if one is a stranger and treat one as a manuhiri (visitor); they can make one feel not very welcome. A participant in my research, Tiana, told me how she had to tell people off and impose herself in the kitchen, as one of them. She could not accept being served like a visitor. This demanded a good dose of selfconfidence, courage, and sense of being comfortable as a Maaori and as a member of her whaanau and tribe on her part, which not everybody would have. Some Maaori who try to go home will suffer exclusion and will probably not come back again, or at least not until absolutely necessary. However, as signalled by Durie (1999, 2001a), marae encounters can help to establish and renew relationships between the person, the group, the ancestors, and the wider environment. Many things which happen at marae are expressions of connectedness and can help someone who is serious and shows good faith to reconnect to their people. Tauparapara (incantations) and karakia (prayers) as well as ritual chants locate the speakers and the listeners in terms of tribe, places, and relation to the heavens and the earth. Tauparapara, according to Durie, may be heard as a call for a union of the elements and terrestrial places (tuia ki runga, tuia ki raro); or the departed with each other (tuia te hunga mate ki te hunga mate); the living with the living (tuia te hunga ora ki te hunga ora); the sky with the earth (tuia te rangi e tu nei, tuia te papa e hora mai nei). (1999: 359) Karakia also have the wider purpose of creating a sense of unity between the living (person, tribes and peoples), the ancestors, the environment, and the spiritual powers (Durie 1999: 359; Salmond 1975). Karakia lift preoccupations with daily existence to an elevated spiritual plane. They serve to both free people from threat of harm, and at the same time offer a degree of protection afforded by a link with a higher power (Durie 1999: 359). Marae are sacred places recognized as having the potential for one to find oneself again. They are also very important places where conflicts can be openly discussed. The move back home to find oneself and/or reconnect with others is also difficult for the hosts who never went away. It can be really demanding for them: many people come 172

185 back with a desire to learn everything and expect that they will be taught genealogies, traditions and other knowledge straight away. Those who stayed may well feel like refusing to let strangers come and research them and their ancestral resources without having specific proof that they are related. They may feel a total lack of interest and response to the returnees. They are also sometimes angry with those who only come back from time to time for holidays, while they are the ones who do all the hard work keeping the marae warm, welcoming everybody back during funerals, and caring for the lands, the cemetery, and other people s properties. They are often the poor relatives of the city-dwellers, who have good qualifications and better access to well-paid jobs. Like in all families, jealousy and backbiting are also part of the game between rural and urban cousins. So, the reaction of those who stayed is sometimes one of suspicion, since not all of those who have come back in the past behaved as they should have done. Many country folks are also tired of listening to the city Maaori, who they sometimes call Wannabes or Know-it-alls, telling them how to do things better with their shiny diplomas from university. Nobody will tell me what to do on my own land!, a kaumaatua told me during a visit to East Coast marae. Another rural dweller, Rongo, explained me what people there think when city people come back home: People who are living in the city and they come home, they are not liked at home. People are resentful towards them. Because, see, it works both ways. We look at these people that have had an opportunity to become a great lawyer or accountant or whatever and they have been living the high life and you sort of think, you are struggling, you, at home. These wankers come back with the suit and they are telling you what to do! You see, that s exactly what the pathway any of them went through. They cannot come back with all these koorero about how to make things better for us. (Rongo) More and more Maaori city-dwellers are aware of that potential reaction and will therefore hesitate to go back home and participate in discussions on marae or elsewhere. Others will simply go back and try to behave like anybody else: When I go back home, I m normal, I don t let them know [that I go to university]. I like to be on the same level as my people. Some of them know I am here [at 173

186 university]. It doesn t make any difference. In fact, I think they sort of sneer at people that think they know it all. They will admire you if you don t come back and tell them what to do. (Keita) The journey back home asks for a lot of patience, humility, and respect for the people and ways of doing things in the place; one must first prove one s good faith. It is also important to pass through the right channels and to meet the right people, who can guide one s search and give useful advice about sacred things, places and knowledge, since bad things too can come from the spiritual world. There is always an ambivalence and danger that people fear when city-dwellers come back without necessarily having a deep knowledge of the good ways. Some people, like one of the participants in my research, Fiona, will simply avoid claiming anything from home. She does not want to ask for a scholarship from her father s side since her contact with that part of her family has been limited and she does not want to make people talk behind her back. She is too proud and respects the people too much to ask for something that she feels others deserve more than her, since they grew up and still live there. She would like to be closer to her grandmother, aunts, uncles, and cousins, but her father was working in another rural area and they did not visit as often as they would have liked during her childhood. It is a matter of humility, respect, and mana for her to come to know more about this part of her genealogy before asking for anything from them. I have spoken here about the difficulty of maintaining whaanau relationships with the rural home, but the process of going back to one s people can also be very positive and many are welcomed with open arms. This was the case for Christine. She was seen as someone who could help the community to regain the Maaori language, since she is a Maaori language teacher and very few people still speak te reo in her tribal area. The welcome might be far different in areas where the language is spoken by a large segment of the population and where a non-native speaker with an English accent or a different dialect might not be viewed favourably. Her marae committee was also in need of trustees at the time of her first approach, so the circumstances were ideal for her to take up with her people. 174

187 The process of going back home can be a personal quest, but it can also be a collective one. Rata (2000) describes a whaanau s return to the tribal land. The whole research process in preparation for the return, the teaching and learning of waiata (songs), whakapapa (genealogy) and tikanga (custom, rules), as well as the more practical preparation of the trip itself, is very often a collective process. Even if the return or visit to the tribal area is not collective, there are still usually many whaanau members involved in the preparation. One of the participants in this research went back to her people for the first time when she was in her late forties, with many of her kin. She told me: N. How did the journey, the process of going home begin? R. Well, it was a kawe mate for my mother s two sisters, so tikanga, and I have a cousin, a tuakana, he maintains this tikanga and the decision was made to go back and do it. We took back the spirits of my mother s two sisters who have died. That s kawe mate. Took them back to the tuurangawaewae up north. So, the decision was made to do it and then we just gathered to prepare to do it. People just played a role, find a bus, we fundraised, we learned waiata, we learned the kawa of our marae and we went. N. And how long did it take to prepare? R. We spent about a month I suppose, maybe two months to fundraise, because we took our kai from the city, we bought our kai organized our bus organized ourselves to be aware of the kawa for our northern tribe, to learn the waiata, probably two months, this time to prepare. It was the preparation that made it a good trip. N. It was your first time. But, for some others, it was not? R. It was my first time, and maybe for one or two others on the whole bus, it was not the first time for them. Very powerful as we were as such a large ropuu. (Rewa) As I said earlier (see chapters I), the emphasis since the 1990s has tended to shift again to smaller groupings, like sub-tribes and whaanau, which can hint at more flexibility and inclusion. Many social intervention programs now target mainly whaanau, which is more within the grasp of individuals: impacts are more directly felt and accountabilities are reinforced by the linkages stemming from known relationships, mutual interests, shared whakapapa ( ) and blood ties (Durie 2001a: ). Most of the time, life and everyday activities simply do not intersect with tribal worlds: they revolve rather around whaanau (Durie 2001a: 189). 175

188 Te whaanau: a crucial Maaori figured world In the terms of the theoretical framework of dialogism, the whaanau appears to be a crucial figured world for Maaori today, in the country, but also in the city. The whaanau can indeed be considered as a socially and culturally constructed realms of interpretation in which particular characters and actors are recognized, significance is assigned to certain acts, and particular outcomes are valued over others (Holland, Lachicotte, Skinner and Cain 1998: 52). Here, I must specify that whaanau whakapapa corresponds mainly to the extended family of Metge s fourth definition. In this usage, 1) the whaanau is ancestor-oriented and ambilineal, that is to say that it refers to a kaumaatua from either genealogical line, still living or recently dead; 2) it is distributed among several households, particularly in the city, but acts together as a group on specific occasions (life crisis, caring for whaanau property, etc.); 3) it recognizes participation in whaanau activities as a relevant factor of whaanau membership; 4) it has attached members, namely, spouses and whaangai children, and 5) it extends usually over three or more generations. However, this meaning of the whaanau does not disconnect from its other components or levels: One component is related to Tipuna and whaanau members who have passed on. This provides the spiritual and emotional well-being to the family. It is from the ancestors that Maaori whaanau develop their identity. The next component represents Whaanui or tribal families. Most Maaori people recognize the tribal names to whom they have links or ties. The third component is the whaanau te rito the closer family. This part of the whaanau provides the immediate nurturance and the physical and emotional support. (Tukukino 1988: 70 in Cram and Pitama 1998: 150) The recurring formal features of the whaanau that distinguish it are visible through its core values or principles. Through their actions, interactions and imagination, Maaori reproduce the figured world of the whaanau in the city, but continuity, in the context of a colonized and multicultural city, is only possible through change (see chapter VI for examples of the reaffirmation of whaanau values through practice). 176

189 The governing principles or values of the whaanau but also of the marae and whare Maaori are also the principles which serve to manage the inclusion and exclusion of members or the attachment/detachment and connection/disconnection at the levels of whaanau, hapuu, and iwi. These principles serve as guides for Maaori in their relationships with others within and beyond Aotearoa/New Zealand as well as among themselves. These principles or values are based on tikanga and the space/time of the ancestors. Certainly, the specific criteria governing each principle or value can vary from one whaanau to another, one group to another, depending on particular experiences, relationships with others and intersubjectivity, as well as sensitivities related to particular histories and contexts. The specific criteria, beyond group or whaanau particularities, are also related to a more general positioning, that is, to political, economic and social conjunctures. Thus, for example, knowledge of the Maaori language, knowledge of tikanga and particular protocols and particular kaupapa vary and serve differently to include or exclude members and to manage the relationships between us and the others. The others can be other persons, whaanau, iwi, the Paakehaa, and so forth, depending on circumstances and the particular space/time. Dialogism (see chapter I) is thus very important for a general understanding of whaanau principles. 94 Relying heavily on Metge (1995: ), here are the main whaanau principles or values: The value Maaori name first is aroha, 95 which means unconditional love, warm affection, especially for family members including the ancestors and the supernatural beings but also charity, 96 compassion or pity for those in need, unwell or in trouble. Caring acts are 94 Note that if the whaanau includes or excludes others in or from the us, these others do not automatically become members of or are not automatically rejected from the hapuu and iwi (see chapter III). Each level or grouping of the Maaori social organisation seems to be autonomous, to a large degree at least. 95 It is important to note that the importance or primacy of the values change according to particular contexts; there is a complex combination and hierarchization of values in practice. The case study that is explored in chapter VI, for example, illustrates how the value of mana can sometimes emerge in practice as the most determining factor in certain acts and events. 96 In his 1945 Maaori translation of Shakespeare s Merchant of Venice, which was made into the first Maori-language feature film and screened in 2002 ( executive producer/director: Don C Selwyn), Pei Te Huirinui Jones translated aroha by the English word charity. 177

190 then expected. Aroha is also used to express one s approval or pride in someone as well as gratitude for kindness or gifts received. Traditionally, aroha was not used for sexual love, but that sense is now common among Maaori whose first language is English. Metge (1995: 80) adds that with Christianity, the meaning of aroha was extended to include altruistic love, as shown by God towards humankind. Today, Maaori speakers and writers usually focus on the most comprehensive meaning of aroha, stressing its connection with the divine, the generosity of spirit which puts others before self, and its refusal to impose limits or conditions (Metge 1995: 80). This raises the importance of another value, te taha wairua, or respect for the spiritual dimension, which completes and complements te taha tinana or the physical dimension. When seeking guidance, Maaori acknowledge the signs and presence of their tiipuna and other spiritual beings. Most of them seem to recognize their agency and generally agree on the desirability of seeking divine blessing and assistance in daily life, in crises and whenever they are gathered together, whether or not they do so themselves (Metge 1995: 83). Closely related to taha wairua and taha tinana are the complementary concepts of tapu and noa, which I explained in length in chapter III. They are used to give or restrain access to the group/whaanau resources (taonga, whakapapa knowledge, arts or technical knowledge, natural resources, roles within the family according to rank, age and gender, and so forth). Tapu and noa principles then help to maintain a certain control over persons, groups and other resources and serious consequences (physical as well as supernatural) can follow from violating tapu/noa rules. Whanaungatanga is the Maaori value second in importance and is closely associated with aroha. Whanaungatanga means strengthening and enriching the bonds of family unity, according to Manuka. Whanaungatanga, from whanaunga or relatives, means kinship in its widest sense (see Kawharu 1975 for details). This principle reinforces the commitment of all the relatives and reminds them of their responsibilities, such as providing beds and food for your people. It is also closely linked to the principle of reciprocity, utu. One has to give without being asked for, one has to know how to be helpful. As Manuka explained, when you visit people, you bring kai (food) with you, 178

191 which makes you feel good. Whanaungatanga is also the commitment to one another in the whaanau, the responsibility to help, support and encourage, verbs translated in Maaori by awhi and tautoko. The danger of being excluded is always present if a person or a group does not assume its responsibilities. The principle of whanaungatanga also allows for the temporary acceptance in the group of strangers under particular circumstances, during celebrations and tangihanga (funerals) on marae, for example. The powhiri (welcome ceremony) serves to whakanoa or lift the manuhiri tapu (tapu of the visitors), giving a tangata whenua status (in a restricted sense) to the visitors for the duration of their stay (Tauroa and Tauroa 1986: 90; see also chapter III). When the event ends, these people are not part of the whaanau until the next event of the kind. If some people present themselves as part of the whaanau outside these specific moments, they will receive a discreet (or sometimes more explicit) warning made through words or gestures. Another principle is kotahitanga, which means oneness or unity. Kotahitanga asks for the acceptance of differences within the group, confidentiality in contact with outsiders, responsibility for each other s actions, and prevention and control of damage or reparation in order to maintain or restore the mana of the whaanau (Metge 1995: 102). Mana is another important value which has as its primary reference the spiritual power and authority that is made manifest in human experience (Metge 1995: 87) (see the next chapter for a detailed discussion of a situation where mana seemed to take precedence over the other values). Its second set of meanings can be translated in English as prestige or reputation. Both individuals and groups have mana. Mana can be acquired through a combination of inheritance from ancestors (mana tipuna), direct contact with the supernatural (mana atua) and human achievement (mana tangata). Males and females also have their own special mana, seen as complementary, mana taane (male mana) and mana wahine (female mana), which entitle men and women to specific roles and responsibilities in the whaanau and in relation to the principles of tapu and noa (for details, among others see Metge 1995: 91-98; Salmond 1991; Durie 1994). Durie also 179

192 speaks about mana Maaori, which he defines as a measure of the control and authority which Maaori people were able to exercise as distinct from the authority of the Government (1994: 28). He gives the example of the Kotahitanga and the Kingitanga movements of the second half of the 19 th century in which Maaori united against the colonizers or the Paakehaa in pursuit of common goals (for details, see, among others, Belich 1988 (1986), 1996, Cox 1993; Walker 1990). Because of the mana tipuna, whakapapa is highly valued. Whakapapa cements whaanau ties by developing pride and a sense of belonging to each other and to a common heritage. Whakapapa or genealogical knowledge also prescribes patterns of behaviour and roles according to birth order and generational level, enables whaanau members to establish links with each other and with hapuu and iwi, and enables relations with other groups to be traced. According to the roles prescribed by whakapapa, not everybody has access to the genealogical knowledge. Some people are chosen as inheritors of this knowledge, on the basis of their ability, commitment, maturity, and birthright; young people are not usually taught deep genealogical knowledge. Whakapapa knowledge is tapu and serves as a limiting or controlling principle. Manaakitanga means befriending holistically and demonstrating extreme kindness with the utmost respect (Manuka). Manaakitanga begins when someone s guests arrive and finishes when the last person leaves. Manaakitanga is an extension of whanaungatanga and refers especially to hospitality to visitors on the marae and in private houses or whare Maaori. Metge (1995) does not recognize manaakitanga as one of the principal values, since she puts manaaki as one of the multiple mahi-a-ngaakau, work done from the heart or work laid upon the heart (both quotes from Metge 1995: 98; emphasis in original) or duties which address physical, mental and spiritual needs, along with awhina (help, assist), tautoko (prop up, support), ahu (tend, foster), atawhai (show kindness to, foster), awhi (embrace; foster, cherish), taurima (treat with care, tend), whaangai (feed, nourish, bring up), tiaki (protect, guard, keep), whakamarumaru (shelter), whakangungu (defend, protect), and mahi tahi (work together) (Metge 1995: 99). In my own research, most of the participants identify manaakitanga and whanaungatanga as the two main 180

193 overarching principles and these two principles came up very often in informal and formal conversations on marae, at whare Maaori and in everyday situations. Whanaungatanga is identified as the domain of the self, the us, while manaakitanga is rather the domain of the others which are temporarily included in the us or marked as the others by being cared for as manuhiri; the practice of manaakitanga is directly linked to the whaanau s mana. Metge speaks about manaaki, the duty to care for each other, to show respect and kindness, as a duty within the family (see the case study in chapter VI where this duty was forgotten, but where the offender were not punished immediately under this principle). She also mentions that in contemporary Maaori usage, the word is used to refer to hospitality extended to visitors (1995: 99). My research confirms the emphasis today on this last usage since, for example, manaakitanga can be used to make someone feel excluded from the whaanau or as a stranger at home, as opposed to one of us. Manaakitanga can then serve to establish a relationship but also a boundary between people. The history of relationships is important, as is the larger political and economical context. When people feel that their whaanau and its unity, kotahitanga and mana are under threat, the whaanau network then contracts. Certain caring values like tiakitanga or guardianship can have a more inclusive reach when general issues are emphasized, like the importance of caring for Papatuuaanuku (Mother Earth).In other circumstances, tiakitanga presupposes clear ownership or more adequately clear guardianship boundaries over resources, since rights over resources also mean obligations and responsibilities to protect them against physical or spiritual attacks. Utu, as explained very well in Metge (1995 and 2002), and as I said in chapter IV, is the principle of reciprocity. Utu is the principle that anything received should be requited with an appropriate return (Metge 1995: 100). This definition implies a positive as well as a negative return, depending on what has been received. Metge identifies five 181

194 important rules that underpin the utu principle: 1) the return should never match what has been received exactly but should ideally include an increment in value, placing the recipient under obligation to make a further return (1995: 100); 2) the return should not be made immediately ( ) but should be delayed until an appropriate occasion, months, years and even a generation later (1995: 100); 3) the return should preferably be different from what has been received in at least some respects: one kind of goods may be reciprocated by another kind, goods by services, services by a spouse (1995: 100); and 4) the return does not have to be made directly to the giver but may be made to the group to which he or she belongs or to his or her descendants (1995: ). Because of these rules, the principle of utu maintains an ongoing relationship between persons and groups. The imbalance of obligation is particularly crucial in maintaining the relationship (Metge 2002). The principle of utu is also closely associated, again according to Metge (1995: 100 and 2002: ), with the principle of mana, since the store of mana is increased or diminished according to the holder s actions. Mana is increased by generous giving and protected against any loss by repaying negative gifts in kind. 97 At the whaanau level, members have obligations and responsibilities in relation to inherited mana and older members leadership and guidance. The young are expected to be respectful for what the whaanau consider to be the right ways, to avoid actions that provoke criticism, and, when their turn comes, to provide guidance to the next generation, so that the mana of the whaanau and the mana of the kaumaatua and tiipuna will be maintained and even increased. If one person or a sub-group threatens the mana of the whaanau, utu and mana principles combine and can be used as principles of exclusion. They can also serve as principles of inclusion when a person or a group can enhance the whaanau s mana. 97 Speaking of the return of negative gifts, Metge specifies: In contemporary Maaori society offences against individuals and groups are in theory dealt with by the law of the land and it is well over a hundred years since inter-tribal warfare came to an end. Nowadays the obligation to repay bad gifts is not usually acknowledged openly nor acted upon outside the law by law-abiding citizens. Nevertheless, it still operates powerfully under certain circumstances. It can erupt in violence, for example, in relations between Maaori gangs. But in most cases those involved find other ways of securing utu, for example, in the Maaori Land Court or the general law courts, on the Rugby field or in kapa haka action song competitions (2002: 318). I would add that utu is also secured through verbal exchanges and solid public discussions, public lectures or addresses and whaikoorero on the marae. 182

195 Utu is also closely related to principles such as aroha (Metge 1995: 100) and, I will add, manaakitanga, according to the definition given earlier and its importance for Maaori today, particularly Auckland Maaori. The principle of utu is also essential to the management of internal relations within the whaanau. Thus, those who have received affection, approval, support, care, protection and respect are under the obligation to reciprocate generously without counting what it costs them (Metge 1995: 101). Still according to Metge (1995: 101), the return can be made to the givers close kin and descendants, those in need or the whaanau as a group and not necessarily directly to the actual givers. The return can also be delayed until a specific need or comparable occasion arises. In the case of bad gifts, dislike, jealousy or abuses, the unity of the whaanau can be protected by dealing with the problem collectively, resorting to mediators or takawaenga or having a formal group discussion or koorero/huihuinga (Metge 1995: 101). A good gift can also halt the exchange of insults or injuries. If, in the long run, there is no or not enough reciprocity, the future of the relationship is endangered, which poses a limit to whanaungatanga. Metge (1995: 86-87) identifies three other related principles, which are: tika, or what is correct, just, fair and appropriate morally, spiritually and socially; tikanga, the right way; and pono, being true, genuine and loyal or not hypocritical in relation to others. Ora is another value stressed by Metge (1995: 86). Ora refers to life of a special quality, energised life (Metge 1995: 86, her emphasis). And life is not only limited to the physical dimension; it includes life of the body, mind, and spirit, life in all its fullness (Metge 1995: 86), in its wholeness, linking the person to his or her group, from whaanau to iwi. As an adjective, ora signifies alive as opposed to dead, healthy as opposed to sick, safe-and-sound as opposed to injured and in danger (Merge 1995: 86, her emphasis) The greeting Kia ora!, for example, could be literally transcribed as Be healthy!, Be well! or Be safe!. 183

196 Metge (1995: 103) also identifies negative values which are disliked and attract heavy sanctions in the whaanau. Among others things, any tendency to be self-centred and selfish (kaiapa, kaiapo or mahuki) or lazy (maangere) is disapproved of. A tendency to arrogance, too much self-confidence and looking down on others is condemned. On the contrary, two positive values which are highly encouraged and which were mentioned again and again in discussions and hui of all kinds were the values of humility and respect for others. This is to say that one has to know one s place and one s rank and show respect to others, particularly one s elders. Showing humility and respect is closely linked to one s own and one s whaanau s mana. In fact, trampling on someone else s mana provokes a counter-reaction, following the principle of utu, and serves to exclude one from the group. Metge (1995: ) remarks that charges of being whakahiihii (arrogant) are sometimes unfair when addressed to people particularly gifted or marked out for leadership. These false accusations often arise from jealousy, which is another value identified as negative by Metge (1995: 104). Jealousy or backbiting can arise from envy or resentfulness of another or other s person possessions or advantages. Conclusion The whaanau principles identified here thus form a figured world, a realm of interpretation which guides Maaori, in the countryside and in the city, in their actions and relations with others. As explained by Metge (1995: 105), these whaanau values and principles are all related in diverse and complex ways. They sometimes compete with each other and sometimes reinforce each other. All of the values or principles are flexible and can be adapted to particular circumstances, as we will see in the next chapter, in which I examine a dilemma faced by a whaanau and the principles that were at work in its resolution. We will then see how these principles interact and clash with the principles of other figured worlds. For now, it is simply worth reiterating that while the whaanau has changed with colonization and urban life, it is still very important for Maaori. Even though it is highly emotionally demanding, most of them make every effort necessary to keep their whaanau relationships alive in the city, despite and beyond the urban/rural divide. 184

197 CHAPTER VI FIGURED WORLDS IN PRACTICE Now that we have examined the principles and values of the whaanau, I will proceed by describing how these principles and values emerge and unfold through practice, and thus how the figured world of the whaanau is reaffirmed and negotiated in everyday life, in interrelation with other Maaori and non-maoori figured worlds. I base my demonstration on the case study of a whaanau dilemma that took place in Kiri s whare Maaori. More generally, I also examine relationships between figured worlds, on both the economic and political levels. I then explore how Maaori engage in multiple figured worlds on a day-today basis and negotiate their engagement in the nuclear family, whaanau whakapapa (extended families based on kinship) and whaanau kaupapa (whaanau groups based on a common mission or a special purpose). I also look, more generally, at the dichotomy between Maaori and Paakehaa worlds and show that the boundaries between these worlds are much more fluid in practice than Maaori narratives might suggest. A case study: the whaanau dilemma Living with Maaori families made me realize the importance of the whaanau not only for Maaori everyday lives, but also as a symbol of affirmation of their identities and their making of space/place in the city and society at large. During my field research, people continually stressed the importance of the whaanau in conversation among themselves and during interviews. They spoke of their whaanau as something central to their everyday worlds in Auckland, when talking about their family (immediate and extended), of course, but also in reference to friends, colleagues, schoolmates, kapa haka ropuu (performing arts group), and other groups to which they belonged. Whaanau (singular or plural) occupied not only their conversations, but also a great part of their time and energy. Whanaungatanga, that is the principle of strengthening and enriching the bonds of family unity (Manuka), and more broadly, strengthening whaanau ties and responsibilities (Durie 1997b, Patterson 1992), appeared to be the important value for 185

198 Maaori to put into practice and to work on, to make them strong, individually and collectively, in comparison to others, Maaori or not. The Maaori around me were engaged with various projects and people in their everyday lives in the name of whanaungatanga such as learning te reo (Maaori language), doing whakapapa (genealogy) research, working towards a university degree to improve their conditions as Maaori, or being part of the whaanau of the kohanga reo (Maaori kindergarten) where they send their children. Moreover, almost all Maaori public or more intimate events have a period of time in their schedule dedicated to whanaungatanga, that is, a moment entirely given over to the strengthening or establishment of whaanau connections among participants. In everyday life, therefore, the notion of whaanau comes across as positive and inclusive. It often takes particular significant events to make manifest the limits of inclusion into whaanau: the whaanau is flexible, but it is not devoid of delimiting principles. Conflicts within the whaanau, raruraru (problems, troubles) between whaanau members or, very generally, disclosures of any type of offence by one or more members are especially revealing of the principles at work, and they can ultimately bring about a whaanau s reconfiguration. A problematic situation marked the time I spent living with Kiri s whaanau at 30 Aroha Street. It was a deeply emotional event, since the well-being of the whaanau was at stake, and it mobilized the whole whaanau including those not actually living at the whare Maaori for many weeks. Here was the situation: At the centre of the trouble in the house were two members of the whaanau and the whare Maaori: David and his father William. Both of them had been living there for a couple of years. David and William had their sleeping quarters in the garage in the backyard. William is the ex-husband of Kiri s sister Nina, and David is one of Nina s five children. One day, David s behaviour got out of control to the point of been very disruptive. Kiri, her husband Andrew and her sister Rangi called a meeting with everybody in the house 186

199 looking into the incident (due to the request of this whaanau, the incident could not be disclosed). It was not the first time that he had caused hurt to others, and considering the preoccupations of the whaanau, including their financial situation, the whaanau was under enough stress already. In fact, for some time the whaanau members were suspicious that David s behaviour was escalating affecting all those around him including whaanau and neighbours. Kiri, Andrew and Rangi did not know what to do, and nor did other siblings, relatives and the grandparents who lived in their tribal area in the country but visited the house regularly. They thought that with all the rehabilitation that the whaanau had given to David through the years, he was maybe too set in his erred ways to change. Everyone knew that William and David really needed a place to stay and that William was doing his best with his teenage son. He was working hard as a carpenter s mate in order to provide for his son s needs, and he had a good heart, as did David, even if he had been mucking around for some time. In their intense and very emotional discussions, obligations were invoked in terms of aroha (unconditional love), whanaungatanga, manaakitanga (showing respect and kindness, hospitality extended to visitors) and whakapapa. Even if William was not related to them by blood, and was now divorced from Kiri s sister, the whaanau still had responsibilities towards him, since he was the father of David and of Kiri s sister s other four children. The people of the whaanau had considered him to be one of them for a long time. However, they also felt that William was too conciliatory with his child, not present enough, and was not preventing his son from doing things that were affecting the rest of the whaanau. The whaanau members tried to make William understand that he should do something about David. William was offended, but David s behaviour appeared to be improving. However, after a couple of weeks, David became very defiant and his disruptive behaviour returned. Another whaanau meeting was called, but again, nobody had any answers. This time, however, Kiri and Rangi directly confronted David: one of his cousins had told the adults about what David had done (incident not disclosed at whanaau s request). David denied everything and William stayed silent. 187

200 Kiri, Rangi and Andrew were extremely upset about the situation, and had a discussion about what solution or reaction was tika (correct, morally just) in such circumstances. They were also trying to find a solution which was in accordance with tikanga (traditions). They thought about asking William to leave the house and find another place to stay. In this way, they would have been rid of the problem, but they would have also escaped their whaanau obligations and that was not right. Besides, thinking about their dead tiipuna (ancestors) and possible supernatural utu ( return for something received, whether good or bad, Metge 1995: 336), they knew that one day they would have to pay for neglecting their duties. In fact, Maaori in general are acutely sensitive to such issues and accord great power to the wairua (spirit, feelings of places, peoples, events) and the ancestral or supernatural worlds that manifest themselves through body feelings, emotions, intuitions, and dreams, among other things. Furthermore, they felt an obligation to safeguard David s education and his rights as a biological member of the whaanau, since one person s child is everybody s child. By the same token, they admitted their own responsibility and powerlessness in dealing with David s behaviour. Asking William to leave the house was also risky for future relations with David, as well as for relations between David and his siblings and William and his other children. If it was easily justifiable to cut the connection with William, it was much more difficult to do it, thinking about David. As time went on, however, David s behaviour became increasingly selfish and lazy. He often wriggled out of his chores and, above all, he began to be very disruptive at school and in the neighbourhood. William, for his part, was away from home more and more often. He told me during an interview that he was whakamaa because of his son, but he did not know how to deal with the situation. The word whakamaa is used to describe a range of feelings from shyness through embarrassment to shame and behaviour involving varying degrees of withdrawal and unresponsiveness (Metge 1995: 336; for details, see Metge 1986). He cried during the interview, truly anxious about the possibility of losing his son and/or being asked to find another place to live. This would leave him with no whaanau whatsoever, since links with his birth whaanau were non-existent. 188

201 The call that Kiri received from school telling her that they had not seen David for a couple of days was the last straw. She already had enough worries with the other children, work and university obligations. Seeing that William could not face up to his responsibilities, and that he even denied that David might be behaving badly, she decided that the situation could not continue. Knowing that the whaanau was to support her decision, she drove straight over to see William and asked him to leave the house with David and take all their belongings with them. She felt that with all the work her and her whaanau had done in terms of rehabilitation, exhaustion had finally hit all concerned. What finally led the whaanau to take this step was that, above all else, the whaanau s mana was at stake at school and in the neighbourhood, because of a situation that had gone on too long and in which she felt powerless. She was also afraid that David s behaviour was influencing the younger ones, who would be encouraged in their bad habits by an absence of punitive reaction on her and the other adults parts. After that day, I never saw William and David again. This example shows the importance of practice in the construction of personal and group positionings, personal and group agency and particular configurations of the whaanau. One cannot rely solely on idealized accounts to understand the principles of inclusion/exclusion and the workings of whaanau, especially as Maaori do not usually explain what they want or how they see things in a direct fashion: they like subtlety, insinuation, and ambiguity. My participation in the daily life of Maaori was therefore absolutely critical in coming to understand what follows. Through the example involving David and William, and drawing on the theoretical framework of dialogism, I aim to demonstrate that the whaanau is an important figured world for Maaori today, in both the country and the city. To recap, a figured world is a socially and culturally constructed realm of interpretation in which particular characters and actors are recognized, significance is assigned to certain acts, and particular outcomes are valued over others (Holland, Lachicotte, Skinner and Cain 1998: 52). While valued acts and outcomes come across quite clearly in the example, the particular characters and actors recognized in the figured 189

202 world of the whaanau were probably less obvious. In fact, the dilemma about everyone s responsibility for David s education and behaviour was also a dilemma about everyone s role in the whaanau and their relationships to each other. In Maaori traditions, because of the value of whanaungatanga, you must help and support the young and those in need. However, still according to traditions and particularly the values of tapu/noa (sacred or polluting/ordinary or relaxed) and whakapapa (genealogy), everyone should also respect and support their elders. Kiri, Rangi and Andrew, and indeed everyone in the whaanau, were thus negotiating in practice the values of whanaungatanga, tapu/noa and whakapapa, as well as other closely related whaanau principles which all reinforce each other. Whaanau values or principles and codes of behaviour worked in complex and interrelated ways to guide the whaanau s decision about David s (and William s) behaviour. The values and codes governing behaviour sometimes contradict and sometimes reinforce each other. For a long time, the condemnation that one would expect of David s disrespectful attitude towards his whaanau and elders was subordinated to values such as whanaungatanga, kotahitanga (oneness), aroha (unconditional love), whakapapa, and tikanga (custom, rules, tradition). At some point, however, something in the context changed such that the whaanau s mana and well-being were threatened. This made Kiri react and take the ultimate and, by then, obvious decision of asking David and his father to leave the whare Maaori and, at least for a time, to avoid the whaanau. But what exactly triggered this final act? It seems that the value of mana is a very important motivation in the figured world of the Maaori whaanau. And the primary reference for mana is spiritual power and authority (Marsden 1975 in Metge 1995: 87). 99 Groups as well as individuals have mana, and every 99 I am aware of Keesing s (1984) analysis of the concept of mana in which he suggested, through a linguistic comparative analysis, that mana was traditionally a stative verb meaning to be efficacious, be successful, be realized, work and, as a noun, it was not a substantive, which would have followed from an English reinterpretation of the term, but an abstract verbal noun meaning efficacy, success, potency. However, since in the field among Maaori and throughout the literature about Maaori today, the concept of mana is widely used as a substantive noun meaning spiritual power; authority stemming from the indwelling of spiritual power; prestige; the ability to do and get things done (Metge 1995: 333), I favour this interpretation of the concept (see also Lévi-Strauss 1950; Patterson 1992; Metge 1986). 190

203 share or store of mana influences or affects the mana of the larger group, since mana is a unitary and thus indivisible principle. Thus, when the mana of the 30 Aroha Street whaanau is threatened, the mana of all Maaori is potentially threatened. This is particularly true in David s case, since his behaviour began to be disruptive for people outside the whaanau and more precisely for non-maaori people and institutions. The whaanau tolerated David s non-respect of whaanau values as long as his behaviour only affected people within the whaanau. But as soon as external forces, in the shape of the Paakehaa school representatives, began to intervene in the whaanau regarding these violations, the whaanau reacted energetically and sorted out the situation. The guilty persons, here both David and William, who did not do enough to correct his son s behaviour, had affected not only the whaanau s mana, but potentially also the mana of all Maaori, living or dead. By reacting strongly to signals from external (and powerful) forces, Kiri was also protecting, through the internalized pan-ethnic code, the mana of her kaumaatua (elders), tiipuna (ancestors), fellow relatives and other Maaori as well as the mana of the multitude of ancestors that populate sacred songs and karakia (prayers). The whaanau reaction was all the more decisive since the violations now not only affected daily life in the whaanau, but had also become part of a wider and highly political context, in which power relationships between Maaori and Paakehaa in a colonized space/time come into play. And it is clear that external forces here Paakehaa, but they can also be Maaori have the power to ruin the mana of any whaanau. 100 In fact, had the situation continued, the whaanau s mana would have been diminished both in the Paakehaa neighbourhood and school and in the Paakehaa world more generally. The whaanau would have suffered not only from a bad reputation for the actual events, but also from more general stereotypes about Maaori that would have found support and justification in David s and his whaanau s behaviour. It would also have been affected by 100 If we look more globally at the concept of mana, it is conceived of differently from one culture/people to another (see Lévi-Strauss 1950 and Smith 1974 for details). Mana is sometimes thought of as an innate character or nature, and sometimes as a quality which is acquired through life and one s actions. In Indonesia, for example, mana is conceptualized as innate or inherent and people are all the more preoccupied with not losing it. Elsewhere, people put more emphasis on the mana acquired through good deeds, such as extreme generosity. Among Maaori, both conceptions are significant but, according to Smith (1974), the innate character of mana is associated with the eldest son, while acquired mana is associated with the youngest son. In the example of the whaanau dilemma discussed here, people are more preoccupied by the protection of acquired mana. 191

204 malicious rumours among Maaori defenders of the Maaori national mana. To summarize, as long as the signs of trouble only came from within the whaanau, the ways of dealing with them were open to debate. But the whaanau structure of values, of which mana is an essential part, emerged very clearly when signs arrived from external forces: the panethnic code internalized by the whaanau made it react strongly and promptly. Indeed, all of the values or principles which come from the habitus and cultural norms are flexible and can be adapted to particular cases or circumstances. Epa Huritau, one of Joan Metge s informants, explained this adaptability of the whaanau well: The Maaori value system has the flexibility built into it to accommodate variation. If we know the principle, we can make adjustments (Metge 1995: 105). This case shows that because the whaanau, its values and codes of behaviour are so important to whaanau members, and for the sake of its survival and for the good of all Maaori, the whaanau network had to contract. The situation called for a circumstantial renegotiation of values, which were subsequently ranked according to contextual priorities. Thus, in these particular circumstances, values like aroha (unconditional love), whanaungatanga and manaakitanga ( befriending holistically and demonstrating extreme kindness with the utmost respect, definition provided by Manuka) came in second place after mana in the relationship with the whaanau members at fault. This particular arrangement of values emerged only in practice as the best way of reaffirming whaanau values with other whaanau members and with all Maaori, and thereby securing the whaanau s (and all Maaori s) place in society at large, with the ultimate aim of getting things back to normal. In social relations, in practice, people behave according to cultural values, but they also make choices linked to their particular social positions or contexts. In doing that, they are always addressing and improvising specific, situated interactions as and when they arise. This allows for both change and continuity (Holland, Lachicotte, Skinner and Cain 1998). The figured world is made manifest through people s actions and practice, and it unfolds as a working schema through social processes and history. Values or principles of the figured world function as guides to behaviour: they combine in complex ways for the best 192

205 ends according to specific circumstances. However, in social relations with others, certain principles are subordinated to others. In this particular case, mana is clearly among the leading values and, in the particular circumstances described here, is not negotiable; the rest of the figured world depends on it. A strong and immediate reaction to protect the core value effectively reaffirms the other values and principles, and thus the figured world itself. Within an overall continuity, there is always a process of (re-)emergence and change. Ambiguity and therefore tension are always inherent in the practices through which persons and sub-groups negotiate the various principles. The adjustments that emerge from context and practice are needed to maintain solidarity, to achieve whaanau s collective aims, to optimize the whaanau s mana and to ensure cultural survival. Each case engenders its own practical possibilities and limits through the complex play of the figured world s principles with the objectives of the whaanau at the time. Hastrup (1995) reminds us that cultural reproduction, like cultural production, requires effort. However, this is only possible through change, a conclusion which has proven to be particularly obvious in the case of Maaori living in the city. Diverse motivations among individuals, groups, and Maaori as a people come into play to reinforce the positive values or principles and to avoid negative ones. These motivations include the desire to be accepted and admired, the fear of gossip and explicit and unspoken threats of support withdrawal (Metge 1995: 105), the desire to regain knowledge of traditions, genealogy and the Maaori language, and the vision of increased autonomy for the group. This is not to say that certain aspects of belonging to the whaanau are not solidified or essentialized into stereotypes. This is at work in the case of the rhetoric about urban versus real Maaori that I discussed earlier. But these essentialized aspects also change in the long run, again depending on particular contexts, power relationships and the desire for cultural survival and renewal. The more a situation is politicized, the less flexibility is allowed and the more self-conscious are the persons involved in the reaffirmation/contestation of the directional values and principles of the figured worlds. This is why the value of mana is so non-negotiable in the city and in today s world, where 193

206 powerful forces are at play. Mana is and has been equally important in highly politicized situations in the country or in the past. However, each situation calls for a particular solution, which emerges from a plurality of options that are linked, in turn, to many rhetorical and political possibilities and ways of being Maaori. Dialogic perspectives, such as Bakhtin s (1981), explicitly free us from the idea that we as a group or as individuals can hold only one perspective at a time (Holland, Lachicotte, Skinner and Cain 1998: 15). Each situation thus has a potential for heteroglossia produced by actors plural figured worlds and affected by power relationships, politics, essentialism and stereotypes. Just as regional, national and even globalized socio-politico-historical contexts can bring about variations in the negotiation of whaanau values and actions, so specific criteria governing each principle or value vary from one whaanau or group to the other. These variations, then, depend on particular experiences, relations with others and sensitivities connected with specific histories and contexts. However, they are also governed by cultural and historical codes (or structures) which are firmly internalized and constantly reaffirmed. Above all, they emerge through practice, since change is (of necessity) part of the process of continuity. In fact, the case of David and William serves to seriously question any kind of particularist absolutism, since it is both situational/circumstantial and cultural/structural. I posit that this is where constructivism and culturalism as well as phenomenology and structuralism meet. The figured world of the whaanau in the larger world Like earlier discussions in this thesis, this case study highlights important points about the practical workings of figured worlds as well as the relationships between figured worlds that are not on an equal footing in terms of power. We need to be clear that one (some) figured world(s) here, the figured world of the whaanau is/are predominantly engaged by colonized people (the indigenous minority), while other figured worlds are closely linked to the members of the majority and their sociohistorical realm of interpretation. Firstly, drawing on Austin-Broos (2003), and Beckett (1993), I will discuss 194

207 how the figured world of the whaanau, and any engagement in it, is no longer possible in isolation. For its own survival, the figured world itself must to some extent take into account 101 certain aspects of mainstream figured worlds. People s and groups internal dialogisms will inevitably include an internalization of key elements of the mainstream figured worlds that are essential to survival in the present era. People will also necessarily act and imagine themselves in mainstream figured worlds as well as in the figured world of the whaanau. Secondly, I will show how this has necessarily brought about choices, change and even remodelling of the figured world of the whaanau in order to insure its survival. Thirdly, I will show how the figured world of the whaanau is implicated in the politics of difference, and how Maaori use their engagement in this figured world in order to distance themselves from dominant world-views and realms of interpretation. The scope and power of influence of the figured world of the whaanau will then be underlined. Throughout the discussion, I will also show how the dialogue itself raises problems of negotiation or dilemma (Peterson 1998 in Austin-Broos 2003: 118) within and between realms of interpretation. Unbalanced relationships between figured worlds: the economic reality Maaori today live in a globalized world, under a capitalist world economy, in broad conditions of modernity (perhaps even postmodernity or hypermodernity), and in a historically colonial nation-state. Maaori figured world(s) tend therefore to have to take into account at least some of the aspects or fields of mainstream figured worlds, such as the workplace and welfare and commodities found in supermarkets or other enterprises. These days, Maaori do not live in a (completely) autonomous interpretative universe or figured world that is also totally integrated and indestructible. In fact, various cultural formations sometimes compete, sometimes coexist, articulated perhaps in a makeshift fashion but also separated by disjunctions (Becket 1993: 677). Access to commodities and cash have brought about important changes. We saw in chapter V a historical overview of how the whaanau has changed with colonization, capitalism and life in the 101 Note that I am well aware that the vocabulary used here can give the impression that figured worlds are autonomous entities endowed with consciousness, but it is difficult to do otherwise. I reaffirm here the view according to which figured worlds only live thanks to the persons and groups that reproduce and change them through history. 195

208 city. The figured world itself has changed, even while perpetuating itself, so as to accommodate contemporary obligations towards work, school and leisure activities. Its inherent flexibility has enabled its adaptation to life under new global conditions. Maaori engage with the other spaces or figured worlds that contain essential elements for everyday life and survival. This is all the more true since the fourth Labour government, in the 1980s, put in place free-market policies that turned New Zealand into a laboratory for neo-liberalism on the international scene. In fact, Maaori, like most if not all indigenous people around the world, are reminded every day that their traditional figured world is not sufficient for survival. The whare Maaori, like other peoples traditional places, is an important site for upholding this figured world, especially but not exclusively in the city. But such places also open out onto the larger world. 102 In the example of the whaanau dilemma exposed above, it is clear that money is an important issue, since its abundance or lack will impinge upon a whaanau s everyday survival. David s disruptive behaviour resulted in unforeseen expenses which created enormous stress since even before these expenses, it was already hard enough to make ends meet. The situation around David touched on a sensitive issue, and even if the total amount of money utilised was not large, it could only exacerbate the situation. So, as well as illustrating disrespect for whaanau values and conflict resolution in practice, this example also highlights the penetration of the capitalist world economy, and thus of another realm of interpretation, into the figured world of the whaanau. First and foremost, the whaanau had to deal with David s and his father s behaviour, because it contravened the values of the whare Maaori s favoured figured world and put at risk the whaanau s mana in a highly political arena. However, to a certain degree, their behaviour also put at risk the whaanau strong motivation to engage in another figured world, that of mainstream New Zealand society and the capitalist West in general. I wrote that the whaanau was strongly motivated to engage with the figured world of capitalist mainstream New Zealand because on the one hand, following colonization, land 102 The last chapter of the thesis will be precisely about that opening and its particular modes. 196

209 confiscation and incorporation into the British empire, the New Zealand nation-state and the world economy, Maaori have had hardly any alternative but to rely on cash, commodities and the larger capitalist economy in order to survive. On the other, they do have some choice in their engagement within this figured world, even if their choices are made under a certain pressure to conform. That is to say, they have some room to select their habits of consumption, such as the extent to which they follow the mainstream fashion industry. However, in large part, and particularly at the level of basic everyday necessities (food, fuel, transport), people are almost bound to engage in this figured world. Everyday life in both the city and the country is thus shaped through the very multiplicity of figured worlds. People and groups internalize these diverse figured worlds and, through practice, agency, (re)orchestration, negotiation and choices, they make sense of their own worlds in heteroglossic ways, stressing different aspects of each figured world at different moments. Even in the country, Maaori have to rely on commodities and cash obtained through work or welfare. While modern technology is not always necessary for subsistence, it can be a great help; it is difficult to be completely self-sufficient, even in the country. The pull of the urban world is powerful in the country, too, since people often idealize the life of their city cousins. The symbolic attraction of the capitalist economy thus remains high. Although the majority of the Maaori participants in my research told me repeatedly that money and commodities matter little to Maaori and their status in the community, whaanau or tribe, and do not make one a person of mana, in the practical real world, it is clear that mainstream commodity culture has a huge impact on interpersonal relationships. It allows people to display generosity towards guests, of course, but it also enables them to acquire the latest model of cell-phone, the hottest computer game, the flashest running shoes or the biggest TV set. Of course, these commodities do not mean the same to everybody, but they do have a certain importance, even for Maaori (and especially young Maaori). They allow one to acquire a certain renown, a certain status. Cash and commodities may not be ranked as highly in the value system of the whaanau as in the mainstream world, and the 197

210 same items or habits of consumption may not be valued in the same ways, but cash, commodities and consumption are certainly not devoid of meaning. The values of different figured worlds from that of the whaanau thus intersect with and are, to a certain extent, integrated into it. In fact, success in the so-called Paakehaa world is not so alien to the meaning of mana and its set of rules since, for example, a person can increase his/her inherited mana through personal achievement, and success in the Paakehaa world is often recognized as a mana-conferring form of personal achievement. The importance given to achievement in the Paakehaa world still varies greatly depending on values, persons and groups. Muru-Lanning, in a study about Maaori rangatahi (which could be glossed as youth, but in practice can mean people anywhere between 21 and 50 years old 103 ) and their leadership, writes: Higher education and wealth have become important factors in modern understandings of mana (2004: 10). The same is true for professional success in mainstream society. It should be noted here that money and commodities not only facilitate consumption, but also give access to schooling, professions, and positions of influence. Money and commodities enable appropriation (actual or symbolic) of places such as owner-occupied houses, universities, shops and overseas tourist locations as well as of spaces of recognition and political power within society at large. Maintaining and engaging with the figured world of the whaanau, then, implies also being able to comply with the basic requirements of the capitalist economy, since survival within one figured world is rendered possible through survival within the other. The figured world of the whaanau does not live in isolation, but, as a figured world activated by colonized indigenous people, neither does it simply coexist with the mainstream figured world(s): the power relationship is not in its favour, which exerts a great degree of pressure on Maaori and leads them to engage in mainstream figured world(s). As we are reminded by Austin-Broos (2003: 130), the economic is not completely beyond culture ; rather, it is part of it, even if there are always a variety of possible cultural responses to it. 103 See Muru-Lanning (2004) for more details. 198

211 The need for commodities and money can put a lot of pressure on the whaanau and on the persons who are part of it. In fact, the new exigencies of the modern world provoke other whaanau dilemmas. Whaanau obligations and responsibilities make substantial financial demands on the working members of the whaanau, in order to provide everyone with food, clothes, shoes, furniture, and other necessities, so that they can succeed as individuals at school, at work and among friends in the wider society, as well as fulfilling responsibilities on the marae and in the tribe. Needless to say, caring for a large whaanau is not an easy task. Some people end up just withdrawing from the whaanau s wider obligations, while others will try to fulfil all their responsibilities, putting themselves through a great deal of stress and suffering. Retribalization, that is, the legal reinforcement of tribal entities by the government, has even increased the pressure to engage with and answer to many figured worlds and whaanau, because it called for much genealogical research on the part of those who wanted to benefit from tribal resources and services, and led many city-dwelling Maaori to re-establish contact with their tribe. We have already seen in chapter V the kinds of choices that people must grapple with in this process of engagement and negotiation with many figured worlds. Commodities and money are not only important among Maaori, but also in their relationship with Paakehaa and other New Zealanders. At the level of everyday life, Maaori have to show their success and equality by having great houses with great furniture, great outfits and great cars. This relationship can hold true among neighbours, co-workers, friends and students, and it is also a question of showing one s mana and one s whaanau s mana. I felt that it is particularly important for Maaori who are from a middle-class 104 background and/or live in middle- or upper-class neighbourhoods, where standards of consumption (and their impact on social relationships) are already well established. This can put many Maaori under considerable stress, which is all the more intense when they also have to respond to the whaanau s demands in order to maintain their relationship with it (or them, if they belong to more than one whaanau). This is one of the reasons why some people prefer to live in poorer neighbourhoods, but among Maaori, rather than in better and safer neighbourhoods among Paakehaa. Paakehaa 104 When I refer to social class in this thesis, I refer to the American system. 199

212 do not necessarily have the same standards of consumption as Maaori and, in mainly Paakehaa neighbourhoods, the balance of social power is clearly not in Maaori s favour. The reverse is also true: some Maaori are unable to tolerate the impoverished conditions in which some of their fellow Maaori live, so they move to other, whiter areas, which can also be a way for them to enhance their prestige. Finally, dealing with whaanau every day can simply become too difficult, and moving to another neighbourhood is one way to avoid it. Even traditional places like marae now need money to function properly (Salmond 1975). 105 One cannot feed hundreds of visitors without relying on cash and commodities. Everything has a price: the power and the gas used to cook the food, the new toilet installed, the new carpet laid in the whare nui (meeting house), and so on. Koha (gifts, presents) in kind are good koha, but if everybody paid this way, there would be no money for bills and the marae would be in trouble. So marae now survive thanks to cash and quite utilitarian commodities. I heard tell several times of a group that stayed for a weekend waananga (traditional school of learning) on an Auckland marae and gave as their koha a miniature carving of a Polynesian sailing boat. The craftwork was lovely and greatly admired by the people of the marae, but after the waananga was over, they were heard wondering how it would pay for all the food, hot water and heating that the visitors consumed over the weekend. The fine koha made a great decoration in the wharekai (dining room), but money would have been more appreciated in those circumstances. This new reality has pushed many marae committees to set fees for visitors, according to the number of people, the length of the stay, the kind of food they want, and so forth. 105 Speaking of traditional places or structures, it should be noted that the claim settlements of recent years have left Maaori with a lot of money which was needed for everyday life, for the administration of the tribe, and also for building capacities through tribe services and businesses. For example, [the] agreement known as the Waikato Raupatu Setttlement Act returned to Waikato-Tainui people a small portion of land, compensation of 170 million [New Zealand] dollars and an official apology from the British Crown (McCan 2001:305). Consequently, the reinstatement of tribal lands and new cash-flows has given Waikato- Tainui considerably more power in the Waikato region and transformed the tribe s traditional King Movement social structure (Muru-Lanning 2004: 6). 200

213 Unbalanced relationships between figured worlds: the political facet The unbalanced but unavoidable relationship between mainstream and whaanau/maaori figured worlds is not only of an economic nature: it also has an important political dimension. Politically, engagement with mainstream society is a way to improve the Maaori situation and secure a place in the nation-state. If the whaanau dilemma discussed above had happened in the 1970s, before the Maaori Renaissance and the Maaori movement in education (kohanga reo and kura kaupapa Maaori), very few Maaori would have seen truancy from school as a serious fault. In fact, Maaori truancy is a very old problem, and until fairly recently Maaori parents did not deal with it seriously. This is not the case so much today; according to Te Hoe Nuku Roa Research Team (1999: 75), 43.9% of Maaori consider that mainstream education is extremely important and 47.5% consider it important. To explain this change, we have to look beyond the whaanau to sociocultural transformations and the struggle for affirmation and autonomy throughout Maaori society. People like Parekura Horomia, now Maaori Affairs Minister and Associate Minister of Education, academics such as James Henare, Maharaia Winiata, Bruce Biggs, Hugh Kawharu, Ranginui Walker, Patu Hohepa, Ngapare Hopa, Tamati Reedy, Mason Durie, Linda Tuhiwai Smith and Graham Hingangaroa Smith as well as people directly involved in Maaori education initiatives like Pita Sharples, Whatarangi Winiata, Walter Penetito and Rongo Wetere have done much for Maaori education All of them, and many others, did and still do a great deal to improve Maaori perceptions of schooling and to set standards for Maaori education and qualifications. Maaori schools first started as resistance initiatives (Smith 1997: 227) to combat Maaori underachievement in mainstream schools and respond to the need for Maaori language and cultural revitalization. These schools were incorporated into the state system as a result of the 1989 Education Act (Smith 1997: 227). The state gave Maaori a measure of authority and rights and obtained in exchange some first-rate collaboration on many educational projects. The first kohanga reo (Maaori language early childhood centre) was founded in 1981, and today there are 643 kohanga reo for children 201

214 throughout Aotearoa/New Zealand. 106 The first kura kaupapa Maaori (Maaori language immersion school) was established in 1987 (Smith 1997: 225) and in there were 61 kura kaupapa Maaori throughout Aotearoa/New Zealand. In fact, Te Hoe Nuku Roa Team (1999 : 76) revealed that 55.4% of all Maaori adults consider that Maaori education initiatives are extremely important while 36% consider that they are important. Tribal and pan-tribal authorities have also done their part to encourage Maaori schooling. For example, Muru-Lanning writes that the Waikato-Tainui tribal authority increased its spending on education during the 1990s: While in 1990 only 26 tertiary education scholarships were given to tribal scholars, in 1995 the number increased to 588 (2004: 9). It is widely recognized among Maaori that in today s world, Maaori cannot better themselves as individuals, as whaanau, as tribes or as a people without education, be it Maaori or mainstream. Education is as essential for their everyday lives as it is for their collective participation in New Zealand society and their autonomy in the world at large. Perceptions of schooling and education in general have thus changed a good deal in recent decades, and both are taken much more seriously by Maaori today. This is certainly the case in the whaanau of our example, if not for all Maaori. In fact, Kiri s whaanau, including the children themselves, have been involved in educational initiatives for at least four generations. First, the great-grandfather, Rongo (see the genealogy, appendix G), set up a cultural enrichment programme for urban youth dealing with drug problems and nomadic lives on the streets of Auckland. Teria and Hiko have also been involved in building a marae in South Auckland, a project which had clear educational goals. Teria worked as kaiako (teacher) in the kohanga reo when they moved back to Hiko s tribal area down south. She left the kohanga reo after a few years because of 106 After a constant increase, the number of kohanga reo has gradually decreased since 1995 while in 1994, there were 800 kohanga reo for children. (Ministry of Education, Review of the relationship between the Crown and Te Kohanga Reo National Trust in Ministry of Education, [on-line], (Page consulted on February 16 th, 2003). This is not due to a fall in the birth rate. Some researchers suggest that the system has reached saturation level, and that some Maaori parents are questioning the pragmatic value of these programs in today s world. 107 Ministry of Education, Nga Haeata Matauranga: Annual Report on Maori Education 2001/2002 and Direction for 2003 in Ministry of Education, [on-line], d=1063 (Page consulted on February 16 th, 2003). 202

215 internal whaanau conflicts. Hiko and she are now taking a correspondence course in Maaori studies and Hiko also works as kaumaatua (elder) in a health organisation. Kiri is responsible for a Maaori and Pacific Island cultural program in collaboration with a team of kaumaatua (elders) in a hospital. Kiri is also a university student, and dreams that her children will all go to university and get diplomas that will give them a good standing in society in general, but also a position of influence for the future of Maaori. Rangi, Kiri s sister was teaching in a kohanga reo in her husband s tribal area, but moved back to Auckland to study for a teaching qualification while working as kaiawhina (teacher s assistant) in a Maaori bilingual unit in a mainstream primary school in South Auckland. Three of Kiri and Rangi s other sisters go to university, studying in different disciplines. This whaanau thus takes a particularly favourable view of schooling, and clearly recognizes how important it is to obtain qualifications, not only for whaanau members own sake, but also for the good of Maaori more generally. In fact, all five sisters are directing their schooling and future career towards a field in which they will work for and/or with Maaori. Last but not lease, Whetu s daughter goes to kohanga reo. All this does not mean, however, that in everyday life at 30 Aroha Street, the children s schooling and homework always takes priority. With all the worry of having a big whaanau on top of a regular workload, their energy goes first on fire-fighting, that is they deal first with critical problems and then, if they still have time, they will go to parents meetings at school, inquire about the children s school performance and, sometimes, remind the children to do their homework. Rangi is clearly the one who keeps on top of the children to do their homework, given that she works at the children s school and has time available. She also feels she has considerable responsibility for it. At 30 Aroha Street, schooling is important, but everyday subsistence, primary cares and chores and the occasional crisis demand a lot of attention, energy and time, which leaves little for routine matters of education. 203

216 The New Zealand State has done a great deal to encourage Maaori to go back to school. In fact, Maaori, like all other New Zealanders, cannot escape schooling: as individuals they need a certain amount of formal education to state standards in order to gain employment, but as a collectivity, they need schooling in order to participate in the nation as partners. In that, the case study whaanau acts and reacts as members of a larger group, the Maaori people. It also acts and reacts in relation to a rationality that has taken form throughout history and has been internalized, embodied, incorporated through everyday practices in a particular space/time. I have to specify here that Maaori, and indigenous people in general, have a particular inclination for choices, reactions or codes which are first and foremost all collective. The reaction/decision that ended the whaanau s dilemma was not an improvization, as defined by Holland, Lachicotte, Skinner and Cain (1998), since most Maaori people with whom I discussed the case would have reacted in similar ways. Nor was it the fruit of a deep and lengthy debate about values and principles, even if the whaanau members did discuss the best action to take, and even if schooling is important to them. The action/reaction followed from whaanau habitus, which was itself part of a larger rationality within Maaori and New Zealand politics and, in this particular case, a bicultural ideology, as we shall see below. The decision was supported by almost everybody, which clearly shows that it was the best way to preserve the unity that was threatened from both inside and outside the whaanau at once. The action/reaction resulted from the sense that such an uncertain situation could not continue indefinitely. The whaanau felt it had no other option. William s and David s departure from the house was, ultimately, a relief. However, it is clear that the outcome of a conflict or dilemma is never determined in advance. In David s case, some important factors played against him: when the school representative called, he was already stigmatized by his defiant attitude and bad behaviour and by his whaangai status of living with his father but also being cared for by Kiri and the other adults of the house. Kiri was also highly preoccupied with a range of pressing issues and demands at the time. 204

217 The bicultural ideology of Aotearoa/New Zealand was in fact built from the Treaty of Waitangi (see appendix A), the founding document of the New Zealand nation-state, which recognizes an equal partnership between Maaori and Paakehaa, as we saw in chapter I. This Treaty is all the more important in the figured world of the whaanau, where the ancestors provide precedents for acceptable behaviours. Specific precedents, such as contracts, are binding for the ancestors descendants (Paterson 1992: 82). Referring specifically to the Treaty of Waitangi, Moana Jackson explains: Because it was so ordained and acted upon by ancestors as a solemn agreement, it is a kawenata or spiritual covenant that cannot be lightly dismissed. This spiritual aspect does not mean that the Treaty is separate from the material world, but rather that the material rights are guaranteed and have spiritual sanction. Like the other acts of tipuna which came to be regarded as precedent, the Treaty was thus regarded as an affirmation of rangatiratanga and hence a confirmation of the authority implicit in that term to act on behalf of the iwi and to bind them in their future conduct (Jackson 1988 in Patterson 1992 : 82) The Treaty, then, becomes a tactical (ideological) interpretative frame used to stage a potentially equal dialogue with the dominant Paakehaa society (Allen 2002). In spite of its long history of non-recognition and/or non-respect by the Paakehaa or British party, the Treaty has been taken as an ideological base to think about Maaori and Paakehaa relationships in New Zealand society in general as well as in public institutions and government. Indirectly, the problem of David not going to school is related to that bicultural ideology: his behaviour contravenes the spirit of the Treaty, since by his absenteeism, David is failing to prepare himself and his whaanau to fulfil their role as Treaty partners. The whaanau, quite obviously, did not discuss the problem in these terms, but the spirit of the Treaty implies practical demands that are well internalized. Treaty responsibilities and rights are asserted time and time again in public discourse and at diverse public and private meetings on marae and elsewhere. Again, the internalized pan-ethnic code, embodied as common sense, pushed whaanau members to react strongly and swiftly when the circumstances dictated it. The norms and the new value of education for Maaori were in fact respected by the whaanau as an internalized code for life under biculturalism. The code is made up of embodied, self-evident values which go beyond the cognized sort common to intellectual reasoning (Desjarlais 1992: 71). 205

218 Thus, it is important to recognize here the fact that the figured world of the whaanau is influenced by the general history of both Maaori and non-maaori society. It is also important to avoid viewing the distinction between internalized/embodied meaning and ideational/ideological meaning as absolute and as characteristic of two types of people, namely, members of a certain elite as opposed to ordinary people. Both modes of meaning can be differently at play in diverse settings and general time/space (Halliburton 2002 in Arno 2003; Desjarlais 1992), and in practice people switch from one mode to the other. It is in this framework that we need to understand the coexistence of various figured worlds and the relationships between them. It also helps to understand the final whaanau decision of expelling David and his father from the house. In fact, when I discussed my analysis with university colleagues back home, many were surprised at the whaanau s decision. They expected the whaanau to unite in the face of Paakehaa intrusion and defend David from it, even if in private they strongly disagreed with him and his father (albeit for different reasons to the Paakehaa). An understanding of such situations thus requires an analysis of the precise context of the problem and its resolution, as well as of larger socio-political and historical forces: there is no preexisting causal model of explanation. The situation expected by my colleagues might have happened if, for example, the Paakehaa school had been at fault or responsible in some way for David s truancy. Other authors have said that one possible response to a threat to the whaanau s mana from outsiders is to unite and forget about internal quarrels (Pere 1997 in Metge 1995). In fact, the whaanau does not hesitate to criticize the school and stand up for its members when necessary. This happened on a couple of occasions while I was there. When Paua ran off from school and disappeared for a whole day, the whaanau blamed the school for not giving him appropriate support for his behavioural and learning difficulties; everybody was upset by the fact that he was neglected in this respect by his teacher, an educational psychologist and a social worker. Why did he stay outside the school when the bell rang? Why did nobody look for him, or even realize that he was not in the mainstream classroom to which he had just been transferred because he was no longer allowed in the bilingual unit? Do such things happen only or mainly to Maaori students? 206

219 And if he had been Paakehaa, would the teacher have noticed his absence? Once again, the mana of the whaanau was at stake since, in this story, it was the parents who were accused of not doing enough. I also remember that Kiri, supported by Rangi who was part of the school team, decided to withdraw two of the whaanau s children, Paua and Mahora, from the school s annual trip to a series of marae in the country up north because she considered that the teachers and parents even if they were all Maaori did not take enough responsibility for the children s behaviour and did not know enough about marae protocols. Having been part of the trip the year before, she thought that parents and teachers let the children do whatever they liked. This year, she did not want to be associated with the project and did not want the children to have such an experience. Kiri s reaction was again linked to the whaanau s values. And the whaanau s mana was once more the value that determined the final decision: if the children, the whaanau s children, were seen on those marae behaving incorrectly or accompanying people who were behaving incorrectly, the whaanau s mana was at risk of being diminished in the eye of the taaangata whenua (hosts or people of the place) of these marae. Rangi supported Kiri s decision, since she herself did not agree with the way things were going, but being kaiawhina and not full teacher, she could not impose her view within the school team or with the parents. Kiri s intervention was also a way to attract the attention of the principal a Paakehaa woman to the negative dynamic reigning in the bilingual unit, and to ask for changes. This second example, as well as showing the complexity of the figured world of the whaanau and its codes, also demonstrates its heteroglossia: the figured world of the whaanau has an internal dialogism which allows for a plurality of rhetorics and ways of being and reacting in the lived world of everyday life. It is thus essential to avoid reducing Maaori life in the city and beyond to a monoglossic model. This second example also shows how disagreement and power relationships are part of the dynamic not only between Maaori and Paakehaa, but also among Maaori. Certain Paakehaa can become very important allies, as happened in the case of the Paakehaa school principal who finally made sure that the correct protocols were taught to the children and respected during their trip. This strategy also aimed to protect the whaanau s mana, and serves to illustrate that mana can 207

220 be protected/ acquired in diverse ways. Diverse strategies coexist and are available in practice, depending on particular circumstances and configurations of larger forces. The whaanau also expands when necessary to include allies, Maaori or not. To return to the subject of finances, it is doubtless not a shock that in this day and age money is essential for ensuring that the Maaori political struggle continues. While I do not devote much discussion to political struggle in this thesis, it is still, of course, important. Money is needed to pay for lawyers, advisers, Maaori delegates to the United Nations, and trips around the world to build solidarity networks with other minority populations and indigenous peoples. Money enables Maaori artists to exhibit or perform at international arts venues. At a local level, it is needed for organizing Maaori festivals, performing at local venues, organizing workshops or seminars or waananga (meetings called to discuss particular teachings or issues) about the Maaori language, Maaori traditions, Maaori arts and crafts. Money management is dealt with at different levels: sometimes decisions are taken at the whaanau level, sometimes at the hapuu or iwi level and sometimes in pan-tribal organizations or other non-traditional Maaori groupings. I have shown here the impact of dominant figured worlds on the figured world of the whaanau, but the latter also has an impact on the other figured worlds of today. While it may not make much of an impact in the domain of economics, the figured world of the whaanau certainly influences the political spheres of mainstream figured worlds. The official recognition of the Treaty of Waitangi and the partnership that it implies, as well as other socio-political gains, would seem to demonstrate that in the end, assimilationist and later integrationist policies of the various British and New Zealand governments through history have not been a great success. The central importance of the whaanau and its particular values and principles have also been acknowledged recently in other laws. For example, in the Mental Health (Compulsory Assessment and Treatment) Act 1992, family and whaanau views are taken into consideration in applications for compulsory treatment, although in practice, the opportunities for families and whaanau to participate in decisions to discharge patients to the care of relatives are limited (Durie 1997b: 13). The Children, Young Persons and Their Families Act 1989 also allows for whaanau and 208

221 iwi to be involved in decisions about care, protection and youth justice processes (Durie 1997b: 13). Durie (1997b: 13-14), also cites Te Ture Whenua Maaori Act 1993 as one of a few examples of laws emphasizing whaanau and hapuu values in relation to Maaori land and succession rights. These gains underline the importance of Maaori affirmation and resistance. Places like the whare Maaori, a key site of affirmation and resistance, are essential for the strengthening and therefore ensuring the continuity of the figured world of the whaanau, in the face of other powerful figured worlds. The whare Maaori, like other specifically Maaori sites of affirmation and resistance such as marae, allows Maaori to reinforce solidarity within the group, and thus shape and strengthen what being Maaori means. The whaanau and/or the family Since figured worlds are never singular and do not work in isolation (see chapter I), Maaori do not always project and imagine themselves or act within the guiding principles or universe of meanings of the whaanau. As city-dwellers, but also as a colonized people in the context of early 21 st century globalization, Maaori engage in numerous figured worlds which coexist and confront each other. However, people do not always conceive of their engagement in today s Aotearoa/New Zealand in this way. Maaori today often say that they participate on a daily basis in two different worlds, one being Maaori and the other Paakehaa. In this dichotomist view, everything seems to belong to either the Maaori world or the Paakehaa world. For example, Maaori university students told me that the marae and the Maaori Studies department constitute the Maaori world while, on the other side (of the parking lot) is the Paakehaa world. Margaret also explained to me that the only time she does not feel the existence of two different worlds is at international rugby matches, where everybody wants the team representing Aotearoa/New Zealand to win. As soon as the match ends, she said, everything return to the normal and you stop talking and smiling to the Paakehaa fellow beside you. In the car park, after the game, one can already feel that there are two different worlds, she said. The two worlds seem to have an important embodied 209

222 dimension: You feel it! In fact, quite apart from what Maaori express with words, many boundaries between worlds are made visible through people s actions and reactions, the way they speak, they way they walk, their posture, and sometimes just the feeling of a place or the general atmosphere among people. While on the one hand these were just the terms in which they spoke to me, the anthropologist, on the other, it sounded as if reality really was divided into well-defined, bounded, exclusive worlds. It is not my intention here to reify this dichotomy between the Maaori and the Paakehaa worlds. My aim rather is to analyze the rhetorical processes, as well as the practices which sometimes reinforce the dichotomy and sometimes blur the boundaries or show how irrelevant they can be in certain contexts. Observing people s everyday behaviour and practices has taught me that diverse worlds exist, coexist and interrelate, and that the boundaries that distinguish them are often rather blurred. The boundaries (and the blurring of them) are not perceived or experienced in the same way by all Maaori (or Paakehaa), depending on many factors like particular circumstances, personal and collective comfort (see chapter VII) in the different figured worlds and particular periods of life, as well as the larger socio-political context and global forces. Cafés, to repeat an example used earlier, are clearly not part of the Maaori world. One exception is a café in Auckland where all the owners and the staff are Maaori, as is the décor. Still, the café serves no kai Maaori (Maaori food), with the exception of kuumara (sweet potato), so people often ask for boil-up nights in order to make it even more Maaori. Some Maaori do frequent cafés in general, but they are often from a particular socio-economic background and are particularly comfortable in places characteristic of a certain middle-class intellectual Paakehaa universe. Maaori students from university also learn to frequent cafés, probably because it is part of student culture. The cafés on campus are more pleasant than the large cafeterias and they have multiplied in recent years, as they have in the city more generally. Carter and Maynard (2001: 104) allude to the current café culture in Aotearoa/New Zealand. From one semester to the next, I noticed that many of the Maaori students who were among my first contacts at university began to enjoy going to cafés, first at university they even nearly 210

223 appropriated the entire terrace of the café in the Human Sciences building for a semester and then elsewhere in the city. It became a nice way to relax with others and talk about university, work, personal life and Maaori events and news. For many of them, frequenting cafés was quite a new thing, as they were used to suburban pubs and family restaurants, Chinese takeaways and American fast food restaurants. These students reasons for going to cafés were not the same as their reasons for going to KFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken) or Denny s. Cafés came to be mainly associated not with food and eating, but with pleasure and a sense of well-being (Stephens 1997 in Carter and Maynard 2001: 103). I think that the power of place has played a huge role here in changing the students attitudes towards cafés and making them more comfortable in them. By frequenting cafés, the students began to internalize and embody the ways in which that type of place works. Maaori friends accompanied me to cafés on special occasions, but many were clearly not relaxed or not at ease. They seemed to withdraw or close in on themselves, looking around suspiciously. In one case that I remember well, they declared the food to be not very good and overly expensive (although it was not necessarily more expensive than what they were eating elsewhere). The portions, in particular, were considered to be far too small. The excitement of going to the café was soon transformed into disappointment and unease. Others tried to counter their uneasiness by being very demanding to the waitress, speaking loudly and authoritatively. Kiri, who I knew quite well by then, used that strategy, which sounded strange and exaggeratedly assertive to me. Other places are also obviously not part of the Maaori world: M. Do you know Diane? She s from university. J. You ll know her. She is a fine looking woman, short hair. You know her, very healthy. I go to her place, she has a very, very beautiful home, very beautiful. ( ) M. I get nervous there. I don t feel comfortable in her home. I, Mihi. Yeah, I spent most of the time outside, smoking cigarettes. I don t feel comfortable there. As much as I love her, you know, she s a really wonderful woman, but no, I don t feel comfortable in her home. J. Just for me, it s very nice, they have like a separate dining room for formal dinners ( ) and fluffy couch [laughter], very, it is very I mean in the bathroom M. Nice smelling toilet paper! 211

224 J. ( ) It s just because we are in different circles. (Mihi and Joanna) This example shows that the dichotomy between the Paakehaa and Maaori worlds is closely related to socio-economic factors and to the social networks, places and spaces in which people are engaged. Aroha, Mere and Maata affirm themselves as Maaori but are clearly at ease in mainstream worlds. They all either have or have had a Paakehaa husband and benefit from socio-economic conditions which allow them to buy stylish goods and clothes. They would not feel the same sense of being alien to Diane s house, and would not consider it as a different or Paakehaa world because it is also their world. So, the demarcation of the frontier between Maaori and Paakehaa depends on both one s background and one s living milieu. In the teachers room at Rangi s school, the Maaori staff sit on one side of the room (in the back corner) and all the Paakehaa teachers on the other. When I walked in the room for the first time, it was very obvious. I could sense the discomfort on both sides when an interaction was necessary. I could feel misunderstanding and solitude on both sides of the fence. In fact, neither side really knows the other. Most Maaori are too shy to speak to the Paakehaa staff. A couple of Paakehaa teachers tried a couple of times to greet the Maaori staff by a Kia ora, pronounced à la Paakehaa with the English r (the Maaori r is rolled on the tip of the tongue, like in Spanish). When they received no positive reaction or even no reaction at all in return, they stopped, which contributed to the maintenance of the boundaries. Rhetorical processes also essentialize the Paakehaa or the Maaori as a group and prevent people from interacting with people from the other group. All the same, through everyday meetings and practice, the stereotypes and stigma are often put to the test and slowly disappear. Everywhere, there are people that I call boundary-crossers, even in that school. Rangi is a boundary-crosser (like those Paakehaa who first tried to say Kia ora ). I would not say and neither would she that she is bicultural, but this only shows that biculturalism is a question of degree and comes gradually with knowledge and experience of the others, of other figured worlds and of places and spaces. Rangi seems to be the one who opens breaches in the boundaries symbolic as they are to establish relationships. She 212

225 began by saying a timid Kia ora from time to time when she arrived at school, and this eventually grew into a loud and enthusiastic Kia ora! every morning. She also varied her vocabulary in order to add to their knowledge of the Maaori language. Rangi makes a clear and constant effort to open and maintain the passages or interconnections between both worlds. She also makes a conscious effort to speak to the Paakehaa staff and sit on their side of the room. This was not easy, and felt almost confrontational at first, but she now feels more and more comfortable among the others and she can feel that in the main, the staff enjoy her joie de vivre and her Maaori teachings. Her level of comfort in the school and with the other teachers has greatly increased since she arrived there, as has her self-confidence. On my last visit to the school it seemed to me that the other teachers also felt more comfortable. Some replied to her morning Kia ora, and their strong Paakehaa accents no longer matter, because they know that she is understanding and open-minded, and she knows that they are making an effort. The dichotomy is also linked to stereotypes and essentialist assumptions about how and what Maaori should be: not too wealthy, not too slim, not too well-dressed. In fact, as some Maaori point out, it sometimes looks as if the closer one s profile matches the statistics about, for instance, Maaori poor health or precarious socio-economic conditions, the more Maaori one is. For other Maaori, however, these criteria about looks and wealth are indeed used to disqualify someone from being a real Maaori and qualify them as urban Maaori, that is, an assimilated or fragmented Maaori. Such stereotypes are also imposed in practice by the state and the media: in official political discourse, official programs and promotion campaigns, the state favours certain Maaori symbols and certain Maaori ways which are then used by Maaori to identify themselves and to present themselves to others. Maaori people and groups also exercise their agency by using stereotypes to promote a certain kind of Maoriness or certain ways of being Maaori. I often heard comments such as Look at her! She is dressed like a Paakehaa!. This would be said about people who wear and like fashionable clothing, sophisticated jewellery made of gold, for example, instead of only pounamu (greenstone), which has a symbolic value among Maaori). In practice, not having a Maaori look or being a white 213

226 Maaori can be used as a factor of exclusion even if one respects the whakapapa principles and behaves according to tikanga most of the time. People who are the target of such comments often experience quite turbulent emotions. Some react with a strong assertiveness: There is this girl at University that I met. Awesome, very Paakehaa-looking, fair as you, but she wanted her Maaori side to come out so she would wear all the things in her hair: big long pounamu earrings, all the Maaori-style clothing and she would wear that all the time so people would say Oh no! She is Maaori, even though she was blonde. (Mere) So, by using Maaori symbols, one will assert one s place within the whaanau - here, the huge Maaori whaanau. Some use more specific symbols to assert their membership of more restricted groupings, like a particular kapa haka ropuu (or whaanau) or a specific iwi or hapuu. To this effect, many wear t-shirts that claim belonging to particular whaanau, hapuu or iwi. Others have moko (traditional tattoos) and contemporary tattoos which often contain the symbols of particular affiliations. Moreover, te reo Maaori (Maaori language) has long been recognized as central to Maaori identities. Tensions often arise between speakers and non-speakers of te reo, and between those who have learnt te reo in the countryside and those who have learnt it in the city. Te reo Maaori is thus another factor which plays a big role in the way Maaori articulate their narratives of identity. Kepa drew my attention to the fact that even the way that Maaori speak English has an effect on their recognition by others as Maaori, as well as on their self-identification. He explained to me, There are those who look at me and tell [me] I am not a Maaori because I don t have... I don t speak like a Maaori. So he discovered that sometimes he adapts his mode of speaking to his audience: My language changes depending on whom I am speaking with, a range of modes of speaking, different modes of speaking. (...) The whole idea of switching to different modes of speaking only came to me last year or the year before. (...) It was an instantaneous switch and I had to switch and that is when I realized that yeah, I do change my mode of speaking. (Kepa) 214

227 These language factors seem to add to the existing tensions between Maaori born in the country and raised in their tribe and Maaori born in the city who, in certain cases, have weaker ties with their tribe(s) and less contact with tikanga. My experience was also that people introduced themselves differently, depending on the addressee; they even used different names. Some take on new Maaori names when they begin another period of their life during which they are particularly close to or in search of their taha Maaori (Maaori side). Some will use one of the Maaori names on their birth certificate while others just take on a Maaori name which derives directly from their English name. Starting studying the Maaori language, for example, seems to mark an important phase where many Maaori decide to use a Maaori name. This was the case for Fiona: she wanted to make it clear that she was Maaori and for her, her identity as Maaori is related to her name, which is an external, public sign that tells everybody Maaori or not that she is Maaori. Reuniting with whaanau or Maaori relatives can also be the point when people take up a Maaori name. The new name is part of a larger process of discovery or reconnection with their taha Maaori. Matiu, who has Rarotongan (Cook Islands) as well as Maaori ancestry, will project either one identity or the other, depending on the context: When I am with the Maaori, a lot of the times, I just say No, I m a Coconut [nickname for Rarotongans], I m Raro and if I am in a situation that I can t understand, I will just go to my Raro and blame it on my Raro side, but I am a Maaori when it comes to a Raro. ( ) If I stuff up and they say you, Coconut! where there is difficult situations, and it is easy for us to blame it on, not blame it, but you know, use you other side as a scapegoat. (Matiu) This example also clearly shows that there are other realities besides the dichotomous Maaori / Paakehaa worlds. In the so-called Paakehaa world, there is no doubt that Matiu presents himself as Maaori, but among Maaori, he also sometimes plays on his Rarotongan identity. Schwimmer (2004a, 1999) convincingly highlights that Maaori are skilled in operating on several different levels of meanings at the same time. He gives the example of the Maaori 215

228 educational programs which conform to the Ministry of Education criteria, but also succeed in carrying out purely Maaori objectives. They play on the potential for polysemy of words in both Maaori and English, which allows them to respond to the main demands of all the figured worlds involved. Then, depending on the space/time and circumstances, some aspects of the figured worlds or some meanings are favoured over others. The ambiguity inherent in many Maaori narratives, acts and discourses becomes a powerful resource in dealing with particular whaanau members or wider forces like the New Zealand State. Bicultural actors are particularly skilled at heteroglossia, but they are also the ones who can be most easily excluded from the whaanau, being either too Paakehaa or not Maaori enough, and certainly something other than clearly, identifiably Maaori. A bicultural person can all too easily be seen as a traitor or someone lacking authenticity when important issues are at stake. The essentialist dichotomy then functions as a political strategy and as a tool to exercise power, deliver ideological messages and justify oneself. It aims sometimes at excluding others and sometimes at proving one s identity as Maaori. One of the participants in my research, for example, often said that he lives in the Maaori world while urban Maaori live in the Paakehaa one, denying them, by the same token, a true or real Maaori identity. In fact, he often called them riiwai or potato, that is, brown on the outside and white inside, meaning that the only Maaori thing about them is the colour of their skin. The use of this expression is in fact quite widespread by people who claim with a certain arrogance that they know the true way to be Maaori. Others expressions in use include Ngati Tupperware or Ngati Plastic. The prefix Ngati or Ngai or Nga means of that person : traditional groupings have an eponymous ancestor from which they descend, such that the iwi descended from Porou, Whatua, Puhi and Tahu will be called Ngati Porou, Ngati Whatua, Nga Puhi and Ngai Tahu, for instance (Weymouth 2003). In that sense, calling someone Ngati Tupperware says to him/her that he/she has lost his/her ancestral affiliation, he/she does not know where he/she comes from, he/she is a nobody in Maaori terms. And Tupperware, like Plastic, is used to emphasize the artificial or 216

229 inauthentic character of a person in his/her identification as Maaori. Others will say that these inauthentic others are Pakehafied. These rhetorical categories are quite interesting to examine, since almost everyone except for a few people of great mana who are widely recognized as embodying true Maoriness is someone else s riiwai. Such name-calling involves a lot of suffering. In fact, the people who are called these names usually behind their back or in very subtle ways are often deeply hurt. The unpleasant names often touch the sore points of issues that they have grappled with for years. When they become more self-confident and know more about Maaori and Paakehaa figured worlds, however, they are not as affected by these names and by others opinions about their Maoriness. Mere explains: But I can t be totally bicultural if I don t have the reo, that is my personal view. I am going to be more Paakehaa until that happens, that side is going to be stronger than the Maaori side. ( ) I just have that feeling and then, I could be wrong. I have a strong sense of tikanga. I don t know the reo, I can t speak te reo. I understand a lot, but I can t speak it. I am not a comfortable speaker, but I do embrace tikanga more, so I don t know if that makes me more qualified. I don t know, but being able to sit back and see both sides and having that balance and you know, when things don t upset you, but it doesn t mean you are any less Maaori, it just means that you are past that stage of worrying about those kinds of things [being told that she is Pakehafied]. (Mere) Upbringing, life and work experience and overseas travel contribute to making people more at ease in both universes, Maaori and Paakehaa: I must be bicultural because I am comfortable wherever. It has been a long time since I have been uncomfortable. It must have been when I was flying when I was an air hostess, and very discreet, but racism very subtle, but racism nevertheless. I left in 1984 and I got used to it there and I am quite an assertive person, and I really haven t put up with rubbish since! [laughter] (Mere) So, working with the public in a mainstream kind of job seems to improve one s knowledge and internalization of the Paakehaa figured world, and thus one s selfconfidence in that world. Going back to my data, I was struck by the fact that five of the participants in my research had worked in some way in the aviation industry, a very mainstream work environment, as flight attendants or clerks. Four of them Pita, Aroha, Mere and Maata no longer work in this field, but they are all surprisingly self-confident 217

230 in both Maaori and Paakehaa worlds. All have developed strong interests in such typically un-maaori things as travel abroad, classical music, Western arts and the fashion industry. Their houses, which are all situated in predominantly Paakehaa areas, are decorated according to the latest interior decoration trends. All of them are mature students at university, doing graduate studies in domains in which their future work will be of direct benefit to Maaori. Aroha, Mere, and Maata already work specifically with Maaori in order to improve Maaori living, educational and health care conditions. Of the four, only Pita speaks te reo fluently. Aroha and Mere can understand spoken Maaori language, but cannot comfortably speak it. This does not stop them from feeling at ease in Maaori environments. Both are highly knowledgeable in tikanga. Maata is the one who has had to learn the most, since she was raised in Auckland, and spent my childhood growing up in the 60s and 70s in what I would term a fairly Paakehaa Western Eurocentric model (Maata). Aroha has one explanation for certain persons or groups qualifying others as Pakehafied : I heard people say Oh! You re pakehafied. ( ) But what is that? I think it s because I met I can be with different people. I can get on with you, you re not a Maaori. You come completely from a different place. ( ) Sitting with you, I feel comfortable. ( ) maybe it s because I feel spiritual, maybe that s why I feel so comfortable ( ) It s knowing where I come from, but it s also having that element of belief, of spirituality, of believing in the power of our ancestors. (Aroha) It does indeed seem that those who call others Pakehafied feel uncomfortable with these people who can move through different worlds so easily. They may indeed feel jealous of this ease and will simply eject the bicultural person out of the us, out of the whaanau. Bicultural people can claim belonging to both worlds, to a certain degree, and can move more freely between the worlds than their non-bicultural relatives or colleagues. Bicultural people can be very disturbing; in highly politicized situations, their allegiances are often doubted and they may even be accused of being traitors. Bicultural people who are used to living in the central or northern sectors of Auckland are not necessarily comfortable in all Maaori environments. Some of them will certainly not 218

231 be at ease in parts of South Auckland where there is widespread poverty among Maaori (see appendix E for a map showing economic disparities according to areas of the city). For their part, South Auckland Maaori can appear to lack enough pride to be real Maaori, due to their physical appearance or poor housing conditions. They can also be perceived as acculturated because they never show up on the marae in the country for tangihanga (funerals) or other events. Most of the time, however, this is not because they do not want to go, but because they cannot: they do not have a car or they do not have enough money to take the bus or they must stay in the city to look after their children or other dependants. Besides, they may feel that they will not be well received after such a long absence. It is a vicious circle. These are the people then perceived by others as riwaii, or urban, acculturated or disconnected Maaori. Thus, if we take a closer look at the Maaori and the Paakehaa worlds and the boundaries between them, we soon realize that they are not so well defined. We can also note the existence of other worlds, which leads us on to the idea of a multiplicity of possible figured worlds, and the heteroglossic and changing ways that people can imagine themselves through these worlds. In listening attentively to Joanna and Mihi, it seems that our (Maaori) world is the world of the whaanau. This is not necessarily entirely Maaori just think of Kiri s whare Maaori which includes Paakehaa and people of Chinese and Tongan descent. Our world is the intimate world of the us, while the other world is everything outside the intimate circle or whaanau. Joanna and Mihi are not simply reaffirming the dichotomy between Maaori and Paakehaa. Rather, they reveal the fluidity, interpenetration and complex character of the diverse worlds as they are lived. J. Paakehaa environment ( ) I don t have a lot to do with that. I mean, my friends are Maaori, people I work with are Maaori, I don t I mean the environment is Paakehaa, but it doesn t affect [me] like that because at the end of the day, the people I associate with they are Maaori. I don t see my life as being any different all I see is that it s good for Maaori to live in, among a group of other people. N. Do you feel like that too? M. I don t know. I only know the same whaanau in West Auckland. I don t know anyone else. Cousins, yeah. 219

232 N. Like at university and M. All my friends are Maaori there. N. So you don t consider me as your friend [joking]. M. I mean, yeah! [laughs] J. But that s what we mean, you fit in. I don t look at things as a Paakehaa world, I don t look at you and say You re not Maaori. N. It s not separate like that. J. No. It s not that black and white. It can t be, I mean. M. I have never really thought about it. J. But it can t be because M. Like for me, I have never really thought of that you re white and we re all black kind of thing. I have never I don t know J. We keep into our world. It s like we live in different worlds and when we say that all our friends and everything we do is Maaori, because those Paakehaa who come over to this side, and it s our M. And it s part of the life. J. It s part of this world. N. Your world. J. Yeah, yeah, it s like we have created our world in another world, you know what I mean? N. And you don t go out very often in the other one? S. We don t need to. There is enough going on in our world. J. We just basically, we work, we socialize on the weekend, we have each other s children and that s our life. There is no something else on the other side that I want to see. I don t make a point of going to places that I don t know. Because they re not my friends, I don t have Paakehaa friends! [laughter] (Joanna, Mihi, and Simone) Thus, in addition and sometimes in contradiction to the classic dichotomy between the two worlds, participants in this research referred to other worlds or other universes of meanings within the Maaori world itself. For example, two Maaori men in their late fifties who are native Maaori speakers, Hiko and Arana, spoke to me about experiences of multiple worlds of meanings in relation to their ability to speak English as well as te reo Maaori. They told me that they are someone different when they koorero (speak or give a speech) in Maaori on a marae than when they speak English, or even te reo, in their daily lives. Hiko insisted on the idea that he is not playing a role on the marae; it is not like being on the stage of a theatre. He really is someone else in a different universe of meaning, in a different world. After his koorero, Hiko returns to the person that he is as an English speaker or as an everyday speaker of te reo. Tauni explained to me than he similarly engages in two different worlds of meaning. Each of these men s different worlds or figured worlds are equally Maaori, however. Fiona, a young Maaori woman who learnt te reo in city schools and at university seems to experience something similar when she is on a marae speaking Maaori or performing the karanga (ceremonial call). 220

233 Hiko and Fiona describe one world as being the marae world, that is to say the holistic world of tikanga Maaori, the tiipuna (the ancestors) and the spirits, while the other world is the world of their everyday lives where they speak both Maaori and English. Many participants in this research mentioned that those who are intensely involved in the Maaori world and entirely reliant on the whaanau might encounter problems in the long run. Sooner or later, other members of the whaanau might have their own preoccupations and problems or a kaupapa whaanau might break down, which can lead to feelings of loneliness and isolation and the loss of a support network. In fact, there is a lot of pressure put on whaanau links in today s world, where people are pushed to perform as individuals. At the same time, this unavoidable individualistic tendency also allows whaanau members to be more flexible in participating in whaanau life and engaging in different figured worlds. This flexibility also shapes their identities and the heteroglossic ways in which they engage in both the so-called Maaori world and the wider society. Ruka explained the choices he had made in order to keep a balance between the Maaori world of the marae and the whaanau and the larger world in which he also participates with his family: I used to be here [on the marae] just about every day ( ) We were here on Tuesday night, Thursday night, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights, so in some cases my whole life was revolving a bit too much around the marae. Hence, I ended up going out and making affiliations with other groups and organizations. I just went and played rugby league for instance and went and did some sporting activities and that, just break up my weekly routine and that. Because I found a lot of people that I know here, friends and that I have on the marae, if you were to take the marae away from them, they would have nothing. So I am very much quite the person who likes to still interact with the rest of the community, which is why I went to play league for a season. ( ) The marae is very much a large part of my family s life, but it is not our whole life. We have other goals and other aspirations that we would like our children to achieve and for us to do that we need to interact with other parts of society as well as that to become a reality ( ) I think it is for a lot of Maaori on this marae anyway, the marae becomes that much a part of their life that when it comes time for them to head out and seek out their educational or vocational pathways, they are a bit intimidated by that side of the world because they have only kept themselves on this side of the world or on a marae side of the line and they are very intimidated by those responses, for the reaction they will get when they meet up again with the greater community, so with that sense I think it s very crucial that they grow up respecting the marae, but making it a part of their life and not their whole life. Because they could be setting themselves up for a rude awakening later on. (Ruka) 221

234 Mere similarly feels that for Maaori to be able to make positive changes for Maaori, it is important for them to engage and balance their achievements in both worlds, a skill which is encouraged in many educational centres. Usually, students come into an institute, they are very individualistic. They come in for themselves and I am going to pass, no matter what. I don t care about the next person. And then, through coming to resource centre, our concepts there are yes, we do that, but we don t put the qualification up there at the highest we put being Maaori alongside qualifications so we are walking in both worlds, but there is that balance and that is what we try to achieve, is a good balance. (Mere) For some, having a Paakehaa partner opens their eyes to their Maaori identity, Maaori particularities, and the Maaori world in general. It also sometimes creates an urge to rebalance their lives in both worlds or address their taha Maaori (Maaori side) if it has been neglected. This was the case for Mere, for whom cultural differences with her husband led to a separation: M. I spent a whole year once just hui-hopping around the place, just learning te reo and that was good. I learnt a lot in that year. ( ) Anything Maaori N. And what gave you that urge? M. Oh, you just know there is something missing and sometimes other people say when they are married like being married to Dick. Oh yes, I was married, we were married for 15 years or something like that, I can t remember now, I can t even remember when we were separated. But the thing is when you are married in a mixed marriage, before that there wasn t any obvious difference well between me and other people. Being in a mixed marriage, there were things that come out but you think I don t believe this, there was a difference the way you think, the way you do things ( ) The way you think about family it is different where it never came up before. It was never staring at you in the face, so it was different views. ( ) I think that was it, that probably was it that made me think I didn t belong here, not totally. Something is missing. Otherwise, I could have just gone on and on and I have Dick to thank for, yeah but I think the mixed marriage was the icing on the cake. (Mere) Aroha, on the contrary, feels that having a Paakehaa partner has allowed her to balance her involvement in different figured worlds. In fact, he supports her in everything she does Maaori or not. He is himself engaged in the Maaori world and actively participates in the life of Aroha s whaanau and tribe. He was even chosen as a trustee of their land. Aroha explains: It was a little bit awkward at first ( ), but now, he s their latest trustee on our land trust. The Paakehaa is our last... They did not ask me, they asked him! [laughter] ( ) This is a lot of families, like a hundred and more families and she rang and 222

235 asked him to be the new trustee. He had been elected on while he did not know he was nominated. They did not ask me! [laughter] At first, I thought it was so weird and it s like he s the only one that is not a direct descendant, he s Paakehaa. ( ) He has always been helping and he feels comfortable with my own family, because he s a good person, he s a good man: fair, honest, integrity, hard-working, he would have been a good chief! Just the wrong colour. (Aroha) This also demonstrates that Paakehaa too, engage in Maaori figured worlds and that the boundaries are not always clear-cut. They become more visible, however, when situations are highly politicized or when resources or money are at stake. As part of a deliberate balancing of Maaori involvement in the so-called Maaori / Paakehaa worlds, the whaanau will choose certain people to take on specific roles or achieve specific goals (see the novel Cousins by Grace, 1992, for eloquent examples, and see also Schwimmer s analysis of this novel, 2004b). Some will be chosen and raised as caretakers of the traditions of the figured world of the whaanau, while others will be raised as bicultural persons, able to go from one world to the other. The latter will be freed of most of the everyday whaanau responsibilities and will be supported in their career and/or studies. The particular mission that one is given relates to the well-being of the whaanau or Maaori at large. It might be preparing oneself to become the next rangatira (chief) or kaumaatua (elder), or a good Maaori lawyer, professor or advisor for the whaanau or for Maaori in general. Having been thus mandated by one s whaanau, one will feel a definite pressure to succeed in the Paakehaa world. Aroha was chosen in this way, and she is very sensitive to the desires of her whaanau. However, she has also made choices for her and her small family s own benefit. She decided to leave her tribal area because the pressure to achieve was too high and she needed her own space. Her house is open to her whaanau, but when her father comes for a weekend and fills the house with people, she feels that it is too much. She needs to be in control of her physical environment, which is not always possible in a whare Maaori, for example. One has to accept that things will be broken or mislaid and that one s personal space will shrink, if not disappear altogether. Similarly, for her whaanau s sake, Kiri had to abandon her dreams of redecorating and renovating her house with French doors, a barbecue area and a garden. She still says that one day, she will have a new house with a 223

236 big study all of her own. But for now, she is happy with her decision: the house is hers and the door is wide open to whaanau members. Thus, when we examine the workings of the whaanau or the family, it becomes clear that while the figured world of the whaanau is still a crucial element of Maaori identity, it does not always and in all contexts have the same import. Nor it is significant for all Maaori. In fact, most if not all Maaori combine engagements in at least two main figured worlds, the figured world of the whaanau and a Paakehaa-oriented or mainstream figured world. As we have seen, however, these realms of interpretations or world visions also have components which are sometimes hardly compatible. Dealing with or engaging in multiple figured worlds often creates dilemmas. According to actual circumstances and global forces, Maaori will then privilege certain aspects of particular figured worlds. They negotiate their multiple engagements through a complex combination of values and principles that unfold through practice and experience. It is therefore essential to emphasize the lack of a dichotomy between Maaori and their realms of interpretation on one side and Paakehaa and their realms of interpretation on the other. In practice, in the lived world, Maaori and Paakehaa people alike internalize multiple figured worlds and develop multiple identities and ways of engaging within these worlds. As I mentioned, some Paakehaa do internalize Maaori figured worlds, especially if they actively participate in the daily life of a whaanau, like Andrew, even if Maaori are generally more likely to be bicultural, for all the reasons that I have outlined in this chapter. As Schwimmer (2004) 108 has rightly remarked, only mythical figures like the eponymous Potiki of Patricia Grace s novel (1986) can exist simply within one figured world, the figured world of the whaanau. Some mythical figures, like the little girl in Witi Ihimaera s novel The Whale Rider (1987) (now also a film of international renown), even negotiate in a heteroglossic way their involvement in more than one figured world. With so many commitments to so many figured worlds taking in city life, work, parenting 108 Schwimmer, Éric, personal communication, February

237 and other responsibilities the family network sometimes closes in on itself, and the focal point for daily attention becomes the smaller family unit made up of the parent(s) and the children. This unit corresponds to the nuclear or single-parent families of the mainstream figured world. In the Maaori case, this smaller unit regularly includes one or more grandparents, and therefore grandchildren. So, while the whaanau works as an important and specifically Maaori figured world when there is a need for it, in other circumstances, conditions of everyday life often pressure Maaori to concentrate on a more restricted family and to participate in the figured world of the modern, mainstream family(ies), 109 which has different general characteristics and guiding principles and is based on different socio-historical foundations and a different realm of interpretation. The mainstream family(ies) has had historical and cultural dominance over other kinship models in a colonized context such as Aotearoa/New Zealand s, not least because it is the model apparently best suited to the guiding principles and demands of the capitalist, neoliberal economy. The mainstream family is thus linked to a global time/space that favours it, which illustrates again that figured worlds are themselves part of larger power relations and can be subordinated to larger, even globalized forces. For Maaori who are involved in a whaanau network kin-oriented or not (see below) and who take part as universal beings in the public life of Aotearoa/New Zealand or the Paakehaa world by having a job, studying, exercising their rights and responsibilities as citizens and so on, tensions are inevitable between the figured world of the whaanau and other mainstream figured worlds, or simply between Maaori and Paakehaa worlds. Indeed, their participation in the larger society especially as a worker or student is very demanding in terms of time, performance, and availability. One cannot easily leave one s workplace if a child in the whaanau is sick or if a kaumaatua asks for assistance. Nevertheless, one is expected to do so as a member of the whaanau, according to whaanau values and principles. Today, however, most people in the whaanau understand that members have responsibilities and obligations not only towards the whaanau but also 109 The plural indicates that many forms of family are possible beyond the typically modern nuclear family (see, for example, Dagenais 2000) 225

238 towards their employers. Most people also understand that one has to survive in both worlds and, in today s world, survival requires a bit of money, which is ever truer in the city where one cannot rely on hunting and fishing. Those who feel powerless to help their whaanau members as much as they should or would like often feel guilty about it, nonetheless. The labour market makes few allowances for the demands of the whaanau in times of death. Tangihanga (funerals) usually last for three days (see, among others, Ngata 1940; Hiroa 1949; Metge 1964, 1995; Schwimmer 1965; Sinclair 1990 for detailed descriptions; but also the novel Tangi by Ihimaera 1973). Metge defines a tangihanga as a funeral wake lasting several days from the time of death, including the successive arrival of parties of mourners, mourning (expressed in tears, tangi [weeping, lamenting], and speeches), funeral, a funeral fest, and the lifting of tapu from the bereaved home (1995: 335). The fact that tangihanga now often take place in the city, on urban marae and in ordinary city houses or whare Maaori (Walker 1990: 200) as well as in the country allows for more flexibility. People from the city who cannot leave their job can pay their respects to the dead without feeling guilty or fearing reprisals from the supernatural world. It also allows people to participate in the social group and fulfil their responsibilities and obligations as whaanau members, without fear of losing their jobs in the city. It is also a privileged time for reaffirming their identity as Maaori, since tangihanga remain an important symbol of Maaori identity (McIntosh 2001, Sinclair 1990). In recent years, there has been a noticeable increase in the number of tangihanga, as Maaori have returned to their own traditions of mourning and funeral rituals (Carter 2003). Tangihanga are a very political site for the affirmation of the Maaori position in the wider New Zealand society as well as among Maaori (Sinclair 1990; McIntosh 2001). A tangihanga is an excellent occasion for resituating oneself in relationships to the living as well as the dead: By supporting each other on the marae [or at the whare Maaori], the living are made aware of their place in life (Tauroa and Tauroa 1986: 135). During tangihanga, many Maaori that I met also organize a visit to country kin or volunteer their services for the work of the funeral. It is always a good opportunity to express their 226

239 feelings and responsibilities to each other as a whaanau. Even though today, many employers and government programs grant leave to attend tangihanga, people still sometimes hesitate to take their days off from work, either because of the stigma or because they just cannot afford to take days off (their workload is too heavy, they want to show their good faith to their employer or they simply need their full wages). The subsequent reactions of the whaanau are then often difficult to deal with. The example of tangihanga reveals not only a tension between the whaanau and the modern or post-modern family, but also between the collective and the individual: the person is conceptualized in completely different ways in these different figured worlds. The power of the collective is much stronger in the figured world of the whaanau. This is not to say, however, that the members of the modern family or mainstream figured worlds are completely free in their choices and do not feel any pressure from their parents and siblings. Martucelli (2002) warns against seeing the modern or contemporary or nuclear family (or other family models of the contemporary world; e.g., Dagenais 2000; Adair and Dixon 1998) as a family model lacking any firm positional or role structure, with individuals being supposedly the sole real actors. The pressure could be even more important for the child in these types of family because of the pressure of the ideal of performance and even hyper-performance in modern (or post- or hyper-modern) figured worlds. Pihama (1998 in Durie 2001a: 191) also identifies a particular dilemma which arose regarding the position of whaangai (adopted) children and children born through in-vitro fertilization and surrogacy. She explains because of colonial attitudes and the unbalanced relationships between figured worlds, the whaanau concept is sometimes greatly narrowed from its much more inclusive and expansive traditional potential. In the process, those whose birth circumstances lie outside the nuclear construct of the mainstream figured world are excluded from certain rights as full whaanau members. Similar things happen in the case of spouses, as we saw in chapter V, and this has intensified with retribalization. However, once again, there is no particularist absolutism: the internalized pan-ethnic code and ideology bring about certain choices in the 227

240 negotiation between the coexisting figured worlds, particularly when the Maaori mana and survival are at stake. I do not want to imply here that the interaction between the whaanau and the modern family is a place of constant and insurmountable struggle. Some succeed well in combining both or multiple engagements. The presence of different family models in today s world also allows some people greater reflexivity and heteroglossic possibilities. Their involvement, however, will vary according to a range of factors: personal choice, pressure to conform, life-stage, larger socio-political context, history of the relationships, mixed marriage, multiple belongings. Signs from the supernatural or spiritual worlds and the wishes of kaumaatua are also very important in one s engagement(s) in various figured worlds. For some, also, there is simply no choice and thus no negotiation possible between the modern family and the whaanau, or the so-called Maaori or Paakehaa worlds. Because of their upbringing, they live entirely within the framework of the modern family and their connections to their whaanau are very limited or even non-existent. At some point in their life, however, certain experiences can make them (re)discover the figured world of the whaanau, perhaps through marriage or friendship. For others, negative whaanau experiences, such as abuse, or simply other experiences in the larger society may lead to them gradually or abruptly moving away from the figured world of the whaanau. Those who participate in a whare Maaori on a daily basis are usually much more involved in the figured world of the whaanau. Although they might sometimes like to have more personal space, or might sometimes feel under pressure to conform to mainstream figured worlds, the world of the whaaanau is a very real part of their everyday lives. In the confrontation with the mainstream family(ies) and other figured worlds, the whaanau has not disappeared. It is still alive and well, as I have shown throughout this thesis, and as the Te Hoe Nuku Roa Team s survey (1999: 89) confirms. The team found 228

241 that during the 12 months prior to the survey, 48.8% of Auckland Maaori adults had made contact with their whaanau (excluding members of their own household) several times, and 32.5% had made contact more than once a month. Over the same period, more than 50% had stayed with their whaanau a few to several times and more than 60% had their whaanau stay with them a few to several times (Te Hoe Nuku Roa 1999 : 89). In Aotearoa/New Zealand, as elsewhere, many figured worlds coexist. In dialogue with others, Maaori or not, within and outside Aotearoa/New Zealand and in a globalized world, Maaori live and imagine themselves within different figured worlds depending on various factors such as everyday diverse positioning, symbolic forces, life-stage, economic and socio-political contexts, regional and national contexts, social class, social networks and diverse senses of belonging, schooling, access to Maaori and mainstream resources, personal knowledge and skills, and personal and whaanau networks. Some contexts offer more space for reflexivity and freedom of choice than others. Some persons and groups also benefit from more choices than others. The habitus (Bourdieu 1977 and 1980) also plays an important role in making participation in one figured world or the other natural, according to one s background and socialization. However, the political context also leads certain people and groups to privilege one figured world over another, sometimes in spite of the force of habitus. For example, after the Maaori Renaissance, which took place during a time of decolonization world-wide, many who were socialized in the figured world of the mainstream family wanted to recover the traditional figured world of Maaori, 110 so they worked hard to achieve that goal. Others tried to take the best of more than one figured worlds. All these games, negotiations, movements and switches within and between figured worlds can conflict at times and bring about readjustment at the personal and collective level. In practice, the demands of each world are sometimes difficult to reconcile for individuals as well as groups. The coexistence and inter-influence of different figured worlds (almost) necessarily implies conflicts, stress and suffering within or between them. 110 The opposite goal of almost completely abandoning the figured world of the whaanau and the Maaori world in general for the sake of engaging almost completely in the mainstream world, is also possible. This can be motivated by abuse, violent fights, excessively high expectations from whaanau, disagreements with whaanau members on worldviews, and so forth. Whaanau too can sometimes aggravate problems and prevent personal development, since not all whaanau are safe (see Durie 1997b,2001a). 229

242 In this analysis, we have to avoid taking the force of whaanau links for granted. It can also happen that other forms of belonging (gender, age, sexuality, social background, experiences from other places and other kinds of groupings) eclipse the meaning of the figured world of the whaanau for persons and groups, either for a short time or for good. Genealogical links should not, therefore, be seen as always primary, and other factors impacting on dialogism must be explored. Factors such as age, gender, sexuality, social class, social background can sometimes be just as important in understanding engagement within diverse figured worlds. The extension of the figured world: whakapapa- and kaupapa-based whaanau The Maaori cultural renaissance of the 1960s and the global forces favouring indigenous and minority rights renewed and transformed the figured world of the whaanau into a powerful symbol. This sowed the seed that has allowed non-kin whaanau called whaanau kaupapa 111 to emerge (see below). It has also reinforced the conscious desire to perpetuate or to simply participate in the figured world of the whaanau, seen as central to Maaori cultural identity, decolonization and survival. The figured world of the whaanau, with its principles and values, is thus used to govern relationships both among Maaori and between Maaori and others. Family networks can sometimes be quite restricted, but sometimes very large. They can extend to a person s entire tribe or to the whole Maaori people, and can even include non-maaori or incorporate people beyond Aotearoa/New Zealand. Whaanau expand through experiences and practices where there is a need for cooperation, management of collective resources, or opposition to the state or the mainstream population. Family networks contract in times of conflict or divergence, abuses, competition over resources, or discomfort. The whaanau is not only ancestor-oriented or genealogical, but can also be ideological and unite non-kin who cooperate in order to achieve specific aims: whaanau whakapapa are whaanau for which kinship and descent, that is whakapapa, form the fundamental basis 111 In the Maaori language, contrary to the English language, the adjective comes after the noun. 230

243 of connection, while whaanau kaupapa are whaanau groups which are set up not because of a common heritage or a common descent, but to fulfill a common mission or a special purpose (which is what kaupapa means). For instance, neighbours, a performing arts group or students from the same class might speak about their group as a whaanau and therefore respect extended family principles and responsibilities in regard to it. Basically, the figured world is the same, but it unites non-kin. This illustrates once again the inherent flexibility of the figured world of the whaanau. It has adapted to new conditions in the city, for instance, where simply being Maaori has become an important basis for association. Aotearoa/New Zealand s urbanization led to the development of suburbs where large numbers of Maaori live as neighbours. In these places, despite different tribal affiliations and origins from diverse parts of the country, common bonds developed around just being Maaori and therefore finding certain commonalties. Whaanau values and principles can thus begin to govern relationships between neighbours. Under certain circumstances and for certain persons, this identity becomes even more fundamental than their identity as a whaanau whakapapa member or an iwi member. Let us now turn to see how people speak of their relationships with different groups as whaanau relationships. Keita and her daughter Regan are talking about their group of friends in West Auckland, where they have lived for 25 years: K All my Maaori friends are to me like my whaanau. ( ) Because we have been so long together. With some of them, we have been long, long more years than I have been with my own whaanau, at home in the North. I have been here for 25 years, it s longer than I have been up North, really. R See and I m an urban child, I have been brought up here. K. Yeah, she has been brought up with all my friends kids from other tribes. So you know, you get to know each other and share things, birthdays of your children, tangi [funerals] The things you do with your own whaanau back home, you re doing with your extended tribal whaanau, yeah. (Keita and Regan) Christine simply says of the network of neighbours with whom she maintains daily relationships, That s the feeling of being a whaanau! 231

244 Many members of kapa haka ropuu (Maaori performing arts groups) consider their group as a whaanau. Matiu explains how this comes about: Especially at the university, there is a lot of Maaori students who are disassociated with their tribal links and maybe kapa haka is a forum that they can find other Maaori on campus who can understand how they are feeling and they are not alone, and kapa haka is the media where they can join together and share waiata, traditional Maaori songs, and contemporary Maaori music as a means of making them feel better and re-establish and create whaanau feelings. (Matiu) Miiria s kapa haka group has been like a new family for her. Their support has been very important and they have been (and are still) there for her when things have gone wrong with her partner or during her pregnancies. The group has also been very helpful in sharing childcare responsibilities. Kiri s group, too, has been an important resource for learning about Maaori performing arts and Maaori tikanga (customs, rules), so the whaanau kaupapa is also a channel for cultural transmission and inheritance. The ropuu or performing arts groups often have residential courses or activities or waananga, and one of the goals then is to strengthen bonds among the group. Moreover, many group members stay at the marae or the Maaori student room after their weekly activities, for the night, the weekend or even the holidays. They also see each other on a daily basis at school or at home. Some members of the ropuu even have whare Maaori open to everybody (or almost everybody, since exclusionary forces also operate in whaanau, see chapter III). Those who are not good enough at kapa haka, not free enough for parties, not slim enough to look right, or not fluent enough in te reo are sometimes excluded from the everyday life of the whaanau kaupapa. In Maaori schools, kohanga reo (Maaori day-care centres) and kura kaupapa Maaori (Maaori primary schools), Maaori take whanaungatanga as a model for education. As in a whaanau whakapapa, knowledge belongs to the group, the whaanau; pedagogical methods incorporate whaanau values such as manaakitanga and aroha; discipline is based on the authority of elders and the special roles of older children towards those who are younger; and the curriculum reflects the lives of the children, with plenty of opportunity for whaanau values to be reinforced through curriculum content (Durie 232

245 2001a: 193). In West Auckland, the whaanau concept was also the basis for the formation of an urban authority, Te Whaanau o Waipereira (Durie 2001a: 193; Phillips 1999; Waitangi Tribunal 1998). The same idea of whaanau is promulgated among participants in Maaori employment or language programs. On a pan-tribal marae in West Auckland, the kaiako (teachers) emphasize whaanau, whakapapa and iwi relationships, but also speak about whanaungatanga, whaanau support, awhina and aroha as often as they can. They reiterate the importance of being a whaanau to each other in this learning process. They also themselves behave in a supportive way towards their students and do not count the time and energy they invest in them, even after school, on the marae or in their own house, which in some cases functions as a whare Maaori or an extension of the school marae or classroom. The whaanau feeling also comes from the students experience of learning together, of passing through challenging times together and of being together every day for about a year. Tama expressed his feelings in the following way: We know each other so well, we work with each other every day in the program and course ( ). When I go back home, to my own marae, I only see my family, I only see it once a year. So, the feeling is not the same. I have more feelings here than I do in my own marae, it s because I m growing a relationship with these people, it s an everyday thing. (Tama) So, the everyday sharing and togetherness strengthen the family-like bonds. For Tama and many other tauira (students), this contrasts sharply with the whakapapa network, which is mostly in the countryside far away from Auckland. Yearly or twice-yearly visits cannot compare to the everyday experience shared in the city with the whaanau kaupapa. When I was talking about being a family, we re not always going around kissing and hugging each other here on the marae. We actually show it in and outside this marae and that s what whanaungatanga is all about. Supportiveness and that s what family do, they go and support you wherever you go. You go walking, they come and support. That s what they re doing for me when they come to my boxing fights. I feel really special. I feel I m really worth it. It s something very special in my life. (Tama) 233

246 However, this does not mean that Tama s whaanau whakapapa members don t also come to support him. His close family father, brothers and sisters all flew out from the country to cheer him on at his last fight. But, in his everyday life, it is his whaanau kaupapa from the marae that sustains him: We keep each other safe, well (Tama). So, he is also there for them when they need him. The relationship is one of long-term, balanced reciprocity. Here, there is a lot [of] support, love respect, everything is nice, Tama added. Being here with all those people, it s just an experience of happiness, joy, love. It is thus also about being part of a group, about identity: It gives you a sense of belonging, it gives you a sense of identity, of where you are, where you come from. Being among these people, you understand whanaungatanga, that family, the feeling of being close to each other because we understand where we come from, who we are: we re Maaori. I guess we re all proud of it. You know, being taught who you are, it s like your mum and dad telling you this is who you are. Because we all started this together, we feel very close. (Tama) Whaanau is thus about sharing similar issues, problems, life experiences and kaupapa (projects, plans, missions). Kahu considers her work team to be a whaanau for very similar reasons: We have a hard-case bunch of people here. I mean, they are awesome to me ( ) it is like a family. If something happens, they are all here. Like when my dad passed away, he passed away ( ) a couple of months ago and my boss, he works hard here ( ) he took some time off work and a few workers and took them to this little woop woop town where we buried my dad and that was really cool. I mean everybody would have come up, but some had to stay back and because I have my daughter as well and she can come up here if she was sick and stay here while I am working so then when I have finished work, I can just cruise off home. It is just so relaxed. You do for them and they will do for you with a bit of extra. If I am in trouble or if they have trouble, we can ring each other and plus, we have got a good entertainment. You have to have the entertainment, but it is because I have known them for quite a few years. We are all very comfortable around each other and now, our kids are starting to play with each other. If they are all sick, they all come up here. (Kahu) Mihi, who had recently arrived to live at Joanna s place added: 234

247 I mean, I have only been here only for two years and I m treated just like one of the family as well. My baby can go to Joe s house, so I can go out to the pub and stuff or he goes up to Joanna s brother. No, it s hard to explain. I mean for me, I had to live it to actually believe that. (Mihi) She went on to explain that everybody liked to say that her baby is everyone s baby, and that everybody was always there for each other. For instance, when there is a death all the neighbours come and bring money, food, blankets, mattresses or whatever is needed. Whaanau kaupapa members can become uncles and aunts for their neighbours children. They are called mama and papa or whaea (mother) and matua (father) by people from younger generations. The oldest neighbours also became kaumaatua (male elders) and kuia (female elders) for the new whaanau. By us moving things from the rural to here, we did not have many cousins around us, so our neighbours became our cousins. ( ) So it s kind of like adjust into the urban and still having a feel of the old, or what I believe is the old practices still happening even though it happens to be with someone else out of my tribal area. The values are still there because we recreate ( ) They are not, you know, like acquaintances, those are friends and those friends that I have for forty years ( ) They are like my family, they are part of who I am. So when they have a loss, I have a loss. ( ) We did not have the blood ties. We still have the tie, for us it s a whaanau tie. (Joanna) Among young people, members of whaanau kaupapa like kapa haka ropuu or sports teams, the use of words like cousin or simply cous and brother or bro is widespread. These forms of address can also refer to those who share the same ideas or ways of life, whether Maaori or not. So, the use of terms like cous or bro is a good indication of the context-dependent expansion or contraction of the whaanau. These terms are used particularly by certain categories of people, namely, young people, gang members, and people from certain sub-cultures like fans of rap, hip-hop or reggae music. Rewa, a woman in her late forties, who went home for the first time only a few years ago, also uses these terms when she is among Maaori and among her people back home in order to accentuate her Maoriness and belonging to the group: 235

248 My tuakana [cousin of the same sex and generation in a senior line] told me that one day ( ) I m really surprised you re using language like that. Like what? ( ) I don t know. That s maybe their expectation for how I should speak, because they use the bro. Because they don t want me to use the Bro language, maybe they want me to use Paakehaa language, because they called me Paakehaa lady when I was growing up. (Rewa) She goes on by saying that she can be bicultural when she wants to and then, I even talk differently. How I m talking now with you is one way. If you put me in a room of Paakehaa people, doesn t matter the level, and I will speak differently again. Only because if I have to speak at all, I want my point to be clear (Rewa). That is why she uses the Bro language : she wants to make clear that she is part of the whaanau here her whaanau whakapapa. The non-usage of Bro language can consequently serve to exclude those who are not considered part of the whaanau. In fact, the Bro language is closely associated with a Maaori way of speaking in the Aotearoa/New Zealand media and public opinion. I have not done extensive research about the origin of this kind of language, but it is quite clear that it is inspired by the language used by Black Americans (and Black minorities in other countries) to express their solidarity, their fraternity, their particular identity and to distinguish themselves from the mainstream dominant society. Since the 1970s, Maaori have been generally inspired by Black movements and struggles for emancipation and empowerment. Rap, hip-hop and reggae music and their messages have a strong influence among Maaori. Some Maaori, however, do not like this way of talking or moving in ways emblematic of Black youth cultures in the USA and elsewhere. They say that Maaori should find their own distinctive ways to express themselves and should not identify too closely with Black minorities, whose struggles are different. Others do not like this language because it is synonymous in the mainstream media with the underclass and gangs; they would prefer to show that not all Maaori are like that, they are not all dumb and part of the bad statistics. On the other hand, some Maaori will use Bro language to deliberately distinguish themselves from the elite, whether Maaori or Paakehaa, or to shock rightthinking people. Manuka, who is a physically impressive and even rough-looking man in his late forties, will sometimes use Kia ora bro! to greet a well-dressed Paakehaa that 236

249 he does not know at all on the street. Perhaps unsurprisingly, he generally receives no reply. Finally, some women pointed out that they do not like to be called bro, since it is a male-oriented word that should be used by men talking to other men. 112 People use whaanau terms of address to speak to and about each other. These terms show the respect that Maaori devote traditionally to older generations and are a reminder of Maaori values, tikanga and ways of relating to each other. That is the situation among the members of Joanna and Mihi s urban hapuu or whaanau, but it is also how things generally work in kohanga reo and kura kaupapa Maaori (Durie 2001a: 193; Smith 1997), in Rangi s bilingual class, in kapa haka ropuu and so forth. To summarize, at this point, for people to have whaanau feelings with a group of people and to treat them as whaanau members, the crucial criteria seem to be 1) mutual support and help; 2) a feeling of sharing similar experiences and interests; 3) unity, group feeling or oneness; 4) a relaxed atmosphere, in the sense that one can truly be oneself; 5) the acceptance and inclusion of one s children as everybody s children; 6) personal and material support in times of death; 7) reciprocity among the group. We can see that many if not all of the whaanau whakapapa principles discussed in chapter V are at work in some way, including whanaungatanga (enriching and strengthening the bond of family unity), manaakitanga (showing respect and kindness, befriending), aroha (unconditional love), utu (reciprocity, return, compensation), awhina (assistance, help), kotahitanga (oneness). These are all very important for whaanau kaupapa and form the basis of their close association. As we have seen, in practice, if someone infringes those principles, they will be excluded, either little by little, or suddenly in cases of serious whaanau abuse. 112 Note that some Maaori also use sis for sister. Cous, for cousin, naturally has no gender connotations. 237

250 Problems within the whaanau The idea of the whaanau kaupapa presuppose a kind of openness to everybody and implies some measure of equality between all members aside from matters of mana and generational status. Very often, however, the problem with whaanau kaupapa and, I would say, with whaanau whakapapa too is that some people establish special relationships around particular interests or genealogical or tribal ties. This has the effect of dividing the whaanau. I just felt that they had that sort of little cliquey bunches of people and that we were an outsider. Because you had all those little whaanau group within the whole whaanau, they were all little cliquey bunches and I m not into that kind of stuff ( ) and so, I said to my friend, I think I will move my kids [from the kura kaupapa]. I don t feel like, you know, there is a whaanau concept here or feeing of being in a whaanau. (Christine) In the urban setting, as Api, one of my research participants remarked and as I have observed, the conflicts and alliances between iwi and hapuu are still alive. They change according to situations and larger political, economic, and social contexts. Tribal differences are not as marked as in the past and Maaori are clearly capable of working together, as on pan-tribal marae where the underlying kawa (marae protocol) is nga hau e wha, meaning that people from the four winds or from all around the motu (island) come together. However, there are still differences in ways of doing things and points of view. This can create conflict or misunderstandings in pan-tribal organizations and it is difficult to find a consensus: every group or iwi has its own interests and preoccupations. People also like to remind others of the tribal wars of the past. They remember and joke about battles lost and won, but the jokes sometimes take a very serious turn and carry grave warnings about people s behaviour. Kaumaatua (elders) often recall past iwi alliances and conflicts during their koorero (speeches). A kapa haka ropuu in which I participated also had its fair share of tension, like any whaanau. The members of the group were almost all more or less closely related to each other. At the very least, each person is related through tribal affiliation to someone else in the group, and this creates some sub-groups. Other sub- 238

251 groups follow simply from personal affinities or the length of time that members have been in the group. There is some tension between the oldies and the new ones, for example, since the oldies want to learn new and more difficult action songs while the recent recruits hardly know the old programme. Although the oldies sometimes seem bothered by the new members, they also promote an open door policy and depend on new members for their survival as a group, since a few oldies graduate every year and may have to leave the group because of new jobs, parental obligations or just because they feel that it is time for them to do something else. Some of the oldies or the kapa haka freaks, as Regan called them, can be very hard on those who have not done kapa haka before, who know little about poi (flax balls on string used in posture dances) and haka (war dance). The stereotype that all Maaori know how to dance and sing is persistent even among Maaori. The pressure can thus be very heavy for new members. Sometimes girls are told they have Paakehaa hands if they are unable to swing the poi properly. Such an accusation will motivate some to learn fast and well, but it might discourage others so much that they give up kapa haka completely. There is also a great deal of competitiveness in the group, and in the larger university context among Maaori in general. This competitiveness in kapa haka has been exacerbated by kapa haka competitions at regional and national levels, in which standards are very high. The level of knowledge of te reo is another conflicting point. Some like to show off their knowledge whenever possible and make quite offensive remarks about those who hardly know any te reo. Kahu told me how this happened to her once. This event did not take place in the kapa haka ropuu that I was in, but I did hear similar things in that group. I used to speak and one day [someone] said to me don t even bother if I couldn t speak it properly ( ) and that was a real down for me and I was still learning but for me that was a big shifting for someone to say to you Oh! Don t bother doing that because you are not good at it, if you get people like that, that puts you down and that. You think to yourself, why even bother? And I found that was the problem of a lot of people. (Kahu) Other problems within the group arise from puuhaehae (jealousy) and ngautuara (backbiting). For example, since dances are performed in rows, with the women in front and the men behind, people sometimes fight for the front row so that they can be seen and 239

252 their talent admired. This is intolerable behaviour for those members who consider it to be against whaanau values. A former member of the group told me once that all the fights are questions of politics, but that is not what she learnt about tikanga from her mother: she has been taught to awhi people into learning things and not to be there for herself. She added: That s not the way to you know, the talks there is so much talk about the whanaungatanga, but my mum taught me how taught me whanaungatanga to other people, you know, and to awhi humble, humble, and just to help, you know. And I think that s really important. (Regan) Matiu explained a problem that arose in his group: M. There is problem with [our kapa haka whaanau] in that we don t have any old people and every other group that I have been to they have old people, like koroua and ( ) those old people they are the leaders of the group. They determine how the group functions and our group we don t, see, myself now and Heather and Victor, we are probably the oldest people in the group, we are like the old people for the group and it is really hard because we are young as well. ( ) N. So you think you need a kaumaatua and a kuia? M. It would help because we wouldn t be like if there were problems that arose in the group they would be the people that sorted it out. ( ) It does work better in other groups because they have the old people. Every group whatever culture, there is always a hierarchy. In the Maaori side, the old people, our kaumaatua, they hold the knowledge and you expect them to be able to sort out problems and stuff best. (Matiu) Whaanau kaupapa, lacking elders, therefore suffer from certain problems that are unlikely to occur in whaanau whakapapa. However, there is no dichotomy between the two kinds of whaanau. People can divide their time between both and be involved in one or more whaanau whakapapa and one or more whaanau kaupapa. Te Hoe Nuku Roa s research (1999: 91) confirmed that while 41.8% and 30.1% of Maaori adults who live in Auckland say that their whaanau plays, respectively, a very large or a large part in their life, and that members of their whaanau have very strong (48.5%) or strong (30.6%) links with each other. Still, 75% of Auckland Maaori adults also say that they have whaanau in the wider community. There are no inherent conflicts in being involved in multiple whaanau, since the values and principles are more or less the same, but people sometimes have to choose between their various obligations or responsibilities, and subordinate some to others. This can create tension in relations with other whaanau members, who may pay 240

253 the price for someone else s choices, either having to compensate for other people s withdrawal or rely on the arrival of new members. Pressure exerted by members of one whaanau can have various effects: while it might achieve its intended purpose of exacting further commitment from other members, it might on the other hand alienate them and cause them participate even less or to break off relations with the demanding whaanau. In re-evaluating their involvement, some will try to balance their individual needs with the wishes of the collective, but others will simply quash their personal desires and give in to those exerting the greatest pressure. Still others will be paralyzed by indecision. Nevertheless, many people succeed extremely well in combining their commitments to several whaanau. In fact, being involved in a whaanau kaupapa in the city, for example, can serve as a safety net when one is far from one s whaanau whakapapa. People will thus negotiate their involvement in more than one whaanau through practice and interrelationships. The same processes are at work in the case of multiple involvements in whaanau whakapapa networks. Once again, the value of mana plays a crucial role in regulating engagement, but so does the value of whakapapa, as we will see below. What emerged from my participation in the lived worlds of Maaori is that there is a hierarchy between the two types of association in practice, depending on social contexts and relations. Fidelity and first allegiance generally goes to the whaanau whakapapa, except where it contains cases of serious abuse or really disruptive conflicts. Furthermore, the complex workings of the guiding principles and values of whaanau are such that the kaupapa type has many features that distinguish it from the whaanau whakapapa; I have identified eleven. First, the force of the collective is not as strong as in whaanau whakapapa, since the whakapapa values do not apply, or at least not in the same way. Members are conscious of this weakness and of the vulnerability that follows from it. They may then hesitate to place too much emphasis on the whaanau kaupapa. Second, in the whaanau kaupapa, roles are less strictly defined than in the whaanau whakapapa. They are attributed on a voluntary basis and shift from time to time along with the membership. 241

254 Third, difficulties arise at the leadership level, since the members are often of similar ages and a hierarchy does not naturally emerge through status related to age and experience. When elders are among the group, they are not necessarily there for good or traditional reasons: some are there because of personal or financial interests. Some members can also be looking for power and status; many of the participants in my research call these people mana munchers, and they often disturb the structure of power. Elders, like young people, are not always perfect! Fourth, relatives can try to exercise power to favour their kin over non-kin, and can form cliques or sub-groups that disturb the harmony of the group as a whole. Fifth, limited resources (financial or human) can compromise the realization of the kaupapa and thus the very raison d être of the group. Sixth, the whaanau kaupapa does not benefit from the uniting power of the whakapapa or genealogy and is thus more fragile, with a changing membership. Many people will favour the whaanau whakapapa when their time or energy is in short supply. To return to the example explained above, if David had not been kin related, he would have been asked to leave much earlier. In the case of the whaanau kaupapa, the missing uniting power of the whakapapa also prevents the automatic reproduction of the membership from one generation to the other. A seventh issue is that the whaanau kaupapa has no direct power of discipline: the group does not have as strong a hold on individual members as the whaanau whakapapa, which chooses certain persons for specific roles. There is more room for negotiation in the whaanau kaupapa, which also means more power struggles. Eighth, the whaanau kaupapa does not benefit from many other unifying factors. It does not have land in 242

255 common, for example, which would force people to come together for its management. Ninth, when the kaupapa (mission or project) is achieved, there is often insufficient reason to stay together and continue as a whaanau. Tenth, freedom of one s involvement is a lot greater in a whaanau kaupapa than in a whaanau whakapapa, which means that leaving the group is also easier. This liberty of choice is increased in the city, where there are more possibilities to choose from and more importance given to personal (as opposed to collective) experiences. This ease of leaving sometimes brings about extra work for those who stay and have to assume the leavers responsibilities, which can in turn lead to further departures. Finally, if the mana of one s whaanau whakapapa is threatened by one s involvement in whaanau kaupapa, or by other external forces, one will go back or invest more time and energy to one s whaanau whakapapa in order to set the situation right and maintain the whaanau s mana. Te whaanau : at the centre of a politics of differentiation In many respects, the fact that Maaori must be involved in mainstream figured worlds in their everyday lives has also strengthened the figured world of the whaanau and made it an important site of resistance. In view of the previous section, it is clear that the figured world of the whaanau has become an important element in the politics of differentiation. This is no doubt the case for whaanau kaupapa and all organizations that work according to Maaori/whaanau principles, including kapa haka groups, Maaori resource centres in mainstream institutions, Maaori sport teams, and so forth. It also applies to kura kaupapa Maaori, kohanga reo and bilingual units in mainstream schools, most of which are based on the whaanau model in which [k]knowledge belongs to the group, the whaanau; pedagogies incorporate whaanau values such as manaakitanga (sharing and caring), and aroha (respect); discipline is based on the authority of elders and the special roles of older children towards those who are younger; and the curriculum reflects the realities of children with opportunity for whaanau values to be reinforced through curriculum content (Durie 2001a: 193). However, once more, it cannot be said that the state has nothing to do with this new (re-)emphasis on whaanau: we must remember (see chapter I) that after a decade (1984 to 1994) of Maaori development policies centred on iwi (tribe) development, the emphasis shifted to smaller groupings like hapuu and 243

256 whaanau (Durie 2001a: 189), corresponding to a shift from iwitanga (the way of the tribe, vertical structural ethic) to whanaungatanga (the way of the extended family, inclusive kinship ethic). Whare Maaori in city homes are, for many, precisely about being different or simply about being oneself in an environment often conceived as alien, as we saw earlier on in the thesis. The city generally is a context which allows for more choice, but it also sets restrictions. Because of the general discomfort they feel in the city, a complex feeling described in chapter VII, many Maaori choose 113 to develop a sense of home in private places in the city. Here, they rely heavily on a traditional model of homeliness because of the discomfort they feel in the city and the pressure they feel to engage in a particular figured world. The whare Maaori, then, really becomes a refuge both for those who, by habitus, engage themselves in the figured world of the whaanau and for those who consciously want to regain the principles and values of what is, for them, a figured world that has been lost. The creation and maintenance of Maaori places in the city, such as whare Maaori, are thus crucial for the coexistence of the figured world of the whaanau with the other figured worlds of today. The existence of such apparently private places has led analysts to mistakenly negative conclusions about the health of the whaanau, as they fail to perceive its continued and renewed importance. Maaori are not really visible on the public scene or in public space; they are not café kind of people, which makes their meetings and affirmation as whaanau invisible. Even for Maaori, it is difficult to find and meet Maaori people when one does not already have a well-defined urban network: It is very lonely in the city, said Rangi, and we really have to look for the Maaori. The dispersion of Maaori in Auckland is thus deceptive. The whaanau then becomes an important symbol of not being Paakehaa. For many, this means not being selfish or individualistic. Being Maaori is about being part of a group, 113 Choices are inevitably limited and enhanced by the conditions of possibility (Bourdieu 1977 in Wallman 1998: 184) provided by the capability (Wallman 1977, 1998) of the urban setting, and I would add, of the power of the place and the larger socio-political context. 244

257 and the whaanau is probably the single most significant grouping in today s Maaori society according to Durie (2001a: 13), much more than hapuu (sub-tribe) and iwi (tribe), although these are both still important and engagement with a whaanau does not (necessarily) erase other kinds of belongings. To say that Paakehaa are individuallyoriented and Maaori collectively-oriented is over-simplistic, and it is preferable to avoid a strict dichotomy between the individual and the collective, but in general, Maaori indigenous people do manage dialogism collectively. The collectivity, the whaanau, is at the very core of the traditional figured world, as was made clear by the example of Kiri s whaanau s dilemma. In practice, however, Maaori persons and groups have to deal with both sets of principles since Maaori and Paakehaa figured worlds coexist and, to a certain extent, interpenetrate. The varying engagement and motivations of persons and groups may bring about conflicts, dilemmas and problems of articulation. These differences are closely related to the core values and principles of the figured worlds involved. At the level of the nation-state and New Zealand society, many factors combine to play a role in the politics of differentiation. If we consider Maaori in the city to be in a context of migration, then it is probable that the shock of experiencing the mainstream figured worlds is less intense today than a few decades ago, thanks to technology, better work conditions and better education. The internet, decent long-distance telephone tariffs, cellphones, and cheaper and better access to means of transportation like planes and trains all contribute to the maintenance of whaanau links across the city/country divide and beyond the borders of Aotearoa/New Zealand. Durie even speaks of the virtual whaanau (2001a: ). While this new context can allow for more fluid engagement in various figured worlds, it also makes it easier for some to continue their engagement within the figured world of the whaanau. In this way, it can even imply a certain retreat from other figured worlds, even where whaanau members have migrated far from the papakaainga (ancestral settlement). This is clearly the case for a good number of Maaori university students who come from the country to study in Auckland universities. 245

258 Moreover, Maaori have sometimes suffered from a lack of recognition and support in mainstream organizations, especially in comparison to immigrants who are offered targeted services. This is due to the fact that Maaori are indigenous to Aotearoa and therefore part of the nation-state. As such, they are presumed to know everything about mainstream organizations. This is despite the fact that the importance of giving special resources to Maaori has been officially acknowledged, that Maaori are officially recognized as equal partners to Paakehaa and, above all, that it has been clearly established from a scrutiny of Maaori socio-economic and health disparities (Durie 2001a; James Henare Maaori Research Centre 2002) that they are both ill-served by and ill at ease in mainstream institutions. Some Maaori, then, will make all possible efforts to integrate mainstream figured worlds and to melt into the crowd. Others, on the contrary, will engage more actively with Maaori figured world(s) and put more emphasis on their difference. The differentiation process has also been amplified by state decentralization and retribalization policies. At the same time, there is a general tendency for Maaori to fear becoming citizens-likeeveryone-else. This fear is expressed in particular through a negative reaction to rapidly increasing immigration from Asia, which was expressed by the great majority of the participants in my research. The reasoning goes that if Maaori become just one ethnic minority among so many others in New Zealand, they will lose their favoured status as equal partners with the Paakehaa. The large influx of immigrants may even encourage a renewed engagement with the figured world of the whaanau, which is considered to be an crucial site of resistance to the dilution peril. Conclusion The forces behind engagement in or disengagement from the diverse figured worlds are thus sometimes contradictory and sometimes convergent, but always complex and heteroglossic. Certainly, the politics of differentiation both nourish and are nourished by state policies as well as by ethnic/cultural politics. Besides the impetus coming from the state, Paakehaa (and others ) attitudes towards and stigmatization of Maaori also 246

259 accentuate the politics of differentiation on a large scale. They may also contribute to a more active engagement in the whaanau and a parallel retreat (which can only be partial) from other figured worlds. The figured world of the whaanau is thus a critical and, I would add, effective site of resistance to state hegemony, as well as an important space of affirmation and participation into society. However, it must be remembered that the everyday concerns of most ordinary Maaori are neither their place and autonomy within the nation-state as such, nor a clear ideological stance towards differentiation. Rather, what is fundamental is feeling and being comfortable. In the next chapter I explore exactly how the notion of comfort is used by Maaori to express the complexity of their relationships to the city, to others and to society at large. We will see that this reference to comfort reveals a great deal about their identities and their engagement in multiple figured worlds. I have shown here that for many, being comfortable simply means being Maaori which is therefore being different. Being Maaori is not an elaborate discourse or ideology, but rather implies a whole set of everyday relationships and ways of doing things: it means learning and performing traditional chants, songs and dance, taiaha (traditional fighting arts), karakia (prayers), and so on. Being Maaori is also translated through a way of walking, a way of talking, a way of looking at others, a way of dressing with Maaori symbols such as pounamu (greenstones), Maaori and/or tribal/whaanau t-shirts, kete (woven flax hand-bags or backpacks). Illustrations of these and many other ways to affirm identity have been plentiful in this thesis. Being part of a whaanau and behaving as a whaanau member a brother, a cousin, a sister also activates persons in their bodyin-life (Hastrup 1995: 94). These means or strategies are not alien to the rhetoric about being a real or true Maaori. The same is true for place-making, place-marking, and engagement with places. All this is not disconnected from the nation of New Zealand at large and the ideology about the Maaori place within the nation-state; it is just another facet of it, associated with everyday life, embodiment, internalization and the body-mind in action in a lived world. This facet also connects with the politics of differentiation as expressed through the paradigm of the figured world of the whaanau. 247

260 To some extent, the politics of differentiation essentialize differences and boundaries between the figured world of the whaanau (and possibly other Maaori figured worlds 114 ) and mainstream figured worlds, but also, more generally, between Maaori and Paakehaa. As we saw in the whaanau dilemma example and others, the boundaries are not clearly or neatly delimited. The limits of a figured world are rather met in practice and depend on particular circumstances and the ordering of values as linked to history, power relationships and a broader ideological framework which is often internalized or embodied. The same flexibility and vagueness is characteristic of both figured worlds themselves and also of the identities of the people engaged within the figured worlds. 114 I am thinking, for example, of the figured world of Maaori criminal gangs, which is in many respects similar to the figured world of the whaanau, but is very different at the level of fundamental values or principles. 248

261 CHAPTER VII BEING COMFORTABLE : MAAORI RELATIONS WITH THE CITY AND SOCIETY AT LARGE In this chapter, I will explore the complexity of Maaori relationships with the city and society at large. I look at the Maaori expression and illustration of this complexity through the use of a notion that has been emerging throughout this thesis, the notion of comfort. This notion is significant because it is used by Maaori to refer to their relations with and feelings in different places and spaces, to express how they see their engagement in diverse figured worlds and to speak about their relationships with others, Maaori or not, and indeed with the spiritual world. Maaori also widely use the notion of comfort in discussing their identities and power relationships. Firstly, I will review the literature on the notions of comfort and feeling comfortable. I then explore how the notion of comfort is expressed by the participants in this research. In particular, I will investigate the diverse meanings of comfort and how it affects the ways people behave and engage in different figured worlds, spaces and places. I will also examine the impact that comfort has on the expansion and contraction of the whaanau, processes which bring about the changes that accompany and are indeed part of the continuity of the whaanau. Theoretical background Hearing everyday Maaori conversations, talking with them and listening attentively to taped interviews, I soon realized that words like comfort, comfortable, uncomfortable and comfort zone came up regularly and in all kind of contexts. These words struck me even more because in French, it is less common to express one s feelings in terms of comfort. Francophones, at least in Québec, will tend to describe or qualify 249

262 more specific feelings, where English-speakers might use the generalized idea of comfort. For example, French-speakers will say Je me sens à l aise ( I feel comfortable / I feel at ease ), Ça me gêne ( It makes me feel uncomfortable / It bothers me ), Je me sens bien ( I feel comfortable / I feel good ), l ambiance n était pas bonne ( There was an uncomfortable atmosphere / The atmosphere was no good ), c est réconfortant ( It s comforting ), and so forth. In French the words confort and confortable essentially refer to physical well-being or the convenience of material life. However, the whole range of physical sensations, moods and states of mind translated above can be expressed with the word comfort and its derivatives by Englishspeaking people, including, of course, Maaori speaking in English. Social scientists have not paid much attention to how people use the concept of comfort to speak about themselves, their relationships with family and others, everyday and new experiences, and their place in the nation-state. In one of the rare works devoted to comfort, the architect Witold Rybczynski (1986) examines the history of domestic comfort and the home as lived by the French, Dutch, English, American, and Canadian middle and upper classes. He identifies many layers of meaning in the word comfort, tracing its origin back to the latin comfortare, to strengthen or console, as in the phrase his presence was comforting for me. So, comfort has the sense of support and assistance. Rybczynski adds that [t]his idea of support was eventually broadened to include people and things that afforded a measure of satisfaction, and comfortable came to mean tolerable or sufficient one spoke of a bed of comfortable width, although not yet of a comfortable bed. [ ] Succeeding generations expanded this idea of convenience and eventually comfortable acquired its sense of physical well-being and enjoyment, although not until the eighteenth century. (Rybczynski 1986: 20) Comfort, then, began to be specifically framed in a domestic context of contentment and amenity. Rybczynski links these changes to the appearance of the internal world of the individual, the self and the family (1986: 35) in Europe, that is, the advent of the modern family and its associated idea of privacy (see, for example, Dagenais 2000). Rybczynski (1986: 231) traces the continued evolution of the concept of comfort in a domestic 250

263 context and ultimately attaches to it the following attributes: convenience, efficiency, leisure, ease, pleasure, domesticity, intimacy, and privacy. Rybczynski (1986: 231) concludes his book by elaborating what he calls an Onion Theory of Comfort, which 1) incorporates many transparent layers of meaning, 2) involves a combination of sensations physical, emotional, and intellectual, conscious and subconscious (Rybczynski 1986: 232) and 3) also suggests that the idea of comfort has developed historically: it has meant different things at different times. It is a culturally defined concept and as such, it cannot be understood without reference to a specific history. He then explains the evolution of the Euro-American notion of domestic comfort: In the seventeenth century, comfort meant privacy, which lead to intimacy and, in turn, to domesticity. The eighteenth century shifted the emphasis to leisure and ease, the nineteenth to mechanically aided comforts light, heat, and ventilation. The twentieth-century domestic engineers stressed efficiency and convenience. At various times, and in response to various outside forces social, economic, and technological the idea of comfort has changed, sometimes drastically. (Rybczynski 1986: 231) In the Montreal of the late 1990s, Radice shows that the concept of comfort goes beyond the domestic threshold to go out into the world (2000: 132). She explains: Feeling comfortable is a remarkably specific, yet flexible phrase. It evokes a definite sense of well-being, but it can apply to many situations. These range from small events in bars to the ambience of the whole metropolis, from library furniture to entire lives, from speaking a language to walking the streets. Furthermore, it allies several different realms of experience, including internal factors like one s emotional state, sense of security, and knowledge; external factors such as the weather, available information, physical ease, and fellow city-dwellers attitudes; and in-between ones like having room for manoeuvre (both literal and metaphorical), interacting with other people, being satisfied or not with one s material fortunes, and so on. Feeling comfortable is therefore the bridging concept par excellence between inside and outside. (Radice 2000: 131) Among Maaori, expressing oneself in terms of comfort is also a very common and yet meaningful way to speak about one s world(s), which is (or are) at once natural, physical, social, cultural, and supernatural. As Radice explains, one s comfort in the world(s) says a lot about internal, external, and in-between or relational factors. The concept of comfort is used by Maaori to express their own experiences in different spheres and at different levels, such as, for example, whaanau inclusiveness or exclusiveness and thus 251

264 relationships among us and with others, or their feeling of belonging to different groups and larger entities, spaces or sites like marae, mainstream universities, Auckland and Aotearoa/New Zealand as a whole. So, I understand that expressing oneself in terms of comfort speaks volumes about one s being (as a person or a group) and one s relationships with the immediate physical and social environment and the wider world. Comfort features in intersubjectivity and coexistence, and regulates whaanau relationships, the whaanau being a Maaori figured world that encompasses natural, cultural, social, and supernatural worlds, as we saw in chapters V and VI. In exploring how some Anglophone residents relate to Montréal, Radice (2000) also looks by implication at their relationships with other groups living there, including the Francophone majority. For example, certain Anglo-Montrealers feel comfortable in Montréal because they have French as a second language, which allows them to communicate with others and to be more mobile in the workplace. Knowledge of French, then, is a medium that enables relationships between Anglophones and Francophones and thus bestows a certain degree of comfort. In the context of Auckland, the comfort felt by Maaori is one of the factors which make their relationships with others easier (or not), as we shall see. These others are not always non-maaori: they may be Maaori too but from different tribes or other kinds of groups, Maaori who do not share the same philosophies or ways of life or Maaori who are not part of the whaanau. Radice also emphasizes the fact that comfort always implies its uncomfortable counterpart: it is always conditional, requiring constant negotiation in order to be reached or maintained. One does not feel comfortable permanently (Radice 2000: 131). For this reason, when speaking about the concept of comfort in general, I will emphasize the possibility of its uncomfortable opposite and its interrelational nature by using the negative in parentheses, as in (dis)comfort or (un)comfortable. Here is a summary of the different layers of (dis)comfort identified by Rybczynski (1986) and Radice (2000), in no particular order: A) Measure of support, assistance, consolation; B) Measure of satisfaction, tolerability, sufficiency, convenience; 252

265 C) Measure of physical well-being, enjoyment, ease, room for manoeuvre (literal) D) Measure of privacy, intimacy, domesticity; E) Emotional state, sense of security, feelings; F) Intellectual state, 115 knowledge; G) Measure of autonomy, room for manoeuvre (metaphorical); H) Measure of cultural, social, and political affinities or convergence/divergence; 116 In each case, the measure necessary for one to feel comfortable depends on personal needs and preferences, particular circumstances and global forces, as well as on collective and cultural parameters, values or principles which are intrinsic to the figured world(s) in which one engages. Feeling (un)comfortable is context-dependent: one can be (un)comfortable to varying degrees in particular situations or in response to the presence of a particular person, group or element of the natural, social or cultural landscape. (Dis)comfort can also be felt through a combination of several factors in a given space/time. In reference to Rybczynski s Onion Theory of Comfort, all the layers are also interrelated: if we describe each layer separately, we lose sight of the whole (Rybczynski 1986: 230). I will try here to show how the different layers of (dis)comfort identified here relate to the ways in which Maaori express themselves in such terms. As I heard Maaori today in Auckland describe or refer to their everyday lives in terms of comfort, it appeared to me that its meaning has changed again, or more precisely, has taken on new layers of meaning as Maaori use the term. Maaori speak about (dis)comfort in heteroglossic ways. Drawing on both new examples and elements from previous chapters, we shall now see how Maaori negotiate their (dis)comfort by creating or organizing comforting places or zones/spaces of comfort for themselves, by relating to each other in particular ways, and by dealing with (un)comfortable conditions, situations or interactions with others. I will start in the city, like Radice (2000), by looking at the sense and extent of Maaori comfort in Auckland. I will then discuss Maaori comfort in 115 In French, expressions like confort intellectuel or confort moral convey pejorative connotations of (moral or intellectual) complacency, over-confidence or self-importance. 116 See Eriksen (1998) for more on cultural and social convergence and divergence. 253

266 their relationships with others and conclude with a discussion of Maaori comfort in general. (Dis)comfort in Auckland In chapter III, I gave an overview of Maaori migration and experience of the city life. I explained that many Maaori do not recognize the city and its institutions, and Auckland in particular, as a Maaori place. The city, in many cases, is clearly experienced as a colonized place where Maaori generally feel powerless and alien and find it hard to make a home for themselves. I shall try here to specify further how Maaori feel towards the city, as well as how they perceive it in terms of (dis)comfort. Auckland drains me, said Kahu. That was her immediate answer when I asked her how she likes living in Auckland. She explained that the city is an austere place for Maaori, but said that she did not really know why. I am not too sure I don t know what it is that makes it so draining. Honestly, though, if you look around the streets, they don t look relaxed. When we spoke at greater length, though, her perception of life in Auckland seemed to me to be very much a reflection of her personal experience, her whaanau and social relationships. Brought up in a Once were warriors household, as she called it, 117 Kahu was raped as a teenager, was kicked out of her parent s home and finally dropped out of school early. Her experience of life in the city has thus not always been a happy one, to say the least. Latterly, however, her personal life has taken a turn for the better: she has a job that she likes, she is surrounded by friendly, supportive Maaori people at work and she now has a beautiful daughter whose arrival has given her great hopes for the future. It seems that her feelings about Auckland have also changed since these more positive and healthy life changes. 117 This expression refers to Alan Duff s novel Once Were Warriors (1990) (now also a film of international renown) which depicts problems linked to poverty, violence, sexual abuse and alcohol for a Maaori family living in Auckland. This novel/film, however, also shows the process of reconnecting with the tribe and reaffirming Maaori traditions and values. It is obviously not to the latter aspect of the novel/film that Kahu alludes. 254

267 According to Kahu, some areas of the city are worse than others, for instance, South Auckland, with its large Maaori population. In fact, I often heard people comparing South Auckland with the Bronx in New York City, above all because of the gangs that are active there and the (relatively) high crime rates. The comparison is quite surprising and in my opinion is largely based on a campaign of fear waged by the media and the resulting poor reputation of the area. I only heard the comparison, though, from people who had never been overseas, let alone to the Bronx. In fact, crime rates in Aotearoa/New Zealand and in Auckland in particular are relatively low compared to other developed nation-states and capital cities. All the same, I think that this comparison with the Bronx is highly significant. The recourse to extreme images tells us much about some people s discomfort in the city or with their everyday lives in general. Radice (2000: ) reveals the presence of similar extreme images among Anglo-Montrealers likening the situation in Québec variously to war zones, a Sarajevo situation, South Africa under apartheid and Nazi Germany. Like me, she was surprised by such strong images and writes: To a European like myself, who has no particular emotional investment in Quebec s political debate, the references to war zones are thus rendered slightly ridiculous by the unlikelihood of violence in Quebec, and by the ignorance of repression in real war zones and dictatorships that they seem to betray. (2000: 114) Comparing South Auckland with the Bronx is powerful and provocative; however, it also provides a way for Maaori to contrast their feelings about the city with the equally extreme but very positive image of the peacefulness and relaxedness of the countryside. I was always surprised when Maaori told me how hard it was to live in the city, particularly in Auckland where they considered life to be too fast. I myself found Auckland to be rather calm compared to many North American and European cities. This clearly shows the relativity of perceptions based on previous experience. It is also linked to cultural particularities like the conception of time. Maaori like to say that they live by Maaori time, meaning that they are more relaxed and traditionally, politically and rhetorically more in tune with the rhythm of nature and the seasons. However, all this does not negate the fact that life in Auckland is experienced as much faster than Maaori 255

268 life in the Aotearoa/New Zealand countryside. Preoccupations such as working conditions and workload, social life and whaanau life are also of a different speed and quality in the city than in the country (see chapter III and V). The Dreamtime As I said in chapter III, partly because of nostalgia, Maaori often idealize life in the country. As others have put it, Home moves us most powerfully as absence or negation (Social research 1991: 63) which one might interpret as a rather academic conflation of the popular sayings absence makes the heart grow fonder and there s no place like home. Maaori tend to present a romanticized vision of country life, where everything is perfectly in tune with proper Maaori ways and lifestyles. They also often contrast life in the city with the perfect life in the time of the ancestors, that is, the dreamtime, as Ihimaera calls it in his novel Whanau (1996 (1974)): A time of prosperity when the land was still our own and the Whanau A Kai had pride. That was in the dreamtime before we were stripped of our dignity. The dreamtime. A dream built on other dreams. Built on pride and the obstinate need to believe that once there must have been a time when the village blazed briefly with beauty. There must have been, surely, somewhere, such a time. A time to look back to and to escape to from the shame and poverty of the present. (1996 (1974): 16-17; emphasis in original) Dreaming about the dreamtime constitutes an escape from today s difficulties and today s hard life in the city; it creates a refuge in an age lost (Ihimaera 1996 (1974): 41), a happy time The dreamtime; the long ago time (Ihimaera 1996 (1974): 42). Narratives about the dreamtime also sometimes indicate a refusal to engage in a struggle to make the present viable, pleasant or even better. They bespeak a kind of resignation or sense of powerlessness. In fact, references to the dreamtime reveal a great deal about Maaori discomfort, not only in the city, but in the nation, a nation that they describe or conceive of variously as alien, besieged, colonized and decaying. It is also, for some, a rhetorical device to blame others for what is happening. I heard these kinds of dreamtime arguments many times on urban marae among young people. Whetu used it often when she was bored and did not want to make some efforts to improve her situation 256

269 at school and at home. Some Maaori also use the dreamtime arguments and speak of discomfort in the present context in order to differentiate themselves from the Paakehaa and today s world. The dreamtime and (dis)comfort are thus both part of the politics of differentiation. Rapport, speaking about the sense of home among Anglo-Saxon Jewish immigrants to Israel (including himself), explains this kind of process thus: by staying cognitively apart, people remain at home in the old verbal routines of criticizing and distancing [themselves] from the present (Rapport 1998: 80). Rapport also writes: We became at home in Israel, as we would in any other nation-state, by staying cognitively apart (1998: 80). This means that they found a home in staying apart and refusing to engage and thus, by implication, refusing to take responsibility in the wider society and for the present situation, preferring instead to map out commonalities and thus communities with fellow Anglo-Saxon Jews. In the same way, the dreamtime argument among Maaori allows for the establishment of commonalities among those who use it, in opposition to the rest of the population. It also allows these people to withdraw or disengage from the larger world, which is mainly Paakehaa but also includes certain Maaori universes, to a more comfortable place where they can escape from their responsibility in and for today s living conditions. The dreamtime is also part of today s dream for a better and more perfect world, a world where Maaori will be kings and queens once again. The dreamtime can thus be a motivation for some in setting goals, and had inspired many people that I met, especially young people, to regain their language, tikanga and knowledge of the past. Working as a whaanau, identifying with one s marae, learning te reo and acquiring knowledge of traditional philosophy and religion is part of the dreamtime motivation. The dreamtime argument is in fact widely mobilized on a pan-urban marae where I did research as well as on the university marae by some teachers and tutors of Maaori language, Maaori medicine and traditional arts such as performing arts and martial arts. People may invoke the argument in order to criticize or resist mainstream society and ways of doing things, or to motivate others to regain traditional Maaori knowledge. Alternatively, they may use it to assert their own superiority or proximity to the dreamtime in comparison with other teachers, tutors or schools. This last usage 257

270 sometimes creates conflicts, since some people see themselves as better than others at reproducing or living the dreamtime. A kind of power game can be played out around the dreamtime among those who supposedly aspire to or incarnate it more perfectly. I also noted tensions regarding this issue between young and old: for some old people, life in the past was far better than today, when everything is so superficial. According to many participants in my research, dreamtime narratives can indicate a refusal on the part of the older generation to live in today s world and accept, or at least acknowledge, what the young ones are doing to make things better for Maaori or even to simply be Maaori. Dreamtime narratives are thus very revealing of intergenerational gaps. Fiona told me that some people, in particular those who hold on strongly to the dreamtime and who are very strict about tikanga and the old traditional ways, do not recognize the university marae as a real marae because there is no full-time kaumaatua there. The students therefore have to assume the functions of kai kooreroo and kai karanga, which are usually reserved for kaumaatua. This non-recognition of the university marae hurts Fiona deeply, because she and her fellow students and staff members do their best to warm up the marae and to make it real and alive for the Maaori students and staff as well as for manuhiri (visitors). Moreover, it is not as if they have not tried to follow the old ways and have kaumaatua more involved at the marae; these attempts were simply not very successful, perhaps because of the very specific location and nature of the marae and its people. Narratives about the dreamtime are also symptomatic of people s sense that the grass is always greener on the other side and is the sign of a very human coveting of one s neighbour s goods. So, while some urban Maaori really struggle with life in the city and idealize the country life as the dreamtime, their rural cousins dream of the city because they feel that life in the country sucks. In Witi Ihimaera s novel Whanau (1996 (1974)), Hana s greatest wish is to leave the village of her ancestors: She looks around her at the village. What a dump. What a waste of her life living here. And trapped here, that s what she is. ( ) At home, her bedroom walls are covered with pictures of film stars ripped from magazines, showing the kind of life they have. Her radio is always on full blast, for only when it s on loud can she forget this hick town. She reads all the fashion books, wishing she could look like the women in them. And she envies her older cousins when they come back to the village from Auckland or Wellington. They tell her of the fantastic time they re having. And when they leave, she wishes she was going with them too. 258

271 There s nothing here for her. Getting away from the village is like a fever. (1996 (1974): 14) Some of the participants in this research made similar comments, recalling life before their migration to the city. They had moved with the idea that city life would open new doors for themselves and their children. Kepa s mother, for example, moved to Auckland with her children despite the overt disapproval of the rest of the whaanau who still live in the countryside. While some migrants were happy with what they found in the city, many were disappointed. Life in the city is often idealized by country-dwellers, just as life in the country is idealized by city-dwellers. In fact, this twin idealization hints at a certain lack of communication between the two milieus, and almost a certain solitude in each that is not expressed to the other. Fiona s quote is illustrative of the reciprocal envy and idealization between rural and urban cousins: I am very staunch when it comes to my taha Maaori and yet, I don t maintain strong links with my own tribal community. I have strong links with the Maaori community, the university Maaori community, my partner and I don t maintain a strong link with our own tribes. And I think mainly that s because I think mainly for myself it s because I wasn t brought up in my tribal area because my father was a school teacher and I was raised outside my own tribal area. When we did go back there I knew my cousins and that but I wasn t brought up with them and when I go back, all of my cousins look very tight and very close They never ever made me feel as an outsider, they always recognize me, but I think within myself I did feel like an outsider because I wasn t brought up with them. They... at some point in their life, they all lived with my koro [grandfather] and my kuia [grandmother] and I have never lived with my koro and my kuia. I sort of felt stink about that too, because it s a real traditional Maaori value that. As a moko, as a mokopuna, you re raised with your elders and I wasn t raised with my elders, so ( ) I feel stink about that. A few years ago I went back to do a project with my koro and my kuia and one of my cousins made the comment that Yeah! Some only come back when they need something, and I don t know if she was directly referring to me but I felt like she was, inside. I m sort of the outsider ( ) because, as I said, I m very staunch in my taha Maaori, but when I go back to my tribal area, I try to be very humble because I wasn t raised there and some look down on me or I don t know. It s actually interesting cause we had my brother s 21 st a few years ago and all the family came. ( ) and my cousin got drunk and she said to me Cous, I m very scared of you! laughter and I laughed and laughed and I said Why? and she goes We re all scared of you, you know, you re at university and got your degree. Really, there s only a few of us from my father s family who have actually come through university, so I thought about it and then I thought Gee! All my cousins are scared of me and on another level, I m scared of them because when I go back, I haven t been raised within our tribal area. (Fiona) I think Fiona s quote illustrates not only a certain solitude in each milieu, but also a necessary coexistence and interdependence between urban Maaori and rural Maaori. On 259

272 the one hand, the city-dwellers necessarily situate themselves in relation to the hapuu and iwi in the countryside, which still represent an important ontological foundation and serve to situate urban-dwellers and the urban whaanau or urban networks in the larger Maaori system, whatever the changes that city life has brought about. The whaanau in the country remains an important link with traditions and culture as well as with Maaori resources. On the other hand, the rural-dwellers need both the skills of their urban cousins in Paakehaa spheres and figured worlds and their support and engagement in Maaori figured worlds in order to survive and indeed thrive. Both sides need each other to affirm Maaori ways, visions, and rights more effectively and thus, to enlarge Maaori space within the nation-state. (Dis)comfort and (in)security (Dis)comfort in South Auckland or elsewhere in Auckland is closely related to a sense of (in)security, an (in)security which can be physical, emotional or social. In Auckland, one can feel very lonely, cut off from one s support network and thus from one s safety net. It often takes time before one feels good in the city, before one develops a new support network and is sufficiently at ease with the new environment to be able to relax. Hiraina explained to me how Ruka and his family have helped her to feel comfortable at last in Auckland: Ruka has been somebody very important to me. He has been awesome and his family: his mum, his dad, his wife, his mother-in-law and his father-in-law. Ruka has done so much to encourage me to stay on, to hang out a little bit longer, I don t think without his help even though he would probably say I didn t do anything, but just being there and there [are] a lot of things, he has done. He is really special to me. I don t think I would have been still here (Hiraina) When one is incorporated into a whaanau, either whaanau whakapapa or being whaangai when the whaanau is not related by blood, one feels more at ease in the city. In fact, being part of a group or a whaanau is very important in the development of a certain sense of comfort for Maaori migrants to cities. This is what Rangi expressed (see chapter IV): If you have a big family that have come from the country to the city, you will find, majority of the time, they will stay with someone until they are able to cope by 260

273 going out, living on their own. I have been out there and I don t like it, on my own. I find more security living with whaanau. (Rangi) In fact, Rangi said that she came to the city in order to improve the lot of her whaanau. Her goals are to obtain a teaching diploma and then go back to her husband s tribal area, where she feels is home, and teach primary school there. Staying in the city has been a real sacrifice for her: each term, she has questioned her plans, although she has always decided to stay because for once in her life, she has had the opportunity to do something for and by herself, and then she also knows her whaanau will benefit from her studies in the future. But the main factor that influenced these painful decisions was that she was able to rely on her whaanau s support in the city. Discomfort is also explained for many by the fact that the city was a completely new experience : I was a bit scared because it was my first time out and I didn t really know what it was about, explained Hiraina. The unknown, obviously, is an important source of discomfort and, conversely, experience and knowledge are a source of comfort, as we will see. The whaanau or support group, part of the realm of the known, is thus a great help for Maaori migrants. This help is not only moral, emotional and spiritual, it is also tangible since the whaanau network in the city provides an efficient channel to access jobs, churches, and all kinds of groups and services for Maaori and for the general public in the city (e.g., Metge 1964). In fact, having whaanau in the city enables many Maaori migrants to integrate faster in terms of finding employment and learning to use city networks, Maaori or not (see chapter VIII). The city: a cold place for real Maaori There are no statistics about moves back and forth between the country and the city among Maaori. Indeed, it would be impossible to quantify the scale of this phenomena: many Maaori live for a good length of time in the city without having an address of their own since, as we saw, they often live with whaanau members at first. Some Maaori decide to move back in the country after a shorter or a longer urban sojourn. Others cannot tolerate life in the city and the stress that it provokes. If the point of tolerability is 261

274 exceeded or the discomfort is too great, they can decide to go back home to the country where whaanau members are always or almost always there to welcome them. 118 The city is often described as a cold place by many Maaori, which contrasts with the warmth they perceive in the rural community in general. Maaori are not the only ones to experience the city as a cold place where people are not friendly or convivial and do not show great solidarity. It is quite common for country people everywhere to experience the city at first as a cold place and urban dwellers as cold people; this is not peculiar to Maaori. But what is interesting is their use of rhetoric about the city being a cold and alien place for real Maaori, specifically. I discussed the rhetorical strategy of real versus fake Maaori to some extent in chapter III. A rhetoric of discomfort is thus used with the aim of proving or asserting one s authenticity as Maaori. Such rhetoric is not used by all Maaori; rather, it is mostly employed by Maaori who live in the city but want especially to differentiate themselves from urban Maaori, meaning Maaori who do not know where they come from. However, as noted in chapter III, this rhetoric leaves room for a display of heteroglossic interpretations and plays with meanings, symbols, and artefacts which are recognized as being part of either the urban world, the rural world or both worlds. I do not want to imply here that those who talk of the city as cold do not really experience it as a cold place. Many do, but many also refer to this feeling as an authentic and normal feeling for people who know where they come from and still have strong connections to their whaanau and iwi back in the country. For these people, it is not right to consider the city an exciting place to live even if they (more or less secretly) actually like some aspects of the city. There is felt to be something suspect about tribal Maaori who like the city life too much or who feel too comfortable in Auckland or other big cities, in particular when their whaanau have asked or mandated them to go to the city for a particular mission. Of course, those who live in smaller cities nearer tribal homes (like Gisborne, Palmerston North, Hamilton, Whangarei or New Plymouth) are 118 I discussed in chapter V the difficulties that Maaori can experience when they want to go back to their tribal areas in the country. Of course, it is not the same when they have only been gone for a couple of weeks or a couple of months. But still, depending on the reasons for departure to the city, some people can be jealous, envious or resentful of a returnee. But on the whole, people are happy when someone decides to come back, and the returnee will be welcomed with open arms: whaanau is always whaanau. 262

275 subject to much less suspicion. For Auckland Maaori, these places are sometimes not even considered to be real cities. The same rhetoric of discomfort is also used to assert one s true Maoriness. This was particularly true in the case of Rongo, who does not really look Maaori with his fair skin and pale blue eyes. Rongo had decided to go back to his tribal area and was living there at the time that I met him. He explained that the marae and the community he had found in the city was only a pale version of the country life, and he had not been able to stand it anymore. I understood that this was also a way for him to assert his true Maoriness, both then and now, to his whaanau back in the country, to his fellow Maaori city-dwellers whom he found so different from himself and also to me at the time of the interview (which took place in Auckland). Rongo accentuated every sign and symbol of Maoriness. I think he felt that had he stayed in the city for too long, he would have begun to change and his visits to and contact with his tribal home would have diminished. That, coupled with his generally non-maaori physical appearance, would have made it quite difficult for him to go home and claim anything from there and even to claim to belong there. It was clear that important issues of identity and belonging to a particular tribe and whaanau were at stake. He explained to me: R. I lived up here! In Auckland! N. Where? R. Round here somewhere. I did not like it. N. Why? R. It was superficial. All shit! You go to the marae, see some Maaori, hang out with them and they disappear and you don t see them. To me, it doesn t make sense. ( ) I like the marae, the fellow that built it was part of my whakapapa. ( ) I like it, not because he built it, I like it because it s an asset here [in Auckland]. ( ) It helps people. It helps te reo. They provide school for kids that live here, the Maaori children. In a superficial way, they create a sense of community living. N. Why do you say in a superficial way? R. Because a lot of people who are living here aren t from here. That s a sort of superficial communal way of life. ( ) I lived here for about 6 months, 8 months. One day, I went to my brother and I said Fuck this, I m out of here! [laughter] ( ) I don t like you, I don t like the way it is, you people, all you want to learn is stone out of your head. (Rongo) 263

276 This context itself, then, imposes restrictions on how people could locate themselves in the world (Jensen 1998: 99) 119 and many feel the need to justify why they live in the city. Perhaps they were obliged to move because of their health (like Alexis, in my fieldwork), they migrated because of their studies (like Waerete and Fiona), or they came because of better work opportunities (as did Rangi and her husband Hoani). Some, however, will explain that they freely chose to move to the city because they wanted their children to receive a good education (for example, Kepa s mother and Ngareta). For many, that meant huge sacrifices. Other migrated because they wanted to improve their living conditions and better their life. The city is a place where many feel there is a future for Maaori: good jobs and schooling opportunities, better and more diversified services and better opportunities for advancement not only as individuals, but also as Maaori (see chapter VI). This is not new: Metge already noted in 1964 that the city provided better work opportunities for Maaori than the countryside, where many feel that there is nothing for them (Ihimaera 1996 (1974): 17), particularly the young ones. Recently, however, there has been a move back to the country of well-educated young people, who start small businesses or other projects aiming to make the village a better place to live for everybody. They are not always warmly welcomed, as we saw in chapter V, but sometimes their return is greatly desired, since they have skills that are very much needed in the country. The label urban Maaori is not rejected by all. Many Maaori use it to speak about themselves as a political strategy and a strong assertion of their identity. This identification was in fact the very basis of many urban Maaori projects and claims in the 1980s and 1990s (including all the projects and claims by Te Whaanau o Waipareira and Manukau Urban Maaori Authorities; see Durie 2001a; Phillips 1999; Te Whaanau o Waipareira Trust 2001; Waitangi Tribunal 1998), as well as claims like the well-known Maaori Fisheries Case of 1998 (see chapter IV and also Durie 1998). I must say that I have not met many Maaori who speak about themselves as urban Maaori. Those who identify more strongly with the urban setting preferred to say that they are Maaori and 119 Jansen (1998) has written about narrations of post-yugoslav identities, in which he discusses the pressure that nationalist discourse exerts on defining one s identity, sense of belonging and sense of home. 264

277 live in the city. Others, however, use the designation urban Maaori for themselves, but it means above all that they just live in the city. Urban Maaori to me is just living in the city and I do class myself as urban Maaori because I have been brought up in the town, I have always been living in the city (Debra). This more general meaning is that which is used in the report Well-being and Disparity in Taamaki-makaurau by the James Henare Maaori Research Centre (2002). However, Debra also added, Maaori living in the city because when you go back to home, then you see how different you really are to our people back home ( ). We re a bit more inclined to more material things ( ) And before I learnt my reo, I would have been even more urban Maaori [laughter]. (Debra) This quote shows that even if Debra says that an urban Maaori is simply a Maaori who lives in the city, in fact, she sees urban Maaori as being different from rural ones. Her experience leads her to make the following link: the less one knows about Maaori tikanga (custom, rules) and the Maaori language, the more one qualifies as an urban Maaori. This presupposes that urban Maaori are less Maaori than their rural contemporaries; they are acculturated to a greater degree and are in effect whiter, if not physically, then in their hearts and minds. What has emerged so far is that many Maaori but certainly not all, as we will see later feel a certain discomfort in living in Auckland. They are nostalgic about their past in the countryside with their extended family, they miss the close contact with nature, they do not necessarily have a strong or large city network for mutual assistance and friendship, they often feel alien to their work and study environments, and they must often struggle against difficult everyday circumstances (such as poverty or poor quality of life in their neighbourhood). If we go back to the diverse layers of comfort identified above, (dis)comfort in the city definitely refers, then, to layers A) measure of support, assistance, consolation, B) measure of satisfaction, tolerability, E) emotional state, sense of security, feelings, and H) measure of cultural and social convergence/divergence. These levels combine and influence each other, and are involved differently in the (dis)comfort felt by each person. 265

278 An additional layer of meaning that is not identified by either Rybczynski (1986) or Radice (2000) is also implicated in Maaori senses of (dis)comfort. This layer implies a sensitivity to cold / warm, bad / good feelings or signs emanating from the spiritual, natural and supernatural worlds, as we shall see below. Urban (dis)comfort and rural connections Feeling at ease with the rural area can have a significant impact on (dis)comfort in the urban one. (Dis)comfort in the city does not depend entirely on urban conditions and experiences. Aroha, for example, explained her ease in most contexts, Maaori or Paakehaa, urban or rural, by reference to a strong grounding in her rural milieu: I am comfortable with most situations because I know where I am from and I have good kaumaatua [elders] and good family which ground me to my marae (...) Because I know I come from there, I feel quite full, I feel quite comfortable to go to different places as a visitor and I can let myself be welcomed by those people because I know where I am from. ( ) Spiritually, I know where I come from and I know there are greater beings than me. It s knowing where I come from, but it s also having that element of belief, of spirituality, of believing in the power of our ancestors, and believing in good (...) [and] believing that good prevails. And that s what makes me comfortable, that s what is comforting for me. (Aroha) Aroha s case reveals a dimension of (dis)comfort which has to do with connections to the spiritual world and which involves keeping alive or behaving according to certain beliefs, and maintaining a positive attitude towards life in general and urban life in particular. (Dis)comfort in particular situations is thus related to one s general level of well-being. Comfort here has an emotional aspect, as in layer E (emotional state, sense of security, feelings) and one can be comfortable, calm, relaxed or positive in facing the difficult or alien situations that often arise in city life. In Aroha s quote, layer A (measure of support, assistance, consolation) is also relevant, since Aroha s overall sense of ease is deeply bound up in the support she receives from her family, in particular her kaumaatua. Most of Aroha s kaumaatua live in her tribal area in the country rather than in the city, which helps illustrate the lack of dichotomy between rural and urban milieus, and they do come and visit her when they deem it necessary. For example, when Aroha decided to begin research towards a PhD, her kaumaatua came to meet her PhD supervisor, just to make sure that she was in good hands and that they had a good feeling about the supervisor. 266

279 They also came to bless the place where she was to pursue her research, in order to ensure successful studies. Asking for the agreement, support and blessing of her kaumaatua to undertake PhD research was very important for Aroha. In fact, it is part of tikanga (traditions) for many Maaori students at the university, who will likewise consult their whaanau about their choice of research topic, whatever the discipline, but especially if it is about Maaori or concerns Maaori in any way (see chapter V). Speaking about her master s thesis, Tui said: If one or two don t like the idea, I can live with that. If there is a whole lot of them, no, then I will try to see how I can make them happy, I can see what I can do to make it accepted or I just would not do it. It s not worth it. But I think it s something that is important ( ) If people don t agree with the idea, if there s not a good feeling about doing it you won t get people helping you. Secondly people are concerned, we re concerned by who s gonna benefit from this Is it going to benefit to the community or is it all my selfish, self-interest, no? (Tui) Fiona s whaanau made her modify her topic slightly, since they considered she should begin with more general research instead of specializing too soon: My master s thesis, I actually changed my topic. It was still related to what I was supposed to do because quite a few people in my family said how can you do?. I was gonna do tikanga wahine and my family said You know, that s a thing that you are really strong in, but how can you do that if you don t look at tikanga first? (Fiona) These examples show how important the family and the group are for Maaori. It is crucial for many Maaori not only to have the consent and blessing of their whaanau for their projects to run smoothly and successfully, but also to have whaanau/iwi/maaori-oriented project goals: they work not only for their own sake, but for the benefit of their whaanau, iwi and/or Maaori more generally. To be honest with you, I don t want to do a doctorate, I can t think of anything worse, to sit around for three years and write about something. I would rather be on holiday, I don t know, shocking! On an island trip or I could retire and just be a lawyer s wife. I don t need to do this, it s not for me that I m doing this doctorate, I don t get much of pleasure out of this stuff. ( ) The reason that I m going to try to get my doctorate, it s so that I can be in a position to help people from my iwi because we are in a bad situation at the moment and I know it s just my destiny. I m on a boat and I can t get off. ( ) I just even know how I end up doing things sometimes because it s just come to me, like in a dream or something, it comes and I m just told to do so. I mean I m happy in my personal life with my husband, my family, my friends, I certainly have a very good life ( ) This study and stuff, 267

280 ( ) it s not for me, it s for the tribe, it s for other young Maaori people ( ), it s for all those families that don t have access to education and health and money and houses, decent clothing, decent food This doctorate, although it s a doctorate, it s a taonga, it s some way of making life a bit better. (Aroha) The fact that Aroha is doing her doctorate for her family is comforting, and that is also what makes her comfortable in general both around the university and in her daily life with her more immediate family. Because she has been told by her tiipuna (dead ancestors) through signs and dreams to engage in doctoral studies, she would feel immensely uncomfortable if she were not to follow what she calls her destiny. She was meant to do a doctorate, she was chosen by the tiipuna and by certain living kaumaatua from her iwi. Now that she has made the decision to pursue her PhD studies, she feels good, she has a positive attitude to life and she is happy. Aroha does not deny that other factors influence her general sense of ease. She acknowledges that she and her husband have a financial and professional situation that is better than the majority of Maaori in Auckland, which helps her to be more positive and to feel comfortable in the city and elsewhere. She added: And I feel comfortable because I can afford a $10 in my pocket to pay for my lunch and I can pay my friends a cup of tea. Aroha s case also refers to layer F of the comfort onion (intellectual state, knowledge), since her sense of comfort presupposes a certain degree of knowledge, the knowledge of her whakapapa (genealogy) as well as tikanga Maaori: knowing where she comes from, acknowledging her kaumaatua (elders) and tiipuna (dead ancestors), having her studies blessed and following her tiipuna s desires are all tikanga. To raise another example, Kiri learnt to recite her whakapapa in te reo for an important meeting in which she had to present her new cultural program to the management committee of the health organisation where she works, most of whom were Paakehaa. Her proposed program was innovative and potentially controversial, and placed great emphasis on Maaori views and teachings. She explained to me that she felt very strong when she presented her project, she felt that her presentation was good and that she could stand tall in front of the committee, because she felt grounded, she knew who she was and could assert her identity and origin proudly and confidently. During her presentation, she 268

281 also felt comfortable because she had received advice and agreement from her parents, aunts and uncles from her tribal areas. She had travelled there to discuss her project and ensure that she was right in doing it the way she had planned. She was also comfortable because her tuakana (elder sister), Rangi, was at her presentation, which relates to layer A of comfort (measure of support, assistance, consolation): she felt well supported. We ll be there to awhi you! In fact, this practice of accompanying or awhi (embracing, fostering, cherishing) or tautoko (supporting) whaanau members for interviews, public presentations, meetings and so on is widespread among Maaori and part of tikanga (Durie 2001a). The whaanau, whakapapa and/or kaupapa will attend in order to show support and assistance to the whaanau member who has a job interview or a speech to give, for instance. The whaanau shows to the others present that the candidate is well supported and surrounded. It is also a question of showing one s mana, being a united whaanau. In the city and within mainstream institutions, this demonstration of support, even if wellintentioned, can also be a source of discomfort for the candidate, who may feel embarrassed by their whaanau s insistence on accompanying them at crucial moments when they know that it is not in the culture or the figured world of the institution in question. Kiri faced this sense of discomfort when a group of kaumaatua told her that they would come with her and Rangi to be by her side during her presentation to the management committee of the unit where she works (see above). They did not ask her if it would be right to come in the circumstances: they simply told her to pick them up before the meeting. Kiri was touched at first by the demonstration of support, but later, she began to feel uneasy at the thought of having them there with her. In fact, she felt quite stressed by the situation that she foresaw. First, she thought that the management committee (predominantly Paakehaa) might feel invaded by these strangers, which might jeopardize the chances that her project would be accepted by the committee. Second, she was also afraid of the reaction of the Maaori representatives on the management committee: they might interpret the presence of her whaanau (kaupapa) as an intrusion 269

282 into the internal affairs of the unit or as a threat to their control over the taha Maaori (Maaori side or aspect) of the institution and their mana as Maaori representatives. The situation was already rather sensitive, since the Maaori representatives were kaumaatua who had already expressed signs of irritation and disagreement to Kiri over her project. They felt they were losing their exclusive control over Maaori activities and that she was too young, in Maaori terms (see chapter VI and Muru-Lanning 2004), to be in charge of such a project. Kiri was therefore very uncomfortable with the situation and did not know how to deal with it. She thought at first about not disclosing the meeting time to the kaumaatua ropuu (group of elders) who wanted to awhi her at the meeting by telling them that the meeting was postponed, but she soon discarded that idea because she knew that they would find out the truth sooner or later from the kuumara vine (literally sweet potato vine, but grapevine in common English parlance). Another option, rejecting the offer of awhi outright, would not be correct according to tikanga. In the end, Kiri felt that it was most appropriate for her as a member of the institution, for the future of her project, and for the good of the relationships with the kaumaatua at work, to tell the whaanau about her exact feelings, her discomfort and the particular circumstances of the situation. As it turned out, the kaumaatua were sympathetic and did not insist on coming, but Kiri had been under a great deal of stress for the whole week before she decided to discuss the situation with them. I know where I come from Knowing where one comes from is thus not only about oneself and one s own identity and self-confidence, but also about relating to others. There is a saying we have in Maoridom and it is No hea koe?, which means where are you from? and that links you. It is called whakapapa and once you know your whakapapa, it is easy to fit in. Like for instance that man there, he is from up north and he said do you know my uncle?, you see, and we all do that and then suddenly there is a commonality and then you know who their tiipuna are and then you know where their land is, so it is a lot easier to work if there is an element of trust or an element of commonality. (Maxine) 270

283 According to Maxine, it is very important in the city to be able to establish commonalities and relationships and to (re)establish whaanau connections, both in order to survive in the business world, as we shall see, and also, in her case, to get by as a single mother of four children. With whakapapa and whaanau comes mutual support (but also mutual responsibilities). Here, the links between layer F, (knowledge of one s whakapapa), layer H, (measure of affinities or convergence) and layer A, (measure of support, assistance) of the meanings of comfort are well illustrated. These three layers together combine to create comfortable spaces where one can engage with others. These are also closely associated with the contraction and expansion of the whaanau, whakapapa and kaupapa, as shown in VI (see also next chapter). The contraction/expansion is linked to comfort, that is the whaanau expands when people feel comfortable with others and wish to include them within the whaanau, and it contracts as a consequence of tensions, misunderstandings or conflicts with certain individuals or groups. In both cases, the contraction or expansion enables the renegotiation of a certain degree of comfort among those who are included in the whaanau. Sometimes, the establishment of a clear boundary between the whaanau and the others even allows for greater comfort, since it removes ambiguities, frees the atmosphere from tension and provides a sense of relief (see for example the whaanau dilemma of chapter VI). It is not only comfortable relationships with one s tribal area and people that give comfort in the city. The opposite is also true: some uncomfortable aspects of rural life can explain a sense of urban comfort. For Aroha, again, the city means freedom, in terms of being more independent from the whaanau and the hapuu (sub-tribe) who live very closely in the countryside. The city also means the freedom to go where she pleases without being glared at, as she was when she went to what she calls the Paakehaa side of the village. There is a certain anonymity in Auckland that allows more freedom, since one is not as easily monitored there as in the country. However, the kuumara vine also creeps into the capital and people there too will eventually find out about almost anything. Mihi also moved away from her village because of an uncomfortable situation: she left an abusive husband behind, so the city for her meant a new beginning, even if it was difficult to live by herself at first. Joanna s whaanau and whare Maaori were crucial in helping 271

284 her feel comfortable and recognize the new avenues opening up before her. Here, many layers of comfort are involved: layer A, measure of support, assistance, as Joanna s whaanau became Mihi s whaanau, and layers C, measure of physical well-being, enjoyment, ease; D, measure of privacy, intimacy, domesticity; and E, sense of security. These were all closely related to Mihi s inclusion and participation in Joanna s whaanau, and also, very importantly, in the daily life of Joanna s whaanau s whare Maaori. For Pita and Jackie, Auckland also means that they can live freely and openly as gay and lesbian, which would not be widely accepted by the whaanau in the country. Their identity as gay might then become more important than their Maaori identity and lead them to become more involved in the Paakehaa gay scene or the Paakehaa world in general. This does not mean that they do not stand up as Maaori in particular contexts. They may also combine their participation in Maaori and Paakehaa circles and develop new whaanau kaupapa networks. As Cohen (1993) underlines, ease in the city does not depend entirely on the spatial context and/or current social context but also on social background. As we saw in chapter III and VI, life in the city allows for more possibilities and more choices, since many diverse and sometimes conflicting figured worlds are present and can be experienced on a daily basis. The city can then be felt to be a comfortable place by people whose lives were restricted in the countryside, or by people who now can choose more freely between diverse possibilities. This does not mean that one is completely free in the city; on the contrary, there is considerable pressure to conform to certain stereotypes or to limit oneself to particular choices, sectors of the city, social horizons or figured worlds. Life in the city is also more expensive and has, as we have seen, its own set of problems. As I briefly mentioned in chapter III, many Maaori enjoy living in Auckland partly for the pleasure of city life as such. Some people just feel naturally comfortable in the city. They like the environment, urban life in general, the numerous activities and events to choose from, the diversity of the population and the anonymity. And in the city, there is always something to do and there are new things to experience. For many Maaori artists, for example, there is no place like Auckland to practise and sell their art, find venues for shows, and build networks and support with other artists. This was clearly why Alan, a 272

285 painter and designer, chose to settle in Auckland after a sojourn on his native east coast on his way back from Australia. Some Maaori activists also told me that Auckland is the best place for them to be competent and efficient in their professional activities: the information is there, the public forums are there, the media are there And in the city, they can disappear and make themselves forgotten fairly easily if necessary, as Manaaki pointed out. For some, then, it is right to enjoy the city, and those who are critical of them can understand the reasons for their enjoyment. But the city-dwellers must still be careful not to like it too much or show too much enthusiasm towards city life. If they want to keep the support of their whaanau, they need to balance their attachments to the city and to their tribal areas, their involvement in mainstream society and their engagement in Maoridom. Here again, (dis)comfort is negotiated in relation to others: one must achieve a balance in order to maintain the support of Maaori networks (layer A) and to stay within the zones of affinities or convergence with at least some of the people who are part of one s networks (layer H). Maintaining strong whaanau and iwi connections and demonstrating engagement in various environments and their related figured worlds rural and urban or Maaori and mainstream thus seems important in order for one to maintain good relationships with Maaori overall. A strong sense of belonging to Auckland may also be present among those who have lost contact with their whaanau and/or iwi. As I have mentioned, 15.4% of the Maaori adults in Auckland do not know (or do not reveal) their iwi (Te Hoe Nuku Roa 1999: 88). I think that the latter do not necessarily feel a sense of attachment to Auckland as such, but rather to their place of residence, to a particular neighbourhood in the city or to places where they go about their usual activities. Furthermore, those who know their whakapapa, even if they have never been to their tribal areas and do not know the people there, can still cultivate a sense of attachment towards it and develop a sense of a spiritual home outside the city. It is thus not necessary to be born in a place or to have lived in a place to call it home. The fact that one s parents and grandparents come from a place is often sufficient 273

286 for Maaori to call that place home, but if one has never been there, it is not a place that is under one s control in the strictest sense of the term, and bringing some space under control has been identified by Douglas (1991: 289) as one of the characteristics of home. However, there is a certain measure of control even in this kind of unvisited home, since by claiming a place as home by virtue of whakapapa descent, one asserts one s special right to the place. The same is true about the Maaori language which then becomes another site of resistance. It is always surprising, but highly revealing, to hear people who do not know te reo very well, if at all, say my language. This is in fact quite widespread among non-speakers of te reo. By saying that the language is theirs, they also assert their identity and rights as Maaori (see the section below about Maaori language). Some people s feeling of comfort in the urban setting seems also to be linked to the perception that their Maoriness opens up possibilities, because they can play in several semiotic spaces at the same time, depending on their particular needs and circumstances a possibility that is not available to the same extent to the great majority of Paakehaa. Of course, this implies a good knowledge of both worlds and a certain mastery of the different codes and realms of interpretation. It also means being comfortable enough with each figured world to be able to code-switch when necessary, either consciously or not, if the code is well internalized. For Hone as well as for Rongo, this capacity to move through both worlds is clearly seen as a political advantage: R. The thing with Maaori and Paakehaa, Paakehaa should be scared of Maaori because they don t have any understanding of it. ( ) But we understand them! N. So you have an advantage there? R. We do. (Rongo) Life in the city helps to build this capacity to play in multiple universes of meanings, since many Maaori face other worlds/figured worlds there on a daily basis and have no choice but to acquire a fluency and competence in their workings through habitus and daily engagement in urban places. Moreover, being Maaori and living in the city is not just about opening up symbolic or semiotic possibilities for Maaori, of course, but also has very practical advantages. According to Maxine, being Maaori can be good for business: they know that we are 274

287 Maaori and [Maaori] people always support Maaori in business. That was that whakawhanaungatanga [enriching the bonds of family unity] I was talking about (Maxine). Whaanau whakapapa and iwi networks are very important for supporting Maaori initiatives, and Maxine considers that Maaori have an advantage over Paakehaa in this respect. She added that the migration of people from her tribe to Auckland due to a shortage of jobs up north has also helped her business a great deal: If they did not actually know my grandparents, they knew some of my aunts and uncles and they say oh! Do you know that girl ( ) and so on, and so that is part of it, that is whakawhanaungatanga (Maxine). This is the beauty of the kuumara vine when it works in one s favour. But Maxine also points out that most Maaori are likely to be discouraged well before they actually set up in business for themselves, since they are familiar with the negative picture portrayed by the statistics: Maaori businesses generally have a greater propensity to undergo economic problems than Paakehaa ones. (Dis)comfort: a question of access? (Dis)comfort as Maaori in the city is in part linked to the degree of access to the Maaori world, in terms of cultural resources (Maaori language knowledge and skills, tikanga knowledge and skills, marae participation and knowledge of marae protocols), physical resources (land, fisheries, waahi tapu [sacred places], tribal estates), and social resources (whaanau, Maaori friends and associates, Maaori educational institutions, Maaori services, tribal services) (Durie 2001a: 55). (Dis)comfort is not disconnected from the rhetoric about what a real Maaori should know and should have access to. According to Durie (2001a: 56), access depends on many variables: availability of information, personal confidence, economic factors and place of residence. In fact, real marae and or whare Maaori (see chapter IV) are important loci for Maaori teachings and intergenerational transmission, as well as for support and well-being, be that emotional, intellectual or material (these three dimensions being particularly closely related for Maaori). 275

288 (Dis)comfort 120 is then strongly linked with the capacity for self-identification as a Maaori and/or tribe member, which presupposes possibilities for cultural expression and recognition by other Maaori and tribe members as well as cultural endorsement within the institutions of present-day Aotearoa/New Zealand. However, it must be specified that some Maaori will be perfectly confident in the city without having great access to Maaori resources or identifying strongly with their taha Maaori (Maaori side). Some will put more emphasis on another identity, for example, that of a homosexual person, a worker of a particular kind or a mother, and will feel comfortable as such without having a great access to Maaori resources. While not (necessarily) denying the fact that they are Maaori, they will subordinate their Maoriness to other identities or only activate it on certain occasions. For example, they will emphasize it when they visit their whaanau in the country or attend a tangihanga (funeral) or a hui (meeting) in the city, or during particular periods of life or consciousness of their taha Maaori. And there again, their degree of (dis)comfort will vary according to the aforementioned factors. To speak or not to speak te reo Maaori Knowledge of te reo Maaori has long been recognized as central to Maaori identities, and I suggest that it is an important factor of (dis)comfort for many Maaori. It has a great impact on relationships with others, since a feeble knowledge of the language will prevent one from fully participating in Maaori worlds. Not understanding what is said can be a source of shame, shyness or guilt depending on the person, while understanding it well fosters self-confidence, personal pride, and sociability with both Maaori and non-maaori. In fact, for some, speaking te reo is a way of marking their difference or distinct character in relation to non-maaori and of affirming their rights as Maaori. When it is mastered well, te reo enables them to emphasize their engagement in Maaori figured world(s). However, acquiring fluency in te reo is not easy for most people: it necessitates personal resources (including a certain aptitude for learning languages, time and money), and 120 In his book, Durie (2001a) is writing more precisely about mental health, but I think that we can extend its conclusions to (dis)comfort in general, assuming that mental health/illness can be a form of discomfort in the extreme. 276

289 whaanau or tribal resources like the presence of native speakers in the whaanau or tribe as well as easily accessible marae. It also depends on factors such as family history, one s rank within the whaanau, power relationships within the whaanau or tribe and within society in general, larger structures like state programs (TV programs, 121 financial programs, promotion campaigns and so forth), the local presence or lack of Maaori schools, the courses available at school, and the existence and availability of learning material. Learning te reo like learning any language also asks for good faith, selfconfidence and, of course, a great deal of practice on the part of the learner. Mere, who works in a college of technology, noted a remarkable difference between Maaori students who have came through the kohanga reo and kura kaupapa system and those who have passed through the mainstream system: according to her, the former know who they are, have a higher level of achievement in school and are more selfconfident. She attributes this difference to the fact that they know their language. However, I observed that in mainstream universities the kohanga reo generation can also make other Maaori feel somewhat uncomfortable by their mere presence. Kiri, for example, thought that they could be self-important with their knowledge and that they sometimes looked down on others. Mihi, feeling hurt by the arrogance of the kohanga reo generation, added that it is not her and her friends fault if they are not fluent in te reo. They have tried hard, but they did not succeed. It is not something I can just jump into just because it is Maaori, said Kahu, raising an important point: many Maaori feel under a lot of pressure to perform in situations that call for Maaori prayers or songs or a certain Maaori tone because it looks good. Just because they are Maaori, they are expected to know instinctively how to sing waiata (songs), to swing poi (light ball with a short string attached to it), perform kapa haka (performing arts), speak te reo, behave properly and even act as a Maaori representative or specialist adviser. Indeed, many of the participants told me the same story repeatedly, being very emotional about their experience. Some of my classmates at university were tempted at times to drop out of their te reo class, and more than once I saw people crying at break or during morning tea. For many of them, learning te reo Maaori was not simply about gaining an advantage in 121 A new Maaori national TV channel has just been launched at the end of March

290 their lives, it was also about their core identity, so when it became difficult or seemed to go wrong somehow, their suffering was all the greater. In fact, Ema told me that she decided to take a te reo course when she made the choice to be Maaori rather than only identifying as Maaori. For her, knowing te reo helps make one Maaori. And for many, as we will see in the next chapter, learning te reo is not only about individual identity, it is also about autonomy and it can involve the whole whaanau engagement in a collective process of reclaiming and becoming. 122 At a Maaori graduation ceremony on a university marae, I noted that during their koorero (speeches), many graduates mentioned or even insisted on their discomfort at being on a marae and not being able to speak te reo Maaori properly (if at all). Some even apologized and explained the shame and embarrassment they felt. I was sitting next to Kepa, an former graduate, and he told me how courageous he found those people and how intense the pressure on them can be on such occasions, when they could face criticism from others. He said that it is even worse on marae, since in the minds of many, one must speak te reo there, as marae are the only places left where te reo dominates. Linda, a Maaori language teacher in a high school, had noticed that very few parents participate in school hui (meetings). She thinks that they are too shy because they do not know enough about Maaori and Maaori culture: They are scared, they are uncomfortable being around their own tikanga because they have not been taught the Maaori way (Linda). Kiri explained to me that this embarrassment is felt by many people of her generation, and it comes from the generation before them who were beaten with the strap in school for speaking te reo. This instilled such shame that they did not transmit the language to her generation. She finds the next generation, that of her children, very lucky: since the Maaori renaissance, many more opportunities to learn te reo have been created. Meanwhile, the only solution that Linda has found to attract the parents are the children s 122 Note that learning the Maaori language is also a question of mana, which is why whole whaanau sometimes mobilize in a collective effort to regain it. Outside this context, it is quite difficult for individuals to learn the language: little help is available to them, since knowledge, in the Maaori system, is not distributed equally among the population. Certain persons and groups in particular (e.g. senior lineages, older male siblings) are usually the depositary of the knowledge. The fact that the Maaori language is taught democratically in mainstream institutions could thus be misleading. 278

291 kapa haka performances. Since it is a show, they do not need to speak, they are not addressed directly and personally, and since their children are performing they are easily motivated to attend. When it comes to serious issues about their children s learning, however, the parents feel insecure since they themselves lack the knowledge to help as much as they would like. Debra told me that she withdrew her oldest daughter from kohanga reo (Maaori kindergarten) when she was a baby precisely because at that time Debra could not speak te reo, and she did not like the fact that she could neither understand nor reply to her daughter if she spoke Maaori at home. Debra also felt very uncomfortable at the kohanga whaanau hui (meeting) because of her own ignorance of the language (as many Maaori call te reo Maaori). Now that she has learnt it herself, though, she has decided to send her younger child to kohanga reo. All this raises questions about layer F of (dis)comfort, that is, knowledge. This knowledge, in the Maaori case, is of a very particular nature: it is cultural and at the very core of the identity that they claim. This is even more important today, when the Maaori language has become a highly politicized part of the Maaori politics of culture. Looking at the previous examples, it is clear that people s shyness and whakamaa 123 are related to the attitudes of others. Many look down at people who do not speak te reo, one student told me at morning tea after our Maaori language class. Learning the language is highly emotional in many ways, especially for older students, who remember the days when te reo was bad and banished from school premises on pain of corporal punishment for those who were caught speaking it. They still bear the memories of those days in their hearts, heads and bodies. Tensions often arise between speakers and non-speakers of te reo and between those who have learnt te reo in the countryside and those who have learnt it in the city. These add to the existing tensions between Maaori born in the country and raised in their tribe and Maaori born in the city who may have weaker connections with their tribe(s) and less contact with tikanga. Te reo Maaori thus plays a big role in Maaori narratives of identity 123 This word is used to describe a range of feelings from shyness through embarrassment to shame and behaviour involving varying degrees of withdrawal and unresponsiveness (Metge 1995: 336; for details, see Metge 1986). 279

292 and the ways in which Maaori relate to each other and feel comfortable with others, and therefore is a significant factor in the expansion and contraction of whaanau networks as well as engagement within Maaori and mainstream figured worlds. Discomfort related to a lack of knowledge of te reo depends heavily upon support from one s whaanau. Aroha, for example, generally does not feel ashamed for not speaking te reo since her kaumaatua told her that they are confident that she will learn it in good time. For now, she has other things to learn. She is thus self-confident even if she does not speak her language. This does not prevent her from feeling uncomfortable on some occasions where she is not among her own people, like on others marae or in her university department. Aroha is a PhD student who participates regularly in scholarly meetings, and she is often presumed to be a speaker of te reo by white academics. But, with experience, she now deals more easily with such expectations and has a stock of convincing responses to offer to those academics. In fact, Maaori generally believe in destiny and so are often able to see things that happen to them positively, since it was not in me / it was not for me / it was not yet my time to do or have such-and-such a thing. Beliefs about destiny and supernatural signs are also part of the figured world of the whaanau. Life, the ancestors or the supernatural world, that is, the world beyond one s control, turn out to have different plans for people than their own original intentions, and that s it! And, I m sure, better like that!, as one of my research participants put it. As we saw in the previous chapter, even the way Maaori speak English has an impact on their self-identification and recognition by others as Maaori. It is not enough just to speak te reo, one must also have the right accent and pronunciation. This is part of the technique for those who master the code and engage in a particular figured world. Differences in dialect are in fact another point of contention between people and tribes: they argue over which dialect is best, which should be adopted on particular occasions, which people/iwi should control the reo spoken in given schools or university 280

293 departments, which should be used in certain important documents, and so forth. 124 Clearly, this is an arena of power and of control over the reproduction of the hierarchy. Like education in general, learning te reo Maaori is now recognized favourably as being something cool, because people have realized how important language is for cultural survival. Knowing the Maaori language can open doors. However, it was not so in the days before the language revival movement (kohanga reo and kura kaupapa Maaori). As indicated in chapter VI regarding education in general, the state has also played an important role in the Maaori language revival. Keita recalled a time in the not too distant past: I used to hide the fact that I spoke Maaori. I was ashamed of it, because Maaori in the city used to call us backward because we spoke, and now, I realize I m glad of it. In this domain, there have been huge changes over the last two decades or so. Use of language shapes and is shaped by the social world, I observed that people introduced themselves differently according to the addressee, even using different names. For example, with me or any other Paakehaa or people who have uncertain identities at first glance, a man might be John, while he will introduce himself as Hone with Maaori. It also depends on which kind of Maaori their addressee is and on the expectations of people and groups. People then shift from one figured world to another. Moreover, it appears to me that people also activate different aspects of their whakapapa in different contexts, which allows for a certain fluidity. However, constraints like skin colour seem to have an important effect on the way they identify. Niho, for example, who has achieved a senior management position in a state institution, has very pale skin and very Paakehaa features and he often uses or perhaps overuses the greeting kia ora with both Maaori and Paakehaa in order to assert his Maaori identity and his difference from Paakehaa. He also wears a huge pounamu (greenstone) as another sign to be sure that people will not think that he is something other than Maaori. Knowledge of te reo Maaori has opened up new perspectives for many of the participants in this research. It acts as a catalyst, opening their eyes to their taha Maaori. Danny 124 Note that although there is only one Maaori language, there are many dialects linked to different tribes or tribal areas. 281

294 explained to me how learning te reo has changed his life and his idea of himself as a person. He said that he would like to have learnt it earlier, instead of mucking around and doing bad stuff (Danny). He is still nervous when it is time to do his mihimihi on the marae, but his self-confidence and ability to speak in public have greatly improved in the last few months. He said that he is a lot more focused now because he knows more about himself and sees new possibilities for himself. In learning te reo, he has discovered new horizons. Rose was learning te reo in the same program, and she has found that it has raised her consciousness about her Maaori identity and Maaori issues. She has even become involved in a research team from her iwi, with a view to registering a claim in the Waitangi Tribunal. In this sense, knowledge of te reo has a very important impact on layer G of (dis)comfort (measure of autonomy, room for manoeuvre), as well as other layers. (Un)ease in the Paakehaa or mainstream world (Dis)comfort is also linked to access and knowledge of the Paakehaa or mainstream world. Knowing how Paakehaa or others in general work and react allows one to anticipate reactions and to behave correspondingly. The same is true when Maaori are among themselves: they usually feel comfortable because they know exactly how things work ; they are familiar with the internalized non-explicit code of the figured world, with the non-dit (tacit or unsaid). But discomfort can also be experienced occasionally among Maaori. Roimata explained to me how uncomfortable she feels when she goes to Maaori gatherings in South Auckland: she does not know the right way to present herself, as she is used to living in Central Auckland, mainly among rich Paakehaa. Factors such as differences in iwi, social class, status, gender and schooling must be taken into account: the us is not always the generic Maaori, as I have demonstrated in previous chapters. Those who are part of the whaanau are considered more or less similar to oneself. The us can then be the iwi, the hapuu, the whaanau, the whaanau kaupapa or a group of friends from similar backgrounds and/or of similar interests. The us expands and contracts according to circumstances and particular space/time. All these 282

295 refer to layer H of (dis)comfort: measure of cultural, social, and political affinities or convergence. At the national level, discomfort can be linked to a sense of exclusion and powerlessness, and the idea that everything is beyond one s own reach. Good health [and comfort in general] is not compatible with political marginalisation any more than it is with socioeconomic deprivation, writes Durie (2001a: 54). According to Roderick 125, because Maaori are over-represented in lower social classes, they feel marginalized and believe that they do not have a real say at the policy-making level. The statistics are often confirmed by daily experiences of exclusion at the bank, at school, when looking for accommodation and so on. A vicious circle is then created: because Maaori feel alienated and excluded from the decision-making process, they disengage themselves from it even more and express negative, pessimistic feelings and thoughts towards it. I personally would say that many express no feelings or thoughts at all on the matter, since they do not keep themselves informed about what is happening on the local, regional and national political scenes. But this lack of interest is related, to my mind, to the fact that they prefer to concentrate on staying positive in their own life, knowing that the more they know about the world out there, the more depressed and stressed they will feel. This relates to layer G of (dis)comfort people feel that they have no (metaphorical) room for manoeuvre as well as other layers such as layer C (measure of physical well-being, enjoyment, ease), layer E (emotional state, sense of security), layer F (knowledge), and layer H (measure of cultural, social, and political affinities). The aversion to politics and social policy is perhaps exacerbated in the city, where people feel the negative and stigmatizing effects of the statistics more directly. It can also explain why some Maaori withdraw from any social life beyond their family and whaanau: they know almost nobody in the city and feel incompetent in and rather excluded from the larger environment. The whare Maaori then becomes an important place in which to withdraw from public life, public events, the public eye, and public misery, to live in another world, their own private world. In the world of the whare 125 Roderick, Miki, personal communication, March 14,

296 Maaori, there is indeed room for manoeuvre and autonomy (layer G of (dis)comfort), as we will see in the next chapter, and there is a great measure of cultural, social, and political affinity (layer H), since people are among whaanau. The whare Maaori also provides or allows for some patterns of continuity (Jansen 1998: 102) with life in the country or traditional whaanau life and with the meaning of home for Maaori, even if it also involves change and movement. The whare Maaori is part of the attempt to make oneself at home in the city, to return to normality (see Jansen 1998: 102), which also allows Maaori to engage in the larger world on their own terms. The whare Maaori as a place and a home can also have ideational or ideological dimensions: it is about the politics of differentiation, Maaori autonomy and regaining an identity, a place in the city and a space in the nation-state. These dimensions will be explored more fully in chapter VIII. In that, the whare Maaori is more than a reproduction of a traditional way of life through habitus: it can also intentionally aim to achieve specific (political) goals and open doors for engagement in the wider society, since it provides one with support and a group to belong to, and it is the place where one learns and imagines what being Maaori means. Engagement, home, and (dis)comfort As we saw earlier, having a family network in the city helps many Maaori to feel comfortable there. For many, this network goes beyond the nuclear family and whaanau ties, in that it is also made up of friends, Maaori and others, who can be considered as a whaanau kaupapa. The fact of living in a good neighbourhood also seems to increase the sense of comfort for July, Awhina, and Joanna. Joanna even qualifies her network of neighbours as a new urban hapuu (sub-tribe). As for Christine, she speaks about the suburb in West Auckland where she was raised and has lived for 40 years as a whaanau. The same could be said of Kiri. Even if Kiri still has good connections with her iwi, the fact that she was born and bred in Auckland and does not know any other kind of life has strengthened her attachment to the city. Auckland, especially her current residential area in South Auckland, is the place that she likes best and where she wants to stay. Both Kiri and Christine know their neighbourhood and the people who live there very well, and they seem to have a feeling of control over their environment. This represents a 284

297 supplementary layer of (dis)comfort, which has not been mentioned until now: a measure of control over one s environment. This new layer of (dis)comfort is, in fact, closely related to layer G (measure of autonomy, room for manoeuvre). You get to feel safe, it s like you know, when you re a baby in your own home, you know, you you get the feeling of the place, you know you re safe here, you know. And that s how I feel. This is a safe place. I m familiar with the surroundings, I m familiar with the people, the community ( ) Even though this place has been called a slum, and we had murders happen in this area, I just feel that this is a safe place to be, because I m familiar with it, you know. (Christine) What is implicit here is that Christine s engagement in her neighbourhood in the course of her everyday life has turned it into a familiar place, and thus into a comfortable one. (see discussions in chapter I of Ingold 1996; Bourdieu 1977, 1980; Casey 1996). A sentiment of safety and control has emerged from that engagement, which is embodied and appeals to her emotions. This feeling refers to the layers E of (dis)comfort, a sense of security. Christine even made a comparison between the feeling that a baby has in its own home and the feeling she gets from her residential area. In her book, Radice (2000: ) brought to the readers attention a quote by Tim Ingold in which he uses the extendable metaphor of the house a physical building being experienced as a home a meaningful place by the people who live there, in order to explain dwelling theory. So how does a house become a home? Not, I argue, by assimilating its physical features into a symbolic representational blueprint for the organization of domestic space, but rather by incorporating those features walls, doors, windows, fixed furnishings and so on into a characteristic pattern of day-to-day activities. Thus it is the very engagement of those persons with the objects of their domestic surroundings, in the course of their life activities, that turns the house into a home. As the embodiment of these activities, the home environment is forever evolving along with the lives of its inhabitants. It is, if you will, a kind of monument to their endeavours, though with the proviso that it is never complete. (Ingold 1996: 116 in Radice 2000: 133) This quote reveals not only the close link between the concept of comfort and the concept of home, but also their ever evolving nature. The sense of comfort, like the sense of being at home in certain places or with certain persons, changes through experience and engagement in a repetition of habitual social interactions, or in a routine set of practices (Rapport 1997: 73). 285

298 This also means that the sense of (dis)comfort and home are themselves constantly shifting. The comfort zone shifts both in terms of where it is located, in physical, social or symbolic places, and also in terms of where its boundaries are drawn. The limits of comfort shift, and the zone contracts or expands according to the particular space/time, context, conjuncture, life stage or the influence of larger socio-historical forces. Not only does the location of home shift one can move from one home to another, or have several homes, or even be at home in continuous movement per se (Rapport 1997: 72-73) which, to my mind and according to Friedman (2003c), is the case for only a small globalized elite, but the meaning of home is itself fundamentally in movement, changing for individuals and groups. Home and comfort, are formed on the move ( ) on one s journey through life (Rapport 1997: 73), through experiences (Jackson 1989, 1994, 1998), dwelling (Ingold 1996), and narratives (Rapport 1997; Rapport and Dawson 1998b; Ochs and Capps 1996). To return to Christine s sense of home, she has developed an almost umbilical relationship with her residential area, because she has engaged in/with it since birth. In fact, she did not hesitate to call her residential area her tuurangawaewae (a place to stand, connection to the land): Well, you know, tuurangawaewae is where our roots are and while my roots through my ancestors are in the east coast area, the west coast, and up north( ), I feel this is my tuurangawaewae, too, because I ve grown up here and I m really, really into West Auckland. (Christine) For an outsider, there appear to be few objective reasons to get attached to the area, as it has its share of violence and is known to be particularly grubby, but still:. You know, when you have lived here for 40 years ( ) you just get a feel for the place. You know, I drove down the street and I said to my husband Look at these streets! [laughter] ( ) We have the dirtiest street of West Auckland. ( ) But I mean, we have lived here for all our life, so you could not get me to move to the most expensive place in Auckland, because I just love the feel of this place. You know, you get a feeling for a place. (Christine; my emphasis) Feeling comfortable in a place to the point of calling it home, and more profoundly, to the point of calling it a tuurangawaewae, is sometimes just something that you sense. It is something both emotional and physical, that is, embodied. In fact, (dis)comfort, here, is 286

299 not first and foremost a cognitive category, appealing to or depending on the intellect. It is something that has developed over the course of life. One just feels good (or bad) there from everyday experience and out of habit. The place is comfortable because it is one s usual place, a well-known place. For these very reasons, Christine does not feel the same about her ancestors place: When I go back home to you know, where my tribal connections are, I feel I can feel It s a different feeling because I know that my ancestors have been there, you know, and I can sort of feel them around me when I go into those areas. It s not the feeling I have in West Auckland because this is not where my ancestors were, it s a different feeling again. Hard to explain ( ) There is no spiritual links here in West Auckland, but there s definitely a feeling here. (Christine) It seems that calling a place in the city one s tuurangawaewae when one is from another tribal area is a new phenomenon and really refers to the city roots of many Maaori who were born in Auckland in the last few decades. In this use of the term, they are not referring to their spiritual roots, which is what tuurangawaewae is traditionally and generally recognized to mean. Saying that one s tuurangawaewae is in the city could be difficult to sustain in certain situations, or in relation to the taangata whenua, because traditionally the concept involves rights and responsibilities towards the land. But Christine does not mean that she has ancestral rights to the land in Auckland. She acknowledges the Auckland taangata whenua and their rights over the area. She simply uses the concept to express her profound attachment to the place and its people. I am not sure, however, if Christine would have expressed herself in the same way when speaking with other Maaori. Tama also used the same concept to express a deep attachment to West Auckland, particularly to the pan-tribal marae there, but once again, he was only talking about it with me. Could both have expressed themselves in the same terms speaking with other Maaori? Maaori know perfectly well that they must somehow deal with homes that are also credible to others (Olwig 1998: 231) since once is not completely free to conceptualize one s home(s): one needs to engage in a dialogue with others in the process of reflection, self-awareness, self-knowledge, and self-identity. The sense of home is also part of the figured world and must fit with the other elements, 287

300 principles and values of the figured world in which one is engaged. 126 Fiona has the personal resources and ability to assert her home as the university marae, although she knows full well that not everybody agrees with her views: I must honestly say that I have more to do with the university marae than I do with my own tribal marae and that s very sad for me to say, but that s just a fact. And it s ( ) where I work and being in the kapa haka group, we take our name from the university marae, and while I m here at university ( ), that s where I want to be. It s not my traditional tuurangawaewae, but while I m here in the city, it does fulfil my foundational base on which I stand, so in that way it is sort of like tuurangawaewae, but not in a traditional sense of tuurangawaewae ( ), the land that you associate with through your tribe. But while, as I said, while I m here in the city it is a place for me to be and to identify with as Maaori within the city construct and there is lots of times where I need time away from here, I ll ask for the keys and I will go and sit in the whare and just sit there and read and just to get away from the construct of the city with all the burdens of the city life, just for turning to Maaori roots. Some of the people may say that the university marae is not a marae; I do personally take that marae as my marae while I m here at university. As to in the future? I m actually thinking of when my partner and I do finally decide to get married, I would like to get married here at the university marae. And a lot of students past students they still come here for Maaori graduation and help in the kitchen. (Fiona) Christine, Tama and Fiona could probably have spoken of their urban tuurungawaewaae with other Maaori of similar backgrounds, but not with taangata whenua from urban areas, nor with Maaori staunch in their tikanga who live in the city or rural Maaori friends who might well laugh on hearing such an alien use of the term. They know that there are rules that must be respected in order not to appear to be a complete fool or outsider. For some Maaori, the city is certainly the place where they can stand tall, since they know it very well and know how to behave and interact with the different others that inhabit it. They are comfortable there, which is not necessarily the case on the ancestral marae and among its people, which may be rather unfamiliar. So, this new usage of the word tuurangawaewae seems to express the comfort and attachment one feels in certain places and with certain people. Tuurangawaewae can then be used to mean that one 126 The fact that certain Maaori speak differently about fundamental concepts like tuurangawaewae and ahi kaa (see below), for example, is also revealing, I think, of the fact that there are several Maaori figured worlds. This case also illustrates the difference of power within Maoridom in relation to knowledge and the continued existence of a traditional hierarchy. The recognition of the new urban views about tuurangawaewae and ahi kaa would not be possible without the assent of the Maaori elite who are engaged in another universe of meanings. These issues will be explored further in my postdoctoral research. 288

301 considers a given place to be home, and that that place is very important in defining who they are as a person. The issues raised here, and particularly the tension between people like Christine and tangata whenua of urban areas, show that home is rather a contested domain: an arena where differing interests struggle to define their own spaces within which to localize and cultivate their identity (Olwig 1998: 226). The same could doubtless be said of rural or tribal homes. In fact, Maaori seem to have appropriated certain areas of the city quite convincingly, even if they do not physically mark the urban landscape, except for a few marae which are visible signs of the Maaori presence. Certain areas of the city, like Manurewa, Papakura, Ootara, and Papatoetoe in South Auckland and Henderson and certain sectors of Te Atatu in West Auckland, are known as being predominantly Maaori (and Pacific Island) neighbourhoods (see Appendix E for maps of Auckland city). Those residential areas have also taken on largely negative connotations in the minds of the mainstream population, not only because of this predominance but above all because the state was heavily involved in the creation of these new suburbs (Perkins and Thorns 2001: 38), which attracted people with low incomes, including many Maaori families. By 1970 Aotearoa/New Zealand s suburbs were often seen as bland, monotonous and boring places of conformist activity, where leisure was typified by work on the house and section (Perkins and Thorns 2001: 37-38). They were also seen as violent places because of the powerful stereotypes about the Maaori/Polynesian presence in the mainstream press. Some see the reputation attributed to these areas as empowering, since it means that the areas are their, Maaori and Polynesian, homes. Many other Maaori perceive the reputation as a form of discrimination and prejudice. In a paper about Polynesian immigrants to the USA, Teevita O Ka ili, stresses a larger definition of the word whenua or fonua in Tongan and fenua in Tahitian based on Maahina s (1999) definition, according to which fonua means: both land and people. More particularly, it espouses the unity deriving from the ongoing exchange between land and people In Tonga, e.g., the mother s placenta, land [and its people] and one s rave are all called fonua. That is, that one is born out of a fonua into a fonua, who, upon death, enters another fonua Upon birth, the new-born, in living in society, continues to receive nourishment, 289

302 this time from the land and its people, until death, when the body returns back to the land in the form of efuefu dust and kelekele earth, which, in turn, continues the nourishment of the living and awaits the sustenance of generations yet to come. (1999: 282 in Ka ili 2003: 6-7, additions by Ka ili) The Maaori word whenua also means both land and placenta, and establishes a close relationship between the land and the people, which nourish one another. Ka ili then extends the meaning of whenua to a nourishing environment that is also spiritual, social and cultural. In this context, a nourishing environment or whenua for Maaori who live in Auckland can be made up of not only the natural and built elements of the residential area, but also the neighbourhood social network, and a sense of tuurangawaewae can then develop. Belonging to a marae or a whare Maaori in the city can accentuate this sense of connection with the new settled land or whenua. A person can develop a sense of place and identity with that whenua s or that host s land, which might eventually become one homeland among others. The sense of home is thus plural for many Maaori. A plurality of homes can develop following migration from the country to the city and a gradual engagement with the new urban milieu, or, on the other hand, for Maaori from the city, following the discovery of tribal affiliations and/or a reconnection to the ancestral rural spiritual home(s) and people(s). The plurality of homes thus emerges in the movement between places (Rapport 1997 and Rapport and Dawson 1998a, 1998b) and can develop in both directions, that is from the city to the country or from the country to the city. It is certainly related to one s quest for spiritual, cultural and social nourishment. The plurality follows from the movement between urban and rural areas, but also from movements between a variety of places in each area depending on life stage, particular events, circumstances or need as well as on persons/groups. And certainly, the meanings of the home(s) themselves are in movement. The movements are thus physical as well as cognitive and relations exist between both physical and cognitive movements (Olwig 1998: 226). Some people will of course not develop a plurality of homes over the course of their lives. For various reasons, some will only ever have the home where they were born and brought up, which will also be their spiritual home if it is the place where their bones are (that is, where the bones of their ancestors are). Others will never develop a sense of 290

303 home in a new place, be it urban or rural, even after many years there. They may be uncomfortable with the new place or its people, they may feel homesick, exiled and nostalgic, nourishing their dream of return, like some transnational migrants. They may critically distance themselves from the new place, refusing to make a home for themselves there (see chapter III). Some not all will maintain very strong contacts with whaanau in the country and make regular trips there to keep in touch. The refusal to make a home in the city can come from the stigma and processes of exclusion from which Maaori may suffer in the urban setting, along with deprivation of traditional sources of support such as whaanau. Earlier in this chapter, I showed how essential whaanau support can be to feeling comfortable in the city. Feelings of anomie, loneliness and emotional repression (Sarup 1994: 97) are also among the factors which can prevent one from making a home for oneself and making oneself at home, that is, comfortable and relaxed, in the new place in the city. As I have discussed before, the refusal to make a home in the city can also be linked to Maaori urban politics and can be a way to retain one s true Maoriness in the midst of the rhetoric about urban versus real Maaori. For some who were born in the city or moved there following conflict or abuse in the tribal area, the city can be their only home. Even if they reconnect with their people in the tribal area, they may never feel at home there, disappointed that they did not find it to be the home that they imagined. While the city contains its own disappointments, so can the spiritual place and people from the country, if they do not correspond to the imagined home, paradise, dreamtime, or land of freedom. For example, Ruka found that he had nothing in common with the people of his age back home: I can t talk with any one of my age, I have nothing in common with them ( ) I am probably an arrogant bugger to some of them of my own age and that but it is like I say, the way of life for people in their 30s there is far different from mine, you know. When I left school, half my life has been in the habit that I have to work. For me to have a better life I have to work Monday to Friday and that s not the case with some of my own cousins when I go back north ( ) they are quite happy to receive $105 a week and they are happy with that and that is why we have nothing in common. I can t go to them and say how was your day at work? because their day at work was not a day at work. It was just a day of having a sleep, a recovery from the night before. (Ruka) 291

304 Ruka knows that he will not go back to where he comes from any time in the near future: for now, he does not feel comfortable there. His place, his home, is in the city where he has so many goals to achieve. He acknowledges the place where he comes from as his spiritual home, but not because of social relations or mutual relations of exchange there. Rather, his ancestors are from there and they are part of him. Olwig makes an interesting distinction between home as a locus involving specific relations of social and economic rights and obligations, and home as a more abstract entity that is primarily expressed through various types of narratives and other forms of symbolic interchange (1998: 235), with each aspect of home implying and reinforcing the other. However, I would like to add that for Maaori, the world of the ancestors is not merely abstract or symbolic: it involves actual and practical relations which consist of responsibilities and obligations that are part of people s actual daily lives in the same way as their relations with the living are, as we shall see. Ancestors are not only present in the spiritual world in the country, they are also part of life in the city. The ancestors are effectively internalized: they live among and within them in city houses, where their presence is made visible through photos, dreams, sickness, and other kinds of signs. Home can be quite abstract for people who only have a spiritual or emotional attachment to the place through the tiipuna, rather than any material bond. Home is still localized in a certain measure, since it is where one s bones are, but it does not actually need to be physical or material (Rykwert 1991: 51). This is the case for Rewa: When I mihi, I don t talk about my mountains, things and stuff. What s important is who I am which is the mokopuna of So, I am the mokopuna of (and she went on by naming her tiipuna). Because Rewa does not identify with the place, but only with her tiipuna, when she goes home, I don t go back to the people. I m not part of the people yet, they don t know who I am. I only go back for my urupa [cemetery] (Rewa). However, Rewa s attachment to her urupa and tiipuna then constitute her home, since through them she has a connection to the land and thus to the place which is much more than symbolic. 292

305 Many were forced into exile from the homeland by poverty, which can be seen as a long term effect of colonialism, but the need to study, work or seek health care in the city are among other factors that can instigate the move. Many Maaori have not freely chosen to migrate to the city: they have moved because they could see no alternative or because they had to follow family. It is generally the case that home is where the heart is, that is, where one feels comfortable, where one s family is, where one s pleasant memories are, where one s roots are or where one best knows oneself (Rapport and Dawson 1998a: 9). Home is where the foundation for the development and upholding of one s identity is sited. For many, Auckland is therefore not a good place to establish their homes. Auckland is the place where one works and sleeps, but home remains the place where one comes from or where one s parents come from. Home is the place where one wants to return, if not in this life, then at least in death. But some people s hearts are definitely in the city, as is the case for people like Christine and Joanna. However, the heart is a mobile organ, and can be in different places and with different people depending on times of life or the relative importance of various branches of the whakapapa, since the basis for identity can be located in different or multiple places over the course of one s life. Home is thus not fixed in places and meanings: it involves movement in body and mind (Olwig 1998: 335) and, I would add, in the heart and in feelings. Home is developed on the move through actions, experiences, and narratives. But, for many Maaori, their main home is clearly their marae (which can also be plural), which is where their hearts will stay in spite of their movements. At the same time, it is this very sense of home that allows them to be mobile, since a stable and enduring place such as the marae is an important base for identity. A passage from the novel Whaanau is enlightening: People often pass by in their cars and never see Rongopai. For them perhaps, it is just another meeting house, decaying in the wind. But for me, Rongopai is like my father. Home. The place of the heart. The centre of my universe. (Ihimaera 1996 (1974): 115) In Aroha s case, it was also clear that knowing where she comes from and belongs and having a group with which to identify allow her to be comfortable almost everywhere as a 293

306 person, and thus to move through the larger world, which can go far beyond Aotearoa/New Zealand. Places and power Sarup emphasizes that places are socially constructed, and that this construction is about power (1994: 96). As we saw in chapter I, physical places are marked and charged with emotional content, mythical meanings, community symbolism, historical significance and power relationships (Casey 1996; Foucault 1980a; Radice 2000; Shields 1991). All of these organize and orientate social relationships and people s behaviour, narratives, experiences and feelings within places (Foucault 1980a, Lindstrom 1990, Rodman 1992, and others), which is why many Maaori in general feel out of place in Auckland (see chapter III). Tane, one of the participants in my research, actually works on projects that aim to make the urban landscape more Maaori, such as changing certain street names, integrating Maaori art into the urban landscape, and developing city parks in accordance with Maaori tikanga and kaupapa. He thinks that these changes will make Maaori feel more comfortable and at home in Auckland and will lead them to identify more strongly with the city. Tane also thinks that by affirming Maaori presence and by appropriating the space, Maaori will be acknowledged and consulted more widely and seriously. 127 It seems to me that Tane highlights the close links between feeling comfortable, identity, and greater autonomy. Many participants in my research felt powerless because they believe they do not generally have a say in making public policy. Moreover, they sometimes felt excluded from whaanau or iwi decision-making processes back home since they could not afford to go back to participate in them directly as often as they would like. They tend to think that Maaori representatives at many levels of public life are often there as mere tokens. Senses of (dis)comfort and home are therefore about more than just individual or group 127 The exploration of the relationships between objects and agency will be the subject of a separate article. For some discussion of this matter, see, among others, Riggins (1990); Miller (1987, 1994); Gell (1998); Hirsch (1998); Rapport and Dawson 1998c. See also Hayden (1995) who co-designs projects with minority groups in the USA that reclaim historically significant sites in the urban landscape (such as a Chinese laundry, for example). 294

307 preferences: they involve weighty relationships of power, which have a significant impact not only on the practicalities of daily life, but also on feelings, since power relationships embodied and deeply felt as much as they are rational and conscious. Power relationships also exist among Maaori. Several of the participants in my research said they would never feel at home on the university urban pan-tribal marae, or in particular Maaori rooms or halls or churches, because they do not feel comfortable with the people who run these places. They may feel that those in charge do not recognize them as belonging there, because they are not Maaori enough, either physically or in their behaviour or lack of knowledge of te reo and tikanga, or because they do not come from the same background or tribe(s). As we saw earlier, the rhetoric about real Maaori plays an important part in Maaori people s sense of having a home for themselves in the city and its institutions. As Olwig underlines, [t]he ability to define and assert a home therefore requires a certain amount of personal resources (1998: 232). For Maaori, mastering the art of homemaking in the city is closely related to the internalization of the codes or principles of the diverse figured worlds of the city. This is politically significant in relating with other city Maaori and in participating actively in the present day world(s). And making oneself at home is closely linked to people s sense of (dis)comfort, which in turn is closely linked to engagement with and internalization of the figured worlds at stake. In some cases, belonging to or identifying with many places will be incorporated into the whakapapa. Paora, a Maaori language student who is a gifted artist illustrated his whakapapa for me by drawing his maunga, awa, and so on, but also, more importantly, the several marae to which he is connected and that he considers home: his mother s marae, his father s marae and an urban marae where he finds everyday comfort. In fact, this last marae is so central to his day-to-day life that he drew it right in the middle of his drawing. Paora is an example of someone who has found a new home in the city that may or may not remain a home for him throughout his whole life. The links between places in his illustration still might look rather strange to other Maaori eyes, however. 295

308 Spiritual and everyday homes A sense of home is clearly associated with a feeling of safety and security at many levels (layer E of (dis)comfort). Home is a comfortable place. It is a place to retreat from the big wild world as Tama put it. It is a place where one can relax and express oneself freely, where one is accepted as who one is without being judged or criticized. A safe place is also a place where one is welcomed as a member of the whaanau and can always rely on other people. Tui made an important link between comfort and support: The place where I got the most support from is my biological family. ( ) Support and comfort I think if we use the two words together Without support, I can t [be comfortable] My biological family has always supported me ( ) and that is really good. And like my church family, most of them would help me with anything to do with the church or if I don t do something right and the other thing is that they don t they will always offer some ways to do the things differently. If I do something incorrectly ( ) maybe I should try this and that way, I think that helps to build comfort. It s not just criticism ( ) they re always there. (Tui) Comfort is about support, reciprocity, and also being part of a group. Tui added that church whaanau and church involvement have been a great source of support for many Maaori in the city. Without the church involvement, they would have found it difficult to survive, she said, implying that they would otherwise have been alone in the city, far from their whaanau and without any support network. Comfort is also associated with places where people are relaxed, which refers to the layer C, that is, a measure of physical well-being, enjoyment, ease. T. I am the Rangatira at home: I am the boss. ( ) My place at home is my comfort zone. That is where I am comfortable at, my toes up, and I don t have to put airs on or try and change to suit anybody else. I have my kids around me all the time, my whaanau come around all the time and my friends come around all the time and all my kids mates come around all the time. ( ) N. And how would you express in te reo that comfort zone? T. Ko taku kaainga kei Tamaki nei, taku kaainga [My place of residence is in Auckland, my home]. ( ) My home, that is, where I live. I wouldn t call it a kaainga if it wasn t what I deem as mine or my place to reside. I don t own it. I rent it, but the kaupapa in the whare is mine. As long as I pay the rent no one comes and tells me what to do. No te kaainga kei Tamaki nei, taku wahi noho ki Tamaki-Makau-Rau engari ko taku papakaainga kei [T.] kei reira taku tuurangawaewae, kei reira oku nei kuia me oku koroua pakeke, kei reira taku 296

309 mauri kei reira hoki taku whaanau.[ 128 ] Now that s the difference for me. A papakaainga is a tuurangawaewae where I am from, is where I adhere to, that is where everything in me [is]. I am only staying in Auckland, but everybody from here knows that I am from the East Coast. (Tauni) For Hiraina, home is the place where she can settle down. She refers to it with the Maaori word tau (come to rest, come to anchor, lie to, be suitable, recurring cycle, in Williams 2000 (1971): 396). It took her many years to feel fully at home in Auckland. After a trip to visit her family s house in the countryside, it is always difficult to leave, but as soon as she is back on the motorway, she feels right again, because she now has a resting place in Auckland, too, where she can settle down and feel comfortable. So, people who are comfortable in the city of Auckland, like people who have a whare Maaori to visit or to live in, often develop two (or more) senses of home, as Pita explained: Spiritually, my home is the origin of my upbringing because when I die, that s where I am going to go back to. ( ) but presently, and emotionally, my home is here, in Auckland, because I deal with life [here] on a day-to-day basis. (Pita) Ruka also made this distinction between two kinds of home, the everyday one and the ancestral or spiritual one. And again, the important thing is that each place refers to a group, a whaanau or a host of ancestors that give one both a sense of belonging and a sense of being supported. These two senses of home, however, are defined in relation to one another and are infused with the evocation of other homes, places, and events (Rodman 1992: 644). Another way to speak about one s ancestral land is the expression ahi kaa to which I referred in chapter V: N How would you express in te reo the idea what you just said, that this is your home here [speaking about an urban pan-tribal marae] and you feel comfortable? 128 This passage can be loosely translated as: My place of residence (home) is in Auckland, the place where I live now is in Auckland, however, my ancestral settlement is in on the east coast, that is my place to stand, my connection to the land. There are my ancestors and elders (female and male), there is my source of life, there is my extended family. 297

310 R I would call it, to the Maaori sense, I would call it a ahi kaa which is a fire I have lit here, and my ahi kaa or my fire has been lit on this urban Marae for the past 14 years. That fire has kept me warm, not only me, but my family. That fire has nourished me with the values and qualities of my ancestors, that fire has reminded me of how crucial it is that I pass these qualities on to my son and my daughter ( ) But that is the closest way to describe home to me in a Maaori sense is that I have lit the fire here, although I have been born and raised in Auckland, I have lit my fire here in West Auckland ( ). I have lit my fire here and that fire has looked after myself and my family and has also brought other members of my family to realize this is the side of their culture that they can no longer neglect anymore. So my whole family plays a part here on this marae ( ) But my spiritual fire like I said when I pass on then I will go back to the bones of where my ancestors and that come from, the, in the far north and my spiritual fire will finally be united with all my other ancestors. (Ruka) Ruka s words nicely illustrate the idea that home, which can be synonymous with either tuurangawaewae or ahi kaa or papakaainga, is a nourishing place. They also express the fact that home is not about the individual, but about the whaanau, the group. This is my home, this is my whanau, said Tama at his father s funeral, looking across the green fields towards his village in Ihimaera s novel Tangi (1996 (1973): 187). Home, then, is the family, living and dead kin, those who have passed away and those who have never left the land and who connect one to a marae, to an urupa and to the land. This is their home, their family. ( ) The land is in their blood and they are the blood of the land. They will remain here because blood links blood, and blood links years, and blood links families now and over all the years past. It is good to remain family. There is such aroha in belonging to each other. It is growing up together ( ) and being buried next to one another. You are never a stranger. You are never alone. (Ihimaera 1996 (1974): 18; emphasis in original) However, like the word tuurangawaewae, the meaning of ahi kaa seems also to have undergone changes with life in the city. Some people now have their ahi kaa at a pantribal marae in the city, since that is where they work or spend a great deal of their time. Manuuka, for example, has two ahi kaa at the moment: a very small one in Auckland, where he now lives on his own, and a big one where most of his family live, on the east coast of Aotearoa. According to Manuuka, the ahi kaa can be displaced and taken along when one moves. Ahi kaa, like home, then, is considered to have diverse meanings and also some kind of mobility. I am convinced that the larger context of globalization, as 298

311 well as the experience of urban migration and city life, has intensified Maaori mobility 129. The ahi kaa can be lit at an urban marae or school marae or somewhere else for a time, depending on one s journey through life. Some also contrast the spiritual home, the papakaainga or the ahi kaa with the kaainga, or the urban home of everyday life. The spiritual home is the tuurangawaewae, the place to stand and connection to the land, which is central to the Maaori way of being in the world, but both that and the kaainga are significant in terms of identity and as a source of inspiration (Ellis 2001: 9). Speaking about his place in Central Auckland, which he considers to be like a marae in many ways (as we saw in chapter IV), Matiu gave a definition of kaainga : Kaainga is like a place of residence ( ) like a home. ( ) I will call this my kaainga at the moment because I invested. When you start investing ho I don t know ( ) If you have a tane [man, partner, husband] and you have a house and you share the house work you have enough arguments and you have enough love time in the house, the house starts to take on that kind of aahua [appearance, likeness, form, character], that kind of You know how you can walk into some places and could feel warm and you could walk into other places and you can feel, you know, kind of cold. I think this place is a fairly warm place and I think it is because of the time that we have invested into the place. Yeah kaainga. (Matiu, my emphasis) Matiu also said that you can have many kaainga, but you can only have one papakaainga, one kaainga tuuturu [fixed, permanent home]. The spiritual home, or the papakaainga, is necessary to the upholding of one s identity as Maaori or as a member of a particular whaanau, hapuu or iwi. That connection can also be plural, depending on the whakapapa and on personal affiliations. 129 I do not intend to imply that home was not mobile in the past: people then did move from one tribal area to another due to intertribal war, marriage and so on, but life in the city has made migration far more fluid over the course of one s life. Nor do I wish to imply that concepts like ahi kaa and tuurangawaewae do not have stable characteristics: traditional and contemporary usages clearly indicate that they do. Rather, I want to say that these concepts are used today in contexts other than traditional ones in order to speak about home(s), identity(ies) and belonging to place(s). 299

312 Comforting places elsewhere in the city Some people call other places in the city where they feel particularly comfortable home. There is a pan-tribal marae in West Auckland that is felt to be a home by people such as the students and kaiako (teachers) of a Maaori language program which is taught on the marae, partly because they find a whaanau there. Being part of a group or whaanau seems to increase the overall sense of comfort Maaori feel in the city, as well as the self-confidence which allows them to feel more comfortable in other socio-cultural spaces. Here again, we can refer to layer A of (dis)comfort, which in turn influences layers C (measure of physical well-being, enjoyment, ease), E (emotional state, sense of security), and F (intellectual state, knowledge). I have also noticed a strong attachment among Maaori students to the university marae and a correspondingly strong involvement in its activities. For Fiona, whose work and family circumstances have led to a weakening of ties with her original marae, the university marae plays a very important role in her life and her sense of identity as Maaori, and helps her feel at home in Auckland. Some students spoke about the marae and the whare nui being places where they like to go to have a peaceful think on their own. Since the university is pan-tribal, many students will sleep at the feet of the carved tiipuna of their tribe during waananga, and that closeness to their ancestor gives them a good feeling of belonging. It can also be a way to assert their particular tribal identity in the urban and very diversified world. Tama frequents an urban marae on a daily basis. He expresses similar ideas: Being here is sort of balances me, realizes my identity, who I am, gives me peace of mind, makes me feel I belong. Culture, identity, I have lost it pretty much ( ) and here I am, trying to regain [it]. Tama is also engaged in a process of going back to his kaakano (seed), his culture. The marae, then, is a nourishing and calming place. I find that the marae has a very peaceful feeling and a calmness about it, especially living in town, because town can be very draining. (Kahu) The marae help many to keep some sort of balance in their lives as Maaori in today s world. 300

313 In fact, many Maaori consider all marae to be their homes: Kei te pai [That s good], any marae I go to, that is home to me because of the spiritual presence surrounding [it], yeah, [it s] Maaori. Not just Maaori, but the whole atmosphere and the part of it [that] does not matter where you are, you are home (Kahu). This quote shows that the concept of home, like the concept of whaanau, expands or contracts according to particular situations and contexts. Home is always lived as a relationship, a tension (Jackson 1995: 122). All marae can generally speaking be home for all Maaori, but each person or group has their own particular marae as their own home(s). When they travel abroad, the whole of Aotearoa is home. Maata explained to me that it is when she was in London that she really felt an attachment to Aotearoa/New Zealand: I think I became really aware of it when I was living in the UK, and as I say, you know, growing up in the 60s and 70s in suburban New Zealand, you know ( ) all these other things and really, I suppose I was a bit of a pretentious teenager cause I was really interested in you know, I wanted things that were sophisticated and glamorous and stylish. New Zealand is so ( ) I wanted to go out there and explore it. ( ) I went overseas and saw these things and never felt like a backward folk or I didn t cut the mustard but also realized the beauty of what was here and it wasn t just about friends and family either. I felt this real link to the land here. It was the land and the lights and the sea that I missed as much as the people. (Maata) As Rapport and Dawson write, it is sometimes only by way of transience and displacement that one achieves and ultimate sense of belonging (1998a: 9) But when living in Aotearoa/New Zealand and interacting with Maaori of different iwi, attachment is in most cases more precise and specifies the ancestral land, the iwi area, the place where their bones are. To summarize, connections to places constitute an important aspect of Maaori identities. This is not surprising, given the strong connection between Maaori and the land, that is, the inalienability of people from place, the rootedness of identity in places which is common throughout the Pacific and among indigenous peoples. Attachments to places and homes are fundamental for the Maaori people I have met, enabling them to maintain a sense of who they are and to feel at ease generally, especially in the context of the city 301

314 which is often experienced as deterritorialized and fragmented. Senses of place are not only about spaces or land as such, but about belonging to a whaanau, real, imagined or ideological, and to the tiipuna from whom one is descended. Thus, the whakapapa is not about someone as an individual, but rather links someone to a larger group, explaining their origins in a way that is connected to everything in the natural, human and supernatural world. Home usually implies neighbours, and for Maaori it always reflects a particularly communal manner of dwelling (Rykwert 1991: 56). Home, then, is about collective identity and thus involves borders and boundaries that both define the collectivity and allow for relationships, articulation, and communication with others. I will explore this aspect further in the following section as well as in the concluding chapter. Feeling places / place feelings Crucially, the Maaori sense of comfort includes embodied and spiritual dimensions. An important aspect of attachment to a place is its wairua, that is to say the feeling that emanates from the place, its people and the tiipuna or spirits who gather there. The wairua is what emanates from the spirit of a person or a thing (Moana). It s something that you feel (Christine). This is what Matiu was referring to when he said: You know how you can walk into some places and could feel warm and you could walk into other places and you can feel, you know, kind of cold. Patricia Grace, in her novel Potiki writes about similar feelings in the whare nui of the story: There was in the meeting-house a warmth. It was the warmth that wood has, but it was also the warmth of people gathered. It was the warmth of past gatherings, and of people that had come and gone, and who gathered now in the memory. It was the warmth of embrace, because the house is a parent, and there was warmth in under the parental backbone, enclosement amongst the patterned ribs. (1986: 88) Linda told me that when she goes to a marae for the night, sometimes she just feels very comfortable and falls asleep quickly, while in other places she just cannot sleep and she feels cold. 302

315 Manuka says that the wairua has nothing to do with the fact that a house is flash or has fancy furniture, but relates rather to the people (living and dead) inhabiting the place (see Ihimaera 1972; Grace 1986). The wairua is something like the vibes, the energy, the aura or the atmosphere that you get as soon as you arrive somewhere: it s like when you re walking into a room, you know, it s either it got a good wairua or a bad wairua, something you feel it s just a feeling that you get (Christine). I think it is the atmosphere, the sense, you can just sense it. It is a spiritual thing, I suppose. I mean, you can walk into a place and know if this is a nice place or not, you just sort of sense it (Kahu). It is also the feeling that you get when you meet someone or a group of people. So, the wairua is intangible, something you can t really explain, but you know it s there (Keita): one knows it instinctively in oneself, and is not necessarily able to express one s feeling in words. It s that sixth sense (Keita). Maaori are very sensitive to these kinds of feelings and accord great power to the wairua and the ancestral or supernatural worlds, which manifest themselves through body feelings, emotions, intuitions, dreams, and so on. It appeared to me that the quality of wairua is crucial to whether Maaori call a place home. Talking about her place and the surrounding area where she has lived for 40 years, Christine said: I just love the feel of this place! Kahu even said, This is a good thing about Maaori, they can feel the vibes in places. For Linda, this feeling is very physical. If the wairua is bad, for example, my puku [abdomen, stomach] is not happy. Tama also felt the heat, which is a positive, overwhelming feeling, at a pan-tribal marae in West Auckland. He describes this sensation as a state of well-being, not only mentally or emotionally, but physically. For some participants in this research, when the wairua is not Maaori, it is more difficult to be comfortable. For Moana the wairua which emanates is Maaori when Maaori ways, beliefs, and values are shared by the people in a place. Tama told me that a marae that he frequents on a regular basis in West Auckland is part of his comfort zone, because everybody comes from the same place as Maaori, that is to say they share the same 303

316 experience and understand each other. For the same reasons, Christine, who is a kaiako (teacher) in a mainstream school explained: C: I feel a lot more comfortable sitting here at the school marae and having my dinner with all the girls going, you know, as noisy as they are, than I do going down to the staff room. It s very what s the word it doesn t have a there is no wairua Maaori in there. ( ) Wairua Maaori is a feeling that you get when you are around your own people. N: What do you mean by wairua Maaori? C: Oh, heck! I knew you d say that! I think it s like, you know, wairua Maaori A wairua Maaori is completely and totally different from a wairua Paakehaa. So, what do I mean by that? I know how it feels like, but it s so difficult to describe It sort of How I m gonna explain it Like down here, in the marae, you know, I quite feel like I can put my shoes off and put my feet up and lay back and I don t have to be in any particular you know, I don t have to be all prim and proper. I feel that when I go down to the staff room, you know, I have to be sort of prim and proper, and there is a way that I have got to talk, you know it s so hard to describe wairua Maaori! (Christine) Linda said that when the wairua is good, she opens herself more freely to others. Tauni expressed the same idea when he said, in a quote already cited: My place at home is my comfort zone, that is where I am comfortable at, my toes up, and I don t have to put airs on or try to change to suit anybody else. There is again a clear relationship between feeling relaxed, feeling at home and feeling comfortable. When I asked him how he would express comfort zone in Maaori, Tauni even translated it by the expression taku kaainga which means home, but also, according to Williams dictionary (deriv. From kaa, and so, properly, place where fire has burnt; hence) 1. Place of abode, lodging, quarters, encampment, bivouac. ( ) 2. Unfortified place of residence ( ) 3. Country ( ) 4. With a definite article or a possessive pronoun, home (2000 (1971): 81). However, I do not want to imply here that Maaori are never comfortable in non-maaori contexts. The wairua can also be right in non-maaori contexts, among whaanau or in contexts where one is not at home but the vibes are good. This feeling can come from the open attitude of the people there, their respect for others, their kindness and warmth. Comfort can also come in part from the place itself if it is welcoming or comfy or has something familiar about it. 304

317 Comfort is not only about wairua, but also tapu and noa. If a tapu is violated, then people will feel uncomfortable. If, for example, the proper karakia (prayers) are not said, people fear reprisals from the spiritual world, whereas if all the karakia are said correctly, then one is in a safe domain, protected against any attack from the spiritual world. Rewa explained why she was very comfortable with the context in which she received her moko kauwae (traditional female chin tattoo): I would have never been to the arena if (a) it was not my blood [referring to her kinship tie to the kaitaa or tattoo artist] to do it and (b) I was not comfortable with his precautions. If there was no karakia, even though we had our own, if there was no karakia, I would have been uncomfortable. So, if comfort is a question of being among whaanau or iwi members, it also concerns whakapapa, tipuuna and rights. It involves respecting the tapu/noa aspects of things by adopting the proper tikanga, such as prayers or dealing with bloodied items in the proper manner, as Rewa made clear: R. Did you notice that he [the kaitaa or tattoo artist] kept all of the tissues and things in one bag? N. No, I did not notice that. R. It s tapu and I took those, Mona and I, and we took them home to deal with them in my way. And George, the Paakehaa boy, he also used he gathered up some stuff and he came over also and put it in the bag because it belongs to me. N. It was important for you? R. Really, that s the tapu. It s really important that these blood items come back to me. N. How are you going to deal with them? R. ( ) they re still sitting at home. I haven t worked out what I m going to do yet. I would probably bury all. Maybe I ll put it in a huia, a gourd, that s what I will do. To my mind that hui addressed the karakia, so that cleared the tapu. He kept separated my blood George also respected my blood and Mona and Joe were watching as well. It was fine, it was meant to succeed. It did. (Rewa) Respecting the tapu is all about comfort, since it guarantees the good working of a hui (meeting) or any other kinds of activity. Respecting the tapu or using the proper tikanga to lift it is essential for people to feel comfortable. Lifting or dealing with the tapu in a proper way makes it possible to relax and be stress-free and comfortable to do what they have to do or to simply enjoy the moment without any fear or negative feeling. For example, on a first visit to a marae, people can only truly relax after the powhiri, when the tapu of the visitors is lifted and they are not waewae tapu anymore (see chapter III). 305

318 Not everybody is preoccupied by tapu/noa distinctions to the same degree. For some, like Manuka, what is important is to act with good intentions and respect for people, places and things; this will keep him safe. Other Maaori, like Tauni, told me that they are too young now to worry about such matters. They prefer to learn and experience other aspects of the Maaori world such as the language first, and it will be never too late to explore its spiritual dimensions. Wairua is just one of things that guide Maaori in their behaviour and meetings with others. Dreams, spiritual or body feelings and various other kinds of signs have a similarly important impact on their daily actions and relationships. They indicate with whom they should or should not interact, what they should or should not say, what they should or should not do in particular circumstances and what they should plan for the future. Rewa waits for signs or dreams or simply the right feeling before she takes crucial decisions or embarks on new projects. Just before I left Aotearoa, she saw signs that it was time for her to do something else in life and to let someone else who is Maaori take care of her shop. She had similar signs before leaving her husband. When she reaches a turning point in her life, she told me she always wakes up with an uncontrollable urge to clean her house from top to bottom. Rewa and Donna said that this is a Maaori way of seeing life. And Donna replied to Rewa s story by telling her that it was time, then, to make the move: There are other plans for you now. Indeed, Rewa had already seen in a dream that some people were waiting for her, but she still did not know at that time for what exactly. The tiipuna are often taken to be responsible for the signs or dreams received, which is another reason why people trust the signs. Aroha, for example, is in an ongoing spiritual relationship with her tiipuna through her dreams and body feelings. If she is talking with someone Maaori or Paakehaa about issues related to her tribe, she knows when to stop the discussion when she feels a pain in her neck. Her explanation is that one of her dead grandmothers is holding her neck, telling her that she is on a wrong track. The pain can also indicate that her addressee(s) should not be trusted or at least that she should refrain from speaking about important issues with this particular person or group. Aroha, like 306

319 many Maaori I met, attributes a high level of agency to her tiipuna, who express their desires and influence the living through dreams or signs of various kinds. Even though they are dead, they are still part of her whaanau and she needs a sign of their assent or support in order to feel comfortable about any projects or decisions she undertakes. The signs in question, in Aroha s case, can also be a non-sign in the sense that her tiipuna will not intervene if there is no need for warnings. If she feels no pain in her neck, no bad or unclear feelings, then it means that she can trust the person and speak about intimate or sensitive issues, unless of course she has other bad feelings, bad dreams or the wairua is negative. In many Maaori writers novels, dreams and visions are important narrative strategies. They serve as the vehicles through which characters (re)connect with their Maaori spirituality (Allen 2002: 152). The characters also receive messages and signs in their dreams (see, among other examples, Grace 1986, 1992, 1998; Hulme 1986 (1983); Ihimaera 1973, 1987). Dead ancestors are very important in everyday life for many Maaori, and their presence imbues the land, especially places like marae, whare Maaori and urupa. They représente[nt] une présence continuellement (ré)incorporée et actualisée, qui participe activement au déploiement et au devenir du monde (Poirier 2000 : 150). So, the concept of ancestors or tiipuna cannot be reduced to a simple genealogical model. This was well illustrated in the recent feature film The Whale Rider, based on a novel by Ihimaera. My Québécois friends who saw the film told me that it was a touching story, a beautiful myth. What they did not understand is that for many Maaori, it is not a myth: it is part of everyday life. However, several of the participants in my research thought that other people speak too much about the wairua and their tiipuna. Christine felt that some people use these words as a strategy to assert their Maaori identity and to show that they know all about the Maaori world. Keita added, That s their way of saying I am Maaori and making themselves believe, I suppose. It is then a way to establish relationships with other 307

320 Maaori, to be part of the same world and enter into the whaanau. Christine tries to use the word wairua, for example, only when it is absolutely right and not just anyhow, anywhere, and at anytime. Keita explained: K. It s something I have never grown up talking about but always knew it was there. It s only here in urban that these things get brought up, because they lack it so much. You know I don t know if that s right to say that they like it, but they re creating something they miss. They haven t been brought up in their own area, so that N. They create it? K. Yeah for themselves. N. Like when you were living up north K. It s around you all the time. ( ) You know it s there, like I guess when you re growing up in a Maaori community where everything you do is Maaori, the reo, the everything you practise is Maaori Maaori things. You don t think of that, like It s not spoken because it s part of your being, it s not until you come to Auckland, and only recently, in the last maybe ten, fifteen years that it has been brought up more often, but they re just trying to rediscover who they are, Maaori. ( ) Sometimes for me, for these people to say like Maybe I m wrong in saying that It s something you don t talk about because it s naturally there I don t know, it s so unusual, it s strange to me. But to keep bringing that up that your tipuna is with you you know, I think it s because they learnt the creation, the university all those stories, Rangi and Papa, and all that. (Keita) So, speaking too much about the wairua and the tiipuna can make some people uncomfortable because those sorts of koorero are tapu (Keita). I can go to certain ( ) places and I can feel that there are other spiritual things with me, but I don t use that while I m here, while I m at university. My tiipuna are with me you know, to me that is there are those things that I have been brought up you don t talk about. It was tapu because some things were sacred. You don t sort of bring it out, but the Maaori today, everything is to do with their tiipuna this and their tiipuna that and the wairua here and there. That is new to me. Those are born again Maaori to me and don t know where they get their teachings. ( ) I heard a lot of the Maaori here say Oh! My tiipuna are here with me, I can do this or that. For Christ s sake! We never spoke about that out in the open! (Keita) The wairua, the tiipuna, signs and dreams as well as other kinds of premonitions or bodily sensations are very important for Maaori to interpret what is happening to them, to take decisions and interact with others. A breach of a tapu or a bad dream can cause profound anxiety, and bad dreams or bad signs can push someone to change major plans or reverse certain decisions. They can also push someone to make amends by apologizing for or confessing to bad behaviour. The anxiety linked to negative signs or disobedience of signs from the spiritual world, whatever their nature, is acute. This is because the 308

321 spiritual world can be extremely dangerous, and can even be thought of as the source of all misfortune. Clearly, some people attribute more significance than others to wairua, dreams and other kinds of signs. Some do not even know about such signs, or simply do not feel anything or do not believe in such things. However, they are for many Maaori a fundamental feature of both daily and extraordinary events. Maaori and Paakehaa relationships Many Maaori have friendships with Paakehaa and people of diverse origins. Relationships with some groups can be easier to maintain than those with Paakehaa, which are tinged with a history of political struggles. However, Maaori and Paakehaa too (Tilbury and Lloyd 2001: 77) negotiate their comfort by delimiting safe boundaries of conversation, that is by consciously not talking about certain sensitive issues like the Treaty, Maaori rights, Maaori claims, paternalistic or colonizing practices or attitudes, and so forth. This way of negotiating comfort has already been identified by Radice (2000: ) in the context of the Anglophone/Francophone relationship in Montreal and by Tilbury and Lloyd (2001: 76-81) with regard to the Maaori / Paakehaa relationship in Aotearoa/New Zealand. A certain degree of guardedness is then required to stay safe in such relationships, and a dose of self-control is necessary to sustain them in the future. The persons involved in the relationship will also present a particular side of themselves or a particular self in order to maintain the relationship (Tilbury and Lloyd 2001: 79). Tilbury and Lloyd (2001: 80) explain the guardedness between Maaori and Paakehaa in their friendship relations by reference to a feeling of mistrust. They base their argument on the fact that trust is one of the strongest themes in their respondents attempts to define close friendship. I think this interpretation can be true in certain cases, but it represents only one aspect of the relationship. Generally, from my own observations, Maaori and Paakehaa do not transpose the mistrust they feel in general about the other to their private and personal relationships. It is clear that there is often a sense of mistrust 309

322 expressed towards strangers of the other group or addressed to the other group in general, but when it comes to relationships with friends, I think this general mistrust no longer applies, or at least, applies much less, as some prejudices and stereotypes may still be present and active. The prevalence of intermarriage between Maaori and Paakehaa would seem to be a good indication of this. It might well be said that generally, Maaori and Paakehaa do not feel completely comfortable with each other. The sense of unease that Maaori feel when they are around Paakehaa and that Paakehaa feel around Maaori is due in part to the fact that the other s cultural codes, ways of doing and ways of being remain largely unknown. Even after so many decades of living on the same islands, Maaori and Paakehaa do not in fact know each other s culture very well. Maaori, however, are more used than Paakehaa to managing relationships with both Maaori and Paakehaa, particularly in the public arena, and particularly those who have internalized both Maaori and Paakehaa figured worlds and are used to engaging in both worlds on a regular basis. When Maaori are exclusively among Maaori, even if they are strangers it is a different matter: Everybody comes from the same place as Maaori, as Tama put it; they share similar life experiences and can understand each other. Eddy, one of Tilbury and Lloyd s respondents, told them when I m with Pakeha and they re my good friends, you still, you re not fully let go to them. You don t fully cling to them. Whereas with Maori I can feel really let go (2001: 80). This clearly refers to layer H of (dis)comfort: cultural, social, and political affinities. However, affinities are not automatic; as we have seen throughout the thesis, Maaori are very diversified due to tribal differences, disparities in standard of living, differences in social class, levels of education, diverse urban/rural backgrounds, whaanau experiences and so forth. So in actual fact, all Maaori do not come from the same place even if they do have some (or often many) commonalities. (Dis)comfort is thus not only ethnically or culturally defined, but depends on a multiplicity of factors. 310

323 Comfort between Maaori and Paakehaa is negotiated by avoiding certain uncomfortable zones. Mistrust may then be directed to oneself, as one becomes less sure of how to (re)act and what to say. Lack of self-confidence vis-à-vis one s knowledge of certain burning questions or one s capacity to argue leads to avoidance of such issues. There is also the fear of hurting the other by raising undesirable topics, or even losing their friendship or respect through having divergent points of view. There is a clear strategy here of conflict avoidance. Aroha, for example, manages not to hurt anyone s feelings or create conflict with her Paakehaa husband s family by cautiously avoiding intervening with the other children if they behave badly. This is contrary to the principles that guide the figured world of the whaanau, in which all the children are everyone s children and all adults have a responsibility to oversee their behaviour unlike in Paakehaa parenting culture Because Aroha does not want to jeopardize her relationship with her in-laws, she does not assume that particular responsibility towards the children: rather, she adapts herself to the environment, although it sometimes takes great effort for her to keep quiet. Maaori are also often afraid of being seen as radical if they critique present-day relations or the balance of power between Maaori and Paakehaa, or current government policies regarding Maaori issues. It appeared to me that a person could be labelled as radical fairly easily in Aotearoa/New Zealand. To avoid this, it seemed to be preferable to distance oneself from a particular position or debate, feigning indifference in the interest of maintaining a positive relationship. What Radice writes about the relationship between Anglophones and Francophones in Montréal, appears to me to hold equally true for the Maaori case: Conflict avoidance eventually turns into resignation about the political situation. There was a general feeling among the people I interviewed that the political situation was not going to be resolved, as much as they might wish it, so they might as well get used to it (2000: 117). Moreover, a kind of political correctness reigns which prevents both peoples from speaking about topics that are particularly controversial or touch directly on the other s cultural sensitivities. Both are also shy to ask questions that would reveal the extent of their ignorance or misunderstanding. There are some topics that you just do not touch, 311

324 unless you know the person extremely well or you are, as I was, an ignorant stranger and therefore either do not know or can pretend not to know about what is best left alone. Of course, the wider political context, social discourse and history of relations between Maaori and Paakehaa have a considerable influence on their social interactions. Still, freedom to ask questions is clearly linked to a sense of comfort. It is one of the things that makes a certain Maaori café in Auckland particularly comfortable: in a relaxed atmosphere which is even more relaxed for being clearly identified as Maaori, Maaori can afford to ask questions about what they do not know: Like some of the older Maaori people didn t want to go to a café because they didn t understand the coffee. And they just would say I just want a coffee and they would feel embarrassed or the food they had never seen, that sort of food, because that is what middle class Paakehaa did. So they were very edgy to go out other than [to] a smorgasbord [buffet] like Manukau City. It is made up of a smorgasbord and those big places like that. (Maxine) At this Maaori café, older Maaori people feel somewhat at home. They would not drop their guard in a Paakehaa environment where the imbalance of power is obvious. As I mentioned earlier in this chapter and as Sarup writes, places are socially constructed, and ( ) this construction is about power (1994: 96) (see also chapter I). And structures of power also define relations of inclusion and exclusion which allow one to make a home in a place or not. In mainstream cafés, for instance, social classes and ethnic categories are obviously part of the power structures at work. Tilbury and Lloyd show how people ground their interaction not in the immediacy of their situation, but in national issues (2001: 81). This means that national politics and the issues raised in this arena have an impact on the relationships between individuals and groups. This is true even if people do not talk about these questions, since they are conveyed through attitudes, behaviours and the connotations of certain words. So, relations between Maaori and Paakehaa change along with changes in the general climate, as well as changes in one s personal views or circumstances, as underlines by Tilbury and Lloyd (2001: 79). 312

325 Conclusion: Negotiating comfort, or when (dis)comfort is dialogic This chapter has revealed the complexity of the notions of comfort and home and their use by Maaori. Home, like comfort, is created through relationships with the living, the dead, the past and the present, through engagement within diverse places and spaces. When Maaori speak about comfort, they also speak about their relationships with all these entities. Making oneself at home, but also making oneself comfortable, is about negotiating a complexity of relations, imagery from other contexts, which overlap with the home context itself (Hirsch 1998: 164). (Dis)comfort and home are in themselves always rather ambiguous ideas which are in constant flux and movement. What is home, then? It all depends, replies Hollander (1991: 31). The same is true for (dis)comfort. A comfort zone is a blurred zone with blurred boundaries. Zones of comfort and discomfort cross each other constantly and the boundaries of (dis)comfort zones are constantly changing. The zones are flexible, multiple and diverse. And comfort, like home and like any word we use to cover a particular field of experience, always begets its own negation. Home may evoke security in one context and seem confining in another (Jackson 1995: ). This has been demonstrated in my discussion of various Maaori meanings and contexts of home. Meanings of home and feelings of (dis)comfort change through experience, specific contexts, and engagement in particular figured worlds, places and spaces, which are in turn influenced by larger structures, like the state, regional and national events and transnational forces. Specific local circumstances or realities are experienced differently under changing regional and global conditions. (Dis)comfort and home should be understood as lived relationships and not as distinct realities, entities or essences. We have seen that speaking in terms of comfort and home means also speaking about processes of identity- and place-making in the figured worlds in which one engages. We have also seen how comfort relates to the expansion and contraction of the whaanau. It seems also that certain common denominators or zones of convergence are necessary for 313

326 different persons or groups to feel comfortable or at home together (see, for example, Eriksen 1998, Schwimmer 2003). Comfort is found in things and places or spaces which are familiar: the internalization of common figured worlds then becomes of central importance. However, comfort or places of comfort do not exist as such by themselves: they need to be built, which leaves space for negotiation and imagination. In the next chapter, we will see how the places and spaces of comfort discussed in this chapter and earlier on also allow for engagement in the broader society on Maaori s own terms, through the affirmation of Maaori ways and visions. 314

327 CHAPTER VIII CONCLUSION: INTERCONNECTED PLACES AND SPACES OF AUTONOMY In this final chapter, I wish to come back to the main points examined in the preceding chapters, but I also wish to enlarge the discussion. The whaanau and the whare Maaori have been looked at as important places and spaces for cultural recovery and affirmation, but they also allow for mobilization and engagement in the larger world. We have seen that Maaori engage with the larger society on their own terms, that is, through the upholding of their identity as Maaori and by affirming whaanau values, Maaori ways of being, and Maaori places such as marae and whare Maaori. This affirmation of Maaori ways is also part of a larger movement of creating places and spaces for Maaori in the wider society, as well as allowing for more autonomy and decolonization. I wish, therefore, to discuss further ordinary Maaori s types of engagement, both vis-à-vis Maaori figured worlds and Maaori people, and vis-à-vis the larger society. I also want to re-emphasize the importance of the anthropology of everyday life and experiences as an avenue to better understand the Maaori struggle to affirm themselves, reinforce solidarities, and engage in different figured worlds, and diverse places and spaces. The openness of the whaanau and the whare Maaori In the previous chapters, we saw that whare Maaori are a refuge for those who, by habitus, engage in the figured world of the whaanau (chapter V and VI), or for those who consciously want to regain the principles and values of what is, for them, a figured world that has been lost. Whare Maaori are safe, secure, and comfortable places where one is accepted for who one is, where one is welcomed as a whaanau member, where one feels at home. However, these refuges are hardly places of retreat and withdrawal from the larger society and the world. On the contrary, they are central to the expression and imagination of 315

328 Maaori identities; they are crucial to the consolidation of the group and of what being Maaori means. The whare Maaori, as we saw in particular in chapter IV, is thus a crucial site for survival and continuity, but also for change. What are then important about the whare Maaori are not only security and comfort in economical, physical, and emotional terms, but also the possibility of thinking about oneself as part of a group. In fact, the whare Maaori is an important place for meeting whaanau members, for exchanging news and gossip, and for keeping alive and maintaining social relationships among Maaori who live in the city, between Maaori city-dwellers and Maaori who live in rural areas, between Maaori who live inside and outside Aotearoa/New Zealand, and between Maaori and their non-maaori allies or whanaunga (relatives, but here, in a symbolic sense). If the relationships are not always concrete or kanohi ki te kanohi (face to face), as Maaori would say, they are at least symbolic. In fact, places like whare Maaori are very powerful: they make it possible for Maaori to imagine and be something other or something more than simple individuals in a larger society, where one does not always recognise oneself and often feels uncomfortable (chapter VII). I have to specify that all the technological means of the present era are very important in strengthening these relationships, not only at a symbolic level, but also in a real and practical way. Depending on each whaanau s needs and possibilities, whaanau members can use the telephone (landline telephone or mobile phone), fax, and the internet to communicate and keep each other informed. These technologies bring greater immediacy to relationships with Maaori who live in other areas or with Maaori transnational migrants. They give a feeling of the absentees presence to those who have stayed home. The reverse is also true: it gives to those who are away a feel of home and of the whaanau s presence in their everyday life away from home. This is without mentioning the current better possibilities of travelling (cars, trains, planes), and thus for a real presence at the whare Maaori and marae from time to time. This technology also allows for better consultation processes and consensus in the everyday working of the whare Maaori and in other whaanau everyday experiences and enterprises, as well as for official representations at different levels within and outside Maoridom. For many, these technologies also allow for better coordination between Maaori places. In fact, these 316

329 technologies have opened up new spaces for discussions, convergence, solidarities and group consolidation. The whaanau, the group, the fact of being Maaori even when one is physically absent from the whare Maaori, from the marae, and from Aotearoa/New Zealand are made more immediate. The whare Maaori is an important place in which people undertake negotiations and collective decisions about whaanau positions that will then be fed into tribal or school meetings, into sport or voluntary association meetings, into the ballot boxes of local and general elections, onto particular agendas for action in the workplace, into parliament and, ultimately, into international forums such as indigenous transnational association conferences or UN meetings in Geneva or in New York. The whare Maaori allows for the engagement of whaanau members beyond the whaanau, in public space. Whaanau members can engage in public space as members of a group and be supported through the engagement by the group. We saw, in fact, in chapter VII, how the group support or awhina (assistance) is a significant factor in comfort. Since, as I explained in chapter IV, many of the participants in my research compared their city houses or whare Maaori to a marae, it is important here to discuss the inherent character of marae as forums of discussion and, ultimately, consensus. Éric Schwimmer precisely expressed that idea in A young employee at the Ministry of Maori Affairs at the time, he suggested his view of the journal Te Ao Hou/The New World, a government-sponsored publication. He saw it as a marae on paper (see Allen 2002, chapter 1). He used the term marae to refer to a forum for discussion and exchange, an ideal of openness and inclusiveness (Allen 2002: 46). Schwimmer was thus using the word symbolically, evoking wider connotations than Durie, who says the marae is the most enduring forum for debate and decision making (1998: 221), meaning a mode of discussion or a locus of interactions among kin, land, and ancestors. The emphasis on exchange and sharing, however, seems to coincide with certain aspects of Tauroa and Tauroa s (1986) vision of marae. Durie, in 2001, adds that [w]hat is important about a marae is not necessarily the physical structure, but the exercise of encounters and values that might otherwise remain dormant or seem at odds with the wider community (2001a: 317

330 72). According to Schwimmer, the marae on paper allows for the staging of hui (assemblies, gatherings, meetings) virtual ones to bring together and exchanging diverse Maaori thoughts and opinions (Allen 2002: 46). The concept of making the journal into a marae on paper (Te Ao Hou 1952) was aimed ( ) at stimulating a cultural revival, Schwimmer writes today (2004b: 11). In his view, the marae opened possibilities and new spaces. There must have been validity to Schwimmer s view, since the journal Te Ao Hou/The New World enjoyed great popularity among Maaori during Schwimmer s editorship. Moreover, the permanent head of his department, who was a prominent Maaori, let him continue. Schwimmer was also guided by Maaori who did not worked for the government, like Reweti Kohere, Wiremu Parker, and Pei Te Hurinui Jones, with whom he usually discussed the journal. My role was a menial one: Te Ao Hou was made as much by these others who prompted me (Schwimmer 2004b: 12). Graham Hingangaroa Smith wrote, at the end of the 1990s, that his own Ph.D. dissertation itself co-opts the marae format, that is the values, rules and practices embedded in the formal public forum of the traditional marae context (traditional speaking arena). Thus the thesis becomes a marae ( ) to put forward a kauhau (address) and to lay out a kaupapa (a thesis) (1997: 47). As such, a marae consists of the opening of a public forum, a public expression, and thus participation in the public scene where a kaupapa (plan, scheme, proposal) is put forward. The marae, interpreted in that sense, supposes a movement outward, an opening onto/of a larger space. Thus, when Maaori compare their city house to a marae, they are speaking not only of unconditional love, reciprocity, a caring and warm environment, but also of responsibility, debates around all kind of issues and consensus, and interconnectedness. The marae is, therefore, characterized by its openness. In fact, Durie (2001a: 90), writing about marae patterns of thinking and behaving, says the direction of energy on marae is outwards, away from smaller and towards larger levels, as compared with non-marae environments where the direction is inwards, towards smaller units. In a marae, the relationships are endpoints, while individualism is the focus in non-marae environments. This emphasis on exchange and discussion in an open atmosphere corresponds to what I 318

331 observed at 30 Aroha Street and elsewhere. Discussions and debates, particularly, took place when kaumaatua (elders) like Hiko and Teria were present. More people, then, converged on the house to discuss solutions to different problems which often reached far beyond the house and its people: the schooling of the children, one s involvement at the work place, decisions about house or car maintenance, marae renovation, funding for a trip to Wellington to take part in a march or to visit a special exhibition at Te Papa Museum, the tribe s claim to the Tribunal of Waitangi, the master s thesis topic of one of the whaanau members. Exchanges also often took place about the proper Maaori way to do certain things, about tikanga (custom, rules), but also about how the whaanau s actions were going to make a difference for the group and even for Maaori at large. At the end of these discussions and debates, a consensus was generally reached on a kaupapa (plan, scheme, proposal) or a direction to take, and people were already in agreement or rapidly moving into alignment with that consensus. Discussions were most often about places and spaces outside the whare Maaori, or involved people, things, and actions in a wider space. In fact, the whaanau and Maaori cosmogony, in general, suppose a high degree of openness. The interconnectedness of everything in the universe is emphasized: From the mind-heart came darkness and the kore, the nothingness which yet holds the potential for everything to come. And from them came the hau, the breath of life, producing all forms of the world of light by genealogical engagement (Salmond 2000: 40). So, everything in the cosmos is related in some way to every other thing in a network of genealogical connection. All share the same hau, the same wind of life (Salmond 2000: 38) or vital essence (Williams 2000 (1971): 39). Genealogy, then, does not have as restricted a meaning as we give to it in the Western view of the universe (chapter VI). Genealogy is founded on the Maaori account of the creation of the universe, in which each form of life came together with another to make something new in a network of genealogical connection, [while] in the Christian account, God created the world by splitting its parts into binary sets. The deity was an analytic logician (Salmond 2000: 42). The image of the kuumara (sweet potato) vines is widely used today as an illustration of the persistence of this worldview (e.g. Metge 1995; James Henare Maaori Research Centre 2002). In 319

332 fact, Maaori are always looking for connections, whoever and wherever they meet. The same kuumara vines which allow information to circulate, also allow people to connect to each other (see chapter V). I reproduce here the diagram of the Whaanau as a social net -work as described by the interviewees who participated in the Urban Maaori Disparities Research Programme of the James Henare Maaori Research Centre (2002) of the University of Auckland. It corresponds to what I understood from the participants in my research. Figure 1: The Whaanau net -work Source: James Henere Maaori Research Centre, 2002, Well-Being and Disparity in Taamaki-makaurau, vol. 3, Auckland, University of Auckland, Repart prepared for Te Puni Kookiri/The Ministry of Maaori Development 320

333 As explained by the James Henare Maaori Research Centre, [t]he lines radiating out from the centre of the diagram represent the lines of association through which people are linked to the other members of their whaanau (2002, 3: 43). These lines extend beyond the limits of the largest circle. This indicates that despite the stability of its core, the whaanau is always remaking itself over time, growing and accommodating new relationships as old ones are transformed through marriage, birth, ageing, migration, separation and death. In this light, the lines of association through which whanaungatanga[ 130 ] extends itself might be seen as tendrils of a kuumara vine, extending outwards to embrace new people and putting down roots to nourish new relationships of marriage, friendship and descent. (James Henare Maaori Research Centre, 3: 43) In everyday life, the network of kinship and alliances emerges as a net of relationships between people, places, ancestors, and other living and inanimate beings. In fact, to describe any collective action or interaction is also making a relational statement. Salmond (2000: 52 53) shows, however, that engagement does not necessarily imply amity between the parties. On the contrary, as exemplified by Salmond (2000: 53), the relationship can be that of angry companion (hoa riri) as opposed to friend (hoa), and relationships will be managed through the relational principles of utu (return for something received, whether good or bad; reciprocity; compensation; price), mana (status, prestige, authority), and tapu (sacred or polluted). We saw these principles in action in chapter VII. In chapter IV and V, referring to Metge (2002), I also explained the cycle of reciprocal exchanges and relations based on the principle of utu, and directly involving the mana principle. The whaanau relationships and the language of whakapapa (genealogy) are used to trace the relationships between people and the rest of the universe. However, [r]elational logic worked well with people who shared in its assumptions. When other people assumed the superiority of their own forms of life, however, one could be faced with one-way relationships and constant failures of reciprocity (Salmond 2000: 52). Thus, as I have shown throughout the thesis, in particular in chapter VII, the figured world of the whaanau both connects people who share and implement the whaanau s values and 130 Whanaungatanga is defined, in the Jamaes Hanere Maaori Research Centre s glossary, as the processes by which whaanau and other consanguineal and affinal links, cohesion and mutuality are maintained (2002, 3: 155). 321

334 principles, and works as a boundary marker between us and others who infringe on or threaten the whaanau in any way. Depending on circumstances and on power relationships, the whaanau will contract, expand, or make distinctions between those who share its assumptions and those who do not. For example, the Maaori experience of the Paakehaa presence in Aotearoa/New Zealand over the centuries has affected Maaori categories and concepts: the vision of two worlds, one Maaori and the other Paakehaa, is surely a consequence of that experience even if, in reality, the boundaries are porous, very fluid, and allow for connections through practice under different circumstances (see chapter VI; see also chapter VII on how people express their relationships to the two worlds in terms of comfort). Moreover, boundaries [and connections] change in nature over time (Cohen 2000: 11). It all depends on the larger context, which can be regional, national or global, of the reempowerment or disempowerment of categories of persons and figured worlds, of changing relationships between groups. The Maaori case cannot be analyzed without taking into account Maaori relationships with the dominant group in Aotearoa/New Zealand and other growing populations. Nor can it be analyzed without considering internal divisions along different lines: among others, tribes, whaanau, places of residence, and socio-economic factors. The relationships and boundaries are also experienced and conceived differently depending on the person or group. Barth (2000) is right, in my judgement, in emphasizing the fundamental importance of embodied experience and local circumstances, processes of social interaction, politics and economics on shared conceptual categories, and especially the particular patterns of social relations, and engagement in places and spaces. Those contingencies produce the effects from which people in turn reconceptualize boundaries (endowing the concept of boundary with what we used to call connotations ) that derive from what actually happens along that particular boundary as a result of the connections that people spin by their actions and by the consequences of those actions. (Barth 2000: 31) If we look at the concrete level of everyday life, Durie draws the same conclusion: the whaanau (and I will add the whare Maaori) connect people, places, and spaces, and because of that, are empowering for the people. He says: 322

335 capacity to empower, whakamana, is a whaanau function that facilitates the entry of members of the whaanau into the wider community. The whaanau might be the gateway into the marae, or into sport, or to school, or to work. Rather than individuals negotiating the terms of their own entry, the whaanau is able to exercise its wider influence to ease the passage, to advocate on behalf of its people. (2001a: 202) The whaanau has a long history of being very effective. In manual occupations, entry was and is most often determined by whaanau. In fact, in the migration to the city, whaanau have often played a key role in the transition and integration of its members into job market and social networks (Metge 1964), the whare Maaori being the transition place par excellence (see chapter IV). The whaanau is practically a link between places and people, and the whare Maaori is a gateway to other spaces and places even as it reaffirms its central role in strengthening the whaanau in the city. If we look again at Kiri s house, Kiri s whare Maaori, we discover that it is also a solid base from where tikanga (custom, rules, tradition) and Maaori teachings are transmitted to a larger whaanau, the whaanau of the school that the children attend. Rangi is teaching at the same school in a bilingual unit. In preparation for the end-of-the-year show, twice a week, in front of the house and sometimes in the living room, Kiri and Rangi teach poi 131 and waiata (songs) to the students. In return, Rangi has helped Kiri organize cultural activities for her Maaori clients at work, and supports her in her attempt to implement a permanent Maaori and Pacific Island cultural program (see chapter VII). This means giving her cultural advice, teaching her whakapapa (genealogy) in te reo (Maaori language), but also sitting besides her at meetings with the management committee. In fact, when there is a need for it, the whole whaanau mobilizes to support whaanau members in their projects. These examples show the obvious links between places, interpenetration of places, and the open character of the whare Maaori. Not only are people in movement between places, knowledge too emanates from the house, widening the space of Maaori affirmation. 131 A poi is a light ball with a short string attached to it, which [is] swung and twirled rhythmically to the accompaniment of a song, the so-called poi dance (Williams 2000 (1971): 288). 323

336 All the previous examples are good illustrations of agency, self-determination, or autonomy at the personal, whaanau, and cultural level in an environment where it is comfortable and safe to be Maaori, and where everyone feels supported and accepted as full member of the group. Kiri speaks very little about politics, as such, like most of the participants in this research, but she makes every possible effort to change her world and the world around her. This means studying Maaori history and culture by herself and at university, making phone calls to people who could help her, participating in different hui in South Auckland where she can find assistance, going back to her iwi (tribe) for advice, spending her personal time and money for preparing cultural initiatives and for whanaungatanga (strengthening and enriching the bonds of family unity) activities, and involving many members of the whaanau in her work. Many of the participants in my research attend waananga (informal or local sessions organized to pass on traditional knowledge) on a regular basis as a means of upgrading their skills and deepening their understanding of tikanga (custom, rules) Maaori. Many are also doing whakapapa research, and share and discuss their results with the people around them. This is all about being Maaori and being part of a whaanau, a group in a highly political context where it is not enough for one to say one is Maaori. One must master the figured world, rely on a certain knowledge of traditions, feel things and relate to others in a Maaori way and as Maaori, and know enough Maaori words to be accepted, as we saw throughout the thesis. This calls for personal effort, but also for a collective or whaanau mobilization, since one needs recognition and support from one s whaanau, genealogical or not, if one want to affirm oneself as Maaori. Being Maaori is first and foremost a whaanau thing, not an individual one. Kiri says herself that she could not have implemented her cultural program a few years ago, because at that time, she was not comfortable enough as a Maaori, she did not know enough about tikanga and she did not have sufficient support from her whaanau since she had distanced herself from it while she was going through a difficult period with ex-partners. The whare Maaori has thus been a resource centre for hers to go back to and in which to refocus her life, but it has also been a push, through the support it has provided to her in becoming more active in the larger society and more positive about her engagement in diverse figured worlds, Maaori and mainstream. The self-confidence she developed, as well as her whaanau support, played an important role 324

337 in making her more comfortable in diverse places and spaces. The whaanau has given her the strength to implement Maaori ways at the work place, but also to engage into a bachelor s and then a master s degree at university. Ihimaera ( ), writing about Maaori writers who successfully put their creative power into their work and go out into the world (in Aotearoa/New Zealand, Australia, and elsewhere), says the pito (umbilical cord) informs their work, makes it Maaori, and replenishes them. The pito is used by Ihimaera ( , 5) to symbolize the Maaori centre, the source of being Maaori, which comprises te reo (Maaori language), marae, kaupapa Maaori (Maaori philosophy, plan, principle), Maaori history, and tuurangawaewae (the place to stand, connection to the land). [It] always reminds you that, wherever one goes in the world or whatever happens to you, you have a people and a place to return to; a life to which you belong, whether you know it or want it (Ihimaera , 5: 17). In light of the present analysis, it seems that the whare Maaori in the city is also part of the pito or the kaakano (seed), as Rangi suggested in chapter IV and informs and allows for moves forward and outward. This is what allowed Kiri to be more involved in society. This is the same pito or kaakano that allowed Rangi to be a boundary breaker or crosser (see chapter VI). In fact, Ihimaera speaks about the spiral which, at one and the same time, is going both forward and backward: it is a constant going out and returning, te torino heare whakahua, whakamuri, possess the kinds of tensions which can push our work, informed by kaupapa Maaori, into a new form that is an amalgamation of both (Ihimaera , 5: 17). He finally adds: We are the writers of the spiral (Ihimaera , 5: 17). I will say that the people who inhabit the pages of this thesis are the survivors and the fighters of the spiral. The spiral movement allows Maaori to participate in the larger society, and to affirm themselves in the work place and at university. Their engagement in the figured world of the whaanau nourishes them as does the power of places such as whare Maaori, marae, and papakaainga (ancestral settlement, home territory). They are also nourished in their engagements with other figured worlds. It is this very multiplicity and diversity of figured worlds, spaces, and places which they internalized that allows them to be at ease, comfortable, and to use their agency, creativity, and imagination to engage in 325

338 heteroglossic ways with the world, and to affirm themselves as Maaori. This is also what allows for different and diverse ways of being Maaori, since this is also what allows Maaori to be flexible in response to the demands of different contexts and circumstances. As Makareta the chosen one who had the knowledge and the careful upbringing preparing her for initiatives, the one who carries her family s hopes one of the three cousins of Patricia Grace s novel Cousins said, I realized ( ) that having that knowledge, that security, that sound base, allowed me to reach out and to know that I could do anything else in the world that I wanted to do (Grace 1992: 211). This is exactly the source of the motivation behind Mere s actions at the college where she works: all this stuff about getting my qualifications and learning, it s all to do with being able to be some sort of change agent, making change within the bigger group. (...) It s being able to use my skills enough to be able to make change for my family, my instant family, whaanau (...) sisters, brothers, and then people that I work with. There are different levels of whaanau: the staff I work with, they re a whaanau group, the students I work with, they re a whaanau group. To be able to be effective in what I do. (Mere) Her efforts to feel more complete as a person, more comfortable as a Maaori by learning about tikanga Maaori and te reo Maaori serves her in her work to implement comfort and rangatiratanga among her students, that is, reaching the highest pinnacle, succeeding in what you do, being able to get to the level where you can determine your own future, you are not dependent (Mere). And that is made possible by providing the students and the staff member with support, with whaanau feelings, with a comfortable Maaori space, with Maaori-oriented services, so they can engage in the larger society. In this way, Mere also contributes to opening spaces for herself, for her students, and for Maaori at large. Concerning the school whaanau, the notion of comfort in relation to identity, to being Maaori, plays a huge role in the involvement of the parents in the management of the bilingual unit and its activities, according to Maui, the teacher who founded the unit. He explains that: 326

339 as soon as we started calling ourselves an enrichment unit, a Maaori enrichment unit, as soon as we started calling ourselves that, well, some of the parents felt...they just seemed to come in and I think it was just because it was the name Maaori in front and they were coming in. We started with about six parents coming in all the time and then it sort of grew from there and then they talked to another parent and now we sometimes have up to 20 parents involved in our whaanau hui [assembly, gathering, meeting]. When you look at some of the things that happen in the school...they will get about three parents and this is for the mainstream. We might have an open day, we ll get about 20 parents in, other classes, about four. You see the difference...because they feel comfortable. (Maui) And this feeling of comfort seems to be closely related to the fact that the parents are part of a whaanau group. It thus seems to me that, when Maaori feel comfortable, when they have places they call home or places they can call their own, places clearly identified as Maaori, places in which they are part of a group and feel supported, many become involved in their whaanau and in the larger community, and suggest actions or projects aiming at greater autonomy. The autonomy they look for often goes far beyond their personal autonomy and personal comfort. Similarly, as those who have a good knowledge of the Maaori language and culture seem to have greater self-confidence and to feel more comfortable in the city, those Maaori who know who they are, have good whaanau support, and have a safe home seem to acknowledge more easily, for example, the non-maaori side(s) of their whakapapa (genealogy), even if they identify themselves primarily and proudly as Maaori. They also seem to engage more freely and more easily in different universes of meanings or figured worlds. One can be a teacher, a lawyer, a politician, an engineer, or a mechanic without compromising one s identity as Maaori, since one has a whaanau, a support group at all levels intellectual, spiritual, emotional, physical, and economical and one comes back home at night where the support is real. Even when one is away from home or away from the whare Maaori, one still feels supported, at least symbolically, because of whaanau links. Those who succeed and are recognized in both worlds, Maaori and Paakehaa, are precisely those who keep alive their whaanau engagement and support. At a time when whaanau has become an important symbol of Maoridom and of being Maaori, being an active member of a whaanau allows one to succeed in the Paakehaa world and, even if one come back home less often, one will not be considered a traitor. 327

340 Again, the whare Maaori is neither the only place of comfort nor the only place in which family relationships are strengthened and given central importance. Other places, like real marae in the city, Maaori schools, churches, sports clubs, Maaori community centres, and Maaori rooms at university, are also important sites which make possible and easier Maaori comfort, imagination, expression, autonomy, and participation in the public space at the local, regional, national, and even global levels. These places are interrelated and enable cultural survival, but also change. The whare Maaori and its network of interconnected places and spaces are also important at the political level: they form a crucial site for upholding the figured world of the whaanau. This figured world is a means and a strategy for affirmation of Maaori in relationships with other Maaori, but also with Paakehaa. In fact, the figured world of the whaanau is a site of resistance to state power and to Western hegemony, and to the power of the mainstream figured worlds in a colonized and globalized context. In fact, many participants in my research clearly said the whare Maaori is, for them, an alternative way of life. The figured world of the whaanau is thus a means and a strategy for appropriating political, economical, urban, and state spaces and powers. It is a means and a strategy for showing solidarity with other Maaori and for affirming one s Maoriness. It is a means and a strategy for avoiding assimilation; for continuing the struggle in an urban context often felt to be alien, and in a global context which is also sometimes felt to be threatening. While engagement in the public space is often the work of an elite, through political organizations and parties, NGOs, activist groups, and social movements, ordinary Maaori are also engaging actively in affirmation and resistance. However, they are mainly operating within private space, where they also fight assimilation and reinforce traditional Maaori ways and values. Researchers, in most cases, have difficulty seeing this work, this engagement of ordinary Maaori, since the struggle and debates take place in the intimacy of the whaanau, behind the whare Maaori s or the marae s doors. Whaanau as well as whare Maaori members engage in many sites of struggle simultaneously and in various domains, such as Maaori schooling, Maaori health, tikanga (custom and rules), Maaori language, Maaori representation in various governmental and 328

341 non-governmental organizations, and land claims. They are active both in the private and public spheres, even if, as we will see below, most of the work, at the moment, is taking place in the private space. Maaori engagement in many sites is flexible and varies according to stage of life, context, particular configuration of power relationships, and depending on persons and groups. I reproduce here a diagram elaborated by Smith (1999) to explain the indigenous research agenda. I think this figure is also useful in understanding the multiple engagements of the whaanau s and whare Maaori s members in many sites of struggle in a colonized time and space, and their subsequent connections to and active participation in many places and spaces, Maaori and non-maaori. Figure 2: Maaori engagements in multiple sites of struggle Source: SMITH, Linda, 1999, Decolonizing Methodology, Dunedin and London, Zed Books and University of Otago Press:

342 Smith explains: The chart uses the metaphor of ocean tides. From a Pacific peoples perspective the sea is a giver of life, it sets time and conveys localized environments which have enabled Pacific peoples to develop enduring relationships to the sea. For Polynesian peoples the significant deity of the sea is Tangaroa. Although there are many directions that can be named, the chart takes the Maaori equivalent of the four directions: the northern, the eastern, the southern and the western. The tides represent movement, change, process, life, inward and outward flows of ideas, reflections and actions. The four directions named here decolonisation, healing, transformation and mobilization represent processes. They are goals or ends in themselves. They are processes which connect, inform and clarify the tensions between the local, the regional and the global. They are processes which can be incorporated into practices and methodologies. (Smith 1999: 116) This diagram shows the everyday struggle of ordinary Maaori, but it also accounts for public and precisely targeted kinds of struggles. Moreover, as Smith (1999) explains, development or change is not sequential. It is made with back-and-forth movements, improvisations, and, from time to time well-planned actions. It emerges through practice, through multiple and flexible engagements, through the movement of the four major tides identified by Smith (1999: ): survival, recovery, development, self-determination. The force of the tides and of the collective opens new spaces of autonomy and widens others. To my mind, however, this movement like the direction of the flow of energy on the marae and like the whaanau which supposes a high degree of openness and is oriented towards interconnections should be directed toward the larger world. In fact, I see Maaori spaces expanding with the greater autonomy or with self-determination. I thus suggest inverting the tides in Smith s diagram, seeing survival at the very centre, in the pito (umbilical cord) or the kaakano (seed), and self-determination in the wider space, a space in continuous expansion with healing, mobilization, transformation, and decolonization. In this way, the pito allows for survival first, and concurrently or subsequently, for recovery, development, and self-determination. From my understanding at this juncture, I think the inverse might lead to Maoridom s shrinking in on itself; to its retreating into the cultural sphere, ethnicity, a minority status, which would limit, at some point and to a certain extent, the four processes healing, decolonization, transformation, mobilization in which Maaori are engaged. Many factors already push Maaori in the direction of limited autonomy, since it is advantageous 330

343 for many actors, including the state and the majority population, to keep them in their present position. This thesis has shown, however, that it is not the general direction of the flow of energy and work as experienced in whare Maaori and among ordinary Maaori and their whaanau. Of course, some whaanau and families experience troubles and difficulties that affect their participation in the larger society and in the movement outward. Durie (2001a) has found, in a recent study, patterns of dysfunction in Maaori families which lead to disregard for others, limited guidance, and even abuses and violence. These patterns of dysfunctions also often limit a family s capacity for maintaining and developing larger Maaori and non-maaori networks. Postcolonial Maaori writers (Tawake 2000) show in their writing a movement outwards, open to the world, by addressing universal issues and by not limiting themselves to the Maaori situation. Referring to the novel Nights in the Garden of Spain (1995), Schwimmer explains that the author Witi Ihimaera, a retenu comme thème principal le dualisme entre le dominant et le marginalprécaire, mais le monde homosexuel y a pris la place du monde maori. Cette substitution veut dire que l essence du thème d Ihimaera n est plus l expérience de la relation ethnique ici, mais celle d une autre relation, plus universelle, qui ne soit plus réductible au paradigme du Traité de Waitangi. (2003: 177) Ihimaera, casting the action of the novel itself in other places and spaces than Aotearoa/New Zealand, extends Maaori horizons beyond the Treaty, which is symbolic of colonization, even if it has been used strategically and quite successfully by Maaori up to now to assert their position as partner. Within this framework, however, they will always have to ask the Paakehaa, the majority, the dominant ones to recognize their status as partners. Because of historical power relationships, the status of partner will always be precarious and will require constant and renewed negotiations and struggles. Other examples Schwimmer (2003) gives of the de-ethnification of Maaori literature or of postcolonial Maaori are: the poems of Hone Tuwhare (1987), and the texts of Bub Bridger (1996), John Broughton (1996), Alistair Te Ariki Campbell (1989, 1991, 1993), 331

344 Rangi Chadwick (1993), He Ara Hou (1993), Rena Owen (1991), and J. C. Sturm (1996). Many Maaori contemporary artists are also engaging in the same outward process, engaging in the world. The exhibition Puurangiaho Seeing Clearly I visited at the Auckland Art Gallery Toi a Taamaki in 2001 is just one example of that openness to the world and engagement in society at large. Here is the concluding paragraph of one of the texts in the catalogue for the exhibition: This exhibition promises to do both, reflecting the duality in which we all live, between turangaawaewae [sic] and our urban base, between internal and external influences. Working within such binaries exposes the dynamism and power which is Maaori art, and provides us with a way to see clearly, about ourselves, our culture and our art. It is Puurangiaho. (Ellis 2001: 15) Many other examples of engagement with the world can be found in the book Mataora. The Living Face (Ihimaera 1996). Again, We say of the spiral that at the same time it is going forward, it is also returning (Jahnke and Ihimaera 1996: 30). Then, as the spiral goes into the world, is inspired, the spiral is coming forward stronger and is nourished to go outward again. Not surprisingly, this book is thought as a marae, opening with a wero (challenge), followed by the karanga (ceremonial call), the whaikoorero (welcome by the elders), and opening to larger debates and discussions. And then, the spiral goes inward again, finishing in a proper marae mode with a poroporaki (farewell) and a waiata (song) which pushes the spiral outward again: Toi-Uru-Rangi te ao-takarangi e kapua ake nei. nau mai, haere. E huri te wai-o-kamo, ki nga araroa o moananui. No tatou te ao nei, kimihia, rangahaua Ki paenuku, paerangi. Toi, the all embracing creator, the cloud which encircles the earth. Greetings and farewell! Turn the sacred waters of your eyes To the far-reaching pathways of the great oceans. This is our world, seek out and pursue New horizons! (Lardelli 1996: 160) 332

345 The movement of the spiral allows for heteroglossia, flexibility and diversity, and engagement in many figured worlds, places, and spaces on specifically Maaori terms. Inward and outward flows The flows inwards and outwards, however, are not free of constraints. They are limited by external conditions, including the state and other socio-historical global forces. Certain analysts (Meijl 1994 and 1997; Poata-Smith 1996), as we mentioned in chapter I, identified the fact that, since the 1980s, Maaori have been in what they call an introspective phase, not being as active on the public scene as they were in the 1970s, that is in public protests, sit-ins, marches, and demonstrations. Indeed, they have seemed to be less vocal on the national scene and in the public space in general than they were in, for example, the 1970s. The time of large demonstrations or marches such as the Land March of 1975 seems to be over, at least for the moment. In the private or intimate space, however, Maaori are working very hard to stabilize and reinforce the basis, the pito (umbilical cord) or the kaakano (seed), of Maoridom through, among other things, the teaching of the language, tikanga (custom, rules), and the development of Maaori places and spaces in the city. People, at both personal and whaanau levels, work hard to regain what has been lost over the generations. Many are involved in whakapapa (genealogy) research and are also doing research with a view to claiming lands and resources back. Moreover, more Maaori students are learning the Maaori language, many have gone back to school, many are involved in the kohanga reo or kura kaupapa (Maaori kindergartens and schools based on Maaori principles) frequented by their children. It seems that Maaori engage in an everyday, demanding, multiform, and incessant struggle (see Schwimmer 2004a) to recover and reaffirm what has been lost with colonization. Through practice, they negotiate their personal and intimate zone of comfort, which is necessary for day-to-day relationships with others and engagement in diverse figured worlds and places. Maaori, have made significant progress since the 1970s, and have secured a certain level of autonomy as a people, as whaanau, and as iwi (tribes); we need only think of the 333

346 Tribunal of Waitangi, developments in education, the MMP electoral system. However, statistics still show important disparities between Maaori and the rest of the population, particularly regarding education, employment, economic and health status, justice, the courts, and prisons (for a up-to-date detailed study, see James Henare Maaori Research Centre 2002). This situation, in addition to the economic crisis and its important repercussions for Maaori, led many to feel powerless. Many realized they still had much work to do. Education, health, and cultural development became priorities for the majority. At another level, many barriers still existed, many were reinforced and new ones were put in place to slow down Maaori access to public spaces. For instance, the media were quick to qualify Maaori as radical, which inhibited many from speaking out. At the government level, last-minute compromises were always (or almost always) sufficient to silence people. Certain researchers (Rata 2000, 2003, Friedman 2001, 2003c, 2003e) suggest that supplementary limitations were formed in the 1980s through the process of claim settlements, during which a rising Maaori bourgeoisie imposed its agendas and took control of newly restored resources, at once controlling capital and maintaining the conical class structure. This new micro-class, as Friedman (2001, 2003c, 2003e) calls it, seemed disconnected to a certain degree from the grass roots because of education, money, and ease in the Paakehaa world. Rata (2000, 2003) gives an account of this with regard to the Maaori fisheries. She calls this new phenomenon tribal capitalism. According to Friedman (2003c), this phenomenon would not have been unique to Maaori, but would have been at work among other indigenous peoples, such as the Sami and Hawaiian, through a complex process of double polarization, cultural fragmentation, and the formation of transnational networks. These suggestions are worth exploring further through detailed ethnographic studies. The general global disengagement from social movements and public protests appears to have affected the Maaori, too. It is well recognized that there is a worldwide general 334

347 decrease in activism 132 accompanied by the rise of a new generation which is probably less conscious of the effects of colonization which are more subtle and vicious, and the rise of individualism and liberalism with growing importance given to personal freedom. The world has changed since the 1960s and 1970s, which saw the rise of the numerous diverse movements I mentioned in chapter I. Some have begun to speak about signs of a change toward mass mobilization or increased activism, in particular since the tragic events of September 11, 2001, in New York City. However, if Maaori are less active in social and political groups and movements, and resort less often to public protests, sit-ins, marches, and demonstrations, they are not disengaged from the struggle for Maaori rights and autonomy. The mobilization is still there but has taken other forms and is expressing itself differently. The struggle takes place on an everyday basis at the marae, the whare Maaori, in the rhetoric about real vs. urban Maaori, in learning Maaori traditions and language, in carrying on oneself different signs of one s Maaori identity, such as whaanau and tribal t-shirts or stickers, but also the traditional moko (tattoo). For leaders, the struggle also takes place in the courts and through various negotiation forums at all levels of government and the bureaucracy. Many claims more than 850 by 2001, according to Hayward (2001) are already waiting to be heard, while others are in preparation. In fact, according to Belich, [t]reaty law, research and settlement negotiation became quite an industry (2001: 480). This period is, thus, one of active engagement and of mobilization, but in different forms from those of previous decades. The strategies have also changed. My thesis has precisely shown these other forms of mobilization, more private and less vocal, looking at the whaanau and everyday life in the whare Maaori where Maaori resist and reassert Maaori values in a context of change. This period is far from being one of cultural withdrawal. The work that is being done right now is highly promising in terms of affirmation and engagement in the public space. By focusing on education, health, justice, and socio-economic conditions, as well as on Maaori cultural survival, 132 Again, by activism I mean active involvement in social and political groups or movements at the community or broader levels. I do not imply, like certain New Zealand media, that activists are people whose actions are illegal; though some may be, they are certainly the exception. 335

348 transformation, and development, Maaori open important doors on societal participation and full engagement in the larger world. While ordinary Maaori people first appear passive, disengaged, and as having no say in today s world, a closer look at whaanau and at the lived worlds of everyday life soon reveals that this is a false impression: they are actively engaged in the interests of Maaori. Thus, in spite of everything, even if more private, less vocal or subtle, ka whawhai tonu raatou 133 (the struggle continues) for Maaori. The struggle takes many forms and occurs in many places and spaces, which means that Maaori are far from being apathetic and introverted. The struggle is part of the creation and widening of places and spaces and the internalizations, under contemporary and urban conditions of life, of the diverse figured worlds which allow for biculturalism and for playing with traditional Maaori symbols and artefacts, as well as with symbols and cultural artefacts of mainstream figured worlds, and for engaging in both worlds in heteroglossic ways. Not everyone supports or agrees with others ways, but all are about being Maaori in today s world. For the moment, if the struggle is linked to the claiming of their rights (economical, social, and political) as indigenous people in Aotearoa/New Zealand, it is also closely linked to upholding Maaori identity and other cultural elements like the language, the whaanau, and the marae. These elements have changed and will continue to change. This show how indigenous worlds, visions, and ways of being are maintained and even strengthened through changes and openness to the larger society. The upholding of these elements is, in fact, what creates mobilization among Maaori and allows the struggle to continue through, for example, the teaching of the language, history, and values, and the maintenance of whaanau networks in the city and beyond. The important idea is that, in their engagement in the larger world, Maaori put forward Maaori ways, and proudly affirm Maaori identities. This is highly positive and means that Maaori culture and traditions are more than a refuge and do more than simply allow for survival within the private sphere; they serve as a springboard into the 21 st century and allow Maaori to cross boundaries between private and public spheres. 133 This is a wink at Ranginui Walker s book entitled Ka whawhai tonu matou. Struggle without end (1990). 336

349 Concluding remarks This thesis shows the essential character of the anthropology of everyday life, of the lived world, of experiences, which reveals the diversity, the different sites of implantation and expression of local identities, positioning, particularities, and resistance for indigenous people in the context of globalization. The anthropology of everyday life permits us to see in more detail the multiple and diversified effects of larger forces, such as the state and the capitalist economy at the local level, and on the development and upholding of figured worlds. It is also at the level of everyday life that diversity and power struggles become visible between Maaori, between Maaori and non-maaori, and between Maaori and larger forces. Familial and group solidarities are part of the struggle for affirmation, recognition, and autonomy, and not only the engagement in public space. Engaging in the figured world of the whaanau is about actively facing, resisting, and engaging with global forces and in building the nation and the relationships with others, in practice and through everyday experiences. It is for this reason that those who are integrated into the family are important allies or supporters. This is also the reason the whaanau is so important for leaders in establishing their strength and success: it is the site of very important alliances. Concretely, then, the whaanau can go as far as to include non-maaori and even complete strangers in the whare Maaori. Symbolically, the whaanau can come to include all the populations of the Pacific and indigenous people all around the world. Whaanau expand when there is a need for cooperation, management of collective resources, or opposition to the state, to mainstream population, or to global forces. Family networks contract in times of conflict or divergence, abuses, competition over resources, discomfort, or when the whaanau s mana and other important Maaori principles are threatened. Once more, the whaanau or the whare Maaori are not places of retreat and withdrawal from the wider society and the world. On the contrary, by being central places for group strengthening and for being Maaori, they open doors on the world. Then, Maaori play at the same time on many scenes or in many sites or spaces from local to global scenes depending on situations, groups, and persons and they engage in public space as 337

350 needed. The engagement at that level is also linked to global conjunctures, and to the history of conflicts and power relationships. Engagement or struggle on the global or international scene is necessary when Maaori hit the limits of the state, that is, when Maaori reach the limits of self-determination, freedom, and decolonization. There, it is a matter of ensuring a prestigious Maaori position in order to assert Maaori or indigenous rights, or to point out that certain Maaori rights are trampled upon. The sites of Maaori engagement are also linked, in some ways, to global cycles of hegemony and homogeny (Friedman 2003a, 2003c, 2003e). Thus, facing global, regional, and national forces, Maaori engage in many spaces of affirmation and resistance. The whare Maaori and the figured world of the whaanau are important sites we explored in this thesis. They are many others. The resistance, however, is very complex: people and groups can engage in many spaces at the same time, or not; or they may not be directly involved or engaged in any site, but are supporting one or more sites in other ways. If one thing is certain, it is that globalization does not succeed in suppressing localisms, even if it exerts diverse pressures on the local. Local groupings are not passive and without resources, and this reveals once more the importance of the study of everyday life and lived worlds. The study of everyday life, of the lived world of ordinary people, as well as of their networks, and the ways they inhabit and mark urban and public spaces, opens doors on a better understanding of how people conceptualize their identities, and conceive of and live their relationships to others, and their relation to the state and the majority. The everyday life and the lived world are the sites of a variety of negotiations, and strategies: different cards (familial, ethnic, global or other) are played depending on contexts. But, above all, they are critical sites of emergence, through practice, of solutions, positioning, improvisation, or agency according to the overall working scheme or guide to behaviour of the figured worlds involved. This emphasizes, by the same token, the importance of paying close attention to the figured worlds and their principles and values. Being the lenses through which people make sense of their worlds, they are highly revealing of how people conceive and 338

351 imagine themselves, their relationships with others, and the diverse places and spaces in which they engage, including their place in Aotearoa/New Zealand society, and the larger world. In this, ordinary Maaori look at their worlds and make sense of them from the perspective of everyday life and, mostly, from non-public spaces and places, and thus through lenses different from those of leaders or the elite, which contributes to a better understanding of the whole picture. Paying close attention to figured worlds and their principles and values is also revealing of the way people feel (un)comfortable in different settings rural and urban, traditional and contemporary and in their relationships to others, Maaori and non-maaori. The study of Maaori everyday life and the lived world, then, combined with special attention to figured worlds, allows for a better understanding of how Maaori identities and group relationships develop, how people think about themselves as Maaori, how they are or practice what being Maaori really means. It thus throws light on processes of Maaori engagement and of (re)affirmation, as well as on the links between these processes. This thesis also emphasizes the necessity for detailed and empirical studies of localisms, since it became evident that anthropologists and other social scientists have to stop taking for granted the impact of global forces on the local, and the vigour or strength of local relationships or primordial links. At all levels, there are power forces and negotiations ideological or practical at work. For example, we have to investigate how, when, and in what contexts and circumstances kinships links or links of friendship or ethnicity become important or stop being important. We also have to question diversity at all levels: as much the diversity of global as of local forces. There is also a need for a more concrete and detailed analysis of interconnections between persons, groups, and places, between urban and rural milieu, and between the local and the global. Among other things, our study of Maaori families allowed us to better understand how meanings about places are constructed and how senses of places are developed. It gave us a better understanding of the powers of places. It also let us comprehend more fully the links between places and how Maaori create or make their own space, both in the Maaori world and in the larger society. This study of Maaori families has, thus, also allowed us to better understand how Maaori, diverse as they are, conceive of their autonomy, an autonomy which is not only 339

352 or even mainly political, but which is concerned with everyday life, struggle, the strengthening of solidarities, and survival as Maaori and as actors in the larger world. Once more, the study of everyday life, and attention to figured worlds and ordinary people (rather than the leaders or the elite) has been fundamental to our understanding. I intend, during my postdoctoral research, to better understand impact of global forces, such as the state. In fact, there is a need for better understanding of the functioning of states and their effects on public spaces or sites that are open (or closed) to the population. Notably, it is important to look at 1) the ways these structures facilitate or constrain people s insertion and participation, 2) the nature of these spaces, 3) the power and scope of action that they allow, and 4) their influence on ways of being and ways of thinking about autonomy. The same is true with respect to regional and local administrations. Further research should take into account the impact of social class, gender differences, schooling, biculturalism, and other differentiation factors on different types of agency, specific ways of conceiving and being part of events and structures, specific socio-cultural identities, and forms of consciousness. While most of the studies of Maaori have focused on the past and traditional society, I chose to focus on everyday life in Auckland. I tried, throughout this thesis, to incorporate elements of history in order to better understand what was at work in the ethnographic present. I am convinced, however, that a more complete understanding of today s Maaori world will benefit from even more historical depth. I will try to address this in my future research. Finally, it seems to me that Maaori feel comfortable when they have places they call home or places they can call their own, places clearly identified as Maaori, places where the wairua (spirit, feelings of places, peoples, events) is right. These places are crucial for cultural continuity, as well as for their transformation and autonomy. The whare Maaori is one of the most important sites of cultural, ethnic, and political affirmation and resistance, including at the symbolic or metaphorical level in the city. It is the urban place par excellence for the maintenance and emergence of the whaanau figured world in the 340

353 lived world of daily life. It is also a secure, comfortable, and comforting place emotionally, culturally, spiritually, economically, and physically sheltered from the powerful and potentially dangerous Paakehaa and from the public eye. The whare Maaori is about how people show solidarity, support each other, resist and struggle as Maaori in a milieu which at first appears apolitical. It is also about going out into the world. The fact that the whaanau and other traditional aspect of Maaori culture have changed is ultimately of little importance: what is really significant is the continued attachment of Maaori people generally to the idea of being Maaori and to Maaori identities. The spiral continues its movement forward and outward 341

354 APPENDIX A: Map of Aotearoa/New Zealand Source: BELICH, James, 2001, Paradise Reforged: A History of the New Zealanders From the 1880s to the Year 2000, Auckland, Allen Lane and The Penguin Press:

355 APPENDIX B: Maaori and English Versions of the Treaty of Waitangi 343

356 Source : ORANGE, Claudia, 1987, The Treaty of Waitangi, Wellington, Allen & Unwin/Port Nicholson:

357 APPENDIX C: Profiles of the interviewees (formal interviews only) Alias Sex Age Area of Auckland Principal tribal affiliation Te reo 134 Born in Auckland 135 Occupation Ed Alan M 40s Central Eastern +- N, 1st Student, Designer B 2 Alexis M 60s Outside Northern +- N Retired H Sch 3 Andrew M 20s South Paakehaa N Y, 3rd+ Factory worker H Sch 4 Api M 30s Central Eastern Y N Student B 5 Aroha F 30s Central Western +- N, 1st Student M 6 Christine F 40s West Northern Y Y, 2 nd Teacher B 7 Debra M 20s West Northern Y Y, 3 rd + Service sector H worker Sch 8 Donna F 40s South Northern +- N, 2 nd Student B 9 Fiona F 20s Central Western Y N, 1 st Student, Lecturer M 10 Floria F 30s West Eastern Y Y, 2 nd Educator B 11 Georgin F 60s Central Northern Y Y Retired B a 12 Hepi M 30s Oversea Northern N Y, 2 nd Construction industry worker H Sch 13 Hiko M 50s Outside Western Y N, 2 nd Retired H Sch+ 14 Hine F 40s South Eastern Y N, 1 st Artist H Sch 15 Hone M 30s West Western +- Y, 1 st Student B 16 Howard M 70s Central Northern Y Y, 3rd+ Teacher PhD 17 Ihaka M 40s South Northern Y N, 1st Artist, business woman H Sch 18 Iranui F 60s West Northern +- Y, 3rd+ Service sector worker 19 Iritana F 50s South Northern N N, 1st Educator + 20 Jack M 40s Outside Eastern +- N,? Lawyer B H Sch means partial knowledge. 135 I also add the number of generations the family has lived at least a part of their life in Auckland: 1 st = first generation to live in Auckland; + = at least that number of generations to live in Auckland. 136 Formal education : H Sch = High school; B = bachelor's degree; M = master s degree; PhD = doctoral degree; + = plus some studies taken at a higher level 345

358 21 Jean F 40s South Northern N Y, 2nd Healthcare B worker 22 Jessica F 10s West Northern Y Y, 2 nd Student B 23 Joanna F 40s West Western N N, 2 nd Student, Healthcare worker B 24 July F 40s South Northern +- N, 1 st Student B 25 Kahu F 20s South Northern Y Y, 1 st Media worker H Sch 26 Keita F 50s West Northern Y N, 1 st Student, Researcher B 27 Kepa M 20s Central Eastern +- N, 2 nd Student B 28 Kiri F 30s South Western N Y, 3 rd Student, Healthcare worker B 29 Maata F 40s Central Northern N Y, 3 rd Healthcare worker M 30 Manaaki M 40s South Eastern Y N, 1 st Arts B 31 Manuka M 40s West Eastern Y N, 1 st Student B- 32 Margaret F 60s North Western +- N, 1 st Student + 33 Maria F 30s North Northern Y Y,? Educator H Sch + 34 Mark M 50s West? N N,? Service sector H worker Sch 35 Matiu M 20s Central Western Y N, 1 st Student B 36 Maui M 30s South Western N N, 2 nd Education B 37 Maxine F 40s South Northern N N, 1 st Businesswom B an 38 Mere F 40s North Northern +- Y, 2 nd Educator M 39 Merimer i F 40s Central Western N N,? Teacher / B 40 Mihi F 20s West Northern N N, 1 st Student B 41 Miro F 30s South Eastern N Y, 2 nd Healthcare B worker 42 Moana F 50s North Eastern Y N, 1st Teacher M 43 Ngareta F 40s South Western N Y, 3 rd Businesswom an H Sch + 44 Ngawai F 70s Central Northern Y Y, 3 rd + Retired B 45 Niho M 60s South Eastern +- N, 1 st Teacher B 46 Nuku M 40s South Eastern Y N, 1 st Service sector M worker 47 Pania F 60s East Western Y Y, 3rd Retired + 48 Patricia F 20s Central Eastern Y N, 2 nd Student B 49 Phil M 20s Central Northern N N Manager M 50 Pita M 60s Central Northern Y N, 1 st Student B 346

359 51 Raina F 20s South Eastern +- N, 3 rd + Service sector H worker Sch 52 Rangi F 30s South Northern Y Y, 3rd Teacher s assistant H Sch+ 53 Rapi M 60s West Western +- N, 1 st Businessman H Sch 54 Regan F 20s West Northern N Y, 2 nd Student B 55 Rena F 30s South Northern N N,? Unemployed H Sch + 56 Rewa F 50s West Northern +- N, 3 rd Businesswom B- an 57 Riripeti F 50s West Northern Y N, 1 st Teacher B 58 Robert M 20s South Eastern Y Y, 1 st Student B 59 Roha F 50s South Northern N Y, 2 nd Cleaner H Sch 60 Roimata F 50s East Northern +- N, 2 nd Researcher PhD 61 Rongo M 40s Outside Eastern Y No, 1 st Construction industry worker H Sch 62 Rose F 20s West Northern +- N, 1 st Student H Sch 63 Rua F 20s South Eastern N N, 1 st Student, artist B 64 Ruka M 30s West Northern Y Y, 2 nd teacher, artist B 65 Sally F 30s South Northern N Y, 2 nd Un-employed H Sch 66 Sammy M 40s West Northern Y N, 2 nd Teacher H Sch 67 Tama M 30s West Western +- N, 1 st Student H Sch 68 Tauni M 30s West Eastern Y N, 2 nd Teacher B 69 Tepora F 50s South Western Y N,? Retired? 70 Teria F 50s Outside Northern Y N, 2 nd Unable to work through disability H Sch+ 71 Tiana F 20s South Western N Y, 3rd Un-employed H Sch + 72 Tom M 40s Central Central N Y, 3rd+ Artist B 73 Tui F 50s South Northern Y N, 1 st Student, Researcher B 74 Waerete F 20s Central Eastern +- N,? Student B 75 Whetu F 10s South Northern +- Y, 3rd+ Student H 76 William M 30s South Southern N N, 1 st Construction industry worker Sch H Sch 347

360 APPENDIX D: North Island tribes Source: SALMOND, Anne, 1975, Hui: A Study of Maori Ceremonial Gatherings, Auckland, Reed Books:

361 APPENDIX E: Maps showing degrees of deprivation Auckland 349

362 Source: CRAMPTON, P., C. SALMOND, and R. KIRKPATRICK, 2000, Degrees of Deprivation in New Zealand: An Atlas of Socioeconomic Difference, Auckland, David Bateman: and

363 APPENDIX F: Diagrams of traditional marae Source: SALMOND, Anne, 1975, Hui: A Study of Maori Ceremonial Gatherings, Auckland, Reed Books: 8. Source: TAUROA, Hiwi and Pat TAUROA, 1986, Te Marae: A Guide to Customs & Protocol, Auckland, Reed Books:

364 APPENDIX G: Diagrams of the residents of 30 Aroha Street 352

365 353

366 354

367 355

368 APPENDIX H: Ethics Approvals 356

369 357

370 APPENDIX I: Consent forms and participant information sheets 358

371 359

372 360

373 361

374 362