Academic literature on the topic 'Te Waipounamu'

This article follows the alchemical political economy of Edward Gibbon Wakefield for whom Kāi Tahu whenua served as a laboratory. Wakefield’s clever formula for the transubstantiation of an incendiary social situation in Britain into new terrain for capital was designed to secure the transplantation of English economic and social relations to the colonies to ensure the persistence of a landless class compelled to sell their labour for wages. Ingeniously, the transport of that labour to the colonies was to be paid for by the market in land in the new colony: Kāi Tahu would be made to fund their own colonisation. I track the fate of capital’s settler dream for ready land and labour as it was brought into being by the New Zealand Company, subsequently taken over by the Crown, and as it continues into our present. The argument is divided into two parts. The first is the classical moment of primitive accumulation, clearing people from the land to provide a market in land and labour, ‘legal’ dispossession, and commodification. The second is the more recent continuation of the initial processes of dispossession and commodification as these assert themselves in processes of redress and as they are expressed in the corporatisation of Ngāi Tahu.

For Māori in New Zealand, COVID-19 is remarkable in two particular ways. First, we bet the odds for the first time in contemporary history. Forecasts predicted that Māori would have double the infection and mortality rates of non-Māori. However, as at June 2020, Māori have a disproportionately lower infection rate than non-Māori. This is perhaps the only example in our contemporary history of the Māori community having better social outcomes than non-Māori. Second is that attribution is due, perhaps not exclusively, but materially to a self-determination social movement within our Indigenous communities that the pandemic response unveiled and accelerated. This article comments on this self-determination social movement, with a particular focus on how that movement has manifested within the South Island of New Zealand. We specifically draw on the work of Te Pūtahitanga o Te Waipounamu, the South Island Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency to illustrate our analysis.

Most scholars of the subject consider that a pre-Columbian transpacific transfer accounts for the historical role of American sweet potato Ipomoea batatas as the kūmara staple of Indigenous New Zealand/Aotearoa Māori in cooler southwestern Polynesia. Archaeologists have recorded evidence of ancient Polynesian I. batatas cultivation from warmer parts of generally temperate-climate Aotearoa, while assuming that the archipelago’s traditional Murihiku region in southern South Island/Te Waipounamu was too cold to grow and store live Polynesian crops, including relatively hardy kūmara. However, archaeological pits in the form of seasonal Māori kūmara stores (rua kūmara) have been discovered unexpectedly at Pūrākaunui on eastern Murihuku’s Otago coast, over 200 km south of the current Polynesian limit of record for premodern I. batatas production. Secure pit deposits that incorporate starch granules with I. batatas characteristics are radiocarbon-dated within the decadal range 1430–1460 CE at 95% probability in a Bayesian age model, about 150 years after Polynesians first settled Te Waipounamu. These archaeological data become relevant to a body of Māori oral history accounts and traditional knowledge (mātauranga) concerning southern kūmara, incorporating names, memories, landscape features and seemingly enigmatic references to an ancient Murihiku crop presence. Selected components of this lore are interpreted through comparative exegesis for correlation with archaeological science results in testable models of change. In a transfer and adaptation model, crop stores if not seasonal production technologies also were introduced from a warmer, agricultural Aotearoa region into dune microclimates of 15th-century coastal Otago to mitigate megafaunal loss, and perhaps to support Polynesia’s southernmost residential chiefdom in its earliest phase. A crop loss model proposes that cooler seasonal temperatures of the post-1450 Little Ice Age and (or) political change constrained kūmara supply and storage options in Murihiku. The loss model allows for the disappearance of kūmara largely, but not entirely, as a traditional Otago crop presence in Māori social memory.

Abstract On the continental shelf, New Zealand bryozoans dominate ecologically-important three-dimensional benthic habitat providing structural complexity which hosts a wide variety of fauna, including economically valuable species (e.g. oysters and blue cod). The association between these species and bryozoan-dominated biogenic habitat commonly results in trawling damage to the benthos; eliminating pressure from destructive fishing practices could support bryozoan regrowth. In 2002, a voluntary fishing restriction was designated over part of one such bryozoan-dominated biogenic habitat, but the efficacy of this ban has not been assessed. Statutory marine protected areas have been proposed in the same area; they aim to achieve bryozoan protection and recovery. A comparison of the bryozoan fauna using benthic images from 2003 and 2019 from the Otago shelf, South Island, New Zealand/Te Waipounamu, Aotearoa shows that a 17-year voluntary fishing ban has been ineffective at increasing the cover and richness of bryozoan-dominated biogenic habitat on the Otago shelf. This study provides a baseline for future monitoring and develops useful metrics for recovery, while calling for further research on the biology and ecology of habitat-forming bryozoans.

In Aotearoa New Zealand, retracing the footsteps of famous Maori tipuna or ancestral trails is not a new phenomena, but the availability of social media has enabled this information more accessible, reaching a wider audience. Events span from retracing tribal battles, following ancestral mountain trails to the moana and beyond. One such voyage, involved a group of 50 students from Tauranga Moana, who retraced their ancestral connections of the Takitimu waka back to Rarotonga (Te Kanawa, 30 July 2016). The Commemoration of the Battle of Ruapekapeka also followed the footsteps of tipuna, the famous warrior chief Te Ruki Kawiti and his peoples, whose memories were honoured by a 400 strong haka party, dignitaries, politicians and hundreds of people, (Forbes, 2016). Following the journey of Tainui rangatira, was a pre-season bonding exercise that Waikato Chiefs rugby coach Dave Rennie identified as beneficial for his players to learn more about their surroundings ‘…an arduous two-day torture test which connected with the past, the land, the people and the sea they will represent this season’ (Napier, 2013). Over the last three decades, there has also been an increasing interest in the histories of Māori prophets throughout Aotearoa. The journey of children from Parihaka Pa was made into a documentary named Tatarakihi: The Children of Parihaka (2012), which followed the ancestral journey of their tipuna Te Whiti ō Rongomai and Tohu Kākahi (and their people), arrested in Parihaka Taranaki for ploughing their land and wrongfully imprisoned in Christchurch and Dunedin without trial (www.parihakafilm.com; https://www.nzonscreen.com). The Tamakaimoana people also undertook a pilgrimage in December 2013 to retrace the footsteps of their prophet Rua Kenana from Maungapōhatu (Te Karere, April 4 2016). Several Gisborne iwi recently retraced the route from Gisborne to the Rēkohu Chatham Islands following their prophet Te Kooti Arikirangi (Smith, 2016). Retracing the footsteps of ancestors is not only a physical undertaking, but for many, also an emotional, cultural and spiritual journey. The Waitaha People of Te Waipounamu South Island, retraced Te Maihāroa (? – 1885) and Te Heke (The Migration 1877-79) on a contemporary peace walk called Te Heke Omaramataka (2012). The experiences of these trekkers were captured by filmmaker Bronwyn Judge in a free to view documentary entitled ‘Te Heke 2012 Waitaki Mouth to Omarama’ (Judge, B, 2012, Youtube: Te Heke 2012 Waitaki Mouth to Omarama). This paper is based on the whanau journals recorded by participants as they trekked from the Waitaki river mouth to Omarama in December 2012.

In the northern South Island, the area northern Te Wai Pounamu (NTWP) is defined appropriate to a regional investigation of pre-European culture change. It is argued that the Maori sequence of this region is relevant to a range of interpretative problems in New Zealand�s archaeological past. Preparatory to this investigation, the international and New Zealand literature on culture change is reviewed. Two primary investigative foci of change are identified in NTWP; subsistence economy and stone tool manufacturing technology. A chronological scheme of Early, Middle and Late Periods based on firmly dated ecological events and/or independent radiocarbon ages is defined so as to order the archaeological data without recourse to unproven scenarios of cultural change and association. The Early Period subsistence economy is assessed in some detail. An Early Period settlement focus is documented along the eastern Tasman Bay coast in proximity to meta-argillite sources. Early Period midden remains suggest that several genera of seal and moa were exploited, and that people were fishing in eastern Tasman Bay during the warmer months of the year. From the Early Period fishhook assemblages of Tasman Bay, manufacturing change is inferred related to the increasing scarcity of moa bone over time. It is argued that lower Early Period settlement of the larger northern South Island was focused on the north-eastern coast to Rangitoto (D�Urville Island), while NTWP was characterized by smaller stone working communities operating in summer. In contrast, moa-free middens in Awaroa Inlet and Bark Bay of the western Tasman Bay granite coast present a physical dominance of Paphies australis, and finfish species suggesting, along with the dearth of Austrovenus stutchburyi, occupation outside of the warmer summer months. These middens also present an absence of seal and a paucity of bird bone, while sharing a robust 15th-16th centuries AD radiocarbon chronology. With the dearth of all bird species from granite coast middens in general, and evidence that the less preferred kokako (Callaeas c. cinerea) was caught during the occupation of Awaroa Inlet N26/214, it is suggested that cultural regulations beyond immediate subsistence needs were also operating at this time. From southern Tasman Bay, the archaeological investigation of the important Appleby site N27/118 suggests that the people associated with the extensive horticultural soils of Waimea West otherwise consumed finfish and estuarine shellfish in (non-summer) season, kiore (Rattus exulans), dog or kuri (Canis familiaris), and several small evidence of Maori tradition, archaeological charcoal, and the approximately 16th century radiocarbon chronology for N27/118 and the associated Appleby gravel borrow pit N27/122 places the advent of extensive Waimea horticulture within the post-moa, lower Middle Period Maori economy. The Haulashore Island archaeological assemblage of south-eastern Tasman Bay with a similar material culture to Appleby is also bereft of seal and any diagnostic moa bone. This Middle Period evidence is considered in a larger comparative perspective, where the absence of seal from 15th-16th centuries Tasman Bay middens is interpreted as a factor of human predation. A secure radiocarbon chronology suggests the convergence of this loss with the diminishment and loss of selected avifauna, and the subsequent advent of large horticultural complexes in the northern South Island compensated for the loss of faunal calories in a seasonally economy and a managed ecology. The evidence of stone tool use is also reviewed in some detail for NTWP, following the definition of an adze typology appropriate to the classification of meta-argillite tools. It is clear that meta-argillite is the dominant material of adze and (non-adze) flake tool manufacture throughout the Maori sequence of NTWP, while granite coast quartz remains generally subdominant. Beyound the apparent loss of the laterally-hafted adze, the evidence of adze change is generally subdominant. Beyond the apparent loss of the laterally-hafted adze, the evidence of adze change is generally reflected in shifting typological proportions, and in new manufacturing technologies and dressing techniques. Functional change may be inferred in the loss over time of large meta-argillite points and blade tools associated respectively with the manufacture of one-piece moa bone fishhooks and moa and seal butchery. The exclusive identification of hammer-dressed adzes with hump backs and steep bevels in Middle Period assemblages is related to the advent of horticultural intensification. More generally, adzes of the upper Early and Middle Periods are increasingly characterized by round sections, while hammer-dressing is employed more frequently and extensively reduced from riverine meta-argillite and recycled banks. Collectively, these changes reflect a developing emphasis on economy and opportunistic exploitation. From this interpretation, and evidence that meta-argillite adze length and the size of high quality Ohana source flakes diminish over time, it is suggested that accessible, high quality and appropriately shaped meta-argillite rock became increasingly scarce through intensive quarry manufacture. In conclusion, the coincidence of diminishing rock and faunal resources over time is related in a speculative anthropological model of culture change. It is proposed that the 14th-16th centuries Maori economy of NTWP, and by implication and inference, many other regions of New Zealand, was characterized by a resource crisis which either precipitated or reinforced a broader trajectory of culture change. It is suggested that influential leadears perceived a linkage in the loss of high quality rock and important subsistence fauna at this time, and that distinctive technologies, institutions and ideologies of Middle Period Maori society were influenced by, and/or developed from, this perception. Finally, it is recommended that the data of an archaeological Maori culture sequence be ordered and tested within a radiocarbon based chronological scheme, rather than the still generally used model of �Archaic� and �Classic� cultural periods. It is also suggested that New Zealand archaeologists should look beyond the functional-ecological imperative to consider more holistic anthropological explanations of change in the pre-European Maori past, with a focus on integrated regional sequences.

Kaumaatua of the Te Koeti Turanga hapuu (sub-tribe) of South Westland have expressed concern that the mana of their Kaati Mamoe ancestors has been trampled on and their identity subsumed through union with the Kai Tahu tribal confederation. The history of the Kaati Mamoe iwi in the South island has been marginalised by the subsequent arrival of a number of hapuu of the Ngaati Kahungunu in the seventeenth century. The conflict which ensured following this gradual migration has traditionally been interpreted as marking the end of a Kaati Mamoe identity in the island. Complexity has been added to this situation as a result of European colonisation in the nineteenth century. The purchase by Pakeha of vast tracts of land in the South Island, and the failure to exempt the reserves promised, put pressure on the takata whenua�s land base and resources. The Crown�s refusal to acknowledge and redress the grievances of South Island Maori over the last hundred years has obliged the Kaati Mamoe to unite with the Kai Tahu. This process has served to further marginalise their identity, in this case in the southern rohe of the West Coast. The method that I have used in this work draws upon a number of disciplines. Oral history and written records of the Te Koeti hapuu form the central sources and to this extent this work may be described as being written from a Kaati Mamoe perspective. I have undertaken a review of the material recorded by European collectors of South Island Maori tradition in order to understand the way in which their reports have shaped the European view of South Westland Maori. And finally a review of the archaeological record has been included in order to provide information about the everyday material life of the ancestors of the South Westland hapuu. A number of conclusions have been reached in this thesis. Firstly that the peace arrangement at Popoutunoa which has been viewed by Kai Tahu as marking the end of a Kaati Mamoe identity is not necessarily the view of many Kaati Mamoe descendants. The historical record shows that a number of individuals continued to fight the Kai Tahu due to tribal differences while others continued to live alongside Kai Tahu in peace. As throughout much of Aotearoa, the importance of the hapuu as a source for an individual�s identity in Maori society prior to European colonisation has been over-shadowed. In the case of the South Westland people union with Kai Tahu, which was vital in the face of the loss of land, has been interpreted as the loss of their affiliation and identity with Kaati Mamoe.

The ambivalence of many prehistorians toward curio collections has meant that, although they recognise some of their shortcomings, they nevertheless use collections as if they had qualities of archaeological assemblages. In this dissertation it is posited and then demonstrated that curio collections are very different entities to archaeological assemblages. In order to use collections in valid constructions of New Zealand�s pre-European past, the processes that led to their formation need to be understood. It is only then that issues of representation can be addressed. In order to better understand the collecting process, a study of the activity of 24 curio collectors who operated in the Murihiku region of southern New Zealand during the period between 1865 and 1975 was undertaken. The study was structured about two key notions: the idea of the �filter� and the idea that tools and ornaments have a �life history� that extends from the time that raw material was selected for the manufacture to the present. The notion of the filter made possible a determination of the effects of particular behaviours on patterns of collector selectivity and the extent and nature of provenance recording; and the extended concept of life history recognised that material culture functions in multiple cultural and chronological contexts-within both indigenous and post-contact spheres. Examination of the collecting process led to the identification of five curio collecting paradigms: curio collecting for the acquisition of social status, curio collecting for financial return, curio collecting as an adjunct to natural history collecting, curio collecting as an adjunct to historical recording, and ethnological or culture-area curio collecting. Filtering processes associated with each paradigm resulted in particular, but not always distinctive, patterns of curio selectivity and styles of provenance recording. A switch in the focus of attention from examination of curio collectng processes generally to the study of the filtering processes that shaped collections from a specific archaeological site-the pre-European Otago Peninsula site of Little Papanui (J44/1)- enabled some evaluation of individuual collection representation. A database recording up to 19 attributes for each of 6282 curios localised to �Little Papanui� in Otago Museum enabled 31 dedicated or �ardent� collectors who operated at the site to be identified. These 31 dedicated collectors were grouped according to the paradigm that best described their collecting behaviour. It was found that the greater proportion of these dedicated collectors (n=12, 39%) had been influenced by the ethnological or culture-area collecting paradigm. These 12 collectors were responsible for recovering a remarkable 5645 curios or nearly ninety-percent (89.86%) of the meta-collection. Because curio collections lack meaningfully recorded stratigraphic provenance, it is the technological and social context in which tools and ornaments functioned that must become the focus of curio collection studies. Appropriate studies of technological and social and context focus upon evaluations of raw material sourcing, evaluations of manufacture technique and assessments of tool and ornament use and reuse (and integrative combinations of these modes of study). These sorts of evaluation require large collections compiled in the least selective manner possible and the collections need to be reliably localised to specific sites. Collections compiled by the ethnological or culture-area collectors have these qualities. Collections compiled within other paradigms lack locality information and were assembled in highly selective manners.