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Māori people

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For the Māori language, see Māori language.
Māori

Te Puni, 19th-century Māori chief
Regions with significant populations
New Zealand
  586,000 (2001)
  635,100 (2005)

Australia
   72,956 (2001)
England
  ~8,000 (in early 2000s)
United States
  ~3,500 (2000)
Canada
   1,305 (2001)t

Elsewhere
  ~8,000 (in early 2000s)
Languages
Māori, English
Religion
Māori religion, Christianity
Related ethnic groups
other Polynesian peoples, Austronesian peoples

The word Māori refers to the indigenous people of New Zealand and to their language.

Naming and self-naming

In the Māori language the word māori means "normal" or "ordinary". In legends and other oral traditions, the word distinguished ordinary mortal human beings from deities and spirits. Māori has cognates in other Polynesian languages such as the Hawaiian 'Maoli', the Tahitian 'Maohi', and the Cook Island Maori which all share similar meanings. The contemporary English meanings are "native", "indigenous" or "aboriginal".

Early European visitors to the islands of New Zealand referred to the people they found there variously as "Indians", "aborigines", "natives" or "New Zealanders". Māori remained the term used by Māori to describe themselves in a pan-tribal sense. In 1947, the Department of Native Affairs was renamed the Department of Maori Affairs to recognise this.

Māori origins

New Zealand is one of the last areas of the Earth settled by humans.

Archaeological and linguistic evidence (Sutton 1994) suggests that probably several waves of migration came from Eastern Polynesia to New Zealand between AD 800 and 1300. Māori origins relate to those of their Polynesian ancestors (see Polynesian culture). Māori oral history describes the arrival of the ancestors from Hawaiki (a mythical homeland in tropical Polynesia) by large ocean-going canoes (waka) — see Māori migration canoes. Migration accounts vary among Māori tribes (iwi), whose members can identify with different waka in their genealogies or whakapapa.

No credible evidence exists of human settlement in New Zealand prior to the Māori voyagers; on the other hand, compelling evidence from archaeology, linguistics, and physical anthropology indicates that the first settlers came from East Polynesia and became the Māori.

Interactions with Europeans before 1840

File:Murderers' Bay (cropped).jpg
First European impression of Māori, at "Murderers' Bay"

European settlement of New Zealand occurred relatively recently. New Zealand historian Michael King in The Penguin History Of New Zealand describes the Māori as "the last major human community on earth untouched and unaffected by the wider world".

The early European explorers, including Abel Tasman (who arrived in 1642) and Captain James Cook (who first visited in 1769), reported encounters with Māori. These early reports described the Māori as a fierce and proud warrior race. Inter-tribal warfare occurred frequently in this period, with the victors enslaving or in some cases eating the vanquished.

From as early as the 1780s Māori had encounters with European sealers and whalers; some even crewed on the foreign ships. A continuous trickle of escaped convicts from Australia and deserters from visiting ships also exposed the indigenous New Zealand population to outside influences.

By 1830 estimates placed the number of Pākehā (Europeans) living among the Māori as high as 2,000. The newcomers' status varied from slaves through to high-ranking advisors, from prisoners to those who abandoned European culture and identified themselves as Māori. Many Māori valued Pākehā for their ability to describe European skills and culture and their ability to obtain European items in trade, particularly weaponry. These Europeans "gone native" became known as Pākehā Māori. When Pomare led a war party against Titore in 1838, he had 132 Pākehā mercenaries among his warriors. Frederick Edward Maning, an early settler, wrote two colourful contemporaneous accounts of life at that time and a little later, which have become classics of New Zealand literature: Old New Zealand and History of the War in the North of New Zealand against the Chief Heke.

During this period the acquisition of muskets by those tribes in close contact with European visitors destabilised the existing balance of power between Māori tribes, and there ensued a period of bloody inter-tribal warfare, known as the Musket Wars, which resulted in the effective extermination of several tribes and the driving of others from their traditional territory. European diseases also killed a large but unknown number of Māori during this period. Estimates vary between ten and fifty percent.

With increasing European missionary activity and settlement in the 1830s as well as perceived European lawlessness, the British Crown, as a predominant world power, came under pressure to intervene.

1840 to 1890

Ultimately this led to Britain dispatching William Hobson with instructions to take possession of New Zealand. Before he arrived, Queen Victoria annexed New Zealand by royal proclamation in January 1840. On arrival in February, Hobson negotiated the Treaty of Waitangi with the northern chiefs. Many other Māori chiefs (though by no means all) subsequently signed this treaty. It made the Māori British subjects in return for a guarantee of property rights and tribal autonomy.

Both parties entered the Treaty-based partnership with enthusiasm, despite regrettable exceptional incidents. Māori formed substantial businesses, supplying food and other products for domestic and overseas markets.

Governor George Grey (1845 - 1855 and 1861 - 1868) learned the Māori language and recorded much of the mythology — among the first of many to do so.

In the 1860s, disputes over questionable land purchases and the attempts of Māori in the Waikato to establish what some perceived as a rival British-style system of royalty led to the New Zealand land wars. Although these resulted in relatively few deaths, the colonial government confiscated large tracts of tribal land as punishment for what they termed as rebellion (although the military action was initiated by the Crown against its own citizens), in some cases without reference to whether the tribe involved actually participated in the warfare. Some tribes actively fought against the Crown, while others (known as kupapa) fought in support of the Crown.

A passive resistance movement developed at the settlement of Parihaka in Taranaki, but Crown troops dispersed its participants in 1881.

With the loss of much of their land, Māori went into a period of decline, and by the late 19th century most people believed that the Māori population would cease to exist as a separate race and become assimilated into the European population.

Revival

Late 20th Century house post depicting the navigator Kupe fighting two sea creatures
Late 20th Century house post depicting the navigator Kupe fighting two sea creatures

The predicted decline of the Māori population did not occur, and levels recovered. Despite a substantial level of intermarriage between the Māori and European populations, many Māori retained their cultural identity.

The New Zealand government decided to exempt Māori from the conscription that applied to other citizens in World War II, but nonetheless Māori volunteered in large numbers, forming the 28th or Māori Battalion, which performed creditably, notably in Crete, North Africa, and Italy. Altogether 17,000 Māori took part in the war.

Since the 1960s, Maoridom has undergone a cultural revival. Government recognition of the growing political power of Māori combined with political activism have led to a limited redress for unjust confiscation of land and for the violation of other property rights. The State set up the Waitangi Tribunal, a body with the powers of a Commission of Inquiry, to investigate and make recommendations on such issues. Significantly, because of the manner in which it was empowered, the Tribunal cannot make binding rulings. However, as a result of the redress paid to many iwi (tribes), Māori now have significant interests in the fishing and forestry industries. Tensions remain however, with complaints from Māori that the settlements are being made at a level of between 1 and 2.5 cents on the dollar of the value of the lands that were confiscated. The Government is not obliged to accept the findings of the Waitangi Tribunal, and has rejected some of them, the most recent and widely-debated example being the New Zealand foreshore and seabed controversy.

Once Were Warriors, a 1994 film adapted from a 1990 novel, brought the plight of some urban Māori to a wide audience. It became the highest grossing film in New Zealand that year and received international acclaim, winning several international film prizes. While some Māori feared that viewers would consider the violent male characters an accurate portrayal of Māori men, most film critics praised it as exposing the raw side of domestic violence on an international stage.

In many areas of New Zealand, Māori language lost its role as a living community language (used by significant numbers of people) in the post-war years. In tandem with calls for sovereignty and the righting of social injustices from the 1970s onwards, many New Zealand schools now teach Māori culture and language, and pre-school kohanga reo (literally: "language nests") have started which teach tamariki (young children) exclusively in Māori. These now extend right through secondary schools (kura tuarua). In 2004 Māori Television, a government-funded TV station committed to broadcasting primarily in te reo, began broadcasting. Māori language enjoys the equivalent status to English in government and law. As of 2006 Māori politicians have seven designated Māori seats in the New Zealand parliament (and they may and do stand in and win the General seats), and consideration and consultation with Māori have become routine requirements for many New Zealand councils and government organisations.

Despite significant social and economic advances during the 20th century, Māori tend to cluster in the lower percentiles in most health and education statistics and in labour-force participation, as well as featuring disproportionately highly in criminal and imprisonment statistics.

Business and intellectual property

In 2001 a dispute arose between Danish toymaker LEGO and several Māori tribal groups (fronted by lawyer Maui Solomon) and also several members of an online discussion forum (Aotearoa Cafe), over the popular LEGO toy line Bionicle. The product-line allegedly used many words appropriated from Māori language, imagery and folklore. The dispute ended in an amicable settlement. Initially LEGO refused to withdraw the product, saying it had drawn the names from many cultures, but later agreed that it had taken the names from Māori and agreed to change certain names or spellings to help set the toy line apart from the Māori legends. This, however, did not prevent the many Bionicle users from continuing to use the disputed words, resulting in the popular Bionicle website BZPower coming under a denial-of-service attack for four days by an attacker using the name Kotiate .

In 2005 a worldwide survey suggested that Māori have the world's fourth-highest rate of entrepreneurship. This contrasts with the fact that Māori remain one of the poorer population groups in New Zealand. Commentators have remarked in this context that Māori (and New Zealanders in general) readily start businesses, but show less skill at making them more than marginally profitable.[citation needed]

The Law Commission has started its own project to develop a legal framework for Māori who want to manage communal resources and responsibilities. The voluntary system, due for presentation to Parliament in May 2006, proposes an alternative to existing companies, incorporations, and trusts – where they do not appear sensitive to Māori needs – in which tribes and hapu and other groupings can interact with the legal system. The proposed legislation, under the proposed name of the Waka Umanga Act/Māori Corporations Act, would provide a model adaptable to suit the needs of individual iwi.

See also

References

  • Australian Bureau of Statistics (2004). Australians' Ancestries: 2001. Canberra: Australian Bureau of Statistics, Catalogue Number 2054.0. [1]
  • Biggs, Bruce (1994). "Does Maori have a closest relative?" In Sutton (Ed.)(1994), pp. 96 - 105.
  • Hiroa, Te Rangi (Sir Peter Buck) (1974). The Coming of the Maori. Second edition. First published 1949. Wellington: Whitcombe and Tombs.
  • Irwin, Geoffrey (1992). The Prehistoric Exploration and Colonisation of the Pacific. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Simmons, D.R. (1997). Ta Moko, The Art of Maori Tattoo. Revised edition. First published 1986. Auckland: Reed.
  • Statistics Canada (2003). Ethnic Origin (232), Sex (3) and Single and Multiple Responses (3) for Population, for Canada, Provinces, Territories, Census Metropolitan Areas and Census Agglomerations, 2001 Census - 20% Sample Data.. Ottawa: Statistics Canada, Cat. No. 97F0010XCB2001001. [2]
  • Statistics New Zealand (2005). Estimated resident population of Māori ethnic group, at 30 June 1991-2005, selected age groups by sex. Wellington: Statistics New Zealand. [3]
  • Sutton, Douglas G. (Ed.) (1994). The Origins of the First New Zealanders. Auckland: Auckland University Press.
  • United States Census Bureau (2003). Census 2000 Foreign-Born Profiles (STP-159): Country of Birth: New Zealand. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Census Bureau. [4]
  • Walrond, Carl (2005). Māori overseas, Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand. [5]
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