Treaty of Waitangi: The Land is Our History: Indigeneity, Law, and the Settler State Miranda Johnson Oxford University Press, $41.00, ISBN 9780190600020 Reconciliation, Representation and Indigeneity: “Biculturalism” in Aotearoa New Zealand Peter Adds, Brigitte Bönish-Brednich, Richard S Hill, Graeme…
Te Whiti o Rongomai and the Resistance of Parihaka Danny Keenan Huia, $45.00, ISBN 9781775501954 This account of the non-violent resistance movement founded by the prophets Te Whiti o Rongomai and Tohu Kākahi at the Taranaki settlement of Parihaka begins…
Maui and other Māori Legends: 8 Classic Tales of Aotearoa Peter Gossage Puffin $40.00, ISBN 9780143309291 What a delight! Maui and other Māori Legends contains eight complete picture books in one handsome hardback, complete with embossed cover, glossary and bookmark…
Entanglements of Empire: Missionaries, Māori, and the Question of the Body Tony Ballantyne Auckland University Press, $40.00, ISBN 9781869408268 Tony Ballantyne is famous throughout the world of imperial and colonial history for his invention of the very useful term…
Kūpapa – The Bitter Legacy of Māori Alliances with the Crown Ron Crosby Penguin Random House, $65.00, ISBN 9780143573111 Recently, we as a nation have experienced more commemoration and public history about New Zealand’s military history than ever before. We…
From Alba to Aotearoa: Profiling New Zealand’s Scots Migrants 1840-1920 Rebecca Lenihan Otago University Press, $45.00, ISBN 9781877578793 Migration, Ethnicity, and Madness: New Zealand, 1860-1910 Angela McCarthy Otago University Press, $45.00, ISBN 9781927322000 The 12th century; 1642; 1769. These are…
Tangata Whenua: An Illustrated History
Atholl Anderson, Judith Binney and Aroha Harris
Bridget Williams Books, $100.00,
ISBN 9781927131411
The final chapter of the weighty Tangata Whenua is titled “Tangata Whenua, Tangata Ora”, and the book could just as easily have been called that. Throughout the three millennia that are chronicled, an overwhelming theme of the book is that Māori endure, adapt, and live. Any student of New Zealand history will have heard the unfortunate phrase uttered in 1856 by physician and politician Dr Isaac Featherston, that it was the duty of Europeans to “smooth down … [the] dying pillow” for Māori. His was a viewpoint brought forth by the belief that the indigenous population could not withstand European conquest and disease. What more of a testament to Māori endurance can there be than the release of a book detailing the way in which Māori live, nigh on 150 years after that phrase was uttered?
Take These With You When You Leave: Treasures of the Archive
Georgina White
MTG Hawke’s Bay
ISBN 9780992259600
Architecture of the Heart
Lucy Hammonds and Douglas Lloyd Jenkins
MTG Hawke’s Bay
ISBN 9780992259624
Ūkaipō – ō tātou whakapapa: The Identity of the Hapu of Hawke’s Bay
Migoto Eria
MTG Hawke’s Bay, $49.00,
ISBN 9780992259617
The challenges of in-house museum publishing are numerous. Museums are not typically well-resourced, and the decision to focus time and (usually ratepayer) funding on publications inevitably comes at the expense of the same resources being directed to other museum projects or programmes. At the same time, the number of individual visitors to museums is generally small, and the percentage who will buy a book smaller still – meaning the economics of ultra-niche publishing and its efficacy in reaching wider audiences are uncertain at best. As a former art gallery curator and museum director, I was keen to understand what fresh approaches MTG Hawke’s Bay (formerly the Hawke’s Bay Art Gallery and Museum) would bring to this vexing area, under the directorship of published author Douglas Lloyd Jenkins.
Beyond Betrayal, Trouble in the Promised Land – Restoring the Mission to Maori Keith Newman Penguin, $45.00, ISBN 9780143570516 Most Maori I know have a different view of the past to the nation-building rhetoric that inhabits the majority of mainstream…