Te Reo Māori represents an amazing opportunity to New Zealand for its potential to enrich society and culture and transform the experience and consciousness of those who are exposed to and use the language. The Māori language is an official language of New Zealand and is indigenous to our country. It is part of our country’s national character and identity. The richness and vibrancy of the language distinguishes New Zealand in areas such as tourism, exporting, employment, education and broadcasting, and plays an integral role in cultural identity.

This project draws together in digital form taonga exchanged during European voyages to Polynesia between 1765 and 1840. The digital format helps increase knowledge of the collections and reconnects iwi with their taonga held in archives and museums worldwide.

The Hauraki Māori Trust Board and the Cawthron Institute collaborated in this research project which stemmed from a spate of dog deaths on the beaches of Tikapa Moana (the Hauraki Gulf) in August 2009.  The dogs died from the poison tetrodotoxin (TTX) and this poison was present in sea slugs that had washed up on beaches. It became apparent research was needed to determine the poisoning risk associated with kaimoana from Tikapa Moana.

The late Dr Pei te Hurinui Jones (Ngāti Maniapoto), one of Māoridom’s leading scholars, amassed a significant collection of books, manuscripts and taonga during his lifetime. His son Brian Hauāuru Jones donated the vast majority to the University of Waikato and a room, He Mahi Māreikura, was established in 2004 especially to house the collection. The room’s layout is based on a whare puni and adheres to tikanga principles.
 

Whare tapere were pā based ‘houses’ of storytelling, dances, music, games, puppets and other entertainments. This research explores how fragments of traditional knowledge concerning the whare tapere can be used in a contemporary arts project.

This project is contributing to the key policy area of whānau ora/ family wellbeing via new analysis of the wealth of data contained in the six national household censuses of 1981 to 2006. Indicators of family wellbeing have been developed to identify trends across 25 years with the team having produced several reports and publications on measuring changes and key factors affecting family and whānau wellbeing.

Objectives:

The researchers will use wānanga, catch information, laboratory experiments in which the lengths of the day-night and tidal cycles are systematically varied, and simulation modelling to: identify similarities and differences between the Māramataka and science in understanding of the lunar rhythm; develop a consistent analysis and interpretation of patterns of variation in predictions of fish catch; and support transmission of the Māramataka across generations and iwi.

Inequalities in child health between tamariki Māori and non-Māori are largely preventable and unnecessary. An example is rheumatic fever, where tamariki Māori are 30 times more likely to contract the disease than non-Māori. Being ill as a child has a big impact on school attendance and outcomes, and it may cause lifelong disability or illness. There are high costs involved, for the health system, society and to whānau. This study aimed to estimate how much not doing anything to reduce child health inequities really costs us.
 

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Inequalities in child health between tamariki Māori and non-Māori are largely preventable and unnecessary. An example is rheumatic fever, where tamariki Māori are 30 times more likely to contract the disease than non-Māori.

Being ill as a child has a big impact on school attendance and outcomes, and it may cause lifelong disability or illness. There are high costs involved, both for the health system and for society.

This project has involved the digitisation and categorisation of a diverse range of tāonga from the 28 Māori Battalion, D Company veterans and their families, including videoed interviews, handwritten and typed letters and other documents, and photographs of people, places and personal objects. These have been assembled together in a dynamic, searchable database that can be edited, and has made the tāonga easily accessible for research and education.