Lost, and found,
in translation

Could you describe your role and your mahi in the Education team?  

I am a learning specialist in our mātauranga Māori programmes. Most days I am delivering programmes that tell us about aspects of Te Ao Māori, such as our art and architecture, our celebrations and the worldviews that lie behind them, and how we came to discover Aotearoa and the unique knowledge we brought with us from the Pacific.

Over the summer, I started to look at some of the mainstream science programmes we deliver and to translate these programmes into not just te reo Māori, but also to be underpinned by Māori approaches to knowledge. There is so much that mātauranga Māori can teach popular science, and we wanted to start inviting Māori language learners into these programmes more and develop their voices.

Is the objective to improve access for Māori language learners, or is there also an opportunity for the mainstream programmes to be influenced by mātauranga Māori? 

The new programmes for Kura Kaupapa and other Māori language schools offer everything that exists in English versions of those programmes, but they incorporate other mātauranga and ways of looking at things, too. That's where we started. A little later this year, we are intending to design some programmes that are uniquely for Māori language learners. They will be looking at our wider world, specifically through a Māori lens.

These programmes would be just as good for English language learners, but it's important to me to prioritise te reo Māori because for so long English has been prioritised, even though te reo Māori is the first language of this country and a lot more people are learning it now. I want to contribute to giving learning and supporting te reo that extra incentive. 

You are also an artist – a painter – outside this role. Does your art practice influence how you teach? 

Well, I have worked as an artist for many, many more years than I have been teaching – though that feels like a long time too now! But because I look at my world from that side, I appreciate materials a lot in terms of what it would be like to work with them. 

When I'm looking at an object, my mind is always considering what would have gone into becoming the way it was, or imagining what it would be like to use: what processes it would entail, what problems would it pose, and what types of solutions would evolve from that situation. I'm paying attention to what objects can tell me about not only the social and practical interactions of people, but also the types of philosophical values that would arise from using them, is always quite present in my mind. 

I suppose this approach also just fills me with a sense of awe and mystery. Even when there is a lot of kōrero around a particular taonga, I still wonder to think, 'Why did they make it like THAT?! How exactly did they perceive the world to make something like that?’

You have created a series of flash cards featuring prehistoric creatures and translated their names into Māori. What inspired you to make these cards? Which came first, the paintings or the programme? 

Matthew Crumpton (Learning Manager) had encouraged me to figure out how to offer more of our science programmes in Māori contexts, and to make some resources to go along with them. I always think that something that is unique is more attractive, so I did the painting. So, it was the programme first, but in saying that, I used to paint large paintings of dinosaurs in oil paint about ten years ago as part of my art practice, so in that way, the painting came first, but it has now found itself a new context. 

Can you describe how you translated to creatures’ names?  

My scope isn’t limited to just the dinosaurs! I was – and still am – also developing our insects and volcanoes programmes. We have some very different ways of categorising things in te reo, as well as a lot of reo that has simply been lost due to the way our language was engineered out of everyday use by so many educational and legal policies. And with dinosaurs, well, our tupuna didn’t cross paths with them time-wise, in Aotearoa!

In the end, I found quite a few words from 'Wakareo’ that was once under the care of Te Taura Whiri. For some other words, I had casual wānanga with other te reo speakers, and with my colleague Ma'ara Maeva, whose Māori extends back to the Pacific. He was able to shed light on older meanings of some Māori words with their origins in language. I also belong to an amazing Facebook community where Māori speakers are always making posts, asking for a wānanga about some aspect or another of te reo.

With the name for the Plesiosaur, I was stumped. In the end, I could only find a specific Plesiosaur that had been called 'Kaiwhekea'. I was pretty sure that was given to it as a proper name, but since I had nothing else, and it had such a cool ring to it, I have used it for the Plesiosaur as a general species here. 

Te reo Māori is, like all spoken languages, still evolving through adapting to new knowledge, and, as it is being taken up again by our younger generations, it is evolving even more fluidly as they use it to articulate their everyday experiences and thoughts.

How do you think learning these kupu will change how your students learn? 

I don't think all the kupu I have used in these kaupapa are particularly important – if they describe something well enough then its meaning comes through. And it’s not so much about making up words – it’s the picture it puts in your mind. 

I think speaking Māori, you understand a lot from context, and so somebody might come up with other kupu/words for things. There is also a larger project going on with Ngāti Kurī, where they are working with another group from here on reo Māori identifying names for the insects, so that will be a hugely valuable resource. 

It's the immediate transfer of knowledge and ideas that is important to me, and the way people put things together, of their own choosing. That's what makes all language fun and colourful.