Re-claiming, Re-history-ing our past...

The sign at the entrance of the Kingitanga exhibition

 This last weekend I was able to combine my class with other colleagues to visit the Auckland War Memorial Museum whilst on our noho marae or weekend of learning staying overnight at a local marae called Te Mahurehure Marae in Pt. Chev.

This particular visit we were able to attend the last days of an exhibition that celebrated 160 years the Kingitanga movement that started up in the 1800s as a response to the rising tide of unrest in New Zealand over England's people wanting for more Maori land through the confiscation of lands, land grabbing, illegal selling of land etc.

We were told, by the guide, that after sending some tribal chiefs to seek an audience with Queen Victoria, at the time, she refused to see them and they returned with the thought of setting up their own Maori equivalent royal family as a response for two sovereign nations to meet.

Not all iwi or tribes agreed to this or to the Treaty of Waitangi that was signed by some chiefs of various iwi with the Crown through her government representatives and still many Maori do not recognise the Kingitanga movement as theirs.

In fact, since joining the Wananga o Aotearoa in 2009, firstly as a student, I began to learn about another side of New Zealand history that I had no previous idea about as I had learnt US and British history in high school but very little of NZ.

So in my studies, I learnt that there had been an 1835 signing of the declaration of independence by some Maori chiefs prior to signing the treaty of 1840 and there were large amounts of Maori land that was confiscated through legal means that disadvantaged Maori since those early days and still continuing today.

It's a different historical account that we now teach in reclaiming indigenous spaces and drawing from information and sources other than the standard textbooks that got it so wrong during my high school days.

And it's also encouraging in now being more aware of historical events and important Maori leaders and figures who made a difference in re-historying our nations past and giving a more balanced view for future generations to learn about...