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Indigenous Psychology in Aotearoa/New Zealand and Australia
Abstract
In Aotearoa/New Zealand and Australia, the development of Indigenous psychology is a response to the resilience of a colonised people, where the gaze of Western imperialism is ever present. The use of esoteric, ceremonial, environmental, and relational knowledge is included to counter balance the individualism inherent in mainstream psychology. Across both countries, connections to ancestors, land, language, customs and relationships are important. Dudgeon’s Social and Emotional Wellbeing model offers a transformative lens for addressing the significant disparities that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ experience. While Māori wellbeing includes healthy relationships between physical, psychological, community, spirituality and environment domains. The chapter promotes a reclamation of Indigenous knowledge systems that, if not protected and promoted, could be lost from their cultural home.
... Strengths-based approaches inherently contextualize Indigenous mental health and wellness through understanding of historical, intergenerational, social, cultural, and political contexts that support existing community strengths, uphold self-determination and sovereignty, and promote justice and equity [6,11,[14][15][16]. A conceptual approach that is more synonymous with and inclusive of Indigenous worldviews on well-being are socialecological frameworks. ...
... This includes histories of colonialism, histories of resilience and perseverance, and familial, ancestral, and place-based histories that center the importance of lands. The important connection between past, present, and future is a shared teaching among many Indigenous communities in CANZUS [7][8][9]16] and has been used to structure mental health and wellness promotion among youth. Intergenerational engagement encourages Indigenous communities to repair, build, and strengthen relationships between Elders or traditional knowledge holders and youth. ...
... Self-determination, community control, and tribal sovereignty have been identified as vital to health, including mental health promotion and well-being across Indigenous communities in CANZUS [5,24,35]. In Aotearoa/New Zealand, tino rangatiratanga is a Māori concept deeply rooted in Māori worldviews and historical contexts representing the essential domains of self-determination, sovereignty, self-governance, and autonomy vital to health and well-being [13,16,55]. Tino rangatiratanga is described as having a cyclical and interdependent relationship with the well-being of an individual and the collective, including whānau (extended families), hapū (sub-tribes), and iwi (tribes), and if supported and promoted nationally, can benefit health and well-being for all New Zealanders [55]. ...
Globally, Indigenous communities, leaders, mental health providers, and scholars have called for strengths-based approaches to mental health that align with Indigenous and holistic concepts of health and wellness. We applied the Indigenist Ecological Systems Model to strengths-based case examples of Indigenous youth mental health and wellness work occurring in CANZUS (Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and United States). The case examples include research, community-led programs, and national advocacy. Indigenous youth development and well-being occur through strengths-based relationships across interconnected environmental levels. This approach promotes Indigenous youth and communities considering complete ecologies of Indigenous youth to foster their whole health, including mental health. Future research and programming will benefit from understanding and identifying common, strengths-based solutions beyond narrow intervention targets. This approach not only promotes Indigenous youth health and mental health, but ripples out across the entire ecosystem to promote community well-being.
... The limitations of psychology, its research methods, assessment tools and therapy models have long been argued by Indigenous researchers as a reason for pursuing a locally derived psychology that is sensitive to customs, issues and potential solutions specific to the Indigenous context (Adair, 1999). The rise of Indigenous psychologies (Allwood & Berry, 2006;Gray & Coates, 2010;Waitoki et al., 2018) is contemporaneous with a larger postcolonial agenda among researchers to decolonise the social sciences by legitimising Indigenous research methods that "prevent the prioritisation of western ways of knowing" (Drawson et al., 2017, p. 13). Indigenous research processes are politically transparent; they intentionally pursue healing, mobilisation, transformation and decolonisation for Indigenous groups (Smith, 2012). ...
... Others include holism, relationality and interconnectedness of all living and inanimate things (Archibald, 2008;Martin, 2003;Stewart-Harawira, 2013;S. Wilson, 2008); Indigenous self-determination and autonomy (Nikora, 2007;Smith, 2012;Waitoki et al., 2018); prioritisation and protection of the integrity of Indigenous knowledge (Archibald, 2008;Drawson et al., 2017;Stewart-Harawira, 2013;S. Wilson, 2008); respect and reciprocity between researchers and communities (Archibald, 2008;S. ...
Theatre Marae is a contemporary theatre practice unique to Aotearoa New Zealand, and this article outlines its application as an Indigenous-informed creative framework for qualitative research. As a research methodology, Theatre Marae is based in a conceptual partnership between traditional and contemporary Māori performing arts, applied theatre and the therapeutic encounter. As a form of theatre pedagogy, Theatre Marae has been applied as a decolonising strategy in ensemble work, and to craft evocative theatre that honours Māori expressions of colonisation, trauma and social justice. Theatre Marae projects have been carried out in kāinga, schools, prisons, youth justice residential centres, community centres and mainstream theatres throughout Aotearoa New Zealand. Although its creative and therapeutic outcomes are influenced by both Western and Māori psychologies and performance traditions, the underlying principles and day-to-day practice of Theatre Marae are based in te ao Māori. This configuration positions Theatre Marae as an Indigenous creative framework that is also applicable to Kaupapa Māori arts-based research.
... Decolonising feminist psychology means unsettling the colonial knowledge frameworks that dominate, both in psychology research and in feminist discourse. In Aotearoa, we suggest that decolonising feminist psychology means foregrounding Mātauranga Māori, and building respectful understandings of kaupapa Māori research, that is, research by Māori, for Māori, and following Māori principles (see Waitoki et al., 2018;Waitoki & Levy, 2016). Decolonising intersex research in Aotearoa means bringing decolonisation and demedicalisation into dialogue, and we suggest how this could mean designing research centred on Māori models of health. ...
In this commentary, we examine the role of non-Indigenous psychology researchers in settler states such as Aotearoa / New Zealand. A key focus is on demedicalising and decolonising intersex. We describe approaches to knowledge production that are based on the decolonising thinking of Indigenous and non-Indigenous researchers, and that open up opportunities for resistance and transformation. We then examine how decolonisation can be brought into dialogue with demedicalisation. Finally, we consider opportunities for an Indigenous understanding of health to contribute to the demedicalising aspirations of intersex advocates and researchers.
... For example, the theoretical equivalence of the Emotion Cultivation Process (Wang et al., 2019) model which was created in Taiwan could be researched in other Asian countries and in the West as could Hwang's (1987) theory of Chinese social behavior that is grounded in Confucian ethics and emphasizes social interactions with regard to face and favor. Further, by administering the STEP the theoretical equivalence of the Māori philosophy of health and wellbeing which is considered unique to New Zealand (Waitoki, Dudgeon, & Nikora, 2018) could be studied with other indigenous populations throughout the world. The theoretical equivalence of principles posited about cognition found in ancient Indian spiritual and philosophical systems also could be examined through the use of the STEP to determine its relevance to modern Western perspectives about cognition (Sedlmeier & Kunchapudi, 2016). ...
The importance of cross-cultural validity, equivalence, and bias when engaged in cross-cultural and cultural activities (e.g., research, practice, training, supervision, consultation, teaching) are discussed. Two new forms of equivalence (Theory; Intervention) and bias (Theory; Intervention) also are introduced, as is an adaptation of the Systematic Test of Equivalence Procedure (STEP; Gerstein, L.H. 2018. Systematic test of equivalence procedure: New method to investigate cross-cultural validity. Revista de Cercetare si Interventie Sociala, 62, 278–293), which was originally created to enhance equivalence and reduce bias when conducting cross-cultural or cultural studies. Assuming future research supports the validity and relevance of the modified STEP approach, this strategy could offer researchers, clinicians, and others a tool to examine theory and intervention equivalence and bias in their professional activities. Recommendations for conducting projects to investigate the validity of employing STEP when examining the equivalence or bias of existing and future theories and intervention strategies are presented as well.
... First however, it is appropriate that I locate myself in this paper as a M aori theatre practitioner and psychologist with tribal connections to the Far North, West and East coasts of the North Island of Aotearoa/New Zealand. This paper informs my current research on the performance of ancient M aori creation narratives as a blueprint for healing from trauma, a project that will add to a long-standing agenda to legitimate M aori storytelling as a research method (Archibald et al. 2019;Lee 2009) and decolonise psychological practice in Aotearoa/New Zealand (Waitoki, Dudgeon, and Nikora 2018;Waitoki and Levy 2015 ...
This article discusses the work of Māori theatre company Te Rākau Hua o Te Wao Tapu, and its approach to decolonising theatre in Aotearoa/New Zealand through its Theatre Marae programme. First, I locate the establishment of Te Rākau and Theatre Marae as a response to Māori being excluded from mainstream theatre, then present a summary of Te Rākau’s contribution to the development of contemporary Māori theatre, theatre-in-education and applied community theatre over the past thirty years. Finally, I describe the core processes of Te Rākau’s Theatre Marae programme as an example of embedding Indigenous customs and philosophy in the ensemble as a decolonising strategy in actor training.
... Indigenous scholars have a primary role to play in this discussion, exploring a diversity of epistemological frames of references and methods gleaned through sustained, collaborative, engaged action (Smith 2012). The individualist views of mind and self which 4E cognitive theories reject and seek to replace were implicated in colonial political violence in Aotearoa New Zealand as elsewhere (Waitoki et al. 2018). By separating mind and memory from body, society, and environment, Western internalism in its applied forms underwrote active colonial damage, in justifying colonial resistance to indigenous socialisation into community narrative practices, systems of norms, and embodied skills. ...
To investigate the unique kinds of mentality involved in skilled performance, this paper explores the performance ecology of the Māori haka, a ritual form of song and dance of the indigenous people of Aotearoa New Zealand. We respond to a recent proposal to program robots to perform a haka as 'cultural preservationists' for 'intangible cultural heritage'. This 'Robot Māori Haka' proposal raises questions about the nature of skill and the transmission of embodied knowledge; about the cognitive and affective experiences cultivated in indigenous practices like haka; and about the role of robots in the archival aspirations of human societies. Reproducing haka, we suggest, requires more than copying physical actions; preserving the 'intangible' entails more than programming postures and movements. To make this case, we discuss the history of European responses to the haka, and analyse its diverse performance features in cultural context. Arguing that indigenous movement practices incorporate genuinely embodied knowledge, we claim that skilled performance of haka is deeply mindful, embodying and transmitting dynamic, culturally shared understandings of the natural and social world. The indigenous psychologies incorporated in haka performance are animated by a shared history integrated with its environment. Examining haka performance through the lens of 4E cognitive skill theory for mutual benefit, we discuss the effects of synchrony in collective action, the social and environmental scaffolding of affect and emotion, and the multilayered relations between past and present. Culturally-embedded systems of skilled movement like the Māori haka may, we suggest, constitute specific ways of thinking and feeling.
The history of Pacific migration is identified as being a diasporic movement which changed through the encounters with European and American colonialism from migration along familial ties to migration based on trade and empire. The effect today is the vast numbers of Pacific peoples who have dispersed away from home Island-nations and live in places very different to where their ancestors dwelt. Pacific diaspora is a way of understanding the movements or scattering of people through the Pacific region which is thousands of years old. This chapter introduces the Pacific diasporic journey born out of a historical migratory past filled with hopes and dreams of a new utopia – a new way of living, a better life with a hope-filled, expectant future. It also highlights the struggles of many Pacific diaspora who have settled in urban cities across Aotearoa/NZ, Australia and America, where the dream of better living has yet to be fulfilled. Many Pacific communities are disproportionately represented in areas of educational underachievement, teen pregnancy, suicide, alcohol and other drug use and violence and crime. As a result, encounters with ‘helping professions’ such as psychology are inevitable. The ways of knowing, being and doing (worldview) of Pacific nations that lie within the vast waters of Oceania have yet to be represented in the realm of psychology. However, a turning of the tide has begun within scholarship and research where indigenous researchers and practitioners themselves are reframing and developing their own research paradigms and programs based on Indigenous ways of knowing, being and doing. Why? So often results from research produced information for wider international contexts and advanced careers of researchers but depicted and positioned the culture under observation as primitive or uncivilised. As such, voices of Indigenous scholars, elders and leaders have arisen to highlight these struggles as cross-cultural tensions that lie with the different worldviews. The lack of Indigenous knowledge representation in psychology and disparities in knowledge production are evidenced through the language of psychology, which was formulated by privileged souls of academia living in the realm of laboratories and universities far removed from peoples of Oceania. The largest geographical space of ocean in the world made up of many Island nations, lived philosophy, breathed cosmology and basked in the sun of freedom. The foundational sea of life is laid in this chapter to understand the journey of Pacific diaspora and the unique ways of ‘knowing, being and doing’ inherent in Indigenous cultural knowledge.KeywordsFa’asinomaga (cultural identity)Pacific diasporaIndigenous-theorisingIndigenous cultural knowledgeIndigenous psychologiesKaupapa Māori psychologyPacific-Indigenous psychology
Understanding the role of psychological science in shaping human
behaviour towards promoting and maintaining a healthy environment is
critical to a safe, sustainable, and balanced ecosystem in Africa. In addition
to addressing the negative impact of climate change on physical and mental
health, psychologists can help build resilience to mitigate the effects of climate
change. Against the backdrop of COVID-19, the Nigerian Psychological
Association has pursued environmental advocacy including focusing its 2021
national conference on ‘’global climate change, ecosystem and behaviour:
issues and action plans.” In addition, a number of psychology departments
in Nigeria have hosted pro-environment programmes. Similarly, the Ghana
Psychological Association has collaborated with corporate and religious
bodies to educate the public on climate change initiatives and has called for
an annual week-long celebration to promote climate change initiatives. And
additionally, in East Africa, before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic,
the Uganda Council of Psychologists began working hand-in-hand with
local universities to create climate change awareness campaigns, planning to
organise field trips and conduct survey studies in the most impacted regions
of the country. Ultimately, this calls for behavioural and societal change to
avert future disasters. As scientist-practitioners, we need to adopt a multi-sectoral approach and tailored research to address climate change concerns in
Africa.
The New Zealand Psychological Society, publisher of the Global Psychology Alliance Ebook 'Climate Action and Global Psychology', has opened access to the publication ahead of COP27, to allow for greater promotion and awareness of this important contribution to the field of climate psychology.
The book can now be downloaded free of charge from the Society's website here:
https://lnkd.in/gNHT2S2h
This is the PDF version that members of the profession and public can download as they wish. If people want the published E-book version, they can contact the Society's professional development officer whose email address is on the webpage and a copy will be sent to them.
We hope this contribution to the literature will be publicised widely across the professions and to those involved in climate action, policy development, teaching, research and professional practice.
Closer to COP27, we will be producing advertising material describing the book's contents in more detail. In the interim, this quote from the Editors' Preface provides an outline of the book:
"Climate Action and Global Psychology offers a unique, multi-national perspective on organised psychology’s nascent collaborative efforts to address the world’s climate crisis.
This volume is a combination of theoretical and empirical work, varying according to section and topic. Leadership models related to major global crises like climate tend to be more theoretical, while chapters on projects in specific countries are more empirically oriented. The efforts of global psychology and its constituent professional organisations must address the need to understand the imminent threats posed for Indigenous peoples by climate change and seek ways to ensure psychology empowers and supports the actions of their people."
We encourage groups to promote the Ebook to their members through their own communication networks.
Ngā mihi
Brian
Brian Dixon
Co-convenor, Climate Psychology Task Force
Executive member for Te Taiao/Environment
NZ Psychological Society
Based on the authors’ different backgrounds and experiences of working in Pacific communities and with Pacific people as clients, supervisees, trainees, and colleagues, and taking a critical perspective informed by Talanoa research methodology, mainly Samoan and by Southern theory, this article examines person-centered theory and practice. The article firstly reviews Rogers’ theory of therapy, personality, and interpersonal relationships; and second deconstructs Rogers’ original ‘general structure’, offering a reconstruction of the theory that accounts for placing the family and spirituality at the center of psychological practice and theory. The article concludes with identifying three epistemological shifts necessary to make person-centered psychology more relevant to the Pacific context.
This chapter is co-authored by clinical psychologists, Kanaké tradi-practitioners, and a former healthcare administrator in New Caledonia. It presents geographical, demographic, mythical and historical data, before describing the organization of the country’s public health system. The authors provide a quantitative assessment of public health challenges and present the country’s governmental initiatives, including the Do Kamo-Be Fulfilled global health plan, which seeks to address the social determinants of health. This chapter also reviews the efforts of New Caledonian psychologists to integrate indigenous Kanaké universes of meaning with modern Western approaches to health care, while noting that a network of Kanaké traditional practitioners operates on the margins of the official public health system. Elements of traditional practices of psychic care and personal development from the Kanaké Paicî-Camuki and Hoot Ma Whaap countries are then presented. These practices may involve community knowledge, the art of relationship, the use of plants, and inner and spiritual knowledge of the self. The authors conclude that there is a need to redefine the concept of mental health in New Caledonia and that Kanaké indigenous psychology is essential to promote well-being in the country. They draw attention to its central role in the restoration of colonial and post-colonial wounds in the archipelago and to the importance of developing an integrative common care for the benefit of all New Caledonians.
This paper documents a joint initiative of clinical practice educators from four tertiary institutions and their engagement in the design and development of a proposed Hauora Māori Clinical Guide for Psychologists, which outlines how to apply the Hui Process and Meihana Model to applied psychology. It describes the ability for this proposed Hauora Māori Clinical Guide for Psychologists to assist clinicians, professional psychology training programmes and institutions in meeting the expectations of the Health Practitioners Act and The New Zealand Psychologists Board’s (NZPB) Standards and Procedures document. It
presents how this proposed guide can support the implementation of clinical and cultural competence and the Code of Ethics for Psychologists Working in New Zealand. It also provides an opportunity for the psychology profession to demonstrate responsivity to Te Tiriti o Waitangi obligations.
This article explores the relevance of historical trauma theory for Māori research. In exploring the impact of historical trauma upon Māori it has become clear that the terminology associated with historical trauma theory is considered controversial in Aotearoa New Zealand. As such, this article provides an overview of key definitions relevant to historical trauma and explores these in relation to recent reporting related to the use of the terms “holocaust” and “genocide” in the context of colonization in Aotearoa New Zealand. It is argued that in order to engage fully with the impacts of colonization on Māori wellbeing we must articulate fully the impact of historical trauma events and the contribution of those events to the negative health disparities experienced by many of our whānau (extended family), hapū (sub-tribes) and iwi (tribes).
The Gayaa Dhuwi (Proud Spirit) Declaration aims to improve the mental health of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples by supporting their leadership in those parts of the mental health system that work with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander populations. A further aim is to promote an appropriate balance of clinical and culturally-informed mental health system responses, including by providing access to cultural healing, to mental health problems in Aboriginal and Torres Strait persons. Developed by the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Leadership in Mental Health (NATSILMH) as a companion document to the international Wharerātā Declaration, the Gayaa Dhuwi (Proud Spirit) Declaration also sets out principles for governments, professional bodies and other stakeholders to support Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leadership in the Australian mental health system; and principles for working with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mental health leaders as they exercise culturally informed leadership within the Australian mental health system. The Gayaa Dhuwi (Proud Spirit) Declaration is being promoted by NATSILMH as a new paradigm for shaping mental health system responses to Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander mental health problems.
Introduction In constructing this chapter, the authors make a claim for an Indigenous perspective that is grounded in decolonization, the struggle for social justice, cultural reclamation and the development of Indigenous knowledge. This offers the opportunity to view acculturation and the associated research through a different lens. In taking this stance, a critical psychology and Indigenous standpoint approach is adopted, while also acknowledging earlier scholars (for example, Kvernmo, 2006, in the first edition of this Handbook) who have attempted to accommodate Indigenous experiences within acculturation theory and the associated research. The earlier chapter by Kvernmo provided a global perspective on Indigenous psychologies, whereas the current chapter focuses on findings and applications in Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand. Chapter 16, which covers acculturation research in Australia and New Zealand more broadly, is also relevant to our discussion. A key issue addressed is how acculturation research can be linked to cultural reclamation and reconciliation work. Critique of acculturation research Acculturation research, theory development and application have a long and complex history evolving within and between many different social science traditions. Over time, various terms have been used synonymously by disparate disciplines with divergent theoretical and methodological foundations leading to blurred and often conflicting findings (Ozer, 2013). There has also been a lack of critical reflexivity on the part of researchers to examine their ontological positions and clearly articulate the epistemological foundations of their own journeys and consequently their roles within the research endeavor (Ngo, 2008). Consequently, acculturation research occupies a complex and contested space that is further exacerbated when applied uncritically to Indigenous peoples in settler contexts. The original and most cited definition of acculturation emerged from anthropology and contends that “acculturation comprehends those phenomena which result when groups of individuals having different cultures come into continuous first-hand contact, with subsequent changes in the original culture patterns of either or both groups” (Redfield, Linton & Herskovits, 1936, p. 149). While Berry's acculturation framework evolved to incorporate the possibility of change in both groups, and emphasized the importance of including the change that occurs for both groups in contact (Berry, Poortinga, Breugelmans, Chasiotis & Sam, 2011), it has largely been applied to focus on the minority or nondominant groups to the exclusion of the dominant culture (Berry, 1997; Nikora, Levy, Masters & Waitoki, 2004; Sakamoto, 2007).
Colonisation in Australia has had a devastating and lasting impact on the wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in Australia (herein referred to as Indigenous Australians). This paper discusses the role of psychology in Australia and the negative impact that certain disciplinary theories and practices have had on Indigenous Australians. The impact has been further exacerbated by the failure of mainstream policy makers and mental health practitioners to recognise the key, distinctive cultural and social determinants that contribute to Aboriginal health and wellbeing. There is a growing response by Aboriginal psychologists, critical social theorists, and their allies to decolonise psychological theory and practice to redress this situation. This paper outlines key decolonising strategies that have been effective in interrupting those aspects of psychology that are inimical to Aboriginal wellbeing.
Health professionals play an important role in addressing indigenous health inequalities. This paper describes the further development and a new conceptualisation of the Meihana model (2007) and the Hui process (2011), which together have formed the indigenous health framework in the University of Otago, Christchurch undergraduate medical education programme for 4th-6th year medical students over the past 5 years. The components of the framework are defined followed by description of their application to clinical assessment. The indigenous health framework has been evaluated by medical students, health practitioners, Maori patients and whanau over this time and has been rated favourably as a clinically relevant framework that supports health practitioners to work effectively with Maori patients and whanau.
The abstract for this document is available on CSA Illumina.To view the Abstract, click the Abstract button above the document title.
This article examines the origin, development, and characteristics of the indigenous psychologies (IPs) initiated in various regions of the world. These IPs arose as a reaction to the mainstream version of psychology and seek to reflect the social, political, and cultural character of peoples around the world. Fifteen contributions from researchers from different parts of the world are presented, replying to four questions that were posed to them. A number of common themes were identified in the contributions. Post-colonial reactions to mainstream psychology, and the belief that it was not an efficient aid to solving local social problems, were seen as important reasons for developing IPs. IPs were generally seen as attempts to produce a local psychology within a specific cultural context. Different views about what methods are legitimate in IPs were present (from experiments to various more "humanistic'' methods). IPs were commonly seen as being able to open up, invigorate, and improve mainstream psychology. The style of theorizing in the IPs was felt by many to be to build theories from the "bottom up'' on the basis of local phenomena, findings, and experiences. Some contributors saw the IP as a kind of cultural psychology, and a few noted that IP and cross-cultural psychology have an interactive mutually enriching relationship. Nearly half of the contributors emphasized the critical reaction to their work on IP by colleagues working more in the line of mainstream psychology. Many contributors felt that IP could contribute to the development of a more general universal psychology. Different indications of heterogeneity in the IPs were found among the contributors, for example, with respect to the role given to religion in the local IP. Sometimes the presence of different IPs within the same country was reported. This also indicates heterogeneity in the IPs.
The emergence of an academic discourse called Indigenous knowledge internationally, and mātauranga Maori in Aotearoa New Zealand, presents some substantive challenges to concepts of knowing and being, of knowledge creation, knowledge work and the making of meaning. These challenges engage us across philosophical, disciplinary, institutional, inter-generational, territorial and community boundaries, presenting an opportunity to imagine this field anew, and the theories and methodologies that inform contemporary Maori or Indigenous Studies. This article raises some discussion about 'research methodologies' being used when discussing mātauranga Maori and Indigenous knowledge (hereafter referred to as IK mātauranga). Research methodologies are often associated with specific disciplines of knowledge and viewed as the primary if not singular way in which knowledge is generated. Arguably, IK mātauranga occupies a different knowledge space from traditional academic disciplines, including their transdisciplinary interstices. This article speaks to a gnawing sense that mayhem is at play, as the academic work around IK mātauranga begins to consolidate and become institutionalised away from its indigenous communities and contexts, where it began and where it still informs identities, ways of living and being.
Contrary to contemporary views of the act of whakamate (suicide), traditional Māori tribal pedagogies have revealed that the death of an individual by suicide was not considered a shameful or cowardly act; rather it was viewed in its full context. The person was considered to have been impacted by a state of whakamomori (overwhelming sadness and depression) and kahupō (spiritual blindness). Viewed in this context, in the time of our ancestors, premature death through suicide was considered a human tragedy and loss of potential and was thus treated with understanding, compassion and aroha (love). Drawing on traditional Māori pedagogies contained within tribal waiata mōteatea (laments), this paper presents an example of how the wisdom traditions of Māori tribal elders can inform contemporary suicide postvention interventions. The traditions are also shown to support whānau (family) recovery from unresolved grief situations including the (modern) stigma associated with the death of a loved one to whakamate.
Indigenous populations and communities around the world confront historical, cultural, socioeconomic and forced geographic limitations that have profound impacts on mental wellness. The impacts of colonialism and, for some indigenous populations, forced residential schooling and the resulting loss of culture and family ties, have contributed to higher risks of mental illness in these groups. In addition, there are barriers to healing and mental wellness, including inconsistent cultural competence of mainstream mental health professionals, coupled with the limited numbers of indigenous mental health professionals. The Wharerata Declaration is a proposed framework to improve indigenous mental health through state-supported development of indigenous mental health leaders, based on a new indigenous leadership framework. Developed by the Wharerata Group (original membership noted in the acknowledgements section at the end of this article), the framework will be presented for support to the member countries of the International Initiative for Mental Health Leadership (IIMHL) in 2010.
Restricted Item. Print thesis available in the University of Auckland Library or may be available through Inter-Library Loan. Restricted Item. Print thesis available in the University of Auckland Library or may be available through Inter-Library Loan. This thesis is a theoretical journey. Its primary focus is the honouring and affirmation of the voices of Māori women and the assertion of Mana Wahine as a Kaupapa Māori theoretical framework. It is argued that Western theories are inadequate in understanding and explaining Māori experiences and in particular the experiences of Maori women. Kaupapa Māori theory provides the framework within which this thesis is located. Kaupapa Māori theory is conceived of as being a distinct Māori framework that has its foundations in mātauranga Māori. It is argued that Kaupapa Māori is of ancient origins, which derive from within the many realms of the Māori world. Kaupapa Māori theory is a framework that both draws upon, and affirms, mātauranga Māori as fundamental to Māori understandings. Kaupapa Māori theory is also multiple in its articulation and rather than exalt theory this thesis contends that Kaupapa Māori theory provides openings into analysis that can more readily explain and transform current inequities that face Māori people. As such there is an active proposal for the exploration and development of Kaupapa Māori theory in ways that expand on existing theoretical developments. It is argued that colonial imposition of race, gender and class have culminated in the construction of the belief that Māori women hold an 'inferior' 'lesser' position in Māori society to that of Māori men. Through exploring the origins of the ideologies of race, gender and class it is further shown that these constructions manifested in how early ethnographers documented Māori society. Historical sources and Native Schools documentation are examined to provide an overview understanding of the ways in which colonial patriarchal supremacist ideas where entrenched into literature that has since provided the basis for much research related to Māori society. Those sources it is argued were fundamentally flawed in their approach and their disregard of the significance of the roles and status of Māori women. The often unproblematic use of early documentation is challenged and it is argued that the colonial constructions of Māori women mitigate against our interests and therefore the interests of all Māori people. This thesis is an opening discussion that asserts that Mana Wahine theory is an essential development for Māori women. In doing so it argues that there are elements that are fundamental to the articulation of Mana Wahine theory. These elements are not exclusive or definitive, but are seen to exist within the growing body of literature regarding Mana Wahine theory. Mana Wahine theory is a Kaupapa Māori theory that is dedicated to the affirmation of Māori women within Māori society, within whānau, hapū and iwi. It is a theoretical framework that, like Kaupapa Māori theory, is based within mātauranga Māori and is committed to the articulation of Māori women's ways of knowing the world. It is argued that asserting Mana Wahine is a recognition of the current inequitable context within which Māori women are located and therefore there is an inherent political project of engaging oppressive relations that impact upon Māori women. Mana Wahine theory is presented as a Māori women's theory that remembers our tūpuna wāhine, our atua wāhine and which affirms Māori women as critical actors for change.
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Languages of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples-A uniquely Australian heritage
- K Obata
- J Lee
From exclusion to negotiation: The role of psychology in Aboriginal social justice (Discussion Paper
- R Riley
Seven orientations for the development of indigenous science education
- G Cajete
Ngā kete mātauranga: The baskets of knowledge, a curriculum for an indigenous psychology
- W Waitoki
Introduction. In People Culture Environment and one Generation Media
- P Dudgeon
Global development and characteristics and local development
- L W Nikora
- M Levy
- B Masters-Awatere
- W Waitoki
Conceptualising the link between resilience and whanau ora
- A Boulton
- H Gifford
Australian Psychological Society issues a formal apology to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people
- Naccho
Whaiora: Maori health development
- M Durie
Talking story with Ripeka to support the healing of soul wounds
- M Taitimu
Strong helpers’ teachings: The value of indigenous in the helping profession
- C Baskin