Māori oral histories and the impact of tsunamis in Aotearoa-New Zealand

Abstract

Abstract. Māori oral histories from the northern South Island of Aotearoa-New Zealand provide details of ancestral experience with tsunami(s) on, and surrounding, Rangitoto (D'Urville Island). Applying an inductive-based methodology informed by "collaborative storytelling", exchanges with key informants from the Māori kin groups of Ngāti Koata and Ngāti Kuia reveal that a "folk tale", published in 1907, could be compared to and combined with active oral histories to provide insights into past catastrophic saltwater inundations. Such histories reference multiple layers of experience and meaning, from memorials to ancestral figures and their accomplishments to claims about place, authority and knowledge. Members of Ngāti Koata and Ngāti Kuia, who permitted us to record some of their histories, share the view that there are multiple benefits to be gained by learning from differences in knowledge, practice and belief. This work adds to scientific as well as Maōri understandings about tsunami hazards (and histories). It also demonstrates that to engage with Māori oral histories (and the people who genealogically link to such stories) requires close attention to a politics of representation, in both past recordings and current ways of retelling, as well as sensitivities to the production of "new" and "plural" knowledges. This paper makes these narratives available to a new audience, including those families who no longer have access to them, and recites these in ways that might encourage plural knowledge development and coexistence. Whakarāpopototanga. Ko ngā kōrero tukuā-waha Māori oTe Tauihu o te Waka a Māui e whakaahua nei i ngā wheako o ngā tūpuna ki te/ngā taiāniwhaniwha ki runga i te motu o Rangitoto, ki tōna takiwā anō hoki. Mā te whai i tētahi pūnaha, ko tōna tūāpapa ko ngā tirohanga ki te hapori,ā, he mea tohutohu hoki e 'te tuku kōreroā-kāhui', i mārama ai iētahi whakawhitinga kōrero kiētahi māngai matua o ngā iwi Māori o Ngāti Koata me Ngāti Kuia, tērā tētahi 'pūrākau' i tāngia i te tau 1907, ka taea tōna whakataurite me tōna whakakotahi atu kiētahi kōrero tukuā-waha e ora tonu nei, kia whai tirohanga ai kiētahi aituā parawhenua waitai nui o nehe. Koēnei momo kōrero tuku he whai wheako maha, he whai tikanga maha anō hoki, mai i te whakamaumahara ī etahi tūpuna o nehe me ngā mahi i oti i a rātou, tae atu ki ngā kōrero mō te rohe, mō te mana, mō te mātauranga anō. Ko tā ngā mema o Ngāti Koata me Ngāti Kuia i tuku kia hopukinaētahi oā rātou kōrero tuku e whakaae nei, he hua nui ka puta i te whai māramatanga ki ngā rerekētangaā-mātauranga, a-tikanga,ā-whakapono anō. Ka whakawhānui tēnei mahi i ngā māramatangaā-pūtaiao, otirā, i ngā māramatanga o te Māori ki ngā pūmate o te taiāniwhaniwha (me ngā kōrero tuku anō). He mea whakatauira anō e tēnei, e whai kiko ai te whai wāhi atu ki ngā kōrero tukuā-waha Māori (me te iwi e honoā-whakapapa ana ki ngā kōrero), me aro pū ki te taha tōrangapū o te tū hei māngai mō tangata kē, ki ngā hopukanga kōrero o mua, ki ngā ara tuku kōrero anō o nāianei,ā, me aro pū hoki ki ngā k...

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Comparing and combining ethnographic records with active Māori histories to provide insights on tsunami hazard

“…This research followed an inductive-based approach informed by "collaborative storytelling" (Bishop, 1999;Lee, 2009;King et al, 2018) to help deliberate the nature, function, and meaning of two ethnographic records by comparing these records with active oral histories. Supporting a wider call to decolonise research methodologies (Smith, 1999;Kovach, 2009), while seeking inclusivity of "different," and sometimes supressed knowledges (Howitt and Suchet-Pearson, 2003;Shaw et al, 2006;Johnson et al, 2016), all phases of the research observed Kaupapa Māori research principles expressed through enduring cultural rules, norms, and procedures (Smith, 1990;Te Awekotuku, 1991;Smith, 1999).…”

“…Recognition that the narrators (and writers) of history, regardless of where they come from, are neither objective nor neutral (Binney, 1987) underscores the need for careful scholarship and cross-checks to help establish the veracity of specific histories and traditions (Binney, 1987; Soutar, 1996; Williams, 2000; King and Goff, 2010). Further, collaborative storytelling methods that involve working alongside kin-group members who continue to actively participate in the transmission of such narratives have demonstrated the critical role such grounded histories can make to scholarship (King et al, 2018). Notwithstanding these points, we remain mindful that Māori oral histories and traditions provide more than alternative sources of information or even alternative perspectives (Binney, 1987; Smith, 1999; Mead, 2003; Hakopa, 2019).…”

“…Detailing examples of coastal deluge attributed to tsunamis (and their likely sources) in classical and pre-colonial history, she argued that insights from Indigenous narratives provide invaluable lessons about extreme environmental disturbances in the pre-written past. Scholars from diverse disciplines have since explored pre-colonial coseismic histories from the Pacific Northwest coast of North America (Heaton and Snavely, 1985; Clague, 1995; Hutchinson and McMillan, 1997; McMillan and Hutchinson, 2002; Ludwin et al, 2005; Ludwin and Smits, 2007; Thrush and Ludwin, 2007) to islands across the Pacific Ocean (Nunn, 2001; Lum-Ho and Lum-Ho, 2005; Nunn and Pastorizo, 2007; King et al, 2007, 2018; McFadgen, 2007; Goff et al, 2008; King and Goff, 2010). Heaton and Snavely (1985) reviewed the early ethnographic writings of James Swan, and concluded that many accounts of great sea-level disturbances within Native American and First Nations oral histories are consistent with tsunami inundation processes.…”

He Tātai Whenua: Environmental Genealogies

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