Te Wiki o te Reo Māori in 2022 is a particularly noteworthy occasion, marking 50 years since the Māori language petition was taken to Parliament! In 1972, a small group of te reo Māori champions presented a petition signed by 30,000 New Zealanders to parliament requesting that Māori language be taught in schools. Ten years later, the same group marched to parliament again and called for te reo to be made an official language in Aotearoa. Each year in Mahuru, the nation remembers these achievements and celebrates the revival of te reo Māori.
This year for Te Wiki o te Reo Māori we’d like to share some mahi that our team in Tāmaki Makaurau recently completed for the Ngamanawa Incorporation.
Ngamanawa Incorporation, photo supplied. The Ngamanawa Incorporation was established in 1971 in response to the Tauranga Joint Generation Committee’s Notice of Intention to Take Land for Electricity Works (1968). The consolidation of land titles through Ngamanawa ensured there was a stronger collective voice (on behalf of the owners of each block) to legally negotiate with the Tauranga Joint Generation Committee. While large tracts of land were eventually taken under the Public Works Act to form the Kaimai Hydro Scheme, the tireless efforts of Ngamanawa’s tupuna meant that no further land than necessary was taken.
Ngamanawa recently decided to have three of their incorporation’s minute books (ranging in date from 1971 to 1991) digitised by NZMS. The minute books were digitised to capture the journey of Ngamanawa’s tupuna and the way they fought the Tauranga Joint Generation Committee to protect and preserve their land for future generations.
“The minute books show us the mahi our ancestors put in, the sacrifices they made, and the intelligence they showed as they navigated the legal system in the 1960s and 70s to create our organisation, the Ngamanawa Incorporation. Connecting our whānau to their whenua is a major priority for us. Digitising our taonga and sharing our history with our Ngamanawa whānau definitely helps us achieve this goal.”
Summer Bennett, Taotahi Tuihono Digital Project and Communications, Ngamanawa Incorporation.
The minute books reveal the Ngamanawa Incorporation’s creation story and provides an insight into how their tupuna worked together to amalgamate land blocks and create an entity that was able to fight the Tauranga Joint Generation Committee.
“This generation committee used the Public Works Act to attempt to take over 5000 acres of our land and water to build the Kaimai Hydro Power Scheme. Our tupuna created our organisation to stop the land being taken, and with the help of our lawyer, less than 200 acres of land was taken and the rest remained in Ngamanawa Incorporation.”
Summer Bennett, Taotahi Tuihono Digital Project and Communications, Ngamanawa Incorporation.
NZMS digitised the minute books to a high resolution of 400ppi and 1:1 scale, to guarantee that even the smallest handwritten notes were visible. There were also a couple of loose items alongside the minute books that were digitised separately to the same specifications — including an aerial map, an incorporation document, and a booklet from a Waitangi Tribunal hearing in 1999. To ensure the minute books and associated documents are easily accessible, our team supplied access files alongside the master copies, transforming the large photographs into OCR’ed multipage PDFs.
The digitised images will be archived in open-source software to ensure data rangatiratanga, as well as the protection of mātauranga for future generations. At first only Ngamanawa’s shareholders and uri will be given access to the archive, however the public may be granted access to the digitised images in the future. The digitised copies of Ngamanawa’s minute books allows them to best protect and archive their taonga, history, and mātauranga.
Digitisation (and preservation) of these minute books also contributes to the goals of Te Wiki o te Reo Māori by widening the understanding of Nganamana’s history and the mahi that they offer their community.
“Our tupuna were native speakers of Te Reo Māori, so the reo used in our minute books are also a glimpse in to the way our tupuna communicated and thought. Te Reo Māori is the language of our taiao, so revitalising our reo rangatira is a major element to the well-being of our environment, our people, and our incorporation.”
Summer Bennett, Taotahi Tuihono Digital Project and Communications, Ngamanawa Incorporation.
NZMS are grateful for the opportunity to help the Ngamanawa Incorporation preserve their taonga and its significant history. We believe that digitisation of items like Ngamanawa’s minute books can assist in the protection of Māoritanga as well as contribute to the revival of te reo Māori in Aotearoa.
Below are some fantastic links to help you begin your te reo Māori journey!
Kia manahau!