Coastal Cannibals: Industry and Occupation on Whangārei Te Rerenga Parāoa

Located on New Zealand’s north-east coast, Whangārei Te Rerenga Parāoa (the Whangārei Harbour) is a place of significant cultural, ecological and historical significance for the different hapū (subtribes) and iwi (tribes) who continue to reside there. A contested and consumed space, the harbour offers powerful examples of the tensions between Māori sovereignty and the Crown-imposed legislation that continue to limit indigenous possibilities. For these harbour tribes, maintaining the unbroken occupation of land and sea has not been straightforward. Hapū and iwi contend with colonial assumptions of supremacy, land confiscation, heavy industry, residential developments, and regional policies that disregard tribal authority and disrupt kaitiakitanga (guardianship relations) – all while continuing to reside and exist as Māori in place. Starting from a consideration of Crown legislation designed to exclude Māori from economic interests in the foreshore and seabed, this creative-led research traverses the impacts, contradictions, and possibilities of ‘development’ within Whangārei Te Rerenga Parāoa. Particular attention is paid to the way that contemporary legislative definitions continue the colonial project of ‘Othering’; reducing possibilities in order to rule. In rejection of this limitation, the exegesis draws upon the concept of ‘visual sovereignty’, engaging the potential of art as a form of counter-hegemonic intervention: challenging settled understandings and offering an expression of the specificity and diversity associated with indigenous peoples, our stories, and the ways we choose to tell them. Through this assertion of self-determination, the making documented here examines the ways in which industry and development in the harbour function not only as a source of tension for hapū and iwi, placing huge pressure on the ocean and surrounding environment, but also provide necessary jobs and income, supporting the on-going occupation that lies at the heart of what it means to be indigenous. In the postcolonial tradition of ‘speaking back’, this exegesis offers a different, less certain picture than that implied by Crown-imposed definitions, canvasing and complicating the various ways in which Māori continue to assert our sovereignty: from presence to petitions to art; worlds made by and for our own.

Name thesis:degree_name

DocFA

Level thesis:degree_level

Doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Fine Arts

Grantor dc:publisher

ResearchSpace@Auckland

Year dc:date.issued

2022

Author dc:creator

• Harrison, Ngahuia Raima

Advisors dc:contributor.advisor

• Robinson, Peter
• Muru-Lanning, Marama

Statement dc:rights

• Items in ResearchSpace are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• https://researchspace.auckland.ac.nz/docs/uoa-docs/rights.htm

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/2292/63884

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:researchspace.auckland.ac.nz:2292/63884