Random Play by Graham Reid

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Random Play: Racial’s coming home . . . to roost

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  • philipmatthews,

    Further to the above, this is a letter that ran in the Press in July this year:

    Pavlova, whitebait patties, afghan and anzac biscuits, Buzzy Bee, Phar Lap and Cardigan Bay, Sir Colin Meads and Sir Richard Hadlee, Speights, Lord Rutherford, Chris Knox and Dave Dobbyn, Katherine Mansfield and James K Baxter.
    No Pakeha culture? Yeah, right.

    But it could have -- and probably has -- run in any city in NZ.

    Christchurch • Since Nov 2007 • 656 posts Report Reply

  • Kyle Matthews,

    Personally, I'm sympathetic to that idea and think they should go for an official dual spelling: Wanganui/Whanganui. As they should also do Christchurch/Otautahi and so on.

    Hmm. Christchurch isn't a mispelling of Otautahi.

    Otago comes from Maori (though I suspect it's mispelled/pronounced) I believe which is an interesting comparison.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report Reply

  • Lucy Stewart,

    It's called Christchurch isn't it?

    (sorry: just anticipating the responses from elsewhere ...)

    Which would be why I'm leaving the place as soon as my degree is put away.

    No Pakeha culture

    They do realise that Pakeha is...a Maori word?

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 2105 posts Report Reply

  • Islander,

    Otago is a southern Maori word: 'b', 'l', and 'g' sounds were routinely heard by the first wave of European settlers (and can still be heard on deep south marae.) The 'o' would have been pronounced as a short 'or' sound, rather than the long 'oh.'

    Otago was a current outside Otepoti, and the first European settlers extended it. It was one of those old words brought from - let's say Hawaiiki? - and reapplied to a feature here in ANZ. Like Aoraki.

    Big O, Mahitahi, Te Wahi … • Since Feb 2007 • 5643 posts Report Reply

  • philipmatthews,

    True Islander, I should have done my homework. According to Wikipedia at least (and no direct citations for this, unfortunately), the corruption happened this way:

    Its original name was 'Otago' but European officials who had learned Māori in the North Island, visiting in the 1840s changed it to 'Otakou', believing that to be the correct form. In fact it isn't and 'Otago' is the correct southern Māori dialect word, as the earliest European records and the oldest Māori traditions both attest. But the myth is very much alive. Many people still believe that 'Otago' is a European corruption of 'Otakou'.

    Christchurch • Since Nov 2007 • 656 posts Report Reply

  • Joe Wylie,

    Pavlova, whitebait patties, afghan and anzac biscuits, Buzzy Bee, Phar Lap and Cardigan Bay, Sir Colin Meads and Sir Richard Hadlee, Speights, Lord Rutherford, Chris Knox and Dave Dobbyn, Katherine Mansfield and James K Baxter.
    No Pakeha culture? Yeah, right.

    That'd be the James K. Baxter who, commenting on the futility of attempting to suppress Maori culture, said that if all Maori were cast into jail to rot the stench would kill us all.

    flat earth • Since Jan 2007 • 4593 posts Report Reply

  • philipmatthews,

    Thought Chris Knox was the odd one out myself.

    Christchurch • Since Nov 2007 • 656 posts Report Reply

  • Rich of Observationz,

    there was once serious discussion about whether a minority people (Maori and Polynesian in our case) could actually be racist. Because, the argument went, racism was about power so the only people who could be racist were the power-holders.

    As far as I'm concerned, that argument is correct. Racism matters when it's exercised by a group with a power relationship to a weaker group.

    Back in Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 5550 posts Report Reply

  • Joe Wylie,

    Thought Chris Knox was the odd one out myself.

    Yeah. While the intricacies of pakeha culture and its on-again-off-again honours system are a little beyond me, 'Sir' Chris Knox seems less likely than 'Sir' Dave Dobbyn. Or even 'Sir' Buzzy Bee.

    flat earth • Since Jan 2007 • 4593 posts Report Reply

  • Lyndon Hood,

    Check it out:
    Khiwiblog

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 1115 posts Report Reply

  • Steve Curtis,

    There is a Hatuma lake outside Waipukurau where they dropped the W instead of the H

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 314 posts Report Reply

  • Jackie Clark,

    My Mum (60ish) really wants a T shirt that says "Michael Laws is a whanker".

    That is classic and should be acknowledged, Jeremy. Hail to the mothers, say I. And as for the man himself, I just felt overwhelmingly sad when I saw him on the telly last night. Here's a man who has some huge things going on in his personal life at the moment, and I wonder if he isn't using this as a distraction, or something. He's doing himself no favours. At all.

    Mt Eden, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 3136 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha,

    Saintly levels of compassion there, Jackie. But a timely reminder, thanks, of some demons driving the man even harder than usual.

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Jackie Clark,

    Oh, I feel no compassion for him, Sacha. Just sad that people deal with grief and pain in different ways, and his way of doing so seems to be somewhat selfdestructive.

    Mt Eden, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 3136 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha,

    You've awakened my compassion, anyway, such as it is. It takes a fair degree of suffering to get that nasty. Though he does seem uncommonly determined to stay in that space. I recall the sense of missed opportunity when others were so widely supportive about his daughter.

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha,

    Hard to take it too seriously though. Comment by "kuzmosis" below TV3's story about Sharples asking people to take the new spelling as a gift:

    I think we should take the 'h' out of Thames and give it to Wanganui, they dont use it.

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Jeremy Andrew,

    Racism matters when it's exercised by a group with a power relationship to a weaker group.

    Which means it was racist when the brown boys bullied me in PE at good old Tokoroa High for my pale geekiness?

    Hamiltron - City of the F… • Since Nov 2006 • 900 posts Report Reply

  • Jackie Clark,

    I think the saw goes that racism is macro, racial prejudice is micro.

    Mt Eden, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 3136 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha,

    geekiness

    Think you answered yr own question. :)

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha,

    When did tv3's web audience get so smart?

    abeltasman1 says:

    Wanganui if democracy means anything in this country, While we are at it how about fixing the bigger picture options
    a) Nieuw Zeeland (original )
    b) New Sealand ( english translation)
    c) New Zeeland ( compromise)

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • andrew gunn,

    And in other news: 93% of people polled think winter is too cold, vote to have summer twelve months a year.

    Because that's what democracy's all about.

    Christchurch • Since Apr 2009 • 45 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha,

    Even if it were 53%, democracy is also mob rule apparently.

    Mr Laws said both names had co-existed since 1991 - neither the council nor the community had sought to declare one choice as the "winner" and the other as the "loser".

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • mark taslov,

    Any argument either way is cultural imperialism, Maori was uniquely oral, the alphabetization was an imposition of European imperatives on an otherwise fully functional language.

    Now, the Roman alphabetization's foothold on the consciousness seems to have usurped the inherent oralness and previously unquantifiable beauty the language possessed prior to the imposition of the European system.

    The underlying assumption beneath all this is that the Roman Alphabet and in turn the English interpretation of the Roman alphabet naturally has the phonemic versatility to do the Maori language justice.

    In Chinese, Wanganui is written 旺加努伊 pronounced (roughly) wang(4) jia(1) nu(3) li(1) in Mandarin. To our anglicised ears it is not a sufficient representation of the phonemic characteristics of the Maori word in question, it could be argued that Mandarin lacks the phonemic variety to do this Maori word justice, and so by the same token it can be argued that the Anglicised Roman alphabet is similarly inadequate. To my ears it's also insufficient to the point that no amount of tweaking will ever truly do the Maori language justice.

    To illustrate the extent to which this cultural imperialism dominates this debate, it's worth considering how much the alphabetization of an oral and fluid language could stymie that language's speed of progress, development and geographic variation, ie. to the extent that the potential development of a unique written Maori language has been essentially annexed out of contention as a viable development. It seems on this issue that people are not so much engaged in discussing how to spell something as much as how to better appropriate and impose a version of a name, ie. Eddie Izzard 'flags' an argument which is to all intense and purposes academic.

    Were a sign for W(h)anganui to accord
    total respect for the intrinsic features of the Maori language it would read "___________ "

    Te Ika-a-Māui • Since Mar 2008 • 2281 posts Report Reply

  • Sam F,

    Were a sign for W(h)anganui to accord
    total respect for the intrinsic features of the Maori language it would read "___________ "

    Um. Not meaning to come across rude, but...

    In the absence of what you might call a perfectly 'authentic' system for doing the Maori language justice in written form, can we perhaps just allow Maori to decide on the appropriate treatment of their own freaking words ?

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 1611 posts Report Reply

  • mark taslov,

    As I began "Any argument either way is cultural imperialism, "

    Te Ika-a-Māui • Since Mar 2008 • 2281 posts Report Reply

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