Flint & Steel | Volume 01 - on belonging and national identity

ISBN 978-0-9864662-8-1

9 780986 466281

Routes and Roots 04 | A Nation at Play 08 | Cultural Turtle 13 | Reconciliation, Colonisation, and Identity in Aotearoa 16 | An Uninterrupted Horizon 30 | New Zealand – In Search of a New National Identity 32 | The Challenges of Integration 40 | White Paint 46

NZD $13.95 INC GST SUMMER 2013

volume 01 - on belonging and national identity

CONTENTS Editorial Routes and Roots / Michelle Tait A Nation at Play / Patrick Silloway Cultural Turtle / Dietrich Soakai Reconciliation, Colonisation and Identity in Aotearoa, New Zealand / Alistair Reese Here's Our Home / Stephan Vermeulen & Nakita Whittaker An Uninterrupted Horizon / Deborah Teh New Zealand – In Search of a New National Identity / Dr Philippa Smith The Challenges of Integration: Lessons From Britain / Dr Jeffrey W. Bailey White Paint / Jaimee Abict

02 04 08 13 16 20 30 32 40 46

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Editorial staff Jaimee Abict Jane Silloway Smith Jeremy Vargo Design Saskia Thorne Photography Stephan Vermeulen & Nakita Whittaker www.stephanandnakita.com Printer Wickliffe Solutions Publisher Maxim Institute editorial@flintandsteelmag.com www.flintandsteelmag.com

Copyright © 2013 Maxim Institute ISBN 978-0-9864662-8-1 Maxim Institute is a not-for-profit independent research think tank, based in Auckland.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or in part without permission from the publishers. The views expressed in Flint & Steel are those of the respective contributors and are not necessarily shared by the publication or its staff.

EDITORIAL Welcome to the inaugural issue of Flint & Steel.

This annual publication aims to live up to its moniker’s metaphor: we want it to spark thought and creativity. In curating a variety of ideas around a central theme each year, we hope to provide a chance for readers to think deeply about the things that affect all of us.

We are also trying to bring back the long read, by the by. Technology might have rewired many of us to read in 140 character increments, but we still believe in ink on bound paper, quiet corners, and phones on airplane mode every now and then. It’s good for humanity.

THE 2013 VOLUME: ON BELONGING, AND NATIONAL IDENTITY Nations and national identities are not static things—they are constantly evolving.

Products of history, geography, demography, culture, and sometimes sheer happenstance, nations and their identities both define and are defined by their people.

How we come to recognise ourselves as a nation, or for that matter find ourselves belonging within one, is more important than we know. The stark reality is that if we don’t think about these things, someone else will tell us who we are – be it filtered through art, lyrics, policy, or national discussion.

In this edition you will find a series of essays to spark your thinking on the issues of belonging and national identity and—for those who call Aotearoa home—to highlight the beauty of the nation that is ours. International perspectives on integration and the creation of identity via narrative sit alongside essays that focus more squarely on home: the role of sport in tying the nation together, how our national identity has been and continues to be formed, and the promise that reconciliation holds for bringing all of our diverse peoples together. Personal reflections, photo essays, and poetry delve further into that eternal question: what does it mean to be a New Zealander?

We Kiwis are a ragtag bunch. The ingenuity, the mumbling, the penchant for desserts made from lightly whipped egg whites, the wry humour, the love of the ocean, the ability to pronounce the words “Whangamomona” and “bach” correctly, the ethereal beauty of the South and the flagrant disregard for road code adherence in the North. We’re a young nation, meaning we’re both innovative and still a little culturally undefined. But therein lies the beauty. We have the potential to cultivate a national identity for ourselves that best reflects us as a people today.

As you read, may this volume inspire you to understand and interpret our historical legacy, be encouraged by what is already developing among us, and become passionate about where we grow from here. Quiet corners await you.

The Flint & Steel editorial team Editorial | 03

04 | Routes and Roots

ROUTES and ROOTS MICHELLE TAIT

H

aving recently arrived in New Zealand from South Africa, I have been met with myriad questions about myself and about my country, including: what do South Africans eat?

How many safaris have you been on? Why are South Africans so good at rugby? (cough cough) And the most frequently asked question: do you know where to (cue thick Afrikaans accent) park your car?

Each time I am asked to tell my story or small facts about “South Africanness,” I reaffirm my own identity as a South African, and it has been both interesting and amusing watching myself becoming increasingly patriotic. A sense of patriotism has not been my only discovery, however, as I have found myself confronted with questions of: “how do I find a place to call home outside of home?” And “why do I feel like I need to be re-introduced to myself?”

Given that I spent an entire year exploring questions of identity and home through postgraduate study in English Literature, I thought that I would have a pretty good handle on these particular concepts when coming to New Zealand. As it turns out, the transition from theory to experience has not been as smooth as I would have hoped, and I have found myself grappling with the need to find words to make sense of my time in a foreign environment.

REFLECTIONS UPON THE USE OF NARRATIVE IN IDENTITY FORMATION I have always been incredibly fascinated by words and language. I am intrigued by the way our words shape our experiences and construct the way we see and understand the world. Some things certainly cannot be confined to description, but I love the fact that we are able to capture ideas and beauty and truth in words—even if the ones we find only give us glimpses of the reality they invoke.

I am interested in the way human beings are always trying to find new ways of saying things, and how in finding the right words, we are able to make sense of our worlds.

Directly connected to my fascination with words and their significance in clarifying (and confusing) the way we perceive things, I chose to use a Master’s thesis as means of looking at the way in which people construct home and identity through narrative. My thesis sought to navigate and explore African diasporic identity by looking at three very different postcolonial novels birthed out of the Atlantic context (at different points of the Atlantic triangle and at different moments in history): The Chosen Place, The Timeless People (1969) by Paule Marshall; Our Sister Killjoy or Reflections from a Black-eyed Squint (1977) by Ama Ata Aidoo; and Crossing the River (1993) by Caryl Phillips. Recognising the weight of location—cultural, geographic, temporal—on the narrative construction of identity, I attempted to trace the way in which Aidoo, Marshall, and Phillips use fictional texts as tools for grappling with ideas of home and belonging in a world of displacement, fracture, and (ex)change.

Marshall’s The Chosen Place is written within one geographic space—fictional Bourne Island, situated in the Caribbean during the late 1900s. While the island remains unattached and essentially free-floating within the Atlantic Ocean, both the land and its inhabitants epitomise creolity—or the blending of cultures or racial groups (eg. European and African) evidenced in language, dress codes, and cultural practices—unable to conceal the scars of exit and entry manufactured by the colonial enterprise. Caught in the confluence between the history (memory) of Africa as origin and Europe as colonial motherland, the people of Bourne Island reflect

Michelle Tait | 05

the ambiguity of the place they have come to call home.

Aidoo’s Our Sister Killjoy, providing much in the way of diaspora history and its far reaching impact, takes place on a two-dimensional scale, moving between Africa and Europe, following the travels of a young Ghanaian woman, Sissie. With an undisguised emphasis on nationalism and pan-Africanism, Aidoo’s story insists that there can be no home for the diasporan outside the geographic coordinates of the African continent.

The third and final text, Phillips’s Crossing the River, presents a transnational narrative and an amalgam of stories and characters, touching the shores of Africa, England, and America, as well as devoting an entire section to life aboard a slaving vessel.

The three texts present perspectives either vested in the relationship of identity to a sense of (physical) rootedness—which naturally takes on a nationalistic agenda—and that of identity as a far more transnational, malleable, and mobile process, more appropriately explained as the result of routes. Where geographic roots are considered to be the most important element in identity realisation for the diasporan, there is only one option available for those seeking a place to call home: return. However, where the impact of routes is considered as a far more transformative and powerful force, the emphasis shifts from one of return to one of embracing a mobile and fragmented existence. All three novels are by no means autobiographies, and yet the stories created by the 06 | Routes and Roots

authors are certainly attempts to construct, with words, narratives in which their own (transatlantic) identities make some sense. Despite reaching vastly disparate conclusions, the texts portray how integral stories and relationships are in the realisation and formation of identity and belonging.

FINDING HOME Turning to today’s (Western) society—a perpetually restless society—we see many people yearning to find and hold onto some form of stability and security despite the assumed glamour of a lifestyle governed by variation and distraction.

Not unlike the postcolonial novels I analysed in my thesis, we too seek to find narratives that will tell us who we are and where we belong.

While much of the late-twentieth century placed an emphasis on “nationality and race” in telling these stories, it seems the historical scales have now been tipped somewhat to incorporate and celebrate the transnational, the fluid, the cosmopolitan.

The life of Caryl Phillips, the author of Crossing the River, provides one such example of this trend. Born in the West Indies (consequently having African ancestors), raised in England, and now dwelling in North America, Phillips’s writing—both fictional

and non-fictional—reflects his struggle to define “home.” Unsure of his national identity, Phillips considers himself as belonging not to any one of these specific localities, but to the Atlantic Ocean itself.

I would also argue that because of his lack of personal connection to a particular place, Phillips uses his writing to create and capture a sense of home that finds expression through stories—stories that continually question what it means to be human. In A New World Order, a collection of essays written by Phillips, he records his unspoken thoughts during a conversation with a hotel waiter in West Africa: These days we are all unmoored. Our identities are fluid.

Belonging is a contested state. Home is a place riddled with vexing questions […] I want to tell Daniel that this boy has had to understand the Africa of his ancestry, the Caribbean of his birth, the Britain of his upbringing, and the United States where he now resides, as one harmonious entity.

He has tried to write in the face of a late-twentieth century world that has sought to reduce identity to unpalatable clichés of nationality and race.

In today’s society, cosmopolitanism has become rather fashionable, attaching itself to presupposed aesthetic and intellectual qualities.

The more places you visit, cultures you encounter and the more eclectic and transnational you seem, the more “street cred” you earn. With the general adoption of a “global” mind-set and a society that values travel and mobility, comes a subtle disdain for nationalism (except, of course, during international sports matches).

Whether we desire a particular nation or group with which to identify, to create our own exciting, cosmopolitan sense of self, or whether we are trying to find some kind of coherency within a fragmented existence, the underlying assumption is that as human beings we desire to be known. We are constantly seeking to find a story that is able to provide clarity, meaning, and purpose to our lives. If we cannot find such a narrative, we assume the role of author and simply try to construct one.

For all our searching and creativity, however, the beauty of being known is simply not possible outside of relationship. I am aware that this may seem glaringly obvious, but it is so easily forgotten. On our quests towards self-discovery we tend to forget that we have been designed for relationship—with our creator, our communities, and with the natural world around us. Without discounting the immense impact of culture and history, this is as true for those who have lived in the same place all their lives, as it is for those who have constantly been on the move. To be human is to come to know ourselves as we are known and held by others. To quote Regent College Professor

Craig Gay: “to the extent that we are free from others, we are alienated from ourselves.”

This may mean that when we move from within a familiar cultural and historical framework to one that is strangely unfamiliar, we will encounter difference. New locations do not nullify our connection to our geographic roots, but allow us to see—sometimes with surprising clarity—the cultural and national lenses we have been wearing without even noticing.

The beauty of encountering difference is that we are not simply absorbed into it, but that we are changed in the process. We are able to appreciate, celebrate, and learn from difference, particularly as we come to see it embodied in the people we meet.

Designed to live in relationship and desiring to be known, we are continually confronted by the stories of people’s lives; stories often very different to our own.

Drawing on the work of James Clifford, I found his definition of diasporic identity helpful for the purposes of my research as well as for my own experience. He suggests that identity comes to encompass and complicate multiple ways to “stay […] and be something else,” to retain elements of previous national and cultural affiliations from one’s original “home,” while coming to weave threads of new cultural, linguistic, and contextual forms into another narrative of self in community. Kiwi poet Glenn Colquhoun puts it this way: The art of walking upright here, Is the art of using both feet.

One is for holding on.

One is for letting go.

Entering into the New Zealand context has been a fascinating and challenging process as I have struggled to make sense of my own identity outside of the familiar contours of the South African culture, landscape, and people. I have been confronted with difference and beauty, with clarity and confusion, and in the process I have come to see that I cannot hold onto familiarity as a substitute for security.

I have come to see that being proud of my South African home and heritage does not have to be mutually exclusive to embracing and celebrating the story of a different people and place. There is a deep, resonant sense of belonging in opening oneself up to being known and to knowing others. Community is a gift, and to be fully human is to find oneself in the midst of it. •

Michelle Tait is the Communications and Social Media Coordinator for Laidlaw College in Auckland. She completed her Master of Arts in English literature at the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa, in 2012. Michelle's thesis explored the use of narrative and memory in the creation of identity, with specific focus on the African diaspora.

Michelle Tait | 07

A NATION at PLAY PATRICK SILLOWAY

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ugby is a deeply entrenched aspect of New Zealand culture. It may be seen in young boys playing rugby in a schoolyard, in a father kicking the ball around with his children on the beach, in legions of fans clad in black making their way to a test match, and in the boisterous crowds who gather in pubs throughout the country to cheer on their local team. In many ways rugby is the national game of New Zealand.

To understand how rugby came not only to dominate all other sports in the Kiwi psyche but also to be the game of the nation, we have to go back to colonial days.

In colonial New Zealand, rugby was a game that both reflected New Zealand society and served as a vehicle for national assertion. Rugby as an institution was unafraid to adopt the ideals of the rural pioneer society around it, and so it melded with that society and became an extension of it.

The extent to which colonial New Zealand was identified, both at home and abroad, with rugby may be seen in the first tour of a New Zealand team to Britain in 1905. That tour exemplified a convergence of culture and sport that continues today, and results in a country that is enthralled with rugby.

THE 1905 TOUR OF BRITAIN The first tour of an all-New Zealand football team to Britain in 1905 reveals how New Zealand became a rugby nation. The team that was selected—though a majority came from the population centres of Auckland, Canterbury, Otago, and Wellington—had representatives

08 | A Nation at Play

from throughout the colony’s two islands, from Auckland to Invercargill. Their occupations were just as varied, though the majority came from professional or industrial backgrounds. The captain of the team, David Gallaher, was a foreman; his vice-captain, Billy Stead, was a bootmaker. Also on the team were blacksmiths, farmers, clerks, and even a civil servant. Though some of the players were of the skilled working class, and were likely more educated than the rest of the colony’s population, to the New Zealand public they still embodied the rural, working-class spirit of the nation. Whether they were a journalist or a slaughterman, they were all colonial pioneers, and they all wanted to win.

The expectations for the team were very high, with the papers, like the Evening Post in October, remarking that “their performances would be closely followed in New Zealand, as football was the national game of the colony.” The telegram the team received from the Prime Minister Richard Seddon at the start of the tour shows the level of the colony’s hope and pride attached to the venture: Confidently anticipated present team prove equal to strongest teams in England, demonstrating advancement scientific Rugby football in this colony […] information respecting contests taking place Great Britain awaited almost as eagerly as news late war South Africa […] The natural and healthy conditions of colonial life produce stalwart and athletic sons of whom New Zealand and the Empire are justly proud.

By drawing comparisons to the Boer War, Seddon established that this tour was more than just a series of games; it was a test of New Zealand’s imperial fitness.

His allusions to the scientific advancement that the colony had

Image: Frank Gillett – All Blacks vs. England, 1905

Patrick Silloway | 09

made in the game, as well as the masculine attributes he described in the players, illustrate colonial inventiveness and New Zealand’s pioneer, virile spirit. New Zealand had high hopes for what their team could achieve, and knew positive results would reflect well on the colony as a whole.

The New Zealand team understood what was expected from them and what was at stake, and they took the tour very seriously from the start. On their long voyage, it was reported in the Evening Post, they trained every day with “a good run round the lower deck, then a lot of scrum work, practicing formation. After this […] dumbbell exercises.” When they arrived in England, their behaviour before matches struck the English cricketer E.H.D. Sewell as particularly intriguing. He commented, “if a team of Rugby players, the members of which are locked into their rooms after lunch for an hour’s rest before changing to go down to the ground, does not mean strict business, I should like to know what it does mean.” The team from New Zealand had come not simply to play, but to win.

Maintaining their fitness and their mindset was essential to that ambition, and their approaches to the game in those regards were reflections of the win-first mindset that dominated the game in the colony.

When the matches began, the team’s commitment to fitness was the first thing that clearly set them apart from their opponents.

In their early games against Devonshire and Cornwall, the better conditioned and practiced New Zealanders could literally run their opponents to defeat. Even as the tour went on, the British teams would hold their own in the first half only to fade in the second as conditioning became a factor. These results caused A.O. Jones, the Leicester fullback, to admit that the British “have not the same class of players as the New Zealanders.”

Beyond physical advantage, the New Zealanders also brought to bear that “advancement scientific” the Prime Minister had hoped they would demonstrate. This was most notable in the way the colonial team formed its scrum. Traditionally, the scrum formation had three players in the front row, two behind them, and another three forming a back row. The New Zealand scrum, however, was built two-three-two, allowing one of their forwards to remain with only his hand on the scrum, ready to play the ball as soon as it was ready, a position referred to as a wing forward, and played during the tour by the team captain, Gallaher. This gave New Zealand an advantage in the set-piece, both in driving, as they could negate the pushing force of three of their opponents forwards, and in the speed with which they could get the ball to the backs on offense or put pressure on the opposition in defence. This innovation was important because of its originality, but also because, to many of the fans and commentators, it was unsporting, and thus illustrative of a win-first attitude amongst the New Zealanders.

Their tactical advantage, however, extended beyond the scrum.

10 | A Nation at Play

The Daily Mail described the New Zealanders as “opportunists in the best sense of the word,” as they would exploit whatever breaks their opponents’ weaknesses offered and were determined to do whatever was needed to score.

The touring team played with vigour and, according to the Evening Post, “made no mistake about tackling low and hard.” The style of play that had often been referred to back home in New Zealand as “free and easy” was winning games and fans in Britain.

From early on in the tour, the crowds that came out to watch the games set attendance records at athletic parks across Britain, especially for New Zealand’s test matches against the British nations and Ireland, which were the real main events of the tour. After the tourists defeated Scotland and Ireland, the demand for tickets to their test with England caused the game to be relocated to a larger capacity venue. The New Zealanders handily defeated the English team, and all the Chairman of the Rugby Football Union could say to the visitors after the game was that “England was grateful on being awakened from her slackness by her colonial sons.”

New Zealand’s march of victory across Britain and Ireland was only halted in their final test with Wales. The game was incredibly close, and the Welsh emerged with a 3-0 victory, an early score the only points in the only defeat the New Zealanders suffered on their tour. Defeat was painful for the people of New Zealand, but they found solace in the quality of the competition they had lost to and in the determination of their players. The colonial papers remarked that “the standard of football played in [Wales] must be immeasurably superior to that in other parts of Britain,” and the Prime Minister himself congratulated the team for “the grit with which [they] fought after the mishap,” which has only “made us more proud of them.”

Though the climactic game of the tour resulted in defeat, the New Zealand footballers, who had come to be known as the “All Blacks,” had had a profound impact on the perception of the colony in Britain and around the empire, and were a major boost to national prestige. The Sydney Morning Herald announced that “the New Zealanders have done for football what the Australians did for cricket – they have revolutionized the game.”

THE NATIONAL GAME OF THE COLONY By 1905, rugby had not only attracted a large following in New Zealand, it had become the national game. The 1905 tour exhibited

New Zealand’s nationalist sentiments because rugby in New Zealand had become an expression of the colony’s identity even before the tour established them as a formidable rugby-playing nation.

This was because rugby in New Zealand had absorbed the culture of the colony as a whole, rather than trying to maintain British norms of play, and reflected back on the colony what it wanted to see in itself. The pioneer spirit of New Zealand defined the way they played rugby.

Image: William Hall Raine – rugby jerseys drying on washing lines, Wellington, c. 1930s

The article went on to compare, as Seddon had done at the tour’s outset, the exploits of the footballers with those of New Zealand’s soldiers in South Africa. The local papers, too, understood the effect the tour’s success had on the perception of New Zealand in the imperial sphere. The Evening Post called it “a unanimous verdict that the victory over England in the Metropolis before 80,000 people is the greatest advertisement the colony has ever had.” Though the team failed to remain undefeated, the All Blacks’ exploits had put New Zealand on the map.

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Image: Wikimedia Commons –Queensland vs. All Blacks, 1907

One of the clearest reasons for why colonial New Zealanders took to rugby is because it was masculine and violent. Because New Zealand was primarily colonised by workingmen, a game built on the importance of physical strength and physique found a better foothold here than it would have elsewhere. Colonial New Zealanders were fiercely proud of their physical abilities as part of the larger pioneer spirit that drove the society. It was a culture that firmly believed in its virility and hardiness, and so naturally gravitated to a game that reaffirmed that self-image.

The style of play in colonial New Zealand followed from this attention to physicality. Indeed, so aggressive was the play of the New Zealanders during the tour in 1905, it surpassed the definition of their British hosts. After their game with Leicester during the 1905 tour, the correspondent for the Evening Post commented, “many thought the game rough, but to a New Zealander it was not so.” The aggressive, physical aspects of the game certainly made the game more popular in a colony that prided itself on being a haven for masculinity and physical prowess.

Thus rugby became the national game of an emerging New Zealand. Rather than merely play the game, New Zealand’s footballers strove to innovate, to make it their own, and to dominate their opponents. The physical play that made the game so popular and the use of innovative formations and tactics were results of the win-first attitude that defined the New Zealand style. The New Zealander played to win, a habit formed in interprovincial play wherein the glory of the province was at stake. The concentration on winning created a sporting culture around the game that allowed for, and demanded, extensive practice and skill.

New Zealand’s players were fit and physical, and, to many, the perfect illustration of the kind of man

the colony could create. The rugby player was the man that colonial New Zealanders believed they were, and his success was their success.

Thus, when the New Zealand team tore through Britain’s sides in 1905, it was said to have “aroused the greatest enthusiasm among all classes of the community.”

This enthusiasm lasts even today, and even modern members of the All Blacks still remember and idolise the “Originals” as workingclass pioneers. In 1996, the biographer of the All Black forward and captain Sir Brian Lochore, who played from 1963 to 1970, explained that Brian “would have been […] a young farmer of the 1890s, a pioneer breaking the land with horse and plough […] And if that meant being a 1905 All Black that would have been just fine with him too. Pioneering in farming and rugby would have suited him.” New Zealand’s players and fans, even today, see themselves as farmer pioneers. They are virile and physical, and the men in the black jerseys are living embodiments of the strength of the nation.

Rugby rose to prominence in colonial New Zealand because it was the sport that best reflected the spirit of the colony’s people.

Rugby as it was played and organised in the colony reflected the working-class, provincially-minded, and pioneer-spirited ethos of the society. More physical and innovative play, combined with a strong desire to win at all costs, assured its ascendance. Rugby provided an outlet for colonial pride, and the success of the team that toured Britain in 1905 represented the virility the colony believed it possessed. The New Zealanders were playing to win.

Today, though modern New Zealand is more than lumber and sheep farming, the pioneer spirit lives on, and whenever the All Blacks take the field, the nation still urges them on, demanding that they play the national game to win. •

Patrick Silloway is a law student at the Walter F. George School of Law at Mercer University in the United States. In 2012, he completed an honours thesis on the history of rugby culture in New Zealand at the University of Georgia.

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| A Nation at Play

CULTURAL TURTLE DIETRICH SOAKAI

Dietrich Soakai

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I AM Confused At 5 years old being asked by my Tongan family “Tama si ha koi ia? Tamasi Tonga pe tamasi Ha’amoa?”

“What kind of boy are you? A Tongan boy or a Samoan boy” Questions of my belonging, Tongan or Samoan?

In a split second thinking my answer could split us and beckon parting Initiating apartheid Separate gatherings that are no longer BBQ meals or umu.

There has never been in the early history of this new family celebratory meals Shared between both sides Just an untangled line of ethnicity that asks me to choose sides.

I AM Part Tongan, Samoan, German, Irish, Scottish I know I don’t look it, in fact I’m sure some of my ancestors Wouldn’t be able to identify or recognize them, in me But see, that don’t deter me From still calling them family Cause I come from ancient waka and ships That connected lonely islands with big continents A line of blood that embodies unity and change That we don’t need to look the same, or carry the same names But that we are linked This is uniquely us Me.

14 | A Nation at Play

One side says, “famili,” another says, “aaiga” One says, “ha’u kai,” another says, “sau e ai” But they never say this to each other Cause they couldn’t see eye to eye Or words to ear Because indifference and ignorance blocks their ears The blood of ancestors split over issues of land and sea are what keeps them apart And is what disconnects them from each other And disconnects them to me And disconnects me to me Which makes me claim KIWI As my identity Too much tension in this tug of war for allegiance I can’t side with one or the other Because I have a German, Irish, Scottish Samoan mother and a Tongan father They make me There is no part of me that is neatly divided I have just come to embrace who I AM And the one thing they first ever agreed on was that I was in Tongan “Sione Palangi,” John the white skinned Or in Samoan, “fia palangi,” wanna be white And in a way

I AM My earliest recollections of racial interactions would have been at primary school in Palmerston North These palangi people didn’t see Samoan or Tongan, they just saw brown And I I just saw white No one asked me if I was Samoan or Tongan Because back in 1989, they had never heard of those islands before In fact, they asked if I was Māori At which I replied, at the age of eight Yes Because we made trips to their Marae Had hāngī which was real similar to umu, just more earthy I felt a connection as I learnt about Māui, and the Māori creation story of Papatūānuku Mother Earth and Ranginui Father Sky and their Separation, which was the genesis of Creation I looked kind of like them so I was content with acceptance.

As I grew older I would describe myself as an Oreo, dark on the outside But white on the inside, looking for somewhere to belong.

I AM a cultural turtle who might not be the fastest creature But there is a surety that I will eventually reach my cultural destination I can navigate through seas of diversity To connect between various ethnicities And I feel that I can skillfully Go from land to sea Because I am after all a son of the sea and land.

I AM a turtle An AFAKASI A creature of in-between Sharing stories from the sea to land and the land to sea I am a generation who makes the connection between the two nations.

I AM

Dietrich Soakai is a youth and Alternative Education support worker at Youthline, an organisation that provides an integrated response to youth, family, and community needs. Dietrich is also a member of the South Auckland Poets Collective, a group that uses spoken word poetry as a tool for positive social change with a focus on young people.

Dietrich Soakai

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16 | Reconciliation, Colonisation and Identity in Aotearoa New Zealand

RECONCILIATION, COLONISATION, and IDENTITY

in AOTEAROA, New Zealand ALISTAIR REESE

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n the Shaping of History, the late historian Judith Binney wrote, “[T]here have been two remembered histories of New Zealand since 1840: that of the colonizers, and that of the colonized. Their visions and goals were different, creating memories which have been patterned by varying hopes and experiences.”

Like many Pākehā growing up in the 1960s, my “remembered history” was shaped by the monolingual and essentially monocultural educational years that reflected the perspectives of my peers and forebears. However, this way of remembering was challenged in the 1970s onwards, not only for me, but also nationally by the emergence of another account in the land that demanded attention. This version belonged to Māori, whose new-found voice found a place to reveal not, in fact, a “new” story, but an enduring one that had informed their claims of identity and belonging, arguably since their arrival by various waka more than a millennium ago.

Since the 1980s, I have taken part in various “education” fora, which aim at bringing Pākehā, particularly, into the conversation about this country’s colonial history. From these events it became evident to me that the call to recognise the historical and present injustices experienced by Māori caused some Pākehā to feel insecure about their identity and sense of belonging. I characterise this

response as follows: “Māori seem clear about who they are, but what about us? Who are we, and how do we fit in this land?”

THE PĀKEHĀ QUEST FOR IDENTITY AND BELONGING Such a response on the part of Pākehā to the redefining of New Zealand’s political and cultural landscape is both natural and important for our psychological and social well-being. Social geographer Anne Buttimer argues that “location” is important to identity. In The Human Experience of Space and Place, she maintains that “people’s sense of both personal and cultural identity is intimately bound up with place … and that the ‘loss of home’ or ‘losing one’s place’ may often trigger an identity crisis.”

Her insights are important, not only in her linking of identity to place, but especially in her observation that a “dislocation,” real or imagined, from these “places” may produce an identity crisis, perhaps echoing what has happened to Pākehā since the 1970s.

In a similar vein, British sociologist Jeffrey Weeks has noted that “identity is about belonging…At its most basic, it gives you a sense of personal location, the stable core of your individuality.” Thus identity is intricately linked to belonging and is understood as being crucial to human well-being, or as Weeks describes it, to our “social core.”

Although the post-1970 attempts by Pākehā to re-formulate their identity are not in themselves misplaced, I remain concerned that

Alistair Reese

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this identity quest may negatively impact upon others, especially Māori.

As Pākehā seek to construct their identity, they will necessarily need to create a narrative, or a story, about themselves. Such a narrative—and by implication its associated identity— will be neither value-free nor exist in a social vacuum.

Rather, it will be an ontological or existential reality that in some contexts may contradict or compete with the social narratives and identities held by others, causing tension or conflict.

An idea that has been posited recently with regard to Pākehā identity revolves around the concept of indigeneity. Late New Zealand historian and biographer Michael King was one of the first to explore identity in response to the new political and cultural landscape brought about by the Māori renaissance. His book Being Pakeha, published in 1985, galvanised a wide-spread response.

One influential notion he posited there was the claim that people like himself who were “committed New Zealanders” had earned “indigenous” status. These claims of indigeneity were echoed in a paper, We are all New Zealanders Now, which was presented by the then-Race Relations Minister Trevor Mallard to the Stout Research Centre in July 2004. His presentation was both a reiteration of some of King’s ideas as well as being a political response to the January 2004 Nationhood speech by the then-leader of the National Party, Don Brash. While Brash did not state explicitly that Pākehā were indigenous, his speech, which challenged the idea of an indigenous “special” status for Māori, equated to a similar outcome. These claims of indigeneity for all (or for none) continue to present

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themselves in a variety of fora as many Pākehā either promote their own indigenous status or, conversely, deny that the term when applied to Māori accords them any uniqueness. These identity perspectives might also be summarised in the seemingly reasonable and often heard phrase “We are all New Zealanders,” which in turn might be progressed to “We are all indigenous!”

THE PĀKEHĀ QUEST FOR IDENTITY AND THE POTENTIAL FOR ETHNIC TENSION AND CONFLICT In Exclusion, the Croatian theologian Miroslav Volf said that while the will for identity is universal, it is also the fuel for many of the world’s conflicts. Does the Pākehā quest for identity and its appropriation of the identifier “indigenous” have the potential to contribute to ethnic tension or possible conflict?

Certainly, if viewed via the old adage of “sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me,” then the use of “indigenous” as an appellation is harmless, and whatever Māori are called or whatever Pākehā choose to call themselves becomes irrelevant. However, given the impact of colonialism, the project of “naming” becomes incredibly relevant.

The Australian spatial historian Paul Carter was one of the first scholars to draw attention to the use of “naming” by settlers as a means of “possessing” new territories. In The Road to Botany Bay, he argues that “by the act of place-naming, space is transformed symbolically into a place that is a space with history.” In the instance of Australia, the “history” that was conveyed via the settler “naming” was an extremely truncated one, but one that effectively cemented the European footprint upon that land. In a similar vein, New Zealand historian Giselle Byrnes, in Boundary Markers, claims that to

perceive colonisation in the New Zealand context by only focussing on war and confiscation has tended to obscure the power of “naming” as a colonising strategy. While not all “naming” efforts were necessarily strategic and merely reveal the hubris of a dominant people group, the net effect is a replacement of the indigenous footprint and the associated loss of mana that results from such re-naming.

Although Carter’s and Byrnes’ research pertains particularly to geographical locations, it is not unreasonable to extrapolate their ideas to the Pākehā identity quest.

A careless use of terms such as “indigenous” and “New Zealander” by the majority population equates to a form of identity replacement. The use of the term “indigenous” and the more subtle phrase “we are all New Zealanders” by Pākehā, while satisfying their existential need to belong, has an equalising effect upon Māori – one that subsumes them within a convenient national narrative and undermines the uniqueness of their identity and any associated rights which should be accorded them either under common law or the Treaty of Waitangi.

This equalising move carries echoes of previous colonial practice and provokes some scholars to suggest that “old habits die hard.”

Cultural historian Peter Gibbons, for one, warns, “[C]olonization is not just an early morning fog that dissipates mid-morning as the bright sun of national identity comes out.” He argues that colonisation is not a ‘finished event,’ but that colonising tendencies are apparent especially within the wider “New Zealand as nation” discourse. He proposes that while there is a geographical entity that is called New Zealand, in almost every other way the term is a “discursive construction,” as is the related “national identity” or “New Zealand identity.” In other words, they are identifiers which have the appearance of being self-evident but are actually social constructions which carry and signal certain cultural, historical, and political assumptions. It is because of this that the Pākehā quest for belonging should not be viewed as an autonomous or an innocuous activity. Given our history, it is one that requires an historical awareness and sensitivity in order to avoid the perpetuation of past colonising tendencies and a consequent ethnic tension.

TOWARDS RECONCILIATION It is clear that the Māori-Pākehā relationship continues to be in need of healing, restoration, and clarity. Furthermore, because it is a foundational relationship for this country, vis-à-vis Waitangi, its restoration is an important piece of the wider reconciliatory puzzle within our pluralistic and multicultural society. One way that Pākehā

might contribute to the healing of their relationship with Māori is simply by refraining from inappropriate “naming” – this is one side of the reconciliation equation. The other is the search for suitable identity identifiers.

I suggest the term “Pākehā,” which I have been using throughout this article to describe those of European descent, is a good example of a “reconciled identity.” Despite the unfounded fears over its meaning, it suitably identifies a people group and locates them geographically and culturally. Former High Court Judge Eddie Durie has proposed another: he has stated that Pākehā need to understand that the Treaty of Waitangi is not only for Māori but for Pākehā too. Accordingly he has offered the term “tangata tiriti,” or “people of the Treaty,” as a possible identifier. This is a term that affords Pākehā a status of belonging on the basis of the Treaty and juxtaposes their identity with Māori as “tangata whenua,” or “people of the land.” Another possibility has been suggested by Michael King, in The Silence Beyond. He offers that “Maori and Pakeha in New Zealand are in a relationship in the nature of siblings: tuakana and teina, to use the Maori expressions for older and younger brothers or sisters.” He suggests that “the tuakana culture does deserve respect for being here first, of being the longest occupiers of the land and the people who first gave that land names and history.” King continues, “[T]he tuakana culture also has the right to expect the state to respect those things promised in the Treaty of Waitangi, particularly cultural taonga such as the Māori language.”

In one sense, the above identity suggestions: Pākehā, tangata tiriti and tuakana/teina reflect a Pākehā relationship with Māori, itself a significant reconciliatory indicator. Further, these terms require some affinity by the later migrant groups of te ao Māori, particularly te reo Māori me ona tikanga, or Māori language and culture. The irony here is that not only would the Pākehā quest for identity be fulfilled and the associated existential need of belonging to Aotearoa New Zealand satisfied – but it would be accomplished, not by an appropriation of the indigenous identity but by an acknowledgment and participation within their world.

The focus here on Pākehā identity is not meant to imply that this issue is the only or even the most important reconciliatory consideration for Māori-Pākehā relationships, neither are the above identity possibilities offered as an exhaustive list but more to provide stimulus to the on-going national conversation. For besides the necessary virtues of sacrifice and commitment, the nurturing of a reconciled relationship between Māori and Pākehā will require imaginative input from all. •

Alistair Reese is a community activist and a Teaching Fellow in the School of Theology at the University of Auckland.

His recently completed PhD thesis, Reconciliation and the Quest for Pākehā Identity in Aotearoa New Zealand explores ways in which public theology can offer reconciliatory ideas that will contribute to the concept of this land as a shared place of identity and belonging for both Māori and Pākehā.

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HERE'S OUR HOME

BY STEPHAN VERMEULEN & NAKITA WHITTAKER

When asked about what home means to us we are indeed a little biased in our answer – we live in one of the most beautiful places in the world. We wake up to its views, we share the land with its people. We are a small nation in comparison to some, but in some ways this brings an incredible sense of unity. This is especially true for us around NZ summer time – that part of the year when the sun comes back for more, and we couldn't be happier about it.

For us, when thinking about what makes summer here all that it is, it's definitely more about “whom” than “what.” It’s about people more than anything, sharing in it all. Whether it's over a meal and a cold one, or in the water on a scorching hot day; around a bonfire, or along the main road driving for hours; over a Christmas meal, or under the night sky covered in our New Year’s lights together. It's about doing it all together. To us, this is home. •

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Stephan Vermeulen & Nakita Whittaker

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Stephan Vermeulen & Nakita Whittaker

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Stephan Vermeulen & Nakita Whittaker

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Image: Logan MacKenzie – photo of Stephan

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Stephan Vermeulen and Nakita Whittaker (pictured) are Auckland-based freelance photographers. www.stephanandnakita.com

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An UNINTERRUPTED HORIZON DEBORAH TEH

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aikumete Cemetery, at the end of my road, is the largest in Auckland. It’s a rambling, hilly patch of green. None of my relatives are buried there, or anywhere else in Aotearoa New Zealand. My paternal grandparents are buried, for now, in Choa Chu Kang, in what I remember to be an eerily overgrown cemetery at the western end of Singapore. With the government’s New Burial Policy limiting a person’s burial period to 15 years, their graves will likely be exhumed within my lifetime to make way for the usual— schools, roads, and high-rise apartment buildings. They will be ordered as efficiently as possible to maximise space use. Real estate agents will downplay their recent history. School children will tell ghost stories.

An open piece of land is, after all, too valuable to leave for the dead. In a country where approximately 7500 live people occupy every one square kilometre (compared to New Zealand’s 17), a grave plot for wood and bones can be nothing but a temporary luxury.

Five million grow up, go to school, fall in love, and replicate bits of their DNA in this city: a well-washed, colour-coordinated concrete jungle rising sharply above the ground; trains and buses running so regularly that a timetable isn’t published; identical trees lining clean streets an even spacing apart; laundry overhanging common pavements twenty-five floors above your head.

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My family arrived in New Zealand in 2002. I was thirteen years old, and mesmerised by every opportunity to see past the immediate building in front of me. Every expanse held a dash of the sublime.

One of my earliest memories of this experience occurred during fourth form PE. I was standing in the sports field of Avondale College with a bunch of other gangly fourteen year olds, when I was suddenly taken in by the view of low-lying state houses half a kilometre away.

“Look!” I exclaimed to a new friend. She looked, and then turned back, confused.

“What?”

“Over there!”

She turned again, and then considered me strangely. “It’s just houses,” she said.

“I guess so,” I mumbled, slightly embarrassed.

That was the year I learned to love the sea as much as I feared it. My friends brought me to the west coast beaches and taught me the mechanics of catching a wave on a body board. I was initiated into the Kiwi custom of running repeatedly into the raging ocean— in spite of jellyfish, sharks, the cold, rip tides, stingrays, and all common sense.

The edges of these islands are remarkable places.

Sometimes I forget the rarity of a border that, for all intents and purposes, looks like it could possibly be the edge of the very world.

They remind me how isolated we are, and why people from all over seeking solitude, personal freedom, and a Shire-like life of quiet selfsufficiency are attracted to New Zealand.

It is difficult to pinpoint when I became a New Zealander. The truth is that turning away from an old country and settling into a new one is a difficult and confusing process. There were moments that allowed me to take it for granted that I belonged here. I remember things like finding the back door of a friend’s house left unlocked for me to drop by whenever I wanted. I remember being endlessly engaged in small talk at the supermarket checkout. I remember being told after a pōwhiri, “this is your Marae too.”

I think we are defined by the things we take for granted. I do not remember when I became used to the uninterrupted horizon.

All I know is that one day I was driving along in the suburb of New Windsor. There is a turn in the road at the top of a hill from which you can see all West Auckland and its flickering lights stretched out before you. I did not gasp in surprise.

I pass Waikumete Cemetery every day. I take it for granted that one day I will die, and I will be undisturbed by planners and councils.

There will be a place for me—if not here, then elsewhere.

I find myself at the beach many times every summer. And I take it for granted what you do when you meet the open sea. You run into it. •

Deborah Teh gets excited about political theory, good food, and dappled sunlight. She currently works as an Issues Assistant with the Green Party of Aotearoa, an Assistant Manager at the Moustache Milk and Cookie Bar in Auckland, and a freelance photographer. Deborah holds a Bachelor of Arts in philosophy and a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Hons) from the University of Auckland.

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NEW ZEALAND – In SEARCH of a NEW NATIONAL IDENTITY DR PHILIPPA SMITH

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sk a range of people from Stewart Island to Cape Reinga to define what it means to be a New Zealander, and the chances are their answers will be many and varied depending on their ethnicity, ancestry, and personal experience. It is not uncommon to hear people assign themselves specific labels such as Pasifika, Māori, Pākehā, Asian or Irish New Zealander, Kiwi, or solely New Zealander, as acknowledgement of cultural and ethnic backgrounds become more pertinent to self-identification. But given that we are living in an age of increased diversity, is it still possible to have a collective national identity for everyone living in New Zealand?

ORIGINS OF NATIONAL IDENTITIES Clearly national identity is something that most of us want or even need. As sociologist Manuel Castells tells us in his 1997 book The Power of Identity, people seek identity as a source of meaning and experience, whether it is through history, geography, religion, personal fantasy, or collective memory. Yet at the same time, the construction of a positive and unique national identity is regarded as important for all nation states - not just for economic and social reasons, but also for loyalty during times of crisis, such as war.

A key concept in understanding national identity construction is that we actually “imagine” who we are as a nation, an idea drawn from the theoretical writings of political scientist Benedict Anderson.

In his book Imagined Communities: Reflection on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, first published in 1983, Anderson seeks to explain the rise of modern European nations during the Age of 32 | New Zealand – In Search of a New National Identity

Enlightenment as a result of historical forces of economic, social, and political change, particularly a decline in religious dominance, that occurred towards the end of the eighteenth century. A fundamental change in the way of apprehending the world emerged at this time, according to Anderson. To know everyone was virtually impossible, and therefore, people came to imagine their nation as a community that had limited boundaries with a defined population and territory ruled by the state.

Advances in communication technologies had a particular impact on the recognition of national identity. Increasing literacy of populations enabled people to read and expand their knowledge and to have a better understanding of their connection with others. This was greatly enhanced thanks to the printing press, which enabled the efficient production of books and newspapers as the earliest forms of mass communication. These helped in the development of a sense of national consciousness. In addition, the introduction of vernacular language in printed material (rather than the languages of Latin and Greek, used traditionally by elites) was also a powerful catalyst in identity formation as more people became aware of the many others who shared their nation and their language. The resulting nationalist discourse played an integral role in the imagining of one’s nation as a cultural entity—a process Anderson believes continues in contemporary societies and is still relevant today.

FORGING A NATIONAL IDENTITY IN NEW ZEALAND The vast majority of early settlers to New Zealand came with a British identity already intact. A distinctive New Zealand identity was virtually non-existent in the first years of European settlement. The settlers regarded themselves as British, working hard to recreate a “Better Britain” in the South Seas, while it was Māori whom they

labelled then as “the New Zealanders.”

Some historians, such as Keith Sinclair, have stressed that European immigrants worked proactively to build a unique identity in the first half of the twentieth century by reflecting this identity in arts, literature, sports, defence, and politics and by their involvement in the first and second world wars. However, other academics, such as James Belich, regard a unique New Zealand national identity as emerging much later. Although Belich in his 2002 book Paradise Reforged: A History of New Zealanders acknowledges that New Zealand formally became a legal independent state when it was granted Dominion status in 1907, he contends that the country— following the colonising days of the 1800s—renewed a strong identification with Britain. In a phase he calls “recolonisation,” New Zealand developed an emotional and economic relationship with Britain (particularly through the exportation of its meat and dairy produce) so that it could survive and prosper. In either case, it may be said that the most significant period in national identity construction occurred between 1960 and 1999. Belich describes this time as a period of “decolonisation,” when New Zealand moved

away from its loyalty and links with Britain towards a separate and more distinct national identity. Several major developments were instrumental in this transformation: Britain’s admittance into the European Economic Community (EEC); a rise in Māori nationalism; and an easing of immigration restrictions.

The terms of Britain’s admittance to the EEC dictated that Britain greatly reduce its trading relationship with its former colonies, including New Zealand. This new reality meant that New Zealand was forced, in many ways, to become more independent culturally, socially, and economically. Although British culture still remained at the core of New Zealand European identity, the country, out of necessity, began geographically to re-orientate itself to the AsiaPacific region for economic and political purposes.

Around the same time as New Zealand was forced to look beyond Britain, Māori within New Zealand were experiencing a rise in their own distinct nationalism. As many Māori moved from rural locations to become city dwellers in the 1960s and 1970s, they became more culturally and politically assertive, seeking redress from the Crown for the illegal confiscation of Māori land and the

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failure to honour the obligations entailed by the Treaty of Waitangi.

This led the Government to establish the Waitangi Tribunal in 1975 to investigate claims.

Towards the end of the century, New Zealand would undergo a third major development that would be instrumental in transforming New Zealand’s national identity: the introduction of a more open approach to immigration.

Though there had been discrete waves of immigrants from ethnic minorities—such as the Chinese in the 1800s and Pasifika peoples in the 1970s—throughout its history, New Zealand immigration policy had traditionally favoured the British, but also people from North America and Europe. This, which some perceive as reminiscent of a non-official “whites only” policy, changed in 1987 however, when the fourth Labour Government, led by Prime Minister David Lange, passed a new Act to enable immigration from a broader range of countries. The impact of this change in policy was that New Zealand’s diversity became more visible over time, particularly with an increase in immigrants from Asian countries in the 1990s. The idea of a more multicultural New Zealand did not find favour with everyone, particularly amongst those who feared the disintegration of New Zealand’s national and cultural identity, and amongst some who felt multiculturalism threatened the country’s bicultural framework.

These major developments—Britain’s admittance to the EEC, a rise in Māori nationalism, and an easing of immigration restrictions— led to changes in the way New Zealand perceived itself as a nation, and a more distinct, less British-focused identity emerged.

Although British culture still remained at the core of New Zealand European identity in the 1970s and 1980s, there was now a greater impetus to seek out a true New Zealand identity or, as some see it, a majority group or Pākehā identity.

One way to achieve this was to draw on the symbols and myths that had been used for many years as signifiers of New Zealand— such as the Kiwi bird and the silver fern. Michael King, in his book The Penguin History of New Zealand, also refers to the “echoes of old New Zealand” that still resonated within contemporary New Zealand culture, such as the desire to preserve the wild, untamed aspect of the beautiful landscape as a place to hunt, fish, and shoot; the “do-it-yourself” attitude to home maintenance, “informal social attitudes,” and an “egalitarian instinct” for the equitable distribution of resources in the community.

Kiwiana—signifiers of a New Zealand identity that became widely used in the late 1980s and included objects such as the pavlova, the Kiwi bach, jandals, Sir Edmund Hillary, and Phar Lap—drew on a nostalgic past and were regularly used by the media, public relations, advertising and marketing companies, and government in “branding” New Zealand, and as a way of securing possibly shaky self-definitions of New Zealanders as a people.

But given that national identity is never static and open to change, it is not surprising that it became more politicised in the new millennium and the focus of debate between the two major parties. National Party leader Don Brash warned, in his now famous “Orewa” speech in 2004, that New Zealand’s dream of being a unified nation state was threatened by the Labour–led Government giving in to Māori demands for rights and resources based on the “principles” of the Treaty of Waitangi. Brash’s vision of “one law for all New Zealanders” regardless of ethnicity appealed to a number of Pākehā New Zealanders. While the National Party was unsuccessful in toppling the Labour Party from its dominant position in a coalition Government in the 2005 elections, the high profile given to national identity in the campaign highlighted the undercurrents of tension in a New Zealand that was increasingly not just bicultural but also multicultural. This was also set against a background of ethnic riots that had occurred in multicultural countries such as France, Australia, Germany, and Denmark, leading some New Zealanders to fear that “Godzone” might experience the same. It was clear to the Government that building an inclusive society with a unified national identity that addressed concerns about diversity would have to be a major feature on its agenda to unify the nation.

REBRANDING THE NATION Political rhetoric often plays a major role in the construction of national identity because it can be so powerful and influential with the messages it conveys. During the Labour-led Government’s last term of office, beginning in 2005, talk about a “new” national identity was particularly prevalent. In her 2006 statement to Parliament, Prime Minister Helen Clark spoke of an “evolving New Zealand way of doing things” that would lead to a “stronger New Zealand identity,” emphasising the importance of developing “that distinctive New Zealand style, identity, and set of community values.” “As a government,” she said, “we will continue to prioritise policies which contribute to a strong sense of national identity.” Implicit in this speech was Helen Clark’s reference to the need for “reconciling the past and adjusting to the diversity of the present,” which suggested Dr Philippa Smith

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addressing concerns relating to injustices to Māori, but at the same time acknowledging that an acceptance of diversity was also key to the nation-building process.

But aside from an attempt to distance the nation from the negativity associated with its colonial past and to present a willingness to embrace diverse groups, there was also an emphasis on the economy and the need for New Zealanders to show their competitive edge in the global market place as a positive aspect of their national identity. A 2006 government budget news release that focused specifically on national identity—one of the Government’s three priorities identified by Michael Cullen in 2000, alongside “economic transformation” and concern for the “young and old”— declared, “It is about who we are, what we do, where we live and how we are seen by the world.” While the Government worked proactively on a strategy to build a socially cohesive society by delicately balancing the concerns of minorities and “mainstream” New Zealanders, it also seized the opportunity to persuade the nation to take on its particular vision of a new New Zealand national identity. In essence it was a rebranding of the nation.

According to Peter Skilling, whose doctoral thesis examined

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the political discourse about national identity as seen in policy documents, this required the population to re-imagine itself as a nation with a shared national purpose and an economic vision for the future, despite its increasing internal diversity and global connectedness.

Skilling points out that the state used national identity with two objectives in mind: firstly to respond to the calls for security and prosperity for citizens, and secondly to suggest a greater sense of subjective meaning and belonging. However, the Government’s intent on pursuing this rebranding of the nation can also be viewed as an ambiguous one.

Skilling suggests that previously marginalised groups were co-opted into New Zealand society and celebrated based on their willingness and ability to be part of the shared vision. Difference, he notes, could be accepted so long as it contributed an element of New Zealand’s unique externally projected brand and did not undermine an internally protected cohesion. Another New Zealand academic Stephen Turner has also voiced similar sentiments. Turner, author of “Compulsory nationalism” published in the journal Moving Worlds: A Journal of Transcultural Writings, views the concept of

a “Kiwi nation,” where everyone was a New Zealander regardless of their ethnicity, erased any sense of difference. In fact, he believes the Government’s management of difference created a national identity that was “compulsory” for all citizens and that had an impoverishing effect in imposing limits on what it meant to be a “New Zealander.”

The government’s proposed new national identity based on the over-riding importance of a shared vision for New Zealand’s future involved shared values and traits that can, therefore, be seen to have been constructed by the state through an official discourse that identified diversity as being a distinct and unique characteristic to make the nation stand out in the world both culturally and economically.

Independence, strength, pride, responsibility, creativity, competitiveness, and commitment to success were just some of those shared traits identified frequently in government speeches and documents as being part of “the New Zealand way.”

This new identity construction was one in which all New Zealanders—regardless of ethnicity,

culture, or religion—would share in the common purpose to help New Zealand succeed as a global competitive player.

It also focused on the theme of becoming a socially cohesive society by learning from the lessons of the past and pursuing a common political present and future that included an acceptance of diversity. But how the population responded to this discourse was not easy to gauge.

NEW ZEALANDERS RESPOND TO THEIR NEW IDENTITY While the politically motivated construction of New Zealand identity dominated the discourse about the nation, it was difficult to locate counter discourses that resisted such representation — at least in widely accessed public domains. If anything, it was the “chatter” on Internet forums and discussions where minority voices had the best chance of being heard. But these views, and the responses they attracted, had little opportunity of making their way into the

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mainstream media, which would have had greater exposure and impact on the imagination of the nation.

My examination of two archived online discussions which featured “talk” about New Zealand national identity during the last term of the Labour-led Government provides some insight into the debate going on behind the scenes at this time. I used these two discussions as case studies in my doctoral thesis exploring the concept that more than one interpretation of New Zealand national identity was possible. One discussion appeared on New Zealand Chinese writer Tze Ming Mok’s Yellow Peril blogsite in 2006, following her satirical posting in response to Statistics New Zealand’s decision to include “New Zealander” as a separate ethnic category in its analysis of the latest census data. The other discussion involved a series of emails circulated between members of the Aotearoa Ethnic Network (AEN), a non-profit organisation that brings together New Zealanders with an interest in diversity. The AEN e-list discussion that occurred in 2008 was ignited by an online news report that used the label “New Zealand passport holder” to describe a New Zealander of Kurdish ethnicity.

Although the online commenters in both these case studies were relatively small and not a representative sample of the New Zealand population, the findings from this research still highlight important issues emanating from a range of voices. These give some insight into how people responded to the “new” national identity discourse.

The key finding of my analysis was that there was a divided image of the nation. Differing interpretations of national identity as people perceived it to be and as the Government projected it to be led to a clash of imaginings.

Anderson’s concept of each individual having to imagine his/ her community because it was impossible to know everyone, meant that New Zealand was now imagined in increasingly diverse ways.

With diversity came differing world views, interpretations, and perspectives about what it meant to be a New Zealander.

My analysis showed that a strong belief that people had the democratic right to be recognised as “New Zealanders” regardless of whether they were Pākehā, were from an ethnic minority, or had a hybrid identity was a point of complete agreement. Feelings of belonging, whether through an attachment to the land, indigenous status, or the justification of citizenship through the holding of a symbolic artefact of membership, such as a New Zealand passport, were some of the arguments used to frame national identity.

However, there was also concern that not all New Zealanders were seen or treated as equal.

Some people argued that “New Zealander” was a bona fide ethnic classification that was inclusive of all ethnicities. A number of people justified their preference to categorise themselves as “New

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Zealander” rather than as “New Zealand European” because they had no connection with Europe and in some cases had never visited there. The fact that some of their families had lived in New Zealand for several generations was also used to claim an identity that was unique.

In response to this, other commenters stated that the label “New Zealander” actually merged ethnicity with nationality in favour of New Zealand Europeans. Some commenters interpreted this as demonstrating an act of exclusion or a subtle form of racism, while others denied that this was the case. Concern was also shown for the need to acknowledge equal rights for all ethnic groups living in New Zealand and the rights of Māori to be classified as indigenous.

Differences of opinion were also apparent when it came to interpreting the meaning of certain labels, particularly those that sought to convey both an ethnic identity and a national identity. If, for example, a Kurdish-New Zealander chose to self-define that way, it was seen by some as enabling that person to freely express his or her ethnicity. However, if the media used this term, or “New Zealand passport holder,” it was seen to highlight that person’s difference in a negative way. While it could be argued that hyphenated labels were used to maintain ethnic distinctiveness at the risk of assimilation, at the same time they could be regarded as an acculturation strategy, whereby acceptance as a New Zealander in some form is sought even if that requires clarification with an adjective.

Although my analysis highlighted that the Government “spoke” the new political language of integration with a particular emphasis on diversity, its justification for new immigrants based on economic advantage dominated any meaningful engagement with minority groups. Resisting, challenging, or appropriating the dominant narrative as it appeared in either the official 2006 census data about New Zealand’s ethnic groups, or in a news headline about a “New Zealand passport holder,” in fact highlighted the difficulties people faced in determining a common and substantive national identity.

In effect, the analysis of the online discussions showed that New Zealand national identity was marked by enduring processes of domination, struggles over the right to speak, and the power to act to frame identity in such a way as to construct “legitimate” citizens of the nation.

WHERE TO FROM HERE? Crucial to the nation’s future is the need to feel that we are equal citizens regardless of whether we are a member of a minority group or the majority group, or even whether we have a hybrid identity drawing on several ethnicities or nationalities.

I believe that the messages posted by commenters in these online discussions made visible those issues that rarely get

debated publicly. My research, therefore, performs a critical function in creating an awareness of societal influences—whether governmental, media or institutional—that contribute to the construction of the nation’s identity.

Labelling, for example, is an important issue in national identity construction, where concerns need to be heard and suggestions sought as to how this might be dealt with more sensitively and equably, whether this is in the discourse of official documents or news reports. While some may scoff at the suggestion of subtle racism in New Zealand, regarding it as an overreaction, the fact that this topic emerged in both online discussions is indicative that it is a very real phenomenon which people are sensitive to, and that attempts need to be made to address it.

At the beginning of this article I questioned whether it was possible for New Zealanders to have a collective identity as the nation became more diverse. I believe that the answer is yes, but that the national identity of today differs from that of those experienced by earlier generations and that it is necessary to adapt.

My research, though only briefly described in this article, has shown that while people consider themselves to be New Zealanders, there needs to be flexibility so that people can express their diversity without feeling that this marginalises them or makes them lesser New Zealanders. What is missing from this picture is an on-going national “conversation” about what being a New Zealander really means.

The value in understanding how others construct national identity within the same nation cannot be underestimated, and developing sensitivities to other points of view is perhaps the first step to learning to live with difference.

It is important for us not only to stop and think about how we envisage ourselves as a nation in the years ahead, but also to acknowledge and listen to the views of others so that we can truly imagine who we are. •

Dr Philippa Smith is the Research Manager at the Institute of Culture, Discourse and Communication and a senior lecturer at the School of Language and Culture at AUT University. Her research interests include identity, media and communications, and discourse analysis.

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The CHALLENGES of INTEGRATION: LESSONS from BRITAIN DR JEFFREY W. BAILEY

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ver the next several decades the vitality of Western countries will depend on their ability to successfully integrate immigrants from many and diverse backgrounds. The United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, France, Germany, and Britain have insufficient native labour pools to prevent them from becoming granny states by 2050. (Germany needs 200,000 immigrants a year just to keep its factories running.) Only successful immigration can provide the markets, manpower, and youth necessary for Western countries to remain competitive and prosperous in a global economy.

Countries such as Canada, the U.S., Australia, and New Zealand, of course, were built on immigration, and continue to welcome large numbers every year.

Over half the skilled immigrants in the world— the majority from non-European, developing countries—come to the United States annually, and another 40,000–50,000 new immigrants (including many from developing countries such as China and India) arrive each year in New Zealand.

Yet the challenges of absorbing such high numbers can be significant, especially in cities such as Auckland, where a great majority of immigrants, temporary workers, and international students reside. The tensions that naturally emerge can lead to public ambivalence about immigration and its contribution to the development of New Zealand’s society and economy.

40 | The Challenges of Integration: Lessons from Britain

TENSION AMIDST DIVERSITY How does a country successfully integrate newly arriving migrant communities? That question was central to a recent research project at the Centre for Social Justice in London, England, led by a working group of which I was Chairman.

It is only in the last sixty years that Britain has seen immigrants of any consequential number arrive on its shores, and it has struggled to develop a post-empire narrative and a clear national identity that is welcoming of outsiders.

A particular challenge has been integrating immigrant groups from former British colonies—some of whom have now lived in England for nearly four generations—who continue to remain outside the social, economic, and political mainstream of British life.

The urgency of these questions was heightened in the summer of 2001, following a series of race riots in several post-industrial towns and cities across northern England. Those riots culminated in three days of arson-filled violence in the city of Bradford, against the backdrop of the city’s abandoned textile factories, between members of the white working class and Bradford’s large Pakistani Muslim population. Over 300 police officers were injured, £7 million in damage was caused, and 200 arrests were handed down.

In the wake of these riots, Tony Blair’s Labour government quickly established an investigative Commission, whose influential report assigned primary blame for the disturbances on the stark divisions that existed between South Asian and white communities: living “parallel lives” in separate residential areas, attending segregated schools, and rarely crossing paths in the course of work or socialising.

COMMUNITY COHESION frustration over expectations that local governments “deliver” such policy directives—for despite numerous attempts at Government performance indicators, it was nearly impossible to objectively measure the success of community cohesion initiatives.

A second frustration also became clear. Underlying the community cohesion framework was adherence to a set of assumptions known in sociological circles as “contact theory.”

Contact theory claims that the way to reduce prejudice between majority and minority group members is through interpersonal contact. Conflict, in other words, is largely due to lack of exposure and interaction with different points of view and ways of life; conversely, greater exposure leads to diminished prejudice and conflict.

Yet, as leading sociologist Richard Alba has written in his book

Image: Nasir Khan – Pakistan

The answer to this problem, the Commission’s report said, was to increase the level of interaction between the different communities, which would help bring “community cohesion.” This was a new concept, by all accounts hastily formulated, and marked the formal introduction of “community cohesion” into the lexicon of public policy. The British government duly rolled out a series of national policy initiatives: local governments began sponsoring multicultural festivals; schools were required to show how they were “promoting community cohesion” in the classroom; non-profits applying for government funding were expected to demonstrate how their project worked across ethnic boundaries.

Yet in the course of our research, talking to scores of officials around the country, it was clear that such a top-down approach to “community cohesion” was viewed with a mix of bewilderment and

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Blurring the Color Line, contact theory “has been the subject of reams of social-psychological research that shows it to hold only under certain restrictive conditions,” and that habitual contact does not guarantee positive cultural exchange. Interactions can, in fact, reinforce animosities. When middle class groups who share similar educational and economic backgrounds interact, for example, any religious or cultural differences that surface may be viewed as interesting and enriching. When groups with wide socioeconomic disparities interact, however—or where different groups feel alienated, each in their own way, from mainstream culture— interactions can actually intensify perceptions of difference and feelings of threat. Community cohesion, therefore, was felt by many to be a simplistic solution to a complex set of challenges.

PATHWAYS TO INTEGRATION What, then, did we propose? History suggests that successful integration is rooted in the economic success and social mobility of those who immigrate.

Image: Nasir Khan – Pakistan

Though there are, of course, exceptions, the pathway to successfully integrated societies is not generally a mysterious thing.

42 | The Challenges of Integration: Lessons from Britain

It is a natural, two-way process in which immigrants (and their children and grandchildren) slowly change their language and culture as they come into contact with the host society while, in time, the host society also changes by accepting greater diversity and eventually incorporating new cultural elements introduced by minority communities. In the most successful cases, this process happens at the immigrant community’s own pace, as they seek their own interests—especially economic and educational interests in pursuit of a better life for themselves and their children—instead of being “pressure cooked” into conformity from the outside.

As this happens over time, one typically observes a gradual decline in the cultural, ethnic, and linguistic markers that were so prominent in the first generation. Those markers (say, food or holiday traditions, or particular professions historically associated with certain immigrant groups) become increasingly optional for individuals. The markers no longer represent static identities imposed upon them (either by their own community or by the host culture). Perhaps most importantly, a successfully integrated society is one in which such markers make little difference in limiting anyone’s opportunities for achievement.

The process by which this occurs, over the course of generations, results from a mix of individual strategies on the part of the newcomer (the immigrant who moves to suburbs with good schools for their children), as well as cultural and institutional shifts on the part of the host culture which affirm their acceptance of greater diversity (legislation ensuring equal access to education and employment, for example, or increased minority media personalities). But perhaps one of the most important pathways to integration is upward social mobility.

Upward social mobility measures the degree to which people’s social status rise from one generation to the next. It assesses the relative chances that children can do better than their parents. This is especially important when it comes to migrant communities, where the first generation is typically starting further behind the host population, in hopes that their children and grandchildren will have the potential for better socioeconomic opportunities than they would have had otherwise.

HISTORICAL LESSONS FROM AMERICA A prime example of the role that social mobility plays in integrated societies can be found in the American context. Today, Americans of Irish, Italian, Jewish, or Asian descents are fully integrated into American life, and social distinctions based on the different origins of many groups have faded to the point of near invisibility. As Robert Putnam puts it in his Johan Skytte Prize Lecture, the cultures of the immigrant groups have by now “permeated the broader American cultural framework, with the Americanisation of St Patrick’s Day, pizza and ‘Jewish’ humour.” Their socioeconomic achievements resemble, and frequently surpass, white Americans. Intermarriage, long considered by sociologists to be the final boundary of integration, now characterises half of all marriages amongst U.S.born Asian-American young people. This has resulted in the mixed ancestry, for example, of nearly two-thirds of all children born to Japanese-American parents in the 1980s. “In some ways,” Putnam writes, “‘they’ became like ‘us’, and in some ways our new ‘us’ incorporated ‘them’.”

What many forget, however, is that America was not always this way. Early in the twentieth century, the first generation of today’s integrated ethnic groups comprised over 40 percent of the population in cities such as New York, Chicago, and San Francisco.

They were segregated in close-knit enclaves served by their own ethnic shops, cinemas, banks, and radio stations. The wider population, who regarded these Catholic and Jewish newcomers to be racially inferior and religiously suspect, viewed them with alarm.

It was widely felt that they were unable to integrate, and lacking in qualities such as self-discipline and a “Protestant work ethic.”

What enabled the wholesale integration we observe today to come about so quickly? In large part it was due to the social and economic advancement enabled by a range of U.S. policies that rewarded aspiration: the GI Bill, which enabled young minorities returning from World War II to access free university education; an explosion of new professional jobs in a growing economy that required precisely the kind of training young minorities were being supplied at college; and changes to federal housing loan regulations which enabled young minority families to buy homes in America’s expanding suburbs. This meant that within a generation minorities were able to access higher education, which enabled them to compete for middle class jobs and higher incomes, which in turn enabled them to leave the immigrant enclaves of the city to buy suburban homes next to white Americans.

Such socioeconomic parity created a pathway to social relationships, intermarriage, and the eventual disappearance of colour lines and ethnic boundaries.

The unique historical circumstances that drove the sheer scale of expanding opportunities in postwar America are not, of course, likely to be repeated any time soon. But it remains an example of just how rapidly social mobility can bring about widespread integration.

DETERMINING THE HURDLES TO SOCIAL MOBILITY We found this to be true on a smaller scale in Britain, as well. To the degree that there are successful examples of integration in the UK, the Gujarati Indian community stands out. Having developed their entrepreneurial business skills in East Africa, members of the first generation who immigrated to the city of Leicester used these skills as stepping stones to success. Today large numbers of their Britishborn offspring are attaining high levels of educational achievement, economic prosperity, and increasing social integration.

Other groups continue to struggle, however, especially Britain’s sizeable South Asian Muslim population (the largest number of which are from rural Pakistan), which continues to experience markedly higher poverty rates and welfare dependency than any other group in the country, even up to four generations after their initial settlement.

Their overall lack of economic advancement parallels their social and political marginalisation. This has led to security concerns, as well, given their roles in recent flash points in British history, such as the 2001 race riots, or the London Underground tube bombings of 7 July 2005.

In seeking to understand the lack of economic and social participation of groups such as the British Pakistanis, we were particularly struck that it did not appear to be due primarily to

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external hindrances, such as racial discrimination. Other visible minority groups, including many from nearby regions across the subcontinent of India, had demonstrated great socioeconomic success in Britain during the same period of time. What we discovered, instead, were a range of self-defeating practices within the community itself: extended families that continued to keep themselves socially and residentially segregated; parents that regularly took their children out of British schools to send them back to Pakistan for extended periods; rigid clan structures maintained from their villages of origin, which largely excluded women from the workplace and young people from having a voice. Our research showed that the majority of Pakistani children spent every afternoon after school in the local mosque, where imported imams (only eight percent of whom are native English speakers) taught them in Urdu and Arabic.

A recent study of inner city Pakistani youngsters painted a poignant picture of their young men, morally adrift and alienated alike from family, mosque, and wider society: not British enough for the majority society, not Pakistani enough for their parents, and not Muslim enough for the imams.

What keeps this cycle of segregation and deprivation in motion, even into the third and fourth generation? Research shows that it is a result, in part, of their marriage patterns. In contrast to the Hindu, Sikh, or East African Muslim communities—in which young people marry aspirationally, and choose partners who already live in Britain—young people in the Pakistani community, under intense cultural pressure, overwhelmingly marry cousins from their country of origin. Thus, they import thousands of new spouses into Britain every year. Data from a leading longitudinal study, the Born In Bradford project, suggests that within the majority of the British Pakistani community, 80 percent of spouses are still sought from “back home.” This means that, even for fourth generation British Pakistani children, an astounding 80 percent have at least one parent who is first generation (and hence possessing low job skills and little English). Thus, families that may technically be third generation perpetually remain, in effect, first generation when it comes to social capital and integration. More worrying still, due to clan practices, approximately three out of four of these marriages are between first cousins. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the rate of cousin marriages has increased rather than decreased across generations.

Not surprisingly, the health deficits that result from such high levels of cousin marriage are alarming. The prevalence of infant and childhood disability, for example, is ten times higher in British children of Pakistani origin than other ethnic groups.

ASKING DIFFICULT QUESTIONS What is an appropriate response to these challenges? In short, it is this: long-term integration is dependent on redressing deprivation and enabling upward social mobility over the course of several generations. Even if economic parity does not guarantee integration, it makes it much more feasible. In this respect, governments might focus their policies less on trying to achieve the chimera of cohesion per se (though the duty to maintain law and order, of course, remains), and focus more on the conditions which best enable cohesion to emerge.

But if social mobility is a key condition of integration, it means that policymakers must be willing to ask potentially sensitive questions over why some groups continue to do worse than others.

Over the years, debates over why some people in the West remain poor have ranged between two poles. One explanation blames powerful economic and social forces beyond the control of any one individual. This belief holds that it is the very structure of the economy that denies poor people sufficient income, and so the only just solution is to counter those forces by indefinitely providing the poor with what they lack. An opposing explanation, while not discounting the role of outside economic and social forces, wants to argue that poverty can result from other factors too: poor home lives, individual choices, cultures of poverty that are handed down from one generation to the next. Because this perspective is denounced by some as racist, it has historically led to the curtailing of serious research on certain problems, as policymakers shy away from researching behavior which might be construed as stigmatising particular groups.

But the hurdles to social mobility are not the same for everyone.

Successful integration, therefore, depends on a willingness to not only address comprehensive hurdles to mobility (for example, failing school systems), but also bespoke hurdles to mobility distinct to different groups. Whether government is always best situated to address such distinct hurdles is, of course, another question. But the future vitality of our countries depends on the capacity to at least have the conversation. •

Dr Jeffrey W. Bailey is the Executive Vice President of Arete Scholars Fund in the United States. Jeffrey served formerly as the Vice President for Research and Development at the Georgia Center for Opportunity and as the Managing Director of the Centre for Social Justice in the United Kingdom, where he chaired the Centre’s policy research on social cohesion, with a particular focus on ethnic diversity and social mobility.

44 | The Challenges of Integration: Lessons from Britain

SUGGESTED READS from Michelle Tait, 04 James Clifford, Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century (1997) Caryl Phillips, A New World Order: Selected Essays (2001) from Patrick Silloway, 08 Greg Ryan, ed., Tackling Rugby Myths: Rugby and New Zealand society 1854-2004 (2005) John Reason and James Carwyn, The World of Rugby: A history of rugby union football (1979)

from Alistair Reese, 16 Michael King, Being Pakeha (1988) Miroslav Volf, Exclusion & Embrace: A Theological Exploration of Identity, Otherness, and Reconciliation (1996) from Dr Philippa Smith, 32 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflection on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (1983)

from Dr Jeffrey W. Bailey, 40 Richard Alba, Blurring of the Color Line: The Chance for a More Integrated America (2012) Robert D. Putnam, E Pluribus Unum: Diversity and Community in the Twenty-first Century (2007)

James Belich, Paradise Reforged: A History of New Zealanders from the 1880s to the Year 2000 (2002)

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WHITE PAINT JAIMEE ABICT

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crawled in white paint on the exterior of my neighbours’ peach-coloured weatherboard abode were three letters: “PHB.” The locals knew exactly what that stood for – the street’s resident “Home Boys.” It was the nineties. MC Hammer, New Kids on the Block and Janet Jackson were blaring from the boombox, and I was a pretty new kid on that block myself, at all of two-yearsold. Still, back then it was simply my “hood;” I was the unofficial mascot of the PHB, and I needed no further validation. My parents had moved into that South Auckland community to do youth work before I was born. This eventuated in a toddlerhood spent blissfully ethnically confused—my white blonde crop of hair bobbing amid a closeknit adopted whānau of entirely Pasifika and Māori descent.

“New Zealander” didn’t really come into it. I thought I was Samoan until I was three.

This sense of cultural ambiguity was only cemented during my school years, where with help from my darkening hair and skin I became a chameleon with ease. My aptitude for camouflage probably peaked with leading the pōwhiri for my school’s kapa haka group in public at 12, with most none the wiser that I wasn’t remotely Māori. I was an odd specimen: an unusually olive “NZ European.”

“Where’s your mum from?” “England.” “Where’s your dad from?”

“Australia.” “Well then why are you so brown?” “Nana’s Welsh. Dark Welsh. Like Catherine Zeta-Jones.”

Just two years later: high school. Same city, new suburb. Whitekid-central. After a few years in this environment, all that remained of my former PHB immersion were residual penchants for hāngī and rap music. Assimilation complete. I heard a lot about “New Zealanders” and what “being a Kiwi” meant throughout those years, but reconciling my melting pot childhood with a teenaged era spent with mostly fair-skinned comrades seemed nigh on impossible.

46 | White Paint

There seemed to be two New Zealands. Two ways of looking at the world, within a 20-minute drive of each other.

I grew increasingly grateful for all those compulsory primary school Te Reo lessons; learning both “peanut butter” and “pata pīnati,” with some time spent incognito in flaxen attire on the side. I was richer for it. But I confused myself with feeling equally at home studying Latin and discovering my British roots. I found myself wondering how it all integrated, and whether it mattered that I could never fully identify with either side. Having moved around so much, by this point, different groups knew me in different ways.

I realised – after much deliberation – that I belonged on these fair isles because I was born here, and not because I adhered to any prescribed stereotypes. Rather, none of them stuck to me.

I’d learnt to approach people from across the spectrum without presuppositions, wanting simply to know their story the way others had shared in mine.

The more people I met, the more I saw how incapable those stereotypes were of revealing the depths of anyone. Ultimately, it is only in the context of our histories that any of us are fully understood.

The stories we are told of ourselves and our families powerfully mold our identity, and my parents continued to regale me with anecdotes from “the HB years” long after we left; of finding neighbourhood kids hiding in trees in our backyard as police circled the block in search of them, and of houses built so close together that my mother and the affable lady next door would literally throw

Image: Childhood photo – author's own

spare eggs across to each other through the kitchen window if someone ran out when baking. Looking back on that time compared to my life now makes me realise that those people knew something about community that I haven’t experienced since, but am determined to replicate. I do not know my neighbours’ names, and any egg throwing around my current suburb would not be for baking purposes.

My family still fondly refers to the ‘90s crowd as “The Whānau.”

We look at old photos and smile, and wonder where some of them scattered. I struggle to articulate the beauty of what we found within that community, and what it meant to be part of it. For this former chameleon, the realisation has dawned that some things are not cultural; they are just human. I will always be grateful to The Whānau.

They taught us things that transcend culture; they opened their homes, and our home was theirs. No one ran out of eggs.

Observing now that I have spent exactly half my years in one culture and half in another, I can see how each phase has drastically informed my view of life. Nowadays, I’m as at home at a Feist concert as a Samoan wedding, and perhaps in that way, my upbringing represents the growing cohort of confused young folk who have grown up in such multi-cultural settings that no one ethnicity neatly defines them. We have learnt to look past assumptions about what “the other” is like, because we have already lived among each other for years, and we know how much better we are for it.

For those of us for whom this is our story, I believe it is our role to learn to weave these experiences together and help many more of us to push through the barriers of prejudice that so often trap us into isolation as individuals and as groups. Outside the labels, we found kin. •

Jaimee Abict is the Communications Manager at Maxim Institute in Auckland. Prior to this she worked for APN, on current affairs publication the New Zealand Listener. She has held former roles in advertising and copywriting.

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A nation’s culture resides in the hearts and in the soul of its people.

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