Missing Connections:
how closed adoptions created generations of ‘ghosts’ within our whakapapa
Dr Erica Newman has been awarded the Marsden Fast Start Grant to further her research into transracial adoption in Aotearoa. Over the next three years she will gather accounts and experiences of Māori adoptees and their descendants and document their efforts to connect to their taha Māori. Crucial to her work is understanding how hapū and iwi currently support adoptees and their uri on their whakapapa journey, and in what ways her own experience as the daughter of a Māori adoptee might assist in the future shaping of those processes. Kaituhi ILA COUCH talks to Erica about the intergenerational effects on Māori of European adoption practices on Māori, and why a te ao Māori approach is needed to help those searching out their whakapapa and tūrangawaewae. PHOTOGRAPH: ILA COUCH
38 TE KARAKA MAKARIRI 2021
