Maori Language Week

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Tēnā koutou katoa, e ngā iwi, e hoa mā.

The week ended yesterday was the Māori Language Week. According to NZ History online (Source: 'Maori Language Week – Te Wiki o Te Reo Maori', URL: http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/culture/maori-language-week, (Ministry for Culture and Heritage), updated 11-May-2010):

Every year since 1975 New Zealand has marked Maori Language Week. This is a time for all New Zealanders to celebrate te reo Maori (the Maori language) and to use more Maori phrases in everyday life. In 2010 Maori Language Week will be 26 July–1 August, the theme is 'Te Mahi Kai – The Language of Food'.

When I started studying te Reo Māori nearly 20 years ago, there was very limited learning resources for adult students of Maori language, except for the one offered from the Corresponding School of New Zealand. Since the launch of Māori Television in 2004 and advent of Internet, it became a lot easier for us wanting to learn the language to find learning resources. To mark te Wiki o te Reo Māori my way, I've listed some Maori language resources I've found on Internet:

Māori Dictionary
Māori Television & online resources for Maori language program Toku Reo
Kōrero Māori
Māori Language net
Maori songs at NZ Folksong website

I plan to update this list as I come across new interesting resources.

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  2. :eyes: Americans spend a whole month celebrating the hotdog!? :insane: :faint:

  3. Originally posted by debplatt:

    Somehow your celebrations sounds a little more uplifting.

    Do you have an occasion to celebrate the indigenous culture in Ohio?

  4. Actually there are all sorts of food-related, month-long celebrations, and the vast majority of us don't even know about. 😆 It is more like the meat-packing lobby convinced the Congress to pass a resolution honoring such and such for the month of you-name-it.Here's a photo I took in my local supermarket this past fall:And then the same month I saw this sign at a university.

  5. @ Mimi, at the end of the first link there is a comma that leads to a "404" error, you just have to remove it. The most simple pages on Maori (number of letter, a few words, a simple construction) I have found are : http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maori_de_Nouvelle-Zélande and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Māori_language . The French is shorter but have pronunciation. Maybe are they " new interesting resources" to our linguist teacher. I wonder if the construction is more like japanese or like Roman languages. By the way why do you name them "Romance" and not "Roman" or "Latin" ?
    The history of this polynesian languages must be fascinating, I just saw, looking for some information, that it included Malagasy and Indonesian

  6. Originally posted by mimi_s_mum:

    Do you have an occasion to celebrate the indigenous culture in Ohio?

    At the time Europeans first came to America, there were three tribes of Native Americans who lived in what later became Ohio. As the population of people of Europeans Heritage became more dense, other Native American tribes moved into the Ohio area, basically fleeing the Europeans. Ohio wasn't one of the original states of the the United States, but joined the nation as a state in 1803. In the 1830 the Indian Removal Act forcibly moved any Native American tribes that still were located east of the Mississippi River farther west (I think most ended in Oklahoma and Kansas). The act impacted those people living on tribal land. Native Americans who owned property as an individual remained where they were. So there are no federally recognized tribes in Ohio today. There are "unofficial tribes" in Ohio, but to be honest, I don't even know what that means. And as you can see, a number of summer time Powwows are held in Ohio, but I've never been to one.

  7. Originally posted by arduinna:

    By the way why do you name them "Romance" and not "Roman" or "Latin" ?

    From the Wikipedia Article on Romance languages:

    The term "Romance" comes from the Vulgar Latin adverb romanice, derived from Romanicus: for instance, in the expression romanice loqui, "to speak in Roman" (that is, the Latin vernacular), contrasted with latine loqui, "to speak in Latin" (Medieval Latin, the conservative version of the language used in writing and formal contexts or as a lingua franca)… From this adverb the noun romance originated, which applied initially to anything written romanice, or "in the Roman vernacular".

    The word romance with the modern sense of romance novel or love affair has the same origin. In the medieval literature of Western Europe, serious writing was usually in Latin, while popular tales, often focusing on love, were composed in the [Roman] vernacular and came to be called "romances".

  8. Thanks for info re Indians in Ohio. Sad to hear they were totally displaced. The powwow info page seems to indicate the indigenous people have not forgot about the land where their ancestors lived. Would you welcome them if they were to return?One of the fascinating things about NZ is the strong, distinctive and unique marks (branding) made onto the mainstream (supposedly European) culture by Maori culture and history. Those are especially visible in place names, rugby and seemingly innocent Maori words pop up in everyday sentences. Of course NZ experienced violent conflict between the original settlers (Maori) and the new settlers. I'll probably write about it in another post.

  9. Originally posted by arduinna:

    at the end of the first link there is a comma that leads to a "404" error

    Thanks for pointing out. Actually that whole segment between the parentheses is what the original page instructed to include as citation, therefore I shouldn't change it. I've put a proper link in the phrase before, instead.Pronunciation of Maori language is almost identical to Japanese and similar to Italian or Spanish (Latin languages), but do not roll the "R". "Wh" is as in whiskey as pronounced by a scot. "Ng" is somewhere between "N", "G" and "K".Regarding sentence construction, it depends what you mean by "construction". If you meant "sentence word order", Maori does not resemble either European languages or Japanese (actually Japanese can have order-independent sentence structure). However when I first learnt Maori, it struck me its structure could be said a mirror image of Japanese. Both use verbs/adjectives very fluid way. Both can be order-independent (Maori is prefix dependent, while Japanese is suffix dependent). Both can have sentences without a verb, but in verbal sentence, Maori places the verb first, while Japanese last.

  10. Originally posted by mimi_s_mum:

    Would you welcome them if they were to return?

    Today Native Americans have full citizenship, and they can and do live in Ohio or anywhere else the want. Also because Native Americans intermarry with others, there are many people who have a grandparent or other ancestor who is Native American while their other ancestors are of some different heritage.However in the United States there are also 310 Indian Reservations. These are areas of land where the U.S. government basically gave certain tribes title to the land and the people living on this land enjoy Tribal Sovereignty. They are still subject to federal law, but they are not subject to state and local laws. In practice, this often means the tribes set up gambling casinos in states where gambling is illegal, and that they hunt and fish whenever and wherever they want within their reservation without being subjected to the state laws which regulate hunting for everyone else.The Reservation system began back when the United States government regarded the various Indian tribes as independent nations. Many of these independent nations were at war with the United States, and as part of the negotiations which resulted in peace treaties, the tribes were given legal title to reservations. Sadly the U.S. government did not always live up to the terms of these peace treaties.So to make a long story short there are Native Americans in Ohio now, but not as many as in the West, and the ones that live here now do not live on reservations. They are members of whatever community they happen to find themselves in.

  11. Originally posted by mimi_s_mum:

    it means those tribes with ancestral roots in Ohio are not given the "tribal sovereignty", is that correct?

    Correct!Originally posted by mimi_s_mum:

    probably very unlikely scenario: if they were to return to Ohio and claim for their ancestral land to be under the control of their "tribal sovereignty".

    When peace negotiations were under way, the land that was granted as reservations was in the "public domain". That is the federal government owned the land, not private individuals. So the federal government could give the title away. But to go to a densely populated area where people currently hold title to the land, and then take that title from them to give it to someone else… I don't see how that could be done justly.

  12. Thanks for your commentary, Deb. So when you said there's no federally recognized tribes in Ohio today, it means those tribes with ancestral roots in Ohio are not given the "tribal sovereignty", is that correct? What I meant by my question was regarding the probably very unlikely scenario: if they were to return to Ohio and claim for their ancestral land to be under the control of their "tribal sovereignty".

  13. Originally posted by debplatt:

    I don't see how that could be done justly.

    I suppose the same dilemma is faced whenever a later generation tries to address the past wrong.

  16. Thanks, Deb. May sound a bit scary but I know every single player in that ABs squad, some of them are still playing in current All Blacks. 🙂

  18. Originally posted by mimi_s_mum:

    I know every single player in that ABs squad

    :eyes:After I went over to YouTube, I watched a number of tribal war displays before Rugby matches. I don't know much about Rugby, and I didn't know anything about this Maori challenge making its way into the sports world. Good stuff!

  19. They've been doing it for a long long time. According to Wikipedia:"The first New Zealand rugby team to tour overseas, playing eight matches in New South Wales, Australia, in 1884, performed "a Maori war cry" or haka before each of its matches."http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haka_of_the_All_Blacks#HistoryI can recite the words, as many kiwis. Though women are not supposed to perform it as the haka under Maori tradition, it is OK to sing or chant the verses.

  20. This is the new haka, Kapa o Pango (The Team of Black) performed before the test match against South Africa's Springboks at Wellington's Westpac Staduim, my patch 🙂http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Twvb8A2ZBu8I believe most guys in this team will represent NZ in the Rugby Wold Cup next year. [Update]That video was so powerful that I ended up writing a new post about it!

  21. Hello Deb,It is the same in New Zealand that once land is in private ownership, it is protected against claims for ancestral lands. However, Government or Local governemnt-owned land which becomes surplus to requirements must either be offered to the local Māori iwi first (if they have already negotiated a settlement of their Treaty of Waitangi claims) or "land-banked" against any claim which is still pending.

  22. Thanks for the info, Richard. That's not the area I'm big on, so your clarification is appreciated. 😉

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