Independent Study Notes:
Task 1 – main points taken from Project Matauranga:
- Māori science, how traditional research and… form pathways for our future
- Night sky, astronomical knowledge helped Māori navigate the ocean.
- Cultural preservation of this knowledge of Matareiki.
Te Korea – the nothingness before the universe. Everything was condensed into a mass that was dense and hot, which exploded outwards. The sky and earth were in an embraced. When the parents were separated the light came into the world. Taane hung the family of light in the sky. Taane obtained his children and headed into the sky and places his children in the sky, making light in the world and things came to be.
Astronomical knowledge informed a lot of Māori traditions. The belief that we come from and are related to the stars. Each iwi has different beliefs of the system.
The colonisation of Aotearoa resulted in the country losing a lot of knowledge of tatai arorangi, the cultural belief system.
- Cycle of the moon relates to good days to plant crops
- Telling time
- Using the stars to figure out the season and time. The star that sits on the horizon in the morning will tell you what season it is. The moon let the Māori know what day it was and if it was good for growing crops. The rising of maatareki, the full moon, reset the Māori calendar.
- The full moon bought water closer to the surface, meaning that the crop would grow larger.
Star compass:
A compass around the waka which divides the horizon into 32 houses. Our ancestors memorised the precise order of when which constellations rise and set. The stories about maatareiki helped these sailors to memorise the constellations. This scientific principles would get them from one place to another.
Task 2: Kaitiakitanga: a definitive introduction to the holistic worldview of Māori.
Legends and knowledge of Māori culture is sacred and shared with caution. A story such as the legend of Tāne ascending to the highest heaven is one that can be easily misunderstood if even one part is not known or understood the legend would become meaningless and impossible to make sense of. It was basic rules of Māoridom that these scared knowledges could not be shared with the tūtūā (common people) as it can be abused or misheard. These sacred stories were not lightly taught and was only shared with a selected few who stood tests to ensure that they were fit to hold such knowledge.
Task 3: A map of points for the chapter; The Introduction to the Oxford Illustrated History of Science by Iwan Rhys Morus.
Act = To promote the sustainable management of natural and physical resources.
Major concerns for Maori is that the cultural and spiritual decisions of Maori and their Taonga were left for local authorities and the planning tribunal to decide. Ground rules in the act say they are not, but these rules can be misunderstood or ignored.
Every person exercising under the act must recognise and make provisions for Maori cultural values in all aspects of resource management.
Kaitakitanga = applies to traditional Maori guardianship over resources ( native Forrest + kaimoana)
Part two of the act ( purpose and principles)
Section 8 = principals of the treaty must be taken into account in management of natural resources, preserving Maori culture. The Maori perspective of the treaty must be taken into account. Concerns amount tribes are that authorities may misunderstand or ignore this information.
Fundamental knowledge:
Myth and legends are a huge part of the knowledge held by Maori philosophers. There are parallels between Maori and Polynesian Cultures, although the cultures have been separated from 800-2500 years. These stories have a common theme running through them. The legends from each culture exhibit a common focus.
These days we commonly dismiss these myths as just primitive superstitions from the past but this in not true. These stories were constructions employed by ancient seers to encapsulate their view of the world into a story, a story of the relationship creator, universe and the man.
This is called the ‘world view’ of a culture, which members believe and which stems their value system. This worldview influences every aspect of the culture.
Western cultures believe that the world is made up of atoms of solid matter and applies strict mechanical laws to assume that the world can be understood and is scientifically describable.
On the surface a story such as Tāne ascending to the highest heaven is seen as just a fantasy to tell children or a myth. This is untrue, as this tale is apart of very sacred Maori knowledge that was kept away from the common people as the story could be misused or abused if even one part was left out, it became impossible to understand. Such scared stories were only shared with a select few who had been through an apprenticeship to be deemed fit to hold such knowledge.
Task 4: Self-directed study on the assessment.
Zoë Bell - Conversations in Creative Cultures 