Funded by: Mobilising for Action theme, of the Ngā Rākau Taketake stream of the Biological Heritage National Science Challenge

Date: July 2021 - June 2023

Amount Awarded: $55,749

Project Team: Mr Neihana Matamua, Mr Te Rā Moriarty, Associate Professor Natasha Tassell-Matamua

Indigenous Māori ontological perspectives speak to the inter-connectivity between all phenomena across time and place and space, and between the tangible and intangible. It is not uncommon for Māori to attribute synchronistic meaning to seemingly unrelated events by suggesting they are tohu (signs) that signal a particular response, solution, direction, or caution to a current issue that requires attention by the perceiver. As such, Māori beliefs imply humans cannot be disentangled from the wider ecosystems they are a part of. When applied to te taiao, the environment, this suggests events occurring in the human realm inevitably impact the well-being of the environment, and events occurring in the environment inevitably impact the collective well-being of humans.

The purpose of this project is to explore the emergence of kauri dieback and myrtle rust from a perspective that aligns with Māori ontology, by mapping the temporo-placial-spatial relationship between the wider socio-historical-political-cultural-spiritual landscape and the discovery and trajectory of both kauri dieback and myrtle rust in Aotearoa New Zealand. This approach involves observing events or data, identifying patterns over time, and surfacing attributions about their effects on other phenomena. This project departs from a reductionist, materialist, pathogen-focussed approach to explaining the onset of kauri dieback and myrtle rust in Aotearoa. Instead, utilising Kaupapa Māori grounded in wairuatanga, it will provide a contextualised holistic understanding of the genesis of kauri dieback and myrtle rust that speaks to notions of inter-relativity of all phenomena and the influence of wider scapes on these two biodiversity issues.

Research Outputs:

Storymaps

Kora, A., Tassell-Matamua, N., Matamua, N., & Moriarty, T. R. (2023). Mai i te pū ki te wānanga. Exploring new ways of understanding biosecurity using wānanga as a methodology and method – He taonga kē te ngahere team Story Map. ArcGIS Online, DOI: https://arcg.is/04XDni

Journal Articles

Matamua, N., Moriarty, T. R., & Tassell-Matamua, N. (2023). Mai i te pū ki te wānanga. Interpreting synchronistic meaning through a wānanga methodology. Knowledge Cultures, 1, 84-97.