Beyond the Shame: Creating Spaces for Treaty-Responsive Pedagogical Dialogues

• In Event: Comparative Research Perspectives on Educational Reform Initiatives in Developing Countries and Indigenous Peoples in Developed Countries

Abstract

Though tiny, with a mere 1.4 million people in the metro area, 11% of the population of Auckland, New Zealand are indigenous Māori first nations people. The Māori were in Aotearoa from between 950 AD and 1350, long before European settlers arrived to settle in 1769 changing the islands’ names to New Zealand. However, what truly sets New Zealand apart from the rest of the world, is the lived reality of the Treaty of Waitangi (1840), the nation’s founding document consisting of principles on which British and Māori chiefs made a covenant to create a nation state and government, complete with with requisite promises exchanged by both parties. The document was penned in English and translated into Te Reo Māori, which marked the opening for interpretation and thus miscommunication. Discrepancies between the documents persist and impact daily life for all New Zealanders Māori, Pakeha (European descent), and immigrants alike. This paper from the perspective of applied critical multiculturalism introduces the notion of treaty responsive pedagogical conversations for secondary school teacher candidates in Aotearoa New Zealand who grapple with the notion of teaching an ethnically, linguistically, and culturally diverse student body punctuated by the richness and presence of indigenous Māori students whose presence, despite the Treaty promises, are all but absent from the mainstream curriculum. The paper describes a process that introduces and encourages novice teachers and associated faculty to engage in exploratory, uncomfortable, and yet healing conversation that moves educators beyond the paralysis and status quo of shame in educational contexts to curricular reform and critical action.

Author

• Lorri Michelle Johnson Santamaria, The University of Auckland