Journal of New Zealand & Pacific Studies - Volume 12, Issue 2, 2024

Increasingly, such lived realities of biodiversity loss, land degradation and climate change have become the topic of much global discourse and debate, with many demanding government and corporate accountability for the health of the land. In Aotearoa New Zealand, mainstream environmental and sustainability discourse largely considers the well-being of whenua (land) in relation to human need and the capacity to sustain people and economies. Though it is critical to understand the societal impacts of ecological concerns and land degradation, Māori perspectives further consider the subjective experience of Papatūānuku (deity associated with the Earth) as a living, breathing entity; a perspective that can be cited across Māori-authored texts and ecological narratives. In turn, the ways in which land use and related sustainability discourse are expressed within creative literary forms have the potential to shape how humans view our relationships with, and responsibilities to, the more-than-human; to challenge anthropocentrism, its assumed objectivity and the risk of perpetuating environmental violence within Aotearoa. This article argues for the importance of shared whakapapa (interconnection, ancestry) and the potential for intersubjectivity between humanity and the more-than-human within ecological narratives, focusing on how this is achieved within poetry, prose and short fictions authored by wāhine Māori (Māori women). In turn, this research demonstrates the capacity of pūrākau (storytelling, narrative) to interrogate and resist land degradation by presenting creatively imagined scenarios that can bring us closer to reality than is possible through the objectification of land.

Set to premiere in 2026, Sofia Kalogeropoulou, Maddy Parkins-Craig and Tessa Romano discuss their multidisciplinary performance piece in progress called Get Me Off This F***ing Planet. Drawing from their cross-sectional expertise of instrumental, vocal music and dance, this new composition/performance piece will use physical and musical storytelling. This approach, inspired by eco-somatics, is to explore our shared humanity within the context of the disturbing emerging trends in the current sociopolitical landscape both in Aotearoa and the wider world, and the looming tipping point in the fight against climate change. The work considers the roles of natural beauty and the potential joys of human relationships, ultimately cycling through the states of anger, grief and joy to confront, commiserate and celebrate with its audience in asking: How do we cope with contemporary living in the midst of climate catastrophe and political upheaval? Emigrating from the United States, Australia and Greece, the authors of this article and creators of this performance piece have witnessed their countries on fire both politically and literally, while being keenly aware, now inhabiting Aotearoa, of ‘sinking’ islands and archipelagos like Tuvalu and Vanuatu. This article considers the urgency behind the performance work’s creation influenced by the fraught relationship between humanity and the environment both in the authors’ countries of origin and their current inhabitance in Aotearoa.

Review of: Transgressing Tikanga Captured by Māori: First-Hand Accounts 1816–1884, Trevor Bentley (2021)

Nelson: Potton & Burton, 288 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 98855 018 3 (pbk), NZ$39.99

Review of: War at the Margins: Indigenous Experiences in World War II, Lin Poyer (2022)

Honolulu, HI: University of Hawai‘i Press, 330 pp.,

ISBN 978 0 82489 182 4 (pbk), $28.00

ISBN 978 0 82489 181 7 (hbk), $68.00

Review of: Wayfinding and Critical Autoethnography, Fetaui Iosefo, Stacy Holman Jones and Anne Harris (eds) (2021)

New York: Routledge, 227 pp.,

ISBN 978 0 36734 379 8 (pbk), £39.99

ISBN 978 0 36734 382 8 (hbk), £135

Review of: Honouring Our Ancestors: Takatāpui, Two-Spirit and Indigenous LGBTQI+ Well-being, Alison Green and Leonie Pihama (eds) (2023)

Wellington: Te Herenga Waka University Press, 376 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 77692 073 0 (hbk), NZ$35

Review of: Climate Change and Impacts in the Pacific, Lalit Kumar (ed.) (2020)

Cham: Springer, 538 pp.,

ISBN 978 3 03032 877 1 (hbk), £95

Review of: Fire on the Island: Fear, Hope and a Christian Revival in Vanuatu, Tom Bratrud (2022)

New York and Oxford: Berghahn, 276 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 80073 464 7 (hbk), £99

Review of: Building and Remembering: An Archaeology of Place-Making on Papua New Guinea’s South Coast, Chris Urwin (2022)

Honolulu, HI: University of Hawai‘i Press, 260 pp.,

ISBN 978 0 82489 188 6 (hbk), $76

Review of: Frances Hodgkins: European Journeys, Catherine Hammond and Mary Kisler (eds) (2019)

Auckland: Auckland University Press, 259 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 86940 893 0 (hbk), NZ$85

Review of: LA Littérature Irradiée: Les Essais Nucléaires EN Polynésie Française AU Prisme DE L’écriture, Andréas Pfersmann (2021)

Marseille: La Courte Échelle and Éditions Transit, 88 pp.,

ISBN 978 2 91727 028 8 (pbk), €10

Review of: Indigenous Pacific Islander Eco-Literatures, Kathy Jetňil-Kijiner, Leora Kava and Craig Santos Perez (eds) (2022)

Honolulu, HI: University of Hawai‘i Press, 404 pp.,

ISBN 978 0 82489 105 3 (pbk), $29

ISBN 978 0 82489 104 6 (hbk), $90

Review of: Tūnui/Comet, Robert Sullivan (2022)

Auckland: Auckland University Press, 72 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 86940 969 2 (pbk), NZ$19.99

The Savage Colonizer Book, Tusiata Avia (2020)

Wellington: Victoria University of Wellington Press, 96 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 77656 409 5 (pbk), NZ$25