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Pākehā (or Pakeha; /ˈpɑːkɪhɑː/, Māori pronunciation: [ˈpaːkɛhaː]) is a Māori-language term for New Zealanders of European descent.^[1] The term has also recently come to refer inclusively either to fair-skinned persons, or to any non-Māori New Zealander.^[2][3]Papa'a has a similar meaning in Cook Islands Māori.^[1][4]

Its etymology is unclear, but the term pākehā was in use by the late 18th century. In December 1814, the Māori children at Rangihoua in the Bay of Islands were "no less eager to see the packaha than the grown folks".^[5]
In Māori, plural nouns of the term include ngā pākehā (the definite article) and he pākehā (the indefinite article). When the word was first adopted, the usual plural in English was "pakehas". However, speakers of New Zealand English are increasingly removing the terminal "s" and treating the term as a collective noun.

Opinions of the term vary amongst European New Zealanders. Some reject it on the ground that it is supposedly offensive,^[6] or they object to being named in a language other than their own.^[6] A sample of 6,507 New Zealanders found no support for the claim that the term “Pākehā” is associated with a negative evaluation.^[7]

In 2013, the New Zealand Attitudes and Values Study carried out by the University of Auckland found no evidence that the word was widely considered to be derogatory; however, only 12 per cent of New Zealanders of European descent chose to be identified by the term, with the remainder preferring "New Zealander" (53 per cent), "New Zealand European" (25 per cent) or "Kiwi" (17 per cent).^[8][9]

Meaning

Māori in the Bay of Islands and surrounding districts had no doubts about the meaning of the word pākehā in the 19th century. In 1831, thirteen rangatira from the Far North met at Kerikeri to compose a letter to King William IV, seeking protection from the French, "the tribe of Marion". Written in Māori, the letter used the word "pākehā" to mean "British European", and the words tau iwi to mean "strangers (non-British)"—as shown in the translation that year of the letter from Māori to English by the missionary William Yate.^[10] To this day, the Māori term for the English language is "reo pākehā". Māori also used other terms such as tupua ("supernatural", "object of fear, strange being"),^[11]kehua ("ghosts"),^[12] and maitai ("metal" or referring to persons "foreign")^[13] to refer to some of the earliest visitors.^[14]

However, The Concise Māori Dictionary (Kāretu, 1990) defines the word pākehā as "foreign, foreigner (usually applied to white person)", while the English–Māori, Māori–English Dictionary (Biggs, 1990) defines Pākehā as "white (person)". Sometimes the term applies more widely to include all non-Māori.^[15] No Māori dictionary cites pākehā as derogatory. Some early European settlers who lived among Māori became known as "Pākehā Māori".

Etymology

The etymology of pākehā is unknown, although the most likely sources are the words pākehakeha or pakepakehā, which refer to an oral tale of a "mythical, human like being, with fair skin and hair who possessed canoes made of reeds which changed magically into sailing vessels".^[16] When Europeans first arrived they rowed to shore in longboats, facing backwards while rowing the boats to shore. In traditional Māori canoes or "waka", paddlers face the direction of travel. This is supposed to have led to the belief that the sailors were supernatural beings.

In her book The Trial of the Cannibal Dog: The Remarkable Story of Captain Cook's Encounters in the South Seas, the anthropologist Anne Salmond recorded that tribal traditions held that Toiroa, a from Mahia, had predicted the coming of the Europeans. He said "ko te pakerewha", meaning "it is the pakerewhā", red and white strangers.^[17][18]

There have been several dubious interpretations given to the word. One claims that it derives from poaka, the Māori word for "pig", and keha, one of the Māori words for "flea", and therefore expresses derogatory implications.^[19] There is no etymological or linguistic support for this notion—like all Polynesian languages, Māori is generally very conservative in terms of vowels; it would be extremely unusual for pā- to derive from poaka. The word poaka itself may come from the proto-polynesian root *puaka, known in every Polynesian language ("puaka in Tongan, Uvean, Futunian, Rapa, Marquisian, Niuean, Rarotongan, Tokelauan, and Tuvaluan; it evolved to the later form puaʻa in Samoan, Tahitian, some Rapa dialects, and Hawaiian); or it might be borrowed or mixed with the English "porker". It is hard to say, since Polynesian peoples populated their islands bringing pigs with them from East Asia, but no pigs were brought to Aotearoa by them. The more common Māori word for flea is puruhi. It is also sometimes claimed that pākehā means "white pig" or "unwelcome white stranger". However, no part of the word signifies "pig", "white", "unwelcome", or "stranger".^[20]

Attitudes to the term

New Zealanders of European ancestry vary in their attitudes toward the word pākehā when applied to themselves.^[21][8] Some embrace it wholeheartedly as a sign of their connection to New Zealand, in contrast to the European identity of their forebears. Others object to the word,^[6] some strongly, claiming it to be derogatory or to carry implications of being an outsider, although this is often based on false information about the meaning of the term.^[22] Some believe being labelled "Pākehā" compromises their status and their birthright links to New Zealand.^[23] In the 1986 census, over 36,000 respondents ignored the ethnicities offered, including "Pākehā", writing-in their ethnicity as "New Zealander", or ignoring the question completely.^[21] A joint response code of "NZ European or Pakeha" was tried in the 1996 census, but was replaced by "New Zealand European" in later censuses because it drew what Statistics New Zealand described as a "significant adverse reaction from some respondents".^[24] Sociologist Paul Spoonley criticised the new version, however, saying that many Pākehā would not identify as European.^[25]

The term pākehā is also sometimes used among New Zealanders of European ancestry in distinction to the Māori term tauiwi ("foreigner"), as an act of emphasising their claims of belonging to the space of New Zealand in contrast to more recent arrivals.^[26] Those who prefer to emphasise nationality rather than ethnicity in relating to others living in New Zealand may refer to all New Zealand citizens only as "New Zealanders" or by the colloquial term "Kiwis".

The term is commonly used by a range of journalists and columnists from The New Zealand Herald, the country's largest-circulation daily newspaper.^[27] Historian Judith Binney called herself a Pākehā and said, "I think it is the most simple and practical term. It is a name given to us by Māori. It has no pejorative associations like people think it does—it's a descriptive term. I think it's nice to have a name the people who live here gave you, because that's what I am."^[28]
New Zealand writer and historian Michael King wrote in 1985: "To say something is Pakeha in character is not to diminish its New Zealand-ness, as some people imply. It is to emphasise it."^[29]
New Zealand politicians from across the political spectrum use the term, including Don Brash,^[30]John Key,^[31]Helen Clark,^[32] and Te Ururoa Flavell.^[33]

History

The point at which European settlers in New Zealand became Pākehā—or indeed New Zealanders—is subjective.

The first European settlers arrived in New Zealand in the early nineteenth century, but most were missionaries, traders and adventurers who did not intend to stay permanently. From the 1840s, following the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi and the assumption of British sovereignty, large numbers of Europeans began to settle permanently in New Zealand. Most of these settlers were from Britain, with a disproportionate number coming from Scotland. There were also numerous settlers from Ireland and Northern and Central Europe.

In the late nineteenth century there were some moves towards cultural nationalism, and many Pākehā began to see themselves as different from people living in Britain. However, there were still strong ties to the "mother country" (the United Kingdom, particularly England), which were maintained well into the twentieth century. Until some point in the mid-twentieth century most Pākehā considered themselves to be both British and New Zealanders. Many Pākehā intellectuals migrated to Britain in order to pursue their careers as this was not possible in New Zealand. Notable expatriate Pākehā from this period include writer Katherine Mansfield and physicist Ernest Rutherford.

Pākehā ties with Britain were drastically weakened in the decades after World War II. Quicker, cheaper international travel allowed more Pākehā to visit and live in other countries, where they saw that they were different from the British and felt the need for a stronger national identity. In 1973, Britain joined the European Economic Community, cutting New Zealand off from free trade with its biggest market and leaving Pākehā feeling betrayed by the people they had thought of as their own. Meanwhile, Māori were becoming more assertive, especially about the value of their culture and their ownership over it. The Māori cultural renaissance made many Pākehā feel that they lacked a culture of their own, and from the 1970s numerous Pākehā writers and artists began to explore issues of Pākehā identity and culture. It was at this point that the word "Pākehā" grew in popularity, although it remained controversial.

Cultural identity

In general, Pākehā continue to develop identities distinct from and complementary to those of their (often) British origins and those of the other Anglophone nation-states such as Australia, the United States, Canada and Ireland, as well as Māori. As with most other settler societies, it can be said descriptively that Pākehā contemporary culture is an amalgam of cultural practices, tensions, and accommodations: British/European with some Māori and Polynesian influences and more recently wider cultural inputs, particularly from Chinese and other Far Eastern cultures. Some have also argued that especially modern Pākehā culture is defined by "shock entry" of Britain into the European Economic Community in 1975, which "[left] the descendants of the colonisers, the Anglo-Celtic majorities, seemingly abandoned and marooned in Australia and New Zealand".^[34]

Christianity in New Zealand, despite its foreign origins, has also been shaped by Māori through movements such as the Rātana Church and Destiny Church, as well as their involvement in churches of European origin such as the Anglican Church. Where Pākehā identity is identified, commonly NZ kitsch and symbols from marketing such as the Chesdale Cheese men are used as signifiers,^[35] and might more appropriately be called "Kiwiana".

Michael King, a leading writer and historian on Pākehā identity, discussed the concept of distinct Pākehā practices and imaginations in his books:^[36]Being Pākehā (1985) and Being Pākehā Now (1999), and the edited collection, Pakeha: The Quest for Identity in New Zealand (1991), conceptualising Pākehā as New Zealand's "second indigenous" culture.^[36] By contrast, Māori art historian Jonathan Mane-Wheoki described Pākehā as "the people who define themselves by what they are not. Who want to forget their origins, their history, their cultural inheritance – who want Maori, likewise, to deny their origins so that we can all start off afresh."^[34]

See also

• New Zealand European


• Pākehā settlers


• 
  Palagi, a term in Samoan sometimes used to describe foreigners


• 
  Haole, the analogous Hawaiian term


• Gaijin


• Gweilo

Notes

References

• 
  Mane-Wheoki, Jonathan (2000), From Zero to 360 degrees: Cultural Ownership in a Post-European Age (PDF), University of Canterbury, International Council of Museums, Council for Education and Cultural Action Conference, New Zealand, via the Christchurch Art Gallery website, archived from the original (PDF) on 4 October 2006, retrieved 2018-06-05
  


• Hoani Nahe, "The Origins of the Words 'Pakeha' and 'Kaipuke'", Journal of the Polynesian Society, vol. 3, December 1894


• New Zealand Electronic Text Centre, Maori Wars of the Nineteenth Century by S. Percy Smith

External links

• 
  The dictionary definition of 'pākehā' at Wiktionary