This article reports research that set out to investigate men’s experiences at taiaha wānanga in Waitaha/ Canterbury, Aotearoa New Zealand, and whether those experiences helped to shape tāne Māori identity. There is a gap in our existing understanding of men’s experiences in this kaupapa, providing a unique opportunity to learn how mau taiaha has shaped participants’ lives. The strongest themes identified within the data include cultural disconnection and the search for tāne Māori identity, along with the role of taiaha wānanga in male identity construction.

Mana and kaitiakitanga capture the relationships essential to Māori perceptions of wellbeing. These relationships reflect the interconnectedness and interdependence of humans with the people, places and things in their worlds, and the responsibilities associated with these relationships. Mana is critical for mokopuna, as is the requirement to action it, through kaitiakitanga (Marsden, 2003; Paul-Burke & Rameka, 2015). Kaitiakitanga recognises the place of humans, including mokopuna, to assume guardianship roles and responsibilities.

Colonising processes, which led to the removal of many hapū and iwi from their whenua through conflict and dispossession, significantly altered Māori relationships with environments and associated tikanga. Mārakai, as a manifestation of ahi kaa, formed an important part of Māori resistance efforts to maintain occupation of their whenua. Large-scale disconnection of tangata whenua from whenua severely undermined their wellbeing and ability to maintain nature-culture relationships through continued practice of ahi kaa.

This article identifies the entrepreneurial mindset as a resolve to engage in exploration and action in order to address an issue or accomplish a goal. Entrepreneurial mindset, in the context of navigation, espouses an expectation of resilience, analysis, adjustment, application and development in all areas of intention. For thousands of years, Polynesian navigators negotiated the unpredictable and unknown Pacific islands, waters, winds and rains to voyage the breadth of the Pacific Ocean.

Role models serve multiple functions as they influence Māori students’ goals and school aspirations. While Māori students are faced with various educational barriers, scholars contend that having a positive role model can influence their educational persistence and overall engagement at school. Therefore, it is important to consider who Māori students choose as role models and how they influence their goals and aspirations.

Giving voice to kaumātua perspectives and experiences, and those of older people in general, during the COVID-19 pandemic has been rare because older people are more often spoken about than provided with opportunities to speak for themselves. When they have been spoken about, the focus has been on their vulnerability. While such vulnerabilities are a critical concern, this focus ignored their active participation in and contributions to their communities.

There have been many attempts at measuring Māori identity and cultural engagement, yet there have been no scales created to specifically explore whanaungatanga. Whanaungatanga can be operationalised as active participation in and a sense of belonging to social groups and collective, reciprocal caring relationships. In this article, we document the development of a whanaungatanga scale alongside a measure of Māori identity.

Tapu and noa are often cited as fundamentals by which we enact tikanga, promote well-being and divide labour. However, exactly how tapu informed precolonial gender divisions of labour is difficult to examine, mostly because of the pervasive influence Christianity has had on cosmological narratives, from which tapu derives (Mikaere, 2017; Rewi, 2010; Te Awekotuku, 1994). This article outlines some commentary on the relationship between tapu, gender roles and colonisation, and tries to extend that scholarship.

This paper explores the process of co-designing a mātauranga-Māori-informed mindfulness intervention with rangatahi in a wharekura and examines the effects on wellbeing. Mahitahi co-design methodology underpinned the design, implementation and evaluation of the intervention, and quantitative psychological tests measured improvements in wellbeing and dispositional mindfulness. Findings showed positive indications for a decrease in levels of psychological distress, improvements in Māori quality of life domains and higher levels of dispositional mindfulness.

This article has been inspired by “Why Isn’t My Professor Māori?” (McAllister et al., 2019), an article which appeared in this journal and addressed the under-representation of, and inequities facing, Māori academic staff in universities in Aotearoa New Zealand. I present some personal reflections and raise some questions with regard to academics with Māori heritage but who struggle to identify as Māori. I also describe some of the discomfort of being in the “middle ground” of cultural identity and how this has come about, and argue that we need to engage with such troubled identities and histories if we are to decolonise ourselves and our universities.