A Challenge to Education

Irihapeti Ramsden

The purpose of this paper is to challenge the neo-colonial education system that has developed in this country. The reality I understand has come from life as a Māori child born into a neo-colonial world, no longer sovereign (currently, but I make the point that we live in history) continuing to belong quite unromantically to our whānau, hapū and iwi.

For all the overt violence of the past colonial occupation I believe that Māori people are currently facing some of the most serious and destructive cultural implications since contact in 1769. Much of the institutional violence in the colonial systems has now become covert and is deeply imbedded in the New Zealand psyche. It appears to be user-friendly for Māori but its outcomes are the classic outcomes of abuse, lack of confidence, identity destruction, self-doubt and self-blame. This, combined with poverty, serves to maintain many Māori in a state of powerlessness.

Sadly, much of this abuse takes place within our cultural education system. This paper looks at the ways in which the ethnic Pākehā education system is failing young Māori, and offers suggestions for how these issues could be addressed.