MAI TE KOPU O TE WAHINE: CONSIDERING MAORI WOMEN AND POWER

Authors

Ngahuia te Awekotuku, National Centre for Maori Research Excellence, University of Auckland

Abstract

Moko kauae: female Maori facial tattoo. This is the subtle power of maintaining a femininity that offends, that endures, that persists in the face of the settlers’ and invaders’ descendants; threatens sensibility and comfort levels; and continues to fascinate and challenge, charm and repel. Whether or not they were aware doing this, the elderly women who continued to inscribe their faces into the final decades of the past century and wear their identity and heritage with pride, were effectively confronting the colonizer and saying, we are here, and we will never ever go away. My face may make you uncomfortable, but it is my face, made by my pain. It is my pride, confronting your fear and your infatuation. And we will never go away. Maori women will not disappear. We will always walk this land, which carries the bones of our forebears and enfolds the placenta of our newborns. He mana a whenua: he mana wahine—this is who we are. This is our power; the assertion of influence and identity, the claiming of time and space. The assurance of continuity.

Recommended Citation

te Awekotuku, Ngahuia (2020) "MAI TE KOPU O TE WAHINE: CONSIDERING MAORI WOMEN AND POWER," Pacific Studies Journal: Vol. 43: No. 1, Article 2.
Available at: https://digitalcollections.byuh.edu/pacific-studies-journal/vol43/iss1/2