Haka is a very New Zealand expression, and we see it more and more in every-day life at schools, sporting fixtures, funerals, graduations and, next week, at the Matatini Kapahaka competitions.
Certainly, there were some that were done before battles, but haka are so much more. They are expressive ways of challenging, honouring, respecting, disrespecting, welcoming, intimidating, celebrating and, sometimes, showing off your physique.
As a non-expert, when I see haka performed, I am hoping for goosebumps. Some appreciate the word play, the rhythms, the actions or the underlying meaning; me? I want that tingle down the back of my neck.
The concepts of ihi and wehi are vital factors in performing haka. Ihi is the energy expressed in the performance and the wehi is our response to it.
When I see a haka, I am hoping that their energy, their ihi, will trigger that wehi in me with those goosebumps and tingles. This is harder to achieve if you are not there in person, although I can tell when the All Blacks are going to have a good game when it can still come through the TV.
Many politicians love haka when it is in support of them but get precious when it is challenging them or their policies. We have seen recent examples of challenging haka, including a spontaneous reaction at a school visit, honouring Te Tiriti o Waitangi, in the All Black haka, politicians facing haka at Waitangi and that wonderful, graceful haka in Parliament by Hana-Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke that was viewed by hundreds of millions around the world.
The multiple purposes of haka must be confusing to outsiders, as they can be used to express numerous emotions such as grief, anger, and contempt, but also hope, joy, love and a sense of unity.
Haka are important Māori cultural expressions of emotions and ideas and, because they are so highly valued, should always be authentic expressions. This is why Māori object so strongly when this form of expression is mocked.
Last week I went to the screening of the new documentary movie The Haka Party Incident, a revisit of the violence that occurred during a protest against a derogatory haka done by Auckland University engineering students in 1979.
It tells the story using archival footage and recent interviews with those involved.
Engineering students had a history of Pākehā doing a parody haka as part of their graduation celebrations. Over the years it had degenerated into a pub crawl dressed in grass skirts. The words of their haka were often crude and insulting of Māori and occasionally included sexual actions. They painted their bodies with mock tattoos, swear words and even genitals.
By the early 1970s there were regular attempts by Māori students to stop the derogatory parts of their celebrations, but these were ignored as Māori had no power or influence that would persuade them to stop.
In 1979, with seemingly every avenue exhausted, Māori and Pacific Islands students, with help from some in their communities, decided to confront the engineering students at their rehearsal and try and make them stop and force them to remove their raffia grass skirts. Naturally the engineering students resisted.
While it appears the violence was unintentional, I think if both sides had thought about it more, it was possibly inevitable. In the movie the level of violence was unclear, as was the violence visited on the protesters by police in the holding cells.
As someone committed to non-violence, I am saddened that violence took place. Despite that, there was some lasting progress that was able to be achieved.
The Race Relations Conciliator’s office asked for submissions for a report on race relations in New Zealand.
It asked about the cause of the Haka Party Incident, also asking opinions about rights, cultural differences, intolerance and how to resolve differences.
A report, Race Against Time, was released in 1982, summarising the submissions. It is valuable because it is a time capsule of prevailing opinion at that time. It shows how much has changed since then, but also how much remains the same.
One of the conclusions of the report was that the government’s policy of assimilation was a failure. Most Māori did not want to become Pākehā, and many Pākehā were "bewildered" why Māori did not want to conform and be like them.
The document gives two sides of the race-relations discussion as does the movie. Both are worth reading or viewing with enough to anger and amuse us all and at times make us squirm in our seats.
— Dr Anaru Eketone is an associate professor in the University of Otago’s social and community work programme.
