Kai Tahu Writing and Cross-Cultural Communication‪.‬

This essay examines some distinctive traditions of writing that emerged around 1900 within Kai Tahu Whanui. (1) Its particular focus is on the ways in which early twentieth century Kai Tahu writers produced forms of short non-fiction, in English, to explain enduring Kai Tahu lifeways centring on 'muttonbirding'. These accounts of muttonbirding, a mahika kai (food source) that continues to be a defining aspect of Kai Tahu, were published in newspapers and school magazines in southem New Zealand. I argue that literacy, specifically literacy in English, was a key element of the distinctive modernity that emerged within southern Kai Tahu as a result of encounters with sealers, whalers, and missionaries. Alongside intermarriage and Christianity (indeed, an aspect of the latter in the south), English literacy was one of the key elements of this alternative modernity. These new strands were woven together with ideas and practices carried over from the pre-colonial world which included seasonal mobility, whakapapa-regulated natural resource-use, and an ongoing belief in tapu. Accounts of muttonbirding illustrate this. However, the primary importance of these pieces of writing, particularly those examined in this essay, is that they underscore the importance of literacy, popular literature, and English, in shaping how Kai Tahu people formed and communicated their worldview, and aspirations, within the colonial public sphere. From the late eighteenth century onwards, the southern South Island of New Zealand became an extension of the New South Wales frontier as Euroamericans visited it in pursuit of seals, flax, whales, and other commodities. As a result of this resource colonisation, Kai Tahu encountered, traded, fought and intermarried with takata pora (literally, boat men) earlier than most other Maori groups. This lead to material and cultural developments within Kai Tahu that continue to set present-day iwi members apart from those of other iwi. One obvious example is the biological consequence of widespread and sustained levels of interracial intimacy. There was, as a result, also an earlier uptake of the English language and quicker relinquishment of te reo Maori (the Maori language) amongst Kai Tahu compared with other iwi (tribes). Indeed, it is estimated that the intergenerational transfer of te reo Maori as the main language of communication has not occurred within Kai Tahu communities for 80 years in some areas, and up to 130 years in others. (2) Such things are highlighted by Kai Tahu personalities committed to the revitalisation of te reo Maori within the tribe. (3) However, the danger of simply equating cultural change with cultural loss (4)--a common consequence of viewing history as the 'interaction of fixed cultural spheres' (5)--is a failure to understand the nature, extent and drivers of cultural alterations, and their place in Maori modernities. (6)