Staff + Student LoginOnline Te Reo journal to be launched at Kīngitanga Day
6 April 2011
Professor Linda Smith: Says the Te Kōtihitihi – Ngā Tuhinga Reo Māori, has been established by a group of Waikato researchers looking for opportunities to publish entirely in Te Reo.
An online academic journal published solely in Te Reo is to be launched next week at the University of Waikato.
The University’s Pro Vice-Chancellor Māori, Professor Linda Smith, says the new journal, Te Kōtihitihi – Ngā Tuhinga Reo Māori, has been established by a group of emerging researchers at Waikato who were looking around for opportunities to publish in Te Reo.
“They were talking about how difficult it was to get research published in Te Reo and how hard it was to provide their students with contemporary Māori research published entirely in the Māori language,” she says. “So I encouraged them to solve the problem themselves!”
Guided by a four-strong editorial team from Waikato’s School of Māori and Pacific Development and Faculty of Education, Te Kōtihitihi aims to attract original research on a wide range of topics.
The editorial team aims to publish Te Kōtihitihi twice yearly, and the journal will carry academic papers, opinion pieces, book reviews and creative work – all in Te Reo.
Issue No 1 contains six academic papers written specially for the journal on topics ranging from language revitalisation, Māori history, tikanga and mātauranga Māori. Also featured is an original haka composition that was performed at Te Matatini, the national kapahaka competition.
Contributors came from the Universities of Waikato, Massey and Victoria.
“There’s a wide enough Māori-speaking audience to publish in Te Reo,” says Professor Smith. “Te Kōtihitihi is aimed at students, institutions, academics and iwi groups who might not otherwise get access to this kind of writing.”
The name for the journal, Te Kōtihitihi means “the summit” and was coined by co-editor Korohere Ngāpō of the Faculty of Education who says it sets a challenge for the journal. “We’re aiming for the summit, to write in Te Reo at a high level, and make our scholarship available to the community.”
Te Kōtihitihiwill be launched on April 14 during the University's Kīngitanga Day celebrations and is supported by a grant from Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga, the National Institute of Research Excellence for Maori Development and Advancement.
