Rangahau me ngā Whakatinanatanga

The strategic goal of the Puna for Māori & Indigenous Research is to become a centre of research excellence capable of fostering and facilitating the self-determination, self-governance and development efforts of indigenous peoples in New Zealand, Australia, and Pacific rim countries generally.

Its research and development activities are supported through research scholarships and the provision of opportunities for emerging scholars to conduct doctoral and post-doctoral research. The Puna continues to form strategic alliances with relevant research institutions both here and overseas. It also provides an advisory service, and assists in the dissemination and publication of research and development findings. The Puna facilitates academic exchanges, conferences, hui, seminars and convocations.

Staff and students of the Faculty of Māori and Indigenous Studies engage in theoretical and applied research in the core disciplines and inter-disciplinary fields that constitute their primary academic focus. That research is aligned with the government's national goals and is designed to meet the needs and aspirations of those local, national and international communities with which the Faculty identifies in its mission, vision and strategic planning goals and with whose members it maintains an ongoing collaborative relationship. Our research and teaching are integrated and both are designed to contribute to theory, practice, and public policy in New Zealand and around the globe.

WERO means to provoke, agitate and inspire. Our researchers actively take up the challenge of confronting institutional and interpersonal racism in Aotearoa.

Racism represents one of the most significant challenges facing Aotearoa. The effects of racism are extensive, manifesting in everyday forms of discrimination for Māori, Pacific peoples and minoritised ethnic communities. Entrenched in systems and structures that create disadvantage for minorities, and advantage for privileged ethnic majorities, racism is evident in inequitable outcomes across almost every indicator of wellbeing, including those within health, education, housing, employment and justice.

• Science-Lead: Associate Professor Waikaremoana Waitoki
• Funded with a grant of $10 million over five years (2020-2025) through the Ministry of Business and Innovation Endevour Fund (MBIE)
• WERO on Research Commons
• Learn more about Our People at WERO

The purpose of Spiritual Care in Aotearoa Health Care research project is to support the transformation of healthcare within Aotearoa New Zealand into a system that recognises the wairua and spiritual dimensions of wellbeing, ensuring inclusive, equitable, holistic and culturally safe health journeys for all. 

• Researchers: Co-Led by Professor Moana Waitoki, Professor Richard Egan
• Research Fellows: Dr Raima Hippolite, Mei-Ling Blank
• The Spiritual Care in Aotearoa Health Care project received $1.3 million for 36 months from the Health Research Council (2023-2026)
• Read more about the Spiritual Care in Aotearoa Health Care Team

ProfessorTe Kahautu Maxwell

Kai piro was traditionally a staple component of the Māori diet. However, over time and due to post-european contact, the practice of sourcing, processing, and consumption of kai piro has lessened to the degree in which it is no longer part of the common Māori diet today. The practice of kai piro is maintained today by remnants of an ageing Māori population.

The objectives of the Kai Piro, Oranga Tangata: Māori Fermented Food and Derived Health Benefits to Māori project are to record the practices, lived experiences and narratives of the few practioners and knowledge-holders, and their belief in the health benefits derived from kai piro. The aim is to retain this mātauranga for future generations, with the intention to revitalise these traditional practices, in the hope that kai piro will once again become a staple component in the Māori diet of future generations. 

Associate Professor Donna Campbell, Rānui Ngārimu and Dr Catherine Smith

Te Rā is the sole remaining customary Māori sail. She is held in the British Museum and has never been systematically studied or documented. Te Rā’s existence is evidence of the relationship of Māori to Polynesian antecedents and speaks to the centrality of voyaging in Māori tradition.

The Te Rā: The Māori Sail | Whakaarahia anō te rā kaihau! research project aims to revitalise the cultural knowledge contained in Te Rā. Recovering this knowledge will involve an interdisciplinary approach and the use of a diverse range of methods in order to access previously unknown information related to cultural knowledge, use, construction and technology. 

• Co-led by Associate Professor Donna Campbell
• The Te Rā: The Māori Sail | Whakaarahia anō te rā kaihau! research project is a Royal Society – Te Apārangi Marsden fund project. 

Te Anau

The growing presence of mātauranga Māori (Māori knowledge) in psychology represents a trend to resist the dominance of Western psychology as a universal paradigm of wellbeing for Māori.

This research will explore the contributions of Māori knowledge to growing an Indigenous psychology that will produce new, empirical theories, cohere fragmented knowledge, decolonise psychology and enhance transdisciplinary collaborations. Using a kaupapa Māori theoretical lens, we will consider and debate the wealth of interrelated knowledge about whānau, creative arts, the environment, and spirituality that hover in places invisible to Western psychology.

We will examine the repositories of Māori traditional knowledge held in archives, museums, and marae, to uncover wellbeing narratives of the past. Linkages to the present will be revealed by using the Critical Incident Technique, which offers a flexible, open-ended, enquiry tool to mediate collaborative conversations with 100 psychologists, counsellors, psychiatrists, elders and healers. The exemplars gained from these conversations will be debated and critiqued at knowledge exchange symposia.

The research findings will contribute to a textbook on the theory of Māori Indigenous psychology; peer-reviewed journal articles, and importantly reclamation of Māori-defined solutions for those seeking wellness.  

Professor Sophie Nock (far right)

Ageing is part of life, and kaumātua see it as a positive development as it means that you are held in high esteem by the community. Rather than kaumātua ‘retiring’, they enter into another phase of life that can have significant cultural, hapū and iwi expectations and commitments.

The phase 2 research programme, Kaumātua Mana Motuhake Pōi (colloquially known as KMM Pōī), is studying further the tuakana-teina (older sibling-younger sibling) peer intervention model, in addition to an intergenerational model for increasing physical activity and cultural knowledge exchange. 

• Professor Sophie Nock
• Funded $2.5M by Ageing Well – National Science Challenge

Professor Tangiwai Rewi

E rua ngā aronga o te hōtaka rangahau nei hei tiaki āwhina i te iwi ki te āta tiaki, manaaki i te taiao : Ko te tuatahi ko te whakaako ki ngā Kaitiaki me pēwhea te uiui me te hopu i a rātou ake pūrākau/kōrero e hāngai ana ki tō rātou ao -te nohoanga ki tātahi. Ko te aronga tuarua ko te whakaako ki ngā Kaitaiaki me pēwhea te kohi me te aro mātai i ngā raraunga e mōhio ai rātou ki te tōnui o ngā momo kai ki ngā wāhi kua tāutungia kētia ki ētahi takiwā. Mā reira, ka āhei te iwi ki te whakarite rautaki hei tiaki i te taiao. 

• Professor Tangiwai Rewi
• Funded $50,000 by Coastal People: Southern Skies

Treaty Principles Bill submission workshop

The ACT Party introduced the Treaty Principles Bill in 2024, proclaiming to protect everyone’s equal rights before the law. The Bill has sparked immense debates over the Crown’s attempt to rewrite the articles of te Tiriti o Waitangi and undermine Māori tino rangatiratanga. It has drawn tangata whenua and tangata Tiriti together to participate in Hīkoi mō te Tiriti and write submissions to vehemently oppose the Bill.

Although the Justice Select Committee members have commenced preliminary analyses of the 300,000 submissions, they have missed significant opportunities to centre Māori aspirations and adequately honour this record-level public input on te Tiriti.

This study seeks to identify the operation of racism in the discussion of Māori and te Tiriti, and solutions to these. To do this, a multi-method analysis of the submissions will be conducted, involving:

1. large language model analyses to identify recurring themes
2. theory-driven analyses on the intersection of racism and problematic reasoning; and
3. counter-storytelling to amplify responses to racist rhetoric.  

Kay Berryman (right)

The purpose of this research is to investigate the perspectives and experiences of a total of twenty Māori women (10) and Indigenous women (10) waka ama paddlers about Mātauranga/Indigenous Knowledge (Mātauranga/IK).

It aims to explore the impact of waka ama on the overall Hauora (well-being) of these women and examine the cultural, social, political, and environmental factors that contribute to the perceived benefits of waka ama within their communities.

Additionally, the research seeks to identify opportunities for integrating and enriching Mātauranga Māori/IK within the context of waka ama, promoting the revitalisation and relevance of traditional knowledge systems.

The research will be guided by Kaupapa Māori principles, ensuring a culturally grounded and respectful approach that empowers participants and is mana-enhancing. 

• Professor Sophie Nock supervising Kay Berryman 
• This research project was funded $123,600.00 for 36 months from the Health Research Council.

Te Aorere Ngātai-Tautuku (left)

This research aims to celebrate takatāpui identities through pūrākau from tāngata takatāpui who create and/or facilitate spaces of belonging as a form of resistance against settler colonialism. Tāngata takatāpui should have tino rangatiratanga – the fundamental right to self-determination and be protected as a guaranteed right of Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

The purpose of this research seeks to contribute to the field of evolving and maintaining proficiency in building social cohesion, fostering inclusion and preventing and resisting violent extremism.   

• Associate Professor Donna Campbell supervising Te Aorere Ngātai-Tautuku 
• This project was funded $15,000 for 12 months from He Whenua Taurikura – a Land at Peace

• 2022/3 Summer scholar Sophia Wairoa-Harrison’s article Māori-focused Course Content in Undergraduate Psychology Programmes in Aotearoa New Zealand was published in the New Zealand Journal of Psychology with her supervisors Professor Moana Waitoki and Dr Kyle Tan. 
• 2023/4 Summer scholar Svanté Johansson’s article Anti-racism Allyship Amongst Psychologists and Students in Psychology Training in Aotearoa New Zealand was published in Journal of the New Zealand College of Clinical Psychologists in collaboration with his supervisors Dr Kyle Tan and Professor Moana Waitoki. 
• 2024/5 Summer scholar Paolo Aquino was awarded the 'Best Poster Award' for his study Kasayayan at mga salaysay: A bibliography of research with Asian communities in Aotearoa (2000-2024) with his supervisor Dr Kyle Tan at the 2025 Asian Academics in Aotearoa Association symposium at AUT.