Maori Race Abroad

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 856, 27 December 1929, Page 8

Maori Race Abroad

Overseas Colonies Kxist

ELEVEN years ago, at Christmas, two New Zealand soldiers stood on the Thames Embankment in London. One, a Maori, expressed a wish which surprised his companion - he wanted to remain in England. Today, the Maori is married to an Englishwoman, has a family, and holds a good position in the Louth of England.

Extraordinary though it appears, there are some hundreds of Maoris living contentedly thousands of miles from their homeland. They' are scattered in many countries abroad. Stay-at-home New Zealanders regard the native race as a people devoted to its own country and proud in its centuries of tradition. Yet, just as surely as a century of European occupation has robbed the Maori race of most of its individuality, and is continuing to do so at an ever-increasing rate, there is a growing tendency among the natives themselves to establish homes abroad. The transition has passed unnoticed, yet it constitutes a not unimportant phase of the passing of the Maori race. People will argue that the Maoris are increasing in number. Admitting this, the growing percentage of half-castes and quarter-castes must be remembered. The old school of Maori is, unfortunately, a dying type; the South Island Maoris of today are scarcely classed as a pure-blood race —even 50 per cent, of the Northern Maoris confess to white blood;' modern native customs are indelibly stamped with European influences; pure art is virtually extinct. Students of the Maori are asking this question in 1929; what will the next 50 years mean to the race? It is conceded in New Zealand today that the Maori is fated with one prospect, absorption by the white race. Perhaps the judgment of some present-day Maoris that they can live as well in white communities abroad as in New Zealand, where the native race is swamped with white civilisation, is the real sign of what the future will mean. The present day shows the increasing tendency among young Maoris to drift to centres of population. While Auckland City can show many Maoris in the community, Australia, California and England can produce small groups of New Zealand natives as apparently permanent residents. The making of homes in Australia, principally in Sydney, by Maoris is understandable as Australia is so closely allied to New Zealand. Why California should attract numbers of Maoris is not quite as apparent. The cosmopolitan elements of California’s main cities, however, have succeeded in drawing natives from Hawaii principally, from New Zealand, Tahiti and Samoa. WAR ALLIANCES

England’s case is more interesting. The Great War played its part ahd more than one Maori soldier married in the United Kingdom and eventually established his home in the motherland of the Empire. But the story really began in the colonising days of New Zealand. British regiments, •which fought the Maoris in the ’6o’s, had mq,ny officers who were members of well-placed families in England. Some of these men married Maori women and stayed in New Zealand after hostilities ceased. The most

Interesting development of these unions came in years. In some instances, the half-caste children of the English officers were requested by their fathers’ families to adopt England as their home. Several of the half-Maori children, reared almost completely in England, married members of comparatively prominent English families ultimately. The most prominent member of the Maori race in England is Mrs. StaplesBrown, who was well-known as the Rotorua guide, Maggie Papakura. She has been prominent socially and has arranged several meetings of Maoris in England. It was Mrs. StaplesBrown’s intention to have a memorial to Maori soldiers who were killed in the Great War, erected on the bank of the Thames.

One of the outstanding members of the Maori race, Dr. Peter Buck, is engaged outside New Zealand. As Director of Maori Hygiene, Dr. Buck accomplished excellent work for the Health Department and he also contributed his researches to the knowledge of Polynesian history. Now, Dr. Buck is a prominent ethnologist, for the Bernice P. Bishop Museum. Honolulu. There is a satisfying feature of his absence from his homeland —his work; is a study of the main branches of the Polynesian race. There are Maoris resident even in South Africa and Canada, but New Zealand, while its natives reveal a greater tendency to go abroad, has attracted a larger Polynesian population from the Pacific Islands. Particularly in Auckland, there ere Samoans, Rarotongans, Tongans and Tahitians in comparatively large numbers. Fijians have also found homes in New Zealand and the numbers of these immigrants probably exceed the numbers of the Maoris who have gone abroad. PACIFIC PROBLEMS

Intermarriage with Maoris is common and the Pacific races of the future seem scarcely likely to retain their individuality. Until civilisation reached the Pacific, the peoples of the various island groups were shar ply defined, in spite of reciprocal trade and racial alliance. Today, there is justification for the opinion of some competent judges that a problem for Polynesians and Melanesians alike will be to preserve their individuality. The overwhelming influence of the Chinese, with smaller numbers of Japanese and Indians, in Malaya, is pointed to as a possible development in the Pacific. Japan’s occupation of the Marshall, and Ladrone Islands, for instance, has resulted in immigration by many Japanese; the Hawaiian Islands have a heavy population of Japanese and Chinese, in addition to a mixture of races; Fiji has a growing population of Indians. While the native inhabitants themselves are increasing in number in most cases, they are not increasing at the same rate as the Astatic races.