CD 1

Track 6 Read the Web page.

History of the Maori Language

Decline and revival
1 In the last 200 years, the history of the
Maori language (te reo Maori) has been
one of ups and downs. At the beginning of
the 19th century, it was the predominant
language spoken in Aotearoa (the Maori
name for New Zealand). As more English
speakers arrived in New Zealand, the Maori
language was increasingly confined to Maori
communities. By the mid-20th century, there
were concerns that the language was dying
out. Major initiatives launched from the Aotearoa (New Zealand)
1980s have brought about a revival of the
Maori language. In the early 21st century, Their children often grew up with Maori
more than 130,000 people of Maori ethnicity children and were among the most fluent
could speak and understand Maori, one of European speakers and writers of Maori.
the three official languages of New Zealand. Particularly in rural areas, the interaction
between Maori and Pakeha was constant.
Maori: A common means
of communication Korero Pakeha (“Speak English!”)
2 For the first half century or so of the 4 Pakeha were in the majority by the
European settlement of New Zealand, the early 1860s, and English became the
Maori language was a common way of dominant language of New Zealand.
communicating. Early settlers1 had to learn Increasingly, the Maori language was
to speak the language if they wished to trade confined to Maori communities that existed
with Maori because settlers were dependent separately from the Pakeha majority.
on Maori for many things at this time.
5 The Maori language was not understood
3 Up to the 1870s, it was not unusual as an essential expression and envelope
for government officials, missionaries, of Maori culture, important for the Maori
and prominent Pakeha2 to speak Maori. in maintaining their pride and identity as a

1 settler: a person who goes to live in a new country

2 Pakeha: Maori word for people who were originally from
Europe and also for the English language. Today it
refers to any non-Maori.

| Reading and Writing 33

 people. Maori was now officially discouraged. war, about 75 percent of Maori lived in rural
Many Maori themselves questioned its areas. Two decades later, approximately
relevance in a Pakeha-dominated world 60 percent lived in urban centers.
where the most important value seemed 9 English was the language of urban New
to be to get ahead as an individual. Zealand—at work, in school, and in leisure
6 The Maori language was suppressed in activities. Maori children went to city schools
schools, either formally or informally, so that where Maori was unheard of in teaching
Maori youngsters could assimilate with the programs. The new, enforced contact
wider community. Some older Maori still recall of large numbers of Maori and Pakeha
being punished for speaking their language. caused much strain and stress, and the
Many Maori parents encouraged their children language was one of the things to suffer.
to learn English and even to turn away from 10 The number of Maori speakers began
other aspects of Maori custom. Increasing to decline rapidly. By the 1980s, less than
numbers of Maori people learned English 20 percent of Maori knew enough of their
because they needed it in the workplace traditional language to be regarded as native
or places of recreation such as the football speakers. Even for those people, Maori was
field. “Korero Pakeha” (Speak English) ceasing to be the language of everyday use
was seen as essential for Maori people. in the home. Some urbanized Maori people
became divorced from their language and
A language lives culture. Others maintained contact with
7 Despite the emphasis on speaking English, their original communities, returning for
the Maori language persisted. Until the important hui (meetings) and tangihanga
Second World War3 most Maori spoke Maori (funerals) or allowing the kaumatua (elders)
as their first language. They worshipped4 in at home to adopt or care for their children.
Maori, and Maori was the language of the
marae5. Political meetings were conducted Seeds of change
in Maori, and there were Maori newspapers 11 From the 1970s, many Maori people
and literature. More importantly, it was the reasserted their identity as Maori. An
language of the home, and parents could emphasis on the language as an integral
pass on the language to their children. part of Maori culture was central to this.
Maori leaders were increasingly recognizing
The lure of the city the dangers of the loss of Maori language.
8 The Second World War brought about New groups emerged that were committed to
momentous changes for Maori society. There strengthening Maori culture and the language.
was plenty of work available in towns and
12 Major Maori language recovery programs
cities due to the war, and Maori moved into
began in the 1980s. Many were targeted
urban areas in greater numbers. Before the

3 Second World War: also called World War II (1939–1945)

4 worship: to pray
5 marae: Maori word for a meetinghouse or a place for
formal discussions

34 UNIT 2 | What happens when a language disappears?

 at young people and the education system, of laws and policies. In 1987, Maori was
such as a system of primary schooling6 made an official language of New Zealand.
in a Maori-language environment. 14 There are now many institutions working
to recover the language. Even so, the
Legislating for change decline of the Maori language has only
13 Efforts to secure the survival of the Maori just been arrested. There is a resurgence
language stepped up in 1985. In that year the of Maori, but to survive as a language,
Waitangi Tribunal7 heard the Te Reo Maori it needs enough fluent speakers of all
claim, which asserted that the Maori language ages as well as the respect and support
was a taonga (a treasure) that the government of the wider English-speaking and multi-
was obliged to protect under the Treaty ethnic New Zealand community.
of Waitangi. The Waitangi Tribunal agreed
with the Maori and recommended a number

6 primary school: elementary school, starting at about age

5 and continuing until age 12 to 14
7 Waitangi Tribunal: a court created to honor the
Waitangi Treaty of 1840 between Great Britain
and the Maori people. Under the treaty, the Maori
accepted British rule, and the British agreed to treat
the Maori fairly.

M ain Ideas
Tip for Success Match each subheading with the correct main idea on page 36.
Making an outline
of the main ideas 1. Decline and revival
helps you read
actively. You can 2. Maori: A common means of communication
use subheadings to
organize your ideas. 3. Korero Pakeha (“Speak English!”)

4. A language lives

5. The lure of the city

6. Seeds of change

7. Legislating for change

| Reading and Writing 35

 Preview Reading 2
In his book When Languages Die, linguistics professor K. David Harrison
examines the traditional knowledge that is lost when a language becomes
extinct (that is, when nobody speaks it anymore). What knowledge do you
think is lost “when languages die”?
CD 1
Track 7 Read the book excerpt.

When Languages Die identified, named, described, or classified

by modern science (Hawksworth & Kalin-
Arroyo 1995). Therefore, we need to look
to indigenous cultures to fill in our vast
knowledge gap about the natural world.
But can they retain their knowledge in the
face of global linguistic homogenization3?
3 Much—if not most—of what we know about
the natural world lies completely outside of
science textbooks, libraries, and databases,
K. David Harrison,
existing only in unwritten languages in
Associate Professor of Linguistics people’s memories. It is only one generation
away from extinction and always in jeopardy
1 What exactly do we stand to lose when of not being passed on. This immense
languages vanish? It has become a cliché1 knowledge base remains largely unexplored
to talk about a cure for cancer that may be and uncataloged. We can only hope to access
found in the Amazon rain forest, perhaps it if the people who possess and nurture it
from a medicinal plant known only to local can be encouraged to continue to do so.
shamans2 (Plotkin 1993). But pharmaceutical 4 If people feel their knowledge is worth
companies have spared no efforts to get keeping, they will keep it. If they are told, or
at this knowledge and in many cases have come to believe, that it is useless in the modern
exploited it to develop useful drugs. An world, they may well abandon it. Traditional
estimated $85 billion in profits per year is knowledge is not always easily transferred
made on medicines made from plants that from small, endangered languages to large,
were first known to indigenous peoples global ones. How can that be true if any idea
for their healing properties (Posey 1990). is expressible in any language? Couldn’t
2 An astonishing 87 percent of the world’s Solomon Islanders talk about the behavior
plant and animal species have not yet been patterns of fish in English just as easily as

1 cliché: a phrase or saying that has been used so many times 3 homogenization: a process in which everything becomes
that it no longer has any real meaning or interest the same
2 shamans: traditional healers or medicine men

42 UNIT 2 | What happens when a language disappears?

 in Marovo, their native language? I argue corresponded with decreasing use of forest
that when small communities abandon their resources and a shift from the traditional
languages and switch to English or Spanish, hunter-gatherer lifestyle, along with a shift to
there is also massive disruption of the transfer speaking Spanish. His conservative estimate
of traditional knowledge across generations. of the rate of knowledge loss should be a
This arises in part from the way knowledge wake-up call to all: “I estimate that the real
is packaged in a particular language. loss of ethnobotanical4 knowledge from one
5 Consider Western !Xoon, a small language generation to the next may be on the order
of Namibia (the exclamation mark is a click of 40 to 60 percent.” (Lizarralde 2001).
sound). In !Xoon, clouds are called “rain 8 This is a dire5 scenario: Bari people who
houses.” By learning the word for cloud, a have limited connection with the forest have
!Xoon-speaking child automatically gets lost up to 45 percent of traditional plant names.
(for free) the extra information that clouds Similar patterns of knowledge erosion may be
contain and are the source of rain. An observed among indigenous peoples all around
English child learning the word cloud gets the world as they undergo a cultural shift away
no information about rain and has to learn from traditional lifestyles and languages.
on her own that rain comes from clouds. 9 Some researchers offer hope for the
6 Languages package and structure knowledge persistence and resilience of very basic
in particular ways. You cannot merely forms of traditional knowledge. A study
substitute labels or names from another by anthropologist Scott Atran (1998)
language and hold onto all of the implicit, tested residents of Michigan on their
hidden knowledge that resides in a taxonomy, knowledge of local animals. He concluded
or naming system. Still, each language and that elements of folk knowledge persist
indigenous people is unique, and language shift even when people have been schooled
takes place at different speeds and under very in modern scientific classification.
different conditions. Can we then predict how 10 Though folk knowledge may persist in
much traditional knowledge will successfully modern cultures, we are also losing traditional
be transferred and how much will be lost? knowledge at an alarming rate. This loss
7 Some scientists have tried to do just that. is accompanied by a severe reduction in
The Bari language (1,500–2,500 speakers) of number of species and range of habitats.
Venezuela was studied by linguists who asked Perhaps future technologies hold enough
how much knowledge of the plant world was promise that humanity will be able to survive
being lost and how much retained. The Bari without making use of this accumulated
live in a close relationship with the rainforest ecological knowledge. Perhaps we will grow
and have learned to use many of its plants plants in greenhouses and breed animals in
for food, material goods, medicine, and laboratories and feed ourselves via genetic
construction of houses. One scientist found engineering. Perhaps there are no new
that the loss of Bari traditional knowledge medicines to be found in the rain forests. All

4 ethnobotanical: describing customs and beliefs about plants

and agriculture held by a group of people
5 dire: very serious; terrible

| Reading and Writing 43

 such arguments appeal to ignorance: we do it is a gamble to think that we will never use
not know what we stand to lose as languages it in the future. Do we really want to place
and technologies vanish because much or so much trust in future science and pay so
even most of it remains undocumented. So little attention to our inherited science?

Tip for Success References

In Reading 2, the Atran, Scott (1998). Folk biology and the anthropology of science: Cognitive universals and cultural
particulars. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 21: 547–609.
name(s) and year in
parentheses form Hawskworth, D.L., and M.T. Kalin-Arroyo (1995). Magnitude and distribution of biodiversity. In V.H. Heywood
(ed.), Global Biodiversity Assessment. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 107–192.
a citation. Citations
tell you that an idea Lizarralde, Manuel (2001). Biodiversity and loss of indigenous languages and knowledge in South America.
In L. Maffi (ed.), On Biocultural Diversity. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian, pp. 265–281.
comes from another
source. You can look Plotkin, Mark (1993). Tales of a Shaman’s Apprentice. New York: Viking.
in the publication’s Posey, Darrell A. (1990). Intellectual property rights and just compensation for indigenous knowledge.
references list for Anthropology Today 6(4): 13–16.
full information
about the source.

M ain Ideas
Each statement summarizes the main idea of a paragraph in Reading 2.
Write the paragraph number next to the statement that summarizes it.

7 1. As the Bari people become divorced from their surroundings and

their language, they lose a lot of traditional knowledge.
2. Some traditional knowledge survives even in modern societies in
the United States.
3. Scientists could find new treatments for serious diseases from plants
that only indigenous people know about.
4. Information can be lost in translations from indigenous languages.
5. We should not trust science to replace the knowledge that is being lost
in indigenous communities.
6. Indigenous people know more about many plant and animal species
than scientists.
7. This pattern of knowledge loss exists all over the world.

8. If information is always lost in translation, is it possible to measure

how much traditional knowledge is being lost?
9. Traditional knowledge is in danger of disappearing if we do not
encourage the people who hold it to preserve it.
10. In some languages, words contain extra information about the things
they describe.

44 UNIT 2 | What happens when a language disappears?