Big growth in interest in Mäori book awards

Winners of the University's second annual Ngä Kupu Ora Mäori Book Awards have been decided by public vote and include a Massey PhD candidate, an internationally-renowned author and a book commemorating the Taranaki land wars.

Voting in the awards, held to coincide with Mäori Language Week, closed last night and attracted more than double the number of votes as last year. Awards organiser University Kaihautü Mäori (Mäori Library Services Manager) Spencer Lilley says the idea for book awards to recognise and celebrate Mäori literature was a result of other major book awards failing to do so.

“It’s heartening to see the growing interest and the continuing high calibre of finalists”, Mr Lilley says. “Although there were fewer categories then the six included at the inaugural awards last year it was pleasing to see that voting figures more than doubled.”

Books on Mäori topics published between June last year and May 30 were selected as finalists in four categories: art, architecture and design; biography; history; and te reo Mäori.

Massey PhD candidate and graduate Julie Paama-Pengelly is the winner of the award for art, architecture and design for her book Mäori Art and Design: Weaving painting, carving and architecture, which traces the origins and evolution of art and design in historic Mäori culture.
The book's editor, Christine Thomson, comments, 'New Holland Publishers is delighted that our publication 'Maori Art and Design' has been honoured with this award and we wish to congratulate Julie Paama-Pengelly on a significant achievement with her first book.'


Internationally acclaimed fiction writer Patricia Grace took out the biography award for her book Ned and Katina, the love story between Ned Nathan, a soldier in the 28th Mäori Battalion, and his wife Katina, whom he met in Crete in 1941.

Two of the winning books, the history and te reo Mäori award winners, were published by Massey alumni Robyn and Brian Bargh of Huia Publishers in Wellington.

The history award was won by Contested Ground: Te Whenua i Tohea, The Taranaki Land Wars 1860-1881 edited by Kelvin Day and published to coincide with an exhibition commemorating the 150th anniversary of the outbreak of the wars.


The te reo Mäori award was won by People of the Land: Images and Mäori Proverbs of Aotearoa New Zealand written by Sir Hirini Moko Mead and Lady June Te Rina