2011 Research Roundup Seminar Series
5 October - 30 November 2011
Seminars take place 4.10 to 5.30pm on Wednesdays Seminars are open to the public. For further information please email address
Programme
5 October ~ Cathy Wylie, 2011 JD Stout Fellow
Cutting red tape or the umbilical cord? The role of connections in New Zealand education before and after Tomorrow’s Schools
In 1989 the New Zealand government instituted school self-management with the aim of improving educational outcomes. Making schools stand-alone units in a more competitive environment has not yielded marked improvements in long-standing issues of disparities in educational opportunities and outcomes, and in student engagement in learning. This seminar looks at how much latitude schools in fact enjoyed before the reforms, and contrasts the use of bureaucratic connections to support change in schools before 1989, with the much more problematic role of cross-cutting connections across the education system since.
12 October ~ Hilary Stace
Mental deficiency colonies and other stories from New Zealand’s disability history
In 1953 a government report recommended the building of large ‘mental deficiency colonies’, each large enough for several hundred disabled people from five years old. At its height up to 2% of the population were living in these institutions with 800 at one site alone, Kimberley near Levin; in some situations unknown to other family members. Institutionalisation is just one aspect of the emerging history of disability in New Zealand, and the storytellers are increasingly those with insider lived experience.
19 October
Break – no seminar
26 October ~ Brian Easton
Venturing out of narrow seas
Not in Narrow Seas is a history of New Zealand Brian is writing from an economic perspective. Starting 650m years ago he is up to 1950 at 170,000 words and expects to reach 1966 – the end of the golden wether – by the end of the year. His presentation today will describe the project, explain why an economic perspective to history is important, indicate some new findings about old issues, and describe how his historical work has considerable relevance to understanding the current state of the New Zealand economy. (Brian was the JD Stout fellow at the centre in 2008, when he worked on the nineteenth century.)
2 November ~ Anne Opie
Rough passages: initial experiences of making the transition from prison
This paper is a report on work in progress. Based on the experiences of thirteen people, eleven of whom who had been released for between 3 weeks to 6 months before my first interview with them, it discusses the complexities facing those released from prison in managing living in a very different society from the one from which they have just come.
9 November ~ Rachel Barrowman
Baching in bohemia: Maurice Gee’s 1950s Wellington
Wellington in the late 1950s was one of Maurice Gee’s ‘magic’ places, not as powerfully, or as darkly complex, as his childhood Henderson, but a ‘magical territory’ of its own. An extract from a biography-in-progress.
16 November ~ Gregory Albisson
“Some people said that tribes stopped existing in the 1970s” - Maori gangs in Wellington
Analyses of Maori gangs rely on a common, a priori definition of what it signifies to be a ‘Maori’. This reliance affects analysis, even when accounts incorporate the impact of history as well as material conditions of existence. My paper will deconstruct this a priori definition through a Lacanian lens.
23 November ~ Therese Crocker
Policy and principles: the Crown’s establishment and coordination of policy on Treaty of Waitangi settlements from 1989
"Treaty settlements" and "Treaty claims" are terms that are now part of the everyday vernacular in New Zealand/Aotearoa. However, this was not always the case. Where did these terms come from? And more importantly what motivated the move to address historical Treaty claims? The Principles for Crown Action on the Treaty of Waitangi, published in 1989 was the first articulation of a Crown responsibility to provide a process for resolution of grievances and redress. For the purpose of this presentation, Therese will take a look back to when these policies were initially developed and explore some of the thinking behind them.
30 November ~ Brad Patterson
“It is curious how keenly allied in character are the Scotch Highlander and the Maori”: encounters in a New Zealand colonial settlement
Despite Scots making up nearly a quarter of all migrants to New Zealand to 1914, until recently they have attracted little serious scholarly attention. Consequently the nature of their relations with Maori in the early settlement years has been subjected to minimal scrutiny. As part of a wider Marsden-funded study of Scottish migration to New Zealand, research on encounters and exchanges has been launched in several districts This paper is a preliminary report on the experiences of Highland settlers and iwi at Turakina. Based primarily on Pakeha sources, it provides one side of a complex story.