I always say that languages have their own personalities and free will. They come and go as they please. Four years ago I had a sudden desire to learn Russian Sign Language. I didn’t succeed, mostly because I didn’t have any Deaf friends at the time, but still it was a worthy experience. I learned a whole other side of languages I could never imagine when i only knew voice languages.
Recently I was approached by te reo, the Māori language, the same way, very unexpectedly.
My first encounter with te reo has been about a year ago when the maiden speech by a New Zealand MP Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke got viral because she did a haka. At that time i was merely entertained by the sound of the language, which i indeed found very similar to Japanese, and my hypothesis that without Chinese loan words Japanese would sound like a Polynesian language was confirmed. Māori even shares some assimilation patterns with Japanese, namely in the ‘tu’ syllable.
However my interest was merely brief then, and nothing happened until Youtube decided to recommend this video to me once more, so i rewatched it. And i made a joke that day, on October 10, that videos like that make me want to learn Māori. I knew nothing about the concept of mana back then, so i didn’t know what could the consequences be when someone joked about something with a very powerful mana…
A couple of days later i was curious, so i searched for Māori metal, and immediately found Alien Weaponry, whom i immediately liked. I have been listening for their masterpiece Kai Tangata every day since then.
Slowly, the mana of te reo Māori took its influence on me and the joke started to become less and less joky. I found some basic language materials and learned some basic words. I was put off originally when i learned that the beginner textbook Te Kākano from Te Whanake series is only available in print and costs $78.25 or 46 Unitedstatesian dollars and 62 cents but later i found a free version on archive.org.
I also turned out that Te Aka Māori Dictionary is not only a great bilingual dictionary but also functions like a wonderful grammar reference.
Words that cannot be found in Te Aka can sometimes be found in Te Papakupu o Te Marautanga o Aotearoa dictionary.
Finally i could find two great grammar reference style textbooks, Let’s Learn Māori by Bruce Biggs and Making Māori Sentences by Lyndsay Head for later use. Having found so much learning material my journey became quite serious. The Māori say: Ko te reo te mauri o te mana Māori, the language is the vital essense of the Māori mana. I really felt it. I already experienced the power of languages like Qazaq or Japanese that feel more deeply connected to the primordial forces of nature and the human soul. In addition to that te reo made me really understand the concept of mana, the authority, the prestige that goes down through generations from one’s ancestor gods. Māoritanga or the Māori way of thinking also made me understand the Qazaq culture deeper, when it turned out that despite looking so different and being situated on the opposite sides of the world the two cultures have much more in common than meets the eye.
Back to my language journey, because the phoneme inventory of te reo is relatively small, i could understand the words much easier than back when i was learning Qazaq. For that reason i started to watch Something for the People Podcast and started using it for shadowing and occasionally learning new words and grammar. It was a completely new experience to me as it was never possible with any other language i have learned previously at such early stage. I called it ‘barely comprehensible input’. It reminded me of watching Dope Söz back when i was studying Qazaq and similarly could not comprehend most of what was said but still enjoyed it greatly. A great part of the podcast is the section Nau mai te hapa at the end of each episode where the hosts discuss and correct their mistakes in spoken Māori they made in the previous episode.
However i soon found another invaluable source of input that not only could help me improve my listening comprehension and vocab knowledge but also deepen my understanding of Māori culture and current situation too.
Speaking about current situation, as it often happens, as i was progressing on my own way to understand the Māori world there was a brief peak of interest from all over the world when Te Pāti Māori did their haka in the parliament again led by Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke that again went viral, and the following hīkoi that ensued.
The treasure i found was The Treasure Box, Waka Huia, a series of interviews with outstanding Māori about their culture and way of life. All videos have English subtitles and therefore can be very helpful even for someone with only a beginner skill in te reo. They also expose the listener to Māori coming from different iwi, from Ngāpuhi to Kāi Tahu, and give a picture of the phonetic variety of Māori dialects.
Speaking of the dialects, I am amazed how careful are Māori in maintaining the balance between preserving their common identity and preserving their local iwi identity. For example, the Kāi Tahu iwi published the whole free series of textbooks Te Hū o Moho dedicated to teaching their dialect.
Another great place for inspiration to learn is the recently appeared Generation Reo project dedicated to intergenerational transfer of the Māori language. I learned about one of the participants, Kahurangi Malcolm from a wonderful The Hui video about them rising their kids as first language speakers of te reo, and thus learned about the project. They make short videos about common problems Māori themselves face when learning and speaking their language, and even though i cannot directly relate, all of it gives great insight into their life and their language. The videos are subtitled in Māori so that’s a step up from Waka Huia videos and above my level at the moment, but having a bit of something that i cannot chew just yet never meant i should not do this.
Finally, i started reading Pounamu, Pounamu by Witi Ihimaera. It is a collection of short stories about Māori published in 1973 that gives a lot of insight into their mentality and traditional lifestyle. The book certainly deserves a separate discussion.
In other words, this escalated quickly. Only two months ago i knew absolutely nothing about Māori culture and language and i could not even imagine them becoming my special interest. Aotearoa is simply too far outside my reach both geographically and financially, and most probably i won’t have a chance this lifetime to meet any Māori in person. But despite all odds the mana of te reo Māori reaches to the farthest corners of the world and the aroha Māori has undoubtedly reached my heart.
My journey continues…