Word: maori
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Visitors to new zealand these days might be excused for wondering if it really is English they speak there. The accent is but a minor distraction; it's the words that stop newcomers in their tracks. Newspapers refer casually to tikanga (Maori culture) and kaupapa (philosophy or plan). TV hosts open and close their shows with haere mai (welcome) and ka kite ano (see you later). Acquaintances say they're flat out with mahi (work) and have a hui (meeting) to get to. John Macalister, a writing teacher at Victoria University of Wellington, returned to New Zealand in 1997 after...
...called a halt just short of 1,000 words. But Macalister's A Dictionary of Maori Words in New Zealand English, published last month by Oxford University Press, suggests the flow of Maori into English won't be stopping anytime soon. Kiwi English is not just annexing Maori words, from Pakeha (European) to whanau (extended family). It's giving them English inflections (moko-ed for tattooed; haka-ing for dancing), and playing with them to create hybrids like maka-chilly (from makariri, cold). "You can't get far these days without having to use a Maori word," says Haami Piripi...
...three years in the '30s, Shirley Temple was Hollywood's biggest box-office star; she was just 6 when the Motion Picture Academy voted her a special Oscar. Since then, the Academy has honored 16 actors under 14 with nominations or Oscars. Keisha Castle-Hughes, 14, the Maori charmer of Whale Rider, was cited last year. Tatum O'Neal (Paper Moon) and Anna Paquin (The Piano) won supporting-actress Oscars on their first acting jobs. Standards change, and what was cute in the '30s can seem forced today. "I watched a Shirley Temple film the other night," says Trevor Albert...
Niki Cairo’s inspirational story features Keisha Castle-Hughes in the role that made her a star. As Paikea, a young girl of the Maori tribe of New Zealand, Castle-Hughes confronts issues of tradition, family, race and gender in her struggle to prove herself to her grandfather. Free and open to the public. Wednesday at 7 p.m. Common Room, Center for the Study of World Religions, 42 Francis...
...ZEALAND After a year of fierce public debate, a controversial law on ownership of the nation's foreshores and seabed passed its first reading in Parliament. Designed to bypass a Court of Appeal ruling that Maori tribes could apply for title to areas below the high-water line, the law vests ownership in the Crown but allows Maori to claim "ancestral connection" to parts of the coastline and insist on being consulted about their use. Maori leaders who object to the law say the foreshores are part of their people's heritage; opposition politicians say the law gives Maori more...