Victoria University of Wellington

Dr Lynne Russell works as a Senior Research Fellow - Maori Health with the Health Services Research Centre (HSRC) at Victoria University of Wellington. Much of her professional and academic work has centred around the Indigenous knowledge and healing practices used in recovery from trauma associated with mental distress, suicide loss and self-harm. She describes herself as an writer, activist and public speaker stirred by cultural resilience, social justice, Indigenous and LGBTI rights, and the amplification of voices more readily silenced in society.

David is the Programme Director - First Year Design at the School of Design. He gained his qualification for Victoria University of Wellington

Mike is a lecturer at Te Kawa a Māui, where he teaches courses on Māori language and customs.

Dr Tina Makereti has a PhD and Masters in Creative Writing from the International Institute of Modern Letters. She is a novelist, essayist, curator and short fiction writer. Her first novel, Where the Rēkohu Bone Sings (Vintage, 2014) has been described as a New Zealand classic and 'a remarkable first [book that] spans generations of Moriori, Māori and Pākehā descendants as they grapple with a legacy of pacifism, violent domination and cross-cultural dilemmas.' It was longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award 2016 and won the 2014 Ngā Kupu Ora Aotearoa Māori Book Award for Fiction.

Her short story collection, Once Upon a Time in Aotearoa (Huia Publishers, 2010), which combines mythological and contemporary stories, also won the Ngā Kupu Ora Māori Book Award for Fiction in 2011. Her latest novel, The Imaginary Lives of James Pōneke (Vintage, 2018) was longlisted for the Ockham NZ Book Awards Fiction Prize 2019 and the Dublin Literary Award 2020. In 2019 it was published in the UK by Eye & Lightning Books, and in audiobook by Aurora. A forthcoming film adaptation, from Taika Waititi and Carthew Neal's Piki Films, was announced in 2020. Tina is editor of an anthology of Māori and Pasifika fiction, Black Marks on the White Page (Vintage, 2017), with Witi Ihimaera. She has curated exhibitions on social and cultural history at Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision and the Courtenay Place Light boxes, and been guest curator for Verb Festival and Auckland Writers Festival.

At the Auckland Writers Festival Free Public Lecture in 2017 , Tina advocated for a more rich and representative house of New Zealand literature, which continues to be the goal of much of her research, teaching and writing. She has spoken about writing and Māori literature throughout New Zealand and in London, Edinburgh, Jamaica, Toronto, Taiwan and Frankfurt. In 2016 Tina won the Pacific Regional Commonwealth Short Story Prize with her story, 'Black Milk'. Other recognition includes the Royal Society of New Zealand Manhire Prize for Creative Science Writing 2009 (non-fiction), the Pikihuia Award for Best Short Story Written in English 2009, the 2014 Randell Cottage Writer in Residence and the 2016 Beatson Fellowship. She is currently working on her third novel and completing a collection of personal essays, titled This Compulsion in Us. Tina is of Ngāti Tūwharetoa, Te Ati Awa, Ngāti Rangatahi Pākehā and, according to family stories, Moriori descent.

Adreanna is a Senior Lecturer in Te Kura Māori in the Faculty of Education. Her research interests include youth, education, and health as well as Māori development with a specific interest in Indigenous – ethnic minority youth and how existent issues within the community influence life experience and the articulation of that experience.

Historically her research is conducted through a sociological consideration of social injustice issues and deploys qualitative and critical research methodologies which include the Indigenous epistemology Kaupapa Māori. She is grounded in her community Te Mahia where she grew up on the whānau farm and like many other Indigenous scholars she supports her community by acting as an advocate for our Indigenous rights and liaising between her people and various institutions, leading and participating in research and writing projects and mentoring the younger generation.

Tia is a lecturer at the school of psychology, Victoria University of Wellington. Her research interests include four key areas, broadly linked and overarched by relationships within Māori and Indigenous Developmental Psychology.

These areas include:

• Indigenous and developmental psychology in the interdependent relations between whānau and their children’s learning
• Autobiographical memory with whanau
• Language research
• Māori pediatric health

Ocean’s teaching and research interests are varied, but her key focus is how mātauranga Māori and science connect and relate, particularly in educational contexts and using novel digital technologies. She co-leads a National Science Challenge project investigating the perceptions of novel biotechnological controls of pest wasps in Aotearoa. Her research also involves kaupapa Māori reading of films. She is the presenter of Māori Television's Project Mātauranga and presents for TVNZ’s Coast.

Current research projects

• Social and cultural perceptions of novel biotechnological controls of pest wasps, with Prof. Phil Lester
• Virtual exchanges on Indigenous knowledge(s) and science in global contexts, with Dr Beth Leonard, University of Alaska, Fairbanks
• Student learning and engagement in the Te Kawa a Māui Atlas
• Place-based and map-based work in Māori Studies
• The 48 Hour Film Competition: what do the audio commentaries reveal?

Research interests

• The interface between mātauranga Māori and science
• Cultural mapping and digital media in documenting local knowledge and diversifying the tertiary education experience
• Kaupapa Māori readings of film, especially those of Taika Waititi
• Portrayals of culture in limited-time film, especially the V48 Hours Furious Filmmaking Competition
• Use of locally relevant 'cultural context' in science resources, especially Te Whata Kura Ahupungao, an initiative of the Faculty of Science (Equity) that has provided multimedia resources for learners and teachers of physics. Short, educational films can be downloaded or watched online in te reo and English.
• Indigenous academic experience.