title: Everyday activisms: Parental places and emotions of disability activism in Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand

authors: Morrison, Carey-Ann

subjects: Social Sciences

abstract: This paper considers the everyday spaces and places of disability activism for parents of disabled children in Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand. Geographers and disability scholars are yet to consider disability activism in a range of everyday child–parent spaces. Parents resist, rework, and subvert ableist structures and spaces in ways that may seem unremarkable, but that are indeed significant acts. We question the meaning of activism by examining the relationship between “activism” and “everyday family lives.” Sara Ahmed's concept of “affinity of hammers” is adopted to understand how parental disability activism is enacted in health, educational, and disability spaces and places. Interviews and written responses from seven parents (five mothers and two fathers) of disabled children are analysed. Findings are divided into three themes: first, quiet, implicit forms of activism; second, fighting for rights and equitable access; and third, using personal experience to educate people about disability rights. We conclude that family disability activism – in its myriad forms – can provide leadership to other people, challenge ableism, and help geographers and others to rethink common understandings of activism.

text: Everyday activisms: Parental places and emotions of disability activism in Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand This paper considers the everyday spaces and places of disability activism for parents of disabled children in Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand. Geographers and disability scholars are yet to consider disability activism in a range of everyday child–parent spaces. Parents resist, rework, and subvert ableist structures and spaces in ways that may seem unremarkable, but that are indeed significant acts. We question the meaning of activism by examining the relationship between “activism” and “everyday family lives.” Sara Ahmed's concept of “affinity of hammers” is adopted to understand how parental disability activism is enacted in health, educational, and disability spaces and places. Interviews and written responses from seven parents (five mothers and two fathers) of disabled children are analysed. Findings are divided into three themes: first, quiet, implicit forms of activism; second, fighting for rights and equitable access; and third, using personal experience to educate people about disability rights. We conclude that family disability activism – in its myriad forms – can provide leadership to other people, challenge ableism, and help geographers and others to rethink common understandings of activism.

year: 2021-11-09

title: Malcolm hardy: the last Waiorongomai miner

authors: Hart, Philip

abstract: Malcolm Hardy was notable for his artistic skills but not for his dynamism until becoming interested in gold mining during the 1920s. A self-taught geologist, he was enthusiastic about the prospects for finding gold, but was also completely wrong and thoroughly pig-headed about the wondrous outcome he anticipated. In 1931, his father, Edwin Henry Hardy, took him to Waiorongomai to show him the spot where good gold could still be found, but died before reaching it. Undeterred, Hardy acquired several claims and set about re-opening old workings and doing some prospecting, being assisted by a few others off and on.
Hardy was notable for his assertions of having traced millions of tons of payable ore – and for demanding government assistance to test and work these – but his special pleading and misrepresentations exasperated officials and experts. In response to their criticisms and failures to see the glowing prospects he proclaimed, he accused them of incompetence and bias, ignoring the fact that all the assays and tests disproved his claims. 
Attempts to obtain financial backing had little success, and a company, Hardy’s Mines, established in 1940, was stillborn. Even Hardy abandoned active mining during the 1940s, but he encouraged the Auckland Smelting Company and then South Pacific Mines to explore all the mountain, insisting, despite all the evidence, that Te Aroha would become a leading mining centre.

text: Malcolm hardy: the last Waiorongomai miner Malcolm Hardy was notable for his artistic skills but not for his dynamism until becoming interested in gold mining during the 1920s. A self-taught geologist, he was enthusiastic about the prospects for finding gold, but was also completely wrong and thoroughly pig-headed about the wondrous outcome he anticipated. In 1931, his father, Edwin Henry Hardy, took him to Waiorongomai to show him the spot where good gold could still be found, but died before reaching it. Undeterred, Hardy acquired several claims and set about re-opening old workings and doing some prospecting, being assisted by a few others off and on.
Hardy was notable for his assertions of having traced millions of tons of payable ore – and for demanding government assistance to test and work these – but his special pleading and misrepresentations exasperated officials and experts. In response to their criticisms and failures to see the glowing prospects he proclaimed, he accused them of incompetence and bias, ignoring the fact that all the assays and tests disproved his claims. 
Attempts to obtain financial backing had little success, and a company, Hardy’s Mines, established in 1940, was stillborn. Even Hardy abandoned active mining during the 1940s, but he encouraged the Auckland Smelting Company and then South Pacific Mines to explore all the mountain, insisting, despite all the evidence, that Te Aroha would become a leading mining centre.

year: 2016

title: Decolonisation through reconciliation: The role of Pākehā identity

authors: Amundsen, Diana Leigh

subjects: Pākehā

abstract: Research indicates that claiming a contemporary identity as Pākehā is being redefined by those individuals who engage closely with Te Ao Māori. This reopens the discussion of the implications for Pākehā researchers who engage across Māori research spaces. This article reports a reflective study I conducted using the transtheoretical model and its six stages of change (J. O. Prochaska & DiClemente, 1982) to understand my Pākehā cultural identity. I discuss my rationale for engaging in research with Māori, and then outline the approaches that I, as a non Indigenous researcher, adopted to appropriately engage in Indigenous research. I discuss responsibilities for Pākehā to take deliberate and conscious steps to decolonise through reconciliation and dismantle disturbing and prevailing prejudiced attitudes. Decolonisation through reconciliation takes various forms, but necessarily involves a process of actions and changes. Our challenge as Pākehā educators is to participate in this change process towards decolonisation through reconciliation.

text: Decolonisation through reconciliation: The role of Pākehā identity Research indicates that claiming a contemporary identity as Pākehā is being redefined by those individuals who engage closely with Te Ao Māori. This reopens the discussion of the implications for Pākehā researchers who engage across Māori research spaces. This article reports a reflective study I conducted using the transtheoretical model and its six stages of change (J. O. Prochaska & DiClemente, 1982) to understand my Pākehā cultural identity. I discuss my rationale for engaging in research with Māori, and then outline the approaches that I, as a non Indigenous researcher, adopted to appropriately engage in Indigenous research. I discuss responsibilities for Pākehā to take deliberate and conscious steps to decolonise through reconciliation and dismantle disturbing and prevailing prejudiced attitudes. Decolonisation through reconciliation takes various forms, but necessarily involves a process of actions and changes. Our challenge as Pākehā educators is to participate in this change process towards decolonisation through reconciliation.

year: 2018