Taniwha, taonga, and tangata

Abstract

AbstractThis comment draws on Paul Tapsell’s work on taonga to help make explicit some of what I take to be working behind Dan Hikuroa’s writings on taniwha and thus Justine Kingsbury’s Taniwha project. I detail some of the insights that a more detailed and complex account of taniwha—one that is framed around taniwha and taonga relationships—can provide. I contend that understanding taniwha in relation to taonga helps to highlight the way that Kingsbury’s account necessarily lacks elements essential to taniwha themselves and essential to their relationships with taonga. On the back of this contention, one conclusion we come to is that Kingsbury merely offers us a way of taking some aspects of taniwha seriously. Another, and perhaps more important conclusion, is that our discussion of taniwha and taonga provides us with a way to recast Kingsbury’s project—allowing us to take as our focus (and thereby value) relationships between taniwha, taonga, and tangata. One upshot is a framework for thinking about what is required to enable deeper and harder conversations later on that are framed in relational terms too. This, I argue, might not only be a more fruitful approach, but one more in line with Kingsbury’s aspirations.