Ngā Manu ā Tāne – the stories of Māori doctoral students in Aotearoa: An ethnographic study

Ko te manu e kai ana i te miro, nōna te ngahere;
Ko te manu e kai ana i te mātauranga, nōna te ao
Ko te manu e whakatinana ana i ērā mātauranga, nōna te whenua taurikura (Ratana, 2022).

The bird that feeds on the miro berry can rule the forest
The bird who feeds on knowledge can rule the world
The bird who embodies that knowledge can be responsible for thriving homelands

Previous studies show that Māori PhD students in Aotearoa face significant structural and systemic barriers during their doctoral studies, but little is known about how they meet and surmount those daily challenges.

Through a Kaupapa Māori lens, which places Indigenous storytelling at the centre of inquiry, this study frames an explanation to the complex, relational spaces that Māori doctoral students grapple with in academia. Further, it provides insight into their everyday worlds as Indigenous scholars who are pioneering new forms of intellectual engagement inside the settler-colonial complex of the Aotearoa university system.

This is a cross-sectional, ethnographic ‘day-in-the-life’ approach which captures not only the intellectual and cultural life-worlds, but the often silenced stories of a nationwide cohort of Māori doctoral students. Their micro-level experiences of entry into academic environments that marginalise Indigenous knowledges and realities are set against larger institutional, structural, and political factors. These influences have exerted a powerful impact on the degree of cultural and intellectual belonging that these Māori scholars have been able to establish within their academic departments.

Kanohi-ki-te-kanohi (face-to-face/in-person), online, walk-along, and drive-along interviews were conducted with 30 Māori doctoral students and recent PhD graduates across Aotearoa. Observations were also carried out in their work and study locations, which included their homes, workplaces, university offices, and tribal communities.

The participants’ accounts focused heavily on the lack of Māori representation at all levels of academia and the subsequent impact on their scholarly lives. For many students, limited access to Māori expertise, mentoring, supervision, and cultural validation heightened a profound sense of cultural dislocation and intellectual isolation. During these times, Ngā Manu (the collective name for participants in this study) also sharpened their determination to establish safe academic environments for the next generation of Māori scholars. Despite significant challenges, the participants also spoke of the everyday triumphs, the moments of recognition and shared purpose in the company of Māori PhD colleagues. In these cultural safe spaces, they shared moments of creativity, pleasure, and joy, as they established their own unique academic selfhoods, which they saw both as a legacy for Māori who would follow after them into the academic world, and a means of ‘speaking back’ to the racialised silences of the ivory tower.