Cultures of New Zealand
From WildWiki
* Cultures of New Zealand (4 credits) This course will examine both Maori and Pakeha (non-Maori) culture in both the historic and modern context with an emphasis on the intersections between culture, identity, and place. The focus will be on “culture,” understanding how the concept of culture is constructed (and contested) and the various ways we can understand cultural dynamics within the New Zealand context. The course will also focus on “identity” with particular emphasis on issues of colonialism and colonization, bi-culturalism, treaty rights, self-determination, assimilation, and accculturation. Finally, the course will examine how both culture and identity intersect with “place” given the unique environmental and geopolitical setting of New Zealand through the disciplinary lens of environmental history. In the introduction to the edited volume, Environmental Histories of New Zealand (2003), the noted environmental historian Richard White states that environmental history in New Zealand is full of controversy and that “[s]uch controversies are as much a matter of identity, ideology, and meaning as they are economy and ecology. As these essays detail, the meanings of mountains and grasslands, of gardens and gorse are not purely biophysical; they have become emblems of cultural and national identities” (iii).
Supplementing this emphasis will be an opportunity to experience some of the cultural dynamics in modern New Zealand through the 12-week home-stay with families in Christchurch which will provide students with grounded and immersive cultural experiences that will be connected to course themes and content through journal reflections, essays, and class discussions. In addition, a month-long stay at the Quaker Settlement on the North Island as well as a farm stay on the South Island will give each student the opportunity to learn about rural and farm life in New Zealand as well as explore ethno-ecological themes such as food production, organic farming, and sustainable agriculture. This course will be taught by a combination of visiting scholars and coordinated by program faculty. Diversity-International Gen Ed.
