The Maori (Early Peoples), by Geoffrey M. Horn

There are a great many readers who consider books written for young people to be beneath criticism, not even worth reading, much less commenting about. One of the more striking things about children’s literature is that it can be remarkably difficult to determine the author of such books, as no author is listed on the title, and the writer’s name occurs in small text in the midst of dozens of staff people involved at the publisher (World Book), almost an afterthought. To be sure, in children’s literature, it is not so much the nature of the author but the nature of what the author writes about that is of greatest interests. To a great degree, writing directed to children is often highly propagandistic in nature, with heavy-handed and clear pedagogical aims, and that is certainly the case here. Though at some points this can be entertaining, the specific nature of this book indicates the troubling nature of a great deal of writings about peoples that occurs in the present world.

This is not to say that this book is bad. Graded on the curve, at least, this book is a fairly average and typical sort of book that is directed at children. This standard is by no means a great one, as the book focuses on aspects of Maori culture that educators want to promote rather than those which the child might be more interested in and more properly focused on. It is revealing, for example, to compare a book like this one with what one might read about the Confederate States of America on subjects where the two intersect (namely their relationship with national governments as well as slavery and law and order, to name a few areas). One can see the author straining to justify the Moari religious worldview in a way that would be unthinkable for an author to respect the biblical worldview, to argue that Maori slaves were viewed like members of the family when such arguments are considered completely unacceptable with regards to slavery in the antebellum South, and to view the paranoid security-minded nature of Maori society with sympathy in a way that is not granted to other societies under similar conditions. We can see the double standard that favors non-Western cultures in full force here, and in this the book is typical of our times.

In terms of its contents, this book is a classic 64 page children’s book that manages to pack a lot of content into those pages. The book begins with a discussion of the identity of the Maori and their origins, their skill in navigation, and how we know about their history. This is followed by a detailed discussion of Maori society, the power of chiefs, warriors, tactics and weapons, as well as gender roles and those with special skills and jobs, as well as a discussion of prisoners and slaves as well as law and order within indigenous society. The author spends a lot of time dwelling on religious beliefs, creation stories, rituals of life and death, arts and crafts, tattoos, the open communal spaces known as marae. Other chapters deal with family life, settlements (often fortified), hunting, fishing and farming as the basis of the economy, education and language, sports and games, and music and dance. Towards the end of the book the author deals with the nature of contact with Europeans (called Pakeha), the treaty of Waitangi that established British settler colony status, the decline and revival of the Maori population, and the combination of tradition and change in contemporary Maori society. The book ends with a glossary, additional resources, and index.