About us

 

Te Hā o Ngā Pou Kaituhi Māori is one of nine Toi Māori artforms supported by Toi Māori Aotearoa.  Our purpose is to identify, encourage, and promote writing by Māori authors writing in Te Reo Māori and in English.  We tautoko writers of all ages, support storytelling in creative and diverse ways, and assist authors at any stage of their writing journey by providing opportunities to meet, to learn from each other, and to collaborate.


We like to think of Te Hā o Ngā Pou as an eco-system of Māori writers where we not only encourage and promote writing by Māori, we also help to connect and weave our writers together across the motu to establish meaningful relationships across our shared passion and purpose. 

 

The current members of the Te Hā o Ngā Pou Kaituhi Māori Kōmiti are:

  • Pāora Tibble

  • Wenarata Kīngi

  • Nadine Anne Hura - current acting co-chair (rotating position)

  • Anahera Gildea - current acting co-chair (rotating position)

  • Ruth Smith

  • Emma Espiner

  • Kirsty Dunn

  • Cassie Hart

  • Sheldon Rua

  • Arawhita Christie - Toi Māori intern + support

Original, long-standing and recent committee members are listed below. If your name should be included below, please do contact us - we are still drawing together all our records. The members named immediately below sometimes still join our hui and contribute to discrete kaupapa when their capacity allows:

  • James George (Previous Committee chair/Current Toi Māori Rep)

  • Bridget Underhill

  • Jacqui Carter

  • Trent Hōhaia

  • Ripeka Takotōwai-Goddard

He mihi tēnei ki ngā kaiarahi pū o tēnei kaupapa whakahirahira, miharo rawa ou koutou mahi! With thanks to the many hands who have carried this kaupapa since the very beginning, arā ko:

  • Witi Ihimaera

  • Haare Williams

  • Patricia Grace

  • Pōwhiri Rika-Heke

  • Robert Sullivan

  • Tina Makareti

  • Anton Blank

  • Tungia Baker

  • Rowley Habib

  • JC Sturn

  • Arapera Blank

  • Meihana Durie

  • Bub Bridger

  • Hone Tuwhare

  • Bruce Stewart

Would you like to join us?

Te Hā o Ngā Pou Kaituhi is an open-invitation to all kaituhi Māori, ahakoa nō hea, ahakoa te reo! We don’t yet have a central database, although we are working towards that. One of the magical things about Te Hā is that it is he kaupapa pā harakeke. We have limited resources, so we rely on (and seek to create) real-life, kānohi ki te kānohi connections. Please get in touch with one of the active members named above to find out more. If you are interested in starting a Te Hā chapter in your region, kei a koe tēnā! We do our best to support all new growth that springs up. We are also very welcoming of kaimahi with capacity to contribute to our collective kaupapa (for example, our National Hui every two years). Over time, we hope to strengthen all our connections, forging ahead, while also holding fast to ngā taonga tuku iho. Kia ora mai tātou.