NUKU

Courtney (Tainui, Ngāti Koroki Kahukura) is a jeweller, artist and a lapidist - someone who cuts and shapes precious stones.

Kera Sherwood-O’Regan (Kāi Tahu) is a wahine who lives with Fibromyalgia. She started the organisation Fibromyalgia Aotearoa NZ,  to help others living with the condition. Alongside this mahi, she also runs Activate, a social enterprise creative agency with a focus on bringing voice to social and environmental kaupapa.

Since age 16, Kera has advocated for Indigenous rights. She is a staunch climate activist and has represented Indigenous Aotearoa a number of times at the United Nations convention on climate change.

In this episode, we talk about climate justice and the effect global warming has on every aspect of life. We learn about how important Indigenous solidarity is when speaking to a global audience and, we kōrero about living with an invisible disability.

Kanoa  (Ngāti Porou, Tuhoe) started off as a kid’s tv presenter and is now one of very few (less than a handful on our count) wahine Māori to lead prime time television in Aotearoa.

Born in Gisborne, she spent much of her childhood moving around Tokomaru Bay, East Cape and Coromandel, before moving to Cromwell. Recently reconnecting to Ruatoria has become a significant part of her adult life and was key in her journey to strengthen her hononga to all sides of her whakapapa.

Using her platform to advocate for and address issues that affect many New Zealanders, Kanoa flows between waves of both public support and public criticism.

In this episode we talk about the joys and pains of being a wahine Māori in mainstream media, we learn about Kanoa’s childhood, she shares stories of the indigenous women who inspire her most, and we laugh, and cringe, about all the keyboard warriors.

Marama (Te Rarawa, Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Porou) is a māmā, an activist, a proud wahine Māori and, the co-leader of the New Zealand Green Party.

For years we have seen her on our television screens, in our newspapers, and at our community events. Many of her speeches in the house have gone viral and she isn’t afraid to front the public on some our toughest social and environmental issues.

But who is the wahine behind the politician?

In this episode we talk about her rise to politics and the realities of mahi and māmāhood. About climate change and social inequalities and, that time she kayaked up the Whanganui Awa, retracing the ancient trade routes, all the way to Tāmaki Makaurau.

Tia lives in Vancouver. It is the tupuna whenua of her husband and where she is raising her tamariki for the time being. Of Ngā Puhi and Te Aupōuri whakapapa, she is a māmā of six and the director of Whaea Productions.

She has spent many years working towards the protection of our taiao, and challenging decision-makers in their recognition of Indigenous peoples.

Being so far from home she finds solace in the Indigenous communities around her, and has focussed much of her recent mahi documenting the stories of Indigenous women.

In this episode we talk about the challenges of living overseas, she tells us about jumping off the Auckland harbour bridge with her Tino Rangatiratanga Flag and, what its like to be a wahine mau moko, and, a Constellation.

Rangimarie is the tumuaki of Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Tututarakihi in the Far North.

At only 29 she is transforming the education system by creating a unique kura, embeded in tikanga Māori, with a goal to actively exercise Tino Rangatiratanga. Tututarakihi aligns its school term with the maramataka. The curriculum caters to the interests of its tamariki, and the taiao as a core part of the classroom.

Language, mathematics and science are learnt through diving, fishing, entrepreneurship, farming and other practices that invite community champions to become kaiako, teaching through lived experience.

In this episode we talk about the status of te reo Māori in Aotearoa, creating a tikanga-based Māori education system, Rangimarie’s dream to build a whare whakairo in Te Tai Tokerau and,  why she advocates for a 4 day working week for better whānau wellbeing. 

Julia is a dancer, mark maker, storyteller.

Of Papua New Guinean and Australian heritage, she created the film Tep Tok : Reading Between Our Lines, sharing the journey to raise awareness for the dying art form that she is helping revive through her hand poke and hand tap method.

She talks to us about her practice, about women’s traditional roles in mark making, and reviving the old, to new old.

This full time artist is a bark cloth maker and currently living in Turanga (Gisborne). Her Aute pieces are adorned with celestial patterns, combining ancestral knowledge of Kapa and star navigation.

In this episode we talk about how Hawaii helped Nikau find her calling, how art school almost turned her off being an artist and, that time she ran off to be in the circus.

Aqui is a Janajāti woman from the Himalayan regions of South Asia. She travelled to Aotearoa from India earlier this year for an exhibition we both participated in at ST PAUL st Gallery. It was in the middle of the Ihumātao reclamation and so we recorded her interview in a portacom, on the whenua.

Recently Pualani Case travelled to Aotearoa to bring us the stories of Hawaii and her fight to protect her maunga, Mauna Kea. 

Aunty Pua, as she is affectionately known, is a spiritual and cultural leader. She is a Kumu Hula, a teacher of traditional dance and chant, and is a passionate advocate for the Kanaka Maoli indigenous people of Hawaii. 

She holds multiple degrees, and was a public school teacher for more than 30 years, but today, she and her family work tirelessly to protect their ancestral spaces from destruction and desecration. 

In this episode we talk about religious colonialism, indigenous solidarity, and of course, her beloved Mauna Kea. 

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