Kaumātua Futures: Ko te pae tawhiti, whāia kia tata. Ngāti Whakaue Case Study

A National Science Challenge Ageing Well Funded Project 2019 – 2022 

Teorongonui Josie Keelan
Linda Waimarie Nikora 
Ngahuia Te Awekotuku 
Okeroa McRae 
Kiri Edge

Kaumātuatanga (eldership) is an issue governments and iwi are slowly coming to grips with. Governments tend to treat kaumātuatanga as a ‘one size fits all’ proposition because it is easier to deliver services when viewing the population group as one unit. That immediately creates problems as populations are not all the same. Rather they are made up of distinct units, each with their needs and wants. 

Kaumātua (elders)are one of those population units being treated as a single group despite their diversity. Government has in the last ten years through its MBIE funded National Science Challenge, “Ageing Well: Kia eke kairangi ki te taikaumātuatanga”, lumped all elderly Māori into ‘Group Kaumātua’. However, iwi do not so define all their elderly thus. 

Most define kaumātua as that group of elderly Māori who serve their whānau (family), marae (community complex), hapū (sub-tribe) and iwi (tribe) using their skills as kaikaranga (ceremonial caller), kaikōrero (speaker), kaiwaiata (singer), mātanga (expert), tohunga (skilled and chosen expert) in the mātauranga (knowledge), whakapapa (genealogy) and stories of their iwi. Some do not genderise the role whereas others do. They are a group who are present at events large and small, standing to represent their iwi always. 

Other elderly Māori in the tribe are known by other terms and in Ngāti Whakaue, the site of the research “Kaumātua Futures: Ko te pae tawhiti, whāia kia tata” funded by Ageing Well, all elderly are known as ‘Koeke’; those who serve in the way defined above, are the only ones who can claim to be ‘Kaumātua’. 

The government applied definition therefore is undermining the role and function of those who serve as Kaumātua. It is a definition that is quickly being applied across all iwi, organisations and communities so much so it is being applied to all elderly no matter their ethnicity. 

The purpose of the “Kaumātua Futures” research was to understand the lifeways of kaumātua. How they become kaumātua; how they serve their whānau, marae, hapū, iwi and communities generally; what supports they may need to be able to fulfil a responsibility they take seriously; what they see as being important for the role to continue into the future; how they pass on their knowledge to the next cohort of kaumātua.