"LIKE RICH SOIL."

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 226, 23 September 1936, Page 12

"LIKE RICH SOIL."

MIND OF THE MAORI. PROBLEM OF ADOLESCENT. ENVIRONMENT ADJUSTMENT. "The time of adolescence is the period daring which the individual's standards of value are fixed, by the cultural system which he lives in or contacts," said Mr. P. Smytli, master at St. Stephen's j College, Bombay, speaking before the Anthropology Section of the Auckland Institute and Museum last niglit. There Mas a very large attendance, the chairman of the section, Mr. Gilbert Archey, presiding. A foundation member of Te Akarana Maori Association, and one of its eaijiest executives, Mr. Smyth is well known as a lecturer and writer on Maori problems and anthropology, and has an experience' of more than 25 years of post-primary native teaching. The vectfnt conference on Maori problems at Wellington, over which the Minister of Education and Health, Mr. Peter Fraser, presided, made Mr. Smyth's lecture very pertinent and timely.

"What are the agents of our system for enabling the organism to cultivate standards?" continued Mr. Smyth. "Surely the home, the school and social contact, and the Maori adolescent is handicapped in all three. Maori home conditions are not on the average conducive to the development of a mentally and physically balanced organism. Malnutrition prevents physical perfection; unhygienic conditions give rise to social opprobrium. One's heart goes out in pityr for the unfortunate ones who live to detrimental surroundings, while finding it impossible to blame those who avoid contact with them."

Mr. Smyth asked which Maori generation was to blame for this—the preI sent, the past, or even the ante-penulti-mate? He quoted Samuel Marsden.wlio wrote a century ago: "The more I examined into their natural character, the more I felt interested in their temporal and spiritual welfare. Their minds appeared like a rich soil that had never been cultivated, and only wanted the proper means of improvement to render them fit to rank with civilised nations."

Race Increasing. The Maori population has increased 23 per cent in ten years, said Mr. Smyth, and .is now, according to the last census, 51,744. This means necessarily more Maori homes. The Maori to-day—the raupo and nikau wliare being gone — through lack of finance"often lives in a homo that is poor, draughty, ill lit, ill ventilated, and there is a consequent toll on Maori health. More manual and technical training would minimise these dangers. Maori ; homes .must be erected on land, owned' bv their occupiers, said Mr. Smyth. Dividing the occupational possibilities into ,twq bi-oad classifications—the land arid pick and shovel— the last is to'be abhorred; the pick and shovel artist is a jno'rtiad, and* he and his offspring develop" the, "hut psychology." Mr Smyth paicUa tribute to the sympathy of the present Government, in their realisation that vocational education must be given in the Maori secondary schools, so that work of a higher status and greater variety could be found" by the Maori, adolescent after leaving school.

Maitiri racial standards cnn only be altered if we interest ourselves more acutely in the adolescent and his problems, said Mr. Smyth. The native school teachers in the settlements make splendid and often €Terculenn efforts to ameliorate mental and social conditions; but this stops after the elementary education period in most instances; no actual equipment has yet been supplied to combat the changing social conditions of our civilisation. The young Maori is unable* to face conditions controlled by educated-men and women, the majority of whom are Europeans; they have nothing to fall back upon, and become enveloped in melancholy indifference. The very few who reach the postprimary schools leave just when they are beginning to aspire to professional careers. They do not stay long enough to become "thinkers," and without the ability to think no adolescent can develop through self-education. Delinquents. Most juvenjle delinquency is due to the fact that the young offenders have neither sound Maori nor European traditions, and an attack on the problem from a mdre sympathetic, viewpoint would mean that most of these cases would never recur. The offences < are caused by an inability to adjust the life to the ; environment.'" Mr. Smyth likens them »to "growing pains" significant of the present stage of readjustment of the race. The unrest is certainly caused by lack of opportunity for self-expres-sion in work. >/' An 'interesting debate followed' Mr. Smyth's th.ought-provoking ; lecture.