THE NEW ZEALANDER

Greymouth Evening Star, 19 March 1934, Page 12

THE NEW ZEALANDER

NATIONAL CHARACTER. The gradual growth of a. national type in New Zealand, together with its main characteristics, were outlined by Mr J. W. Shaw in an address at Auckland. .

A distinct national type has been comparatively slow to emerge in New Zealand, Mr Shaw said, but there was ample evidence that it was now taking definite shape, particularly among the younger generation. New Zealanders had had plenty of time to develop into a distinct type, but owing to various conditions progress in this direction had been very slow.

Perhaps the first handicap was the outlook adopted by the early settlers. They were extremely loyal to the land from which they had come, and, although this was no fault, they had not realised that their destiny lay in a new country. They had clung to old customs and old traditions and New Zealand was so small, so remote and so new that their whole attitude was to feel that thex did not count for much in the world. Accordingly there had been developed a sense of inferiority which had led to imitation in a new country of a form of life taken from an old land. New Zealand was, in fact, for years governed by an inferiority complex. Australia had developed along different lines and awakened much earlier to a sense of her national being. Then came the war, and experiences overseas showed a large volume of young New Zealanders the value of a national individuality. They gained assurance and came back to the Dominion with the feeling that it was good to be a New Zealander.

Now the New Zealand national type was gradually emerging, bringing with it a broader outlook. There was an element of reserve in the New Zealand character which made such things as religious persecution and political fanaticism in the Dominion almost impossible.

Generally, New Zealand to-day was carefully observing the world before going forward on the pathway of her nationhood. Two particular features in the growing New Zealand character were outstanding and probably prove of importance in the future. One was that the New Zealander, although he did not accept discipline for discipline’s sake, was, nevertheless, amenable to disciplinary measures if it could be proved to him that the end was worth while. The second point was that there was an unmistakable sense of reverence in the growing national character.