IS THE MAORI LAZY?

Gisborne Times, Volume LXVIII, Issue 10728, 27 October 1928, Page 12

IS THE MAORI LAZY?

WORK AND THE NATIVE RACE,

INFLUENCE OF TRADITION

INTERESTING-. PROBELMS

(Bv F. -M. Keesing. M.A., in the Auckland Star),

‘The Maori can’t stick it! ’

Such seems to be the final declaration with regard to work made not even so much by the pakeha as by the Maori himself. Almost in the last forty years it has become an axiom aomng the tribes, dinned, as a Maori leader- has told me, into the growing generations from childhood. and "only too often perhaps, made the bulwark behind which the indolent can hide their inactivity. Have 1 you ever explored the earthworks on the site of some ancient pa; examined the carvings, canoes, weapons, implements, clothing. houses of olden days; read or the constant struggle for existence —the cultivating the precious kumara crop, the snaring of birds, and catching ’of fish, the engaging aggressively and defensively of enemies? Study them, and you cannot help hut realise that the life of the primitive Maori called for prodigies of energetic work, sustained, skilled and well-organised effort, and the active co-operation of every member of the social group in carrying on the daily round of tribal life. Has the Maori stock so degenerated, then, that to-dav the descendants of these hardy folk cannot work, cannot “stick it,” are inherently lazy? Jf not, there must be reasons for his evil reputation. And when we seek to find them we enter into a tangle of material, social and psychological causes.

Tlie social are perhaps the most apparent. Students of society tell us that only through long experiences of slavery, hard knocks, time and economic pressure has “work” as we conceive it, become acceptable to civilised folk. We leave school, and are whirled, most of us of necessity, into the economic machine — eight hours a day at least, _ 48 a week, or if we are in some jobs a great deal more. We live by tlie clock, tlie slaves of time; Saturday afternoon and Sunday, should we be town dwellers, are our release. Fortunate. indeed those who have work so congenial that it is utterly absorbing, becoming to them no longer “work,” but “play,” tlieir spontaneous self-expression. Such is civilised work, But what of the Maori? All this pressure of time, necessity, monotony, specialisation and division of labor is quite foreign to his heritage. He had no clocks or Sundays. His holidays were delightfully irregular events; a. tangi (funeral), a reception of visitors, a feast or ceremonial holiday, an enemy attack. He could “down” adze, net, spade at a moment’s notice according to the social demands. When lie worked lie threw himself wholeheartedly into the task and it absorbed his whole energies—it was generally no grim urge of necessity. but a spontaneous willingness to forward the varied activities of his community and tribe. He had happy variety; would hunt, build. fight, plant, play. George French Angas, in his diary of a jouruey into the interior of New Zealand in .1844, tells how a certain meeting-house was built with great rapidity, yet never once did he see anyone at work there, though lie tried to catch the workers at all sorts of unexpected times. It was done piecemeal, but it was done. Now introduce “work” into the life of the Maori as it is known to the pakeha, born and bred to accept it (excepting the “cream” and “dregs” of society, the “lounge lizards,” and the “hobos.” You must expect some difficulty of adjustment. HORI’S DILEMMA, Hori is in a job. His grandmother or fifth cousin inconsiderately passes away on a Monday instead of a Friday; all the family and kindred gather from various parts of the country for what is perhaps the saddest- and gladdest rite in Maori life, the tangi; Hori must go, and,so lose his position, or else hej labelled a bad Maori—for few employers would allow him a week’s holiday offhand. Such is an ordinary example of the clash of social customs in this period of adjustment to civilisation. The result ; is too , often that- the Maori will not settle down to any work which ties him, such as dairying, commercial or industrial pursuits. He prefers the shifting positions—-gum-digging, shearing, fishing, timber and flaxmilling, rabbit-catching, road-making, and the like — to earn

that money which civilisation terms “the necessary.” There are Maoris who have realised fully the inevitability of work, and they are willing to. face tip to it. Here come in new .issues. lue first is the question of how many avenues of work are open to Hie Maori. Say a young man of amb_tion undergoes the long training necessary to lie a doctor. He comes from college full of enthusiasm. He cannot make a living, however, among his own people, because no Maori will pay jiim—native custom demands that he shall give his services freely and • cheerfully, and perhaps feed his patients into the bargain: But it is exceedingly difficult tor him to establish a practice among Europeans, owing to color-discrimin-ation. He then comes up against a blank wall, that wall which looms so large before the educated Maori vouth of to-day. and closes so many of the congenial avenues of occupation. Nevertheless it is a fine thing to find young Maoris increasingly anxious to enter professional training, in medicine, engineering,, nursing,' the ministry and the public service, and these” are doing valuable pioneering in opening the way for .a wider range of opportunity for their race. THE LAND. Now, again, comes in another question—that vexing issue of land. Most authorities are agreed that the main outlet for Maori work activity should be in. the''developinent of his land. But according to the old social order of Maoridom all land was communal. Now a Maori even today may be very anxious to farm his land, and may even have available the all-important finance to back him. But he may not be able to find liis land! For lie will have so much interest in this block, and so much in that block, and again some in others perhaps hundreds of miles away, but no actual soil to which lie may lay liis willing hands. Here we have the whole slow unwieldy problem of “individualising” nativeland. There is the tragic-humorous, example ‘of the enthusiastic Maori farmer who grew a splendid crop of vegetables, but,, as soon as they were ready to eat. all his less energetic neighbours simply came in and carried them off! Some Maori communities are working hard to-day. I think of the strenuous roofing of Ruahs Urewera stronghold in corrugated iron by liis followers to keep out- the. prophesied falling stars at the end of-the world ho is so fond of predicting. Or the energetic working of llatana’s followers at liis settlement near 'Wanganui. Again comes to. mind the itense fervour of competition that is driving some rival settlements to work furiously to heat each other, even verging on active hostilities. But such work-stimuli as the fervour of religion or of emulation are generally not very permanent, and tend to suffer quick slump. Much more interesting are the constructive work efforts of some other districts, where a definite attempt is being made to enter into economic competition with the pakeha. The outstanding example is, of course, the well-known experiment in communal co-operation being carried on by' the Ngati-Porou people on the East Coast, inspired by Sir Apirana Ngata, M.P. However, to quote this great leader, you cannot safely judge the success of such a work experiment until the lapse of at least five to seven years —showing clearly liis own distrust of the capacity of his people as yet to sustain regular work-effort in such an exacting field as dairy farming over a long period. ■