16-18th November 2023, Bay of Islands, New Zealand
Please visit Laidlaw College’s website with accomodation booking information and details regarding speakers, etc, see: wānanga-symposium
For booking the conference itself, please visit: Eventbrite
PLEASE NOTE: There are only 200 places available (199 now!), so be sure to book ASAP
This symposium, featuring leading international and New Zealand scholars, will consider the interactions between Christianity, te ao Māori and colonization in Aotearoa New Zealand. Current public conversations on the nature of our history, the Treaty of Waitangi, and issues of Crown governance and Māori authority, call for fresh research and perspectives on multi-faceted relationships and processes.
The wānanga-symposium will canvas such questions as: how can this ‘national history’ be reframed in terms of local and global interconnections? What was the indigenous response to Christianity by Māori leaders and communities? How should we understand te Tiriti o Waitangi in light of the local context and the wider picture of European empires? What do these entangled histories of beliefs and practices, of ideas and institutions, and of texts and state power, mean for our identities and common life in these islands called New Zealand or Aotearoa?
Brought to you by Te Tii Marae, Te Pihopatanga o te Tai Tokerau, Karuwhā Trust, New Zealand Church Missionary Society, St John’s Theological College, and Laidlaw College.
Key Speakers
Brian Stanley, Zoe Laidlaw, and Dominic O’Sullivan are leaders in their fields, which cover Christian missions and empire, humanitarianism and race, te Tiriti o Waitangi and indigenous policy in postcolonial states. We look forward to their contributions and keynote addresses, and their interactions with leading scholars in Aotearoa New Zealand. Prof. Tony Ballantyne is a prominent scholar of colonialism and the British empire, while Dr Monty Soutar and Bradford Haami are leading New Zealand historians who both draw on a deep knowledge of their own tribal traditions in engaging with big themes in our history, including Christianity, culture, and colonialism.
