Te Hau Kainga: The Maori Home Front during the Second World War

Taking readers to the farms and factories, the marae and churches where
Maori lived, worked and raised their families, Te Hau Kainga tells the
story of the profound transformation in Maori life during the Second World War.



While the Maori Battalion fought overseas, the Maori War Effort
Organisation and its tribal committees engaged Maori men and women throughout
Aotearoa in the home guard, the women’s auxiliary forces, and national
agricultural and industrial production. Maori mobilisation was an exercise of
rangatiratanga and it changed how Maori engaged with the state. And, as Maori
men and women took up new roles, the war was to become a watershed event for
Maori society that set the stage for post-war urbanisation.



From ammunition factories to kumara fields, from Te Puea Herangi to Te
Paipera Tapu, Te Hau Kainga provides the first substantial account of
how hapori Maori were shaped by the wartime experience at home. It is a story
of sacrifice and remarkable resilience among whanau, hapu and iwi Maori.



Te Hau Kainga is
published alongside its companion volume Raupanga: Nga Pito Korero o te
Pakanga Tuarua no te Hau Kainga, edited by Angela Wanhalla and Lachy
Paterson. Raupanga features thirty-five succinct,
illustrated essays exploring the Maori home front, translated into te reo Maori
by Lachy Paterson.

Format: Hardback
Pages: 296
Imprint: Auckland University Press
Publication date: 07/11/2024