For decades, Māori activists have strategically used principles from Te Tiriti o Waitangi – the document, that ‘founded’ the territory widely known as New Zealand – to further social causes that protect Māori people and their culture. Olivia Lucas (2021) has already shown, with Māori metal band Alien Weaponry, how Māori Treaty principles of kaitiakitanga – the protection of taonga (treasures) meaning both physical possessions and intangible cultural treasures – and whai wāhi – the right of Māori people to participate in all aspects of society – offer a way of realizing of the band's contributions to Māori cultural preservation as well as a larger global culture within metal music. In this paper, I consider how these principles might also offer a valuable analytic approach for Māori musician Stan Walker. For Walker, kaitiakitanga and whai wāhi present a framework for understanding his contributions to Māori culture in parallel to Alien Weaponry, with particular focus on Māori identity and Indigeneity. My analysis draws from two of his songs, “Aotearoa” and “New Takeover,” and their respective music videos as well as Walker’s own comments in interviews about them. Through further engagement with these principles, I argue that Walker moves via Māori conceptions of participation to a larger engagement within the defense of cultural treasures in dialogue with global indigenous identities.

The hīnaki is a weaved net that has been taught intergenerationally among my people of the

Whanganui River and remains a significant tool in food gathering. The hīnaki is weaved from

the inner fibres of the aerial roots from the aka kiekie (vine), alongside akatea or rātā (tree

with red timber), and through using karewao (supplejack) (Best, 2005; Downes, 1917; Haami

& Tinirau, 2021; Horwood & Wilson, 2008; Young 1998). The hīnaki is an important symbol

for Whanganui Māori (Indigenous peoples of New Zealand from Whanganui), being featured

as a key component of Te Awa Tupua (River Claims) Settlement 2017, which formalised the

legal personhood of the Whanganui River. These elements inform ‘He Whiringa Hīnaki’,

which is Kaupapa Māori ecomusicological framework to analyse waiata (songs). Kaupapa

Māori methodologies draw on mātauranga Māori (Māori knowledge) with a metaphysical

base that is distinctly by Māori and for Māori focused on using anti-colonial and re-

indigenising frameworks (Eketone, 2008; Pihama, 2015; Smith, 2017; Smith, 1999). This

paper intends to discuss this framework from my doctoral study, which derived from the lived

experiences of Rānana Marae (communal gathering place) descendants to contribute towards

future generations who wish to examine waiata within its environmental and ancestral

contexts.

In 2023, in collaboration with the Ewamian Aboriginal People of northeast Australia, I participated in the initiative to revive their ancestral language through the didjeridu. Research on traditional didjeridu playing styles provides insight into the syllabic and phrasal approach to teaching the didjeridu and its connection to language. In the playing traditions found in the Arnhem Land region of the Northern Territory, Gurruwiwi (2001), Mununggurr (2005), and Dikarrna (2006) demonstrate an approach to didjeridu pedagogy through the use of rhythm words, or a ‘didjeridu language’. The syllables used to teach the didjeridu are directly linked to the language of instruction. While the syllables themselves do not carry meaning in a specific language, they do contain the phonetic characteristics of their respective languages. The aim of this paper is to introduce a newly developed didjeridu teaching method that will assist in the revitalization of the Wamin (Ewamian) language. More specifically, this method utilizes Wamin vocabulary that can be both enunciated into the didjeridu for performance contexts and also used in everyday common parlance. This unique Ewamian didjeridu playing style is executed through articulated vowel sounds which can be distinguished by harmonic pitches above the fundamental drone. Most notably, these pitches, which are produced by different tongue positions corresponding to vowels of speech, mirror the formant frequencies in their spoken vowel equivalents. In short, a communicative approach to teaching the didjeridu will facilitate the revitalization of the Wamin language, its relationship to Country, and the learning of an ancient, yet significant instrument.