ABSTRACT
When the vestiges of vacant anthills empty mouths of mother tongues, and the porous paupers of potbellied princesses parade facades of ferocity on TV screens, how do our broken hearts continue to beat? Bash and crash our lives onto concrete, metal tensions tire as our home-hearth fires dwindle like deadened sunsets. And yet, a golden-skinned hue of hope hearkens. If our genealogies are our bodies, they bare themselves to witness the warmth of bitumen and tar, far removed from the wharetangata, or womb, of our browned and ancient wisdoms. In trekking the mass urbanization of Māori people from traditional village nations, into warring global cities of cultural cataclysm, this research identifies the visage of neo-post-colony brethren. It seeks to stir the coals of the cityscape, the escape from Absalom’s promised promenades to describe potential futures for people pushed to the margins of mediocrity.
