The complainant sent a 3100-word missive to the Vice-Chancellor in a belated response to five columns the professor had co-written three years ago that discussed university funding, decolonisation and mātauranga Māori.
The university has summarised the essence of the complaint as asking whether criticisms of “Māori bodies, colonisation, mātauranga Māori and about Māori studies, te reo Māori, and Māori presence at universities reflect the values of Massey University”.
It would seem the complainant — who prefers not to be named — thinks that any such criticism is an outrage, even when made in a personal capacity.
In fact, Schwerdtfeger and his academic co-authors explicitly stated in the columns: “The opinions expressed here are those of the writers, and not of the universities with which they are or were formerly affiliated.” In her letter, the complainant acknowledged the disclaimer but dismissed it.
The university has instigated a formal investigation. Of course, if it functioned properly as a traditional institute of higher learning, its response to the complaint could have been simple and immediate: “We are a university! All ideas are contestable and open to criticism in our search for truth. Those are the values we hold dear and will defend to the last.”
The complaint should have been instantly rejected.
However, Massey has opened itself up to grievances of this nature by committing the university to being a “Tiriti-led” institution. This commitment — which includes “valuing, advancing and protecting mātauranga Māori as a distinct and important knowledge system” — is one avenue the complainant is using to test Massey’s “values”.
Ironically, the university’s Academic Freedom Policy has been so watered down that the complainant has been able to appeal to that too in her objections. She questioned whether the columns are “consistent with… [the policy’s] commitments to respectful dialogue, mana-enhancing civility, equal access to speech, and awareness of speech that may silence, stigmatise, victimise or marginalise people on grounds of ethnicity, cultural difference, race or national origin”.
Her letter was couched in personal terms:
“I am Māori, and my eldest [daughter] is in her final year of school and has Massey on her shortlist for a degree in Māori Studies. We were at the Manawatū open day earlier this year and she came home set on it... [but] I have since read a series of articles co-authored by Professor Peter Schwerdtfeger of the New Zealand Institute for Advanced Study, published on the Bassett, Brash and Hide website between June and December 2023, each carrying his Massey title. Having read them, I no longer feel confident about my daughter enrolling at Massey.”
Again, an institution dedicated to higher learning should have had no hesitation in rejecting the complaint. Its response should have been simple: “If your daughter is unable to cope with hearing ideas or criticisms she doesn’t agree with, she is clearly not ready for university.”
Given the daughter wanted to enrol in Māori Studies, it is very unlikely, of course, that she would have encountered Professor Schwerdtfeger unless she suddenly discovered a new passion for the hard sciences he specialises in, namely high-level theoretical chemistry and physics.
The mother said her daughter wanted “to learn maramataka, rongoā, whakapapa and te reo properly, and she wants to do it at a university that thinks it is worth learning”.
Maramataka is the traditional lunar calendar used to track time, energy levels, and the best days for fishing, planting, and harvesting.
Rongoā focuses on herbal remedies using native plants alongside massage and physical alignment intended to release physical blockages and shift spiritual energy.
Spiritual healing is purportedly achieved via karakia and other incantations, prayers, and spiritual connections that maintain the mauri (life force) and wairua (spirit) during the healing process.
Herbal medicines, calculations of wairua and mauri, and traditional lunar calendars are worthy of study at a university as anthropological phenomena but not as subjects to be taught uncritically — any more than students should expect biblical accounts of creation to be presented in lectures as just another “knowledge system” deserving the same status as science.
The complainant’s jeremiad is also directed at the criticisms Schwerdtfeger and his co-authors made about the promotion of te reo, and their questioning “whether public money should be spent promoting a language spoken fluently by only three per cent of New Zealanders, one that is not used outside this country and that cannot easily be adapted to the sciences...”
Instead of answering those criticisms directly, the complainant then resorted to a cry-bully’s tactics:
“Te reo Māori is an official language of this country. It reached three per cent because of what the state did to it. To see that figure used as an argument against its revival, by a professor at a university that has a Māori name [Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa] in its own title, is difficult to reconcile with anything Massey says about itself in its recruitment material.”
Massey should rightly offer te reo as an academic subject — indeed it has been taught at New Zealand universities since 1929 — but it is not a university’s job to try to revitalise it to atone for the state’s alleged role in its demise. No one expects a university to promote sign language, for instance, even though that is an official language too.
The complainant also objected to one of the columns stating that colonisation had “brought benefits to indigenous people and that in New Zealand it ended inter-tribal wars....”
That colonisation brought benefits to Māori is indisputable — which they were quick to recognise at the time as they clamoured to learn to read and write, converted to Christianity and invited Pakeha to settle near them to share in the prosperity and the advanced technology they brought from the outside world.
Nevertheless, the complainant seemed to think the benefits of colonisation could be dismissed out of hand given that the writers failed to mention “the New Zealand Wars, the confiscations, the Native Land Court and the Tohunga Suppression Act...”
It would appear she has little knowledge of the petitions presented to Parliament in the 19th Century by Māori leaders for their children to be taught only in English at school or the fact the Tohunga Suppression Act was driven by prominent Māori politicians including Sir James Carroll, and all four MPs holding Māori electorates — including Apirana Ngata — voted in favour of the bill.
Her objections are, in fact, a compendium of the received opinions we have come to expect from apologists for Māori nationalism — and the predictable outrage when anyone dares to publicly reject them.
It should be deeply embarrassing for Massey to be obliged to convene a panel to consider whether the articles written by three senior academics “reflect its values”.
It would seem the complainant — who prefers not to be named — thinks that any such criticism is an outrage, even when made in a personal capacity.
In fact, Schwerdtfeger and his academic co-authors explicitly stated in the columns: “The opinions expressed here are those of the writers, and not of the universities with which they are or were formerly affiliated.” In her letter, the complainant acknowledged the disclaimer but dismissed it.
The university has instigated a formal investigation. Of course, if it functioned properly as a traditional institute of higher learning, its response to the complaint could have been simple and immediate: “We are a university! All ideas are contestable and open to criticism in our search for truth. Those are the values we hold dear and will defend to the last.”
The complaint should have been instantly rejected.
However, Massey has opened itself up to grievances of this nature by committing the university to being a “Tiriti-led” institution. This commitment — which includes “valuing, advancing and protecting mātauranga Māori as a distinct and important knowledge system” — is one avenue the complainant is using to test Massey’s “values”.
Ironically, the university’s Academic Freedom Policy has been so watered down that the complainant has been able to appeal to that too in her objections. She questioned whether the columns are “consistent with… [the policy’s] commitments to respectful dialogue, mana-enhancing civility, equal access to speech, and awareness of speech that may silence, stigmatise, victimise or marginalise people on grounds of ethnicity, cultural difference, race or national origin”.
Her letter was couched in personal terms:
“I am Māori, and my eldest [daughter] is in her final year of school and has Massey on her shortlist for a degree in Māori Studies. We were at the Manawatū open day earlier this year and she came home set on it... [but] I have since read a series of articles co-authored by Professor Peter Schwerdtfeger of the New Zealand Institute for Advanced Study, published on the Bassett, Brash and Hide website between June and December 2023, each carrying his Massey title. Having read them, I no longer feel confident about my daughter enrolling at Massey.”
Again, an institution dedicated to higher learning should have had no hesitation in rejecting the complaint. Its response should have been simple: “If your daughter is unable to cope with hearing ideas or criticisms she doesn’t agree with, she is clearly not ready for university.”
Given the daughter wanted to enrol in Māori Studies, it is very unlikely, of course, that she would have encountered Professor Schwerdtfeger unless she suddenly discovered a new passion for the hard sciences he specialises in, namely high-level theoretical chemistry and physics.
The mother said her daughter wanted “to learn maramataka, rongoā, whakapapa and te reo properly, and she wants to do it at a university that thinks it is worth learning”.
Maramataka is the traditional lunar calendar used to track time, energy levels, and the best days for fishing, planting, and harvesting.
Rongoā focuses on herbal remedies using native plants alongside massage and physical alignment intended to release physical blockages and shift spiritual energy.
Spiritual healing is purportedly achieved via karakia and other incantations, prayers, and spiritual connections that maintain the mauri (life force) and wairua (spirit) during the healing process.
Herbal medicines, calculations of wairua and mauri, and traditional lunar calendars are worthy of study at a university as anthropological phenomena but not as subjects to be taught uncritically — any more than students should expect biblical accounts of creation to be presented in lectures as just another “knowledge system” deserving the same status as science.
The complainant’s jeremiad is also directed at the criticisms Schwerdtfeger and his co-authors made about the promotion of te reo, and their questioning “whether public money should be spent promoting a language spoken fluently by only three per cent of New Zealanders, one that is not used outside this country and that cannot easily be adapted to the sciences...”
Instead of answering those criticisms directly, the complainant then resorted to a cry-bully’s tactics:
“Te reo Māori is an official language of this country. It reached three per cent because of what the state did to it. To see that figure used as an argument against its revival, by a professor at a university that has a Māori name [Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa] in its own title, is difficult to reconcile with anything Massey says about itself in its recruitment material.”
Massey should rightly offer te reo as an academic subject — indeed it has been taught at New Zealand universities since 1929 — but it is not a university’s job to try to revitalise it to atone for the state’s alleged role in its demise. No one expects a university to promote sign language, for instance, even though that is an official language too.
The complainant also objected to one of the columns stating that colonisation had “brought benefits to indigenous people and that in New Zealand it ended inter-tribal wars....”
That colonisation brought benefits to Māori is indisputable — which they were quick to recognise at the time as they clamoured to learn to read and write, converted to Christianity and invited Pakeha to settle near them to share in the prosperity and the advanced technology they brought from the outside world.
Nevertheless, the complainant seemed to think the benefits of colonisation could be dismissed out of hand given that the writers failed to mention “the New Zealand Wars, the confiscations, the Native Land Court and the Tohunga Suppression Act...”
It would appear she has little knowledge of the petitions presented to Parliament in the 19th Century by Māori leaders for their children to be taught only in English at school or the fact the Tohunga Suppression Act was driven by prominent Māori politicians including Sir James Carroll, and all four MPs holding Māori electorates — including Apirana Ngata — voted in favour of the bill.
Her objections are, in fact, a compendium of the received opinions we have come to expect from apologists for Māori nationalism — and the predictable outrage when anyone dares to publicly reject them.
It should be deeply embarrassing for Massey to be obliged to convene a panel to consider whether the articles written by three senior academics “reflect its values”.
Schwerdtfeger — an academic heavyweight with an international reputation — will have to prepare a defence.
He’s up for the fight. As he told Sean Plunket on The Platform: “When I see the kind of pseudo-science coming out in New Zealand at the moment under the umbrella of mātauranga Māori… as a scientist, I have to reject that and write about it.”
It is not the first time he has locked horns with Massey’s management over academic freedom and free speech. And he publicly defended the seven Auckland University professors who wrote a letter to the Listener in 2021 that rejected a purported equivalence between mātauranga Māori and science.
Plunket asked Schwerdtfeger why he continues to work at Massey. After all, he is highly regarded internationally and would undoubtedly not suffer from lack of opportunities to teach at more prestigious universities.
He replied: “Basically, I’m a little bit of a voice for all the academics who don’t dare to speak out.”
And, he added, he is “really positive about the new leadership” — and confident that the new Vice-Chancellor, appointed in February, “will do the right thing”.
Plunket: “Should the complaint have got this far?”
Schwerdtfeger: “Absolutely not — because some of the points are ridiculous.”
A ruling is expected by the end of the month.
He’s up for the fight. As he told Sean Plunket on The Platform: “When I see the kind of pseudo-science coming out in New Zealand at the moment under the umbrella of mātauranga Māori… as a scientist, I have to reject that and write about it.”
It is not the first time he has locked horns with Massey’s management over academic freedom and free speech. And he publicly defended the seven Auckland University professors who wrote a letter to the Listener in 2021 that rejected a purported equivalence between mātauranga Māori and science.
Plunket asked Schwerdtfeger why he continues to work at Massey. After all, he is highly regarded internationally and would undoubtedly not suffer from lack of opportunities to teach at more prestigious universities.
He replied: “Basically, I’m a little bit of a voice for all the academics who don’t dare to speak out.”
And, he added, he is “really positive about the new leadership” — and confident that the new Vice-Chancellor, appointed in February, “will do the right thing”.
Plunket: “Should the complaint have got this far?”
Schwerdtfeger: “Absolutely not — because some of the points are ridiculous.”
A ruling is expected by the end of the month.
Graham Adams is an Auckland-based freelance editor, journalist and columnist. This article was sourced HERE
13 comments:
So what is the complainant's daughter going to do with all this knowledge of lunar calendars and life force blockages? What jobs will that equip her for? With these types of people, working isn't part of the equation.
It is free speech, get over it!
I fully support any move made against this maori revival revisionist nonsense where lies and bullying are used to silence common sense and truth. Given the rubbish spouted by the complainant I actually wonder if Massey has a History department that teaches the reality of early life in NZ and could put the complainant right, or does the fault lie with secondary school dunderheads brainwashing credulous pupils?
Schwerdtfeger is a hero for making this public. Massey’s new VC inherited a terrible mess. There is still great scholarship at Massey, but there are also an awful lot of activists who think their activism = scholarship. The parent behind the complaint clearly buys into that same error. The case looks like the old guard of the Jan Thomas and Gisele Byrnes era trying to enforce their own values. The VC needs the nation backing him to begin to fix this problem.
To anon 3:15. The daughter will complete her studies, take an additional one-year certificate course in leadership, and be hired by a Council on $200K+ to be a cultural expert with veto-power over Council decisions. Sweet!
I pity the complainant's daughter, who will be spending 3 years 'studying' for a useless degree.
As a retiree and co-author with Professor Schwerdtfeger I write about science and education in order to share ideas which the general public can accept or reject. I and others hold to particular views that are not agreed to by everyone. For example, I and others believe that traditional knowledge has a place in our society and has historic, cultural and religious interest today, but should not be accorded equal status with modern global science in our curriculum, nor taught as science unless verified through the methods of science. Our views should be accepted as part of the wider mix of ideas on education and on other issues of public interest. They are advanced with just as much positive intent as others’ opinions.
A considerable volume of material espousing the notion of equality between traditional knowledge and modern global science has been published by the Ministry of Education, the Aotearoa Educators Collective, our university education faculties, our education journals, our mainstream media and others. In addition, a considerable range of material on indigenizing our universities is out there in the public domain. By comparison, the number of publications that advance opposing views is very small and the range of media that will publish such material is very limited. In recent years articles that do not cohere with the prevailing ideology on education and possibly other public issues are usually declined for publication and the reviews accorded to them by our journals often unflattering, to say the least.
Speaking for myself - like most others I want equality of opportunity and education of the highest calibre for all children of all backgrounds, and I want an education system that reflects the multicultural, cosmopolitan nature of our country.
However, I felt obliged to object to initiatives such as the 2023 Labour Government draft refreshed curriculum for Mathematics, Statistics and English, which mentioned Te Tiriti no less than 40 times; the word "mātauranga" 29 times, and the word “Māori” 65 times, but where our Pacific people were mentioned only five times and no other population was mentioned at all – not our Asian community, nor our Middle Eastern/Latin American/African (MELAA) ethnic group (2% of New Zealand’s total population), nor our European population.
The document discriminated between “tangata Tiriti” and “tangata whenua” when all ethnic and cultural groups should be treated exactly the same. The curriculum was “designed to foster the next generation of Te Tiriti partners by moving beyond the rhetorical notion of ‘honouring’ Te Tiriti to give effect to it and its principles.” Here we were in real danger of creating a political manifesto rather than a curriculum.
(CONTINUED FROM ABOVE)
To be clear - it was that kind of imbalance that concerned me most at the time rather than the presence of the Treaty or other issues in that document, and I felt obliged to point out the issues. For the record – I feel that the Treaty has a place in education and within our wider society, but not to the extent demanded in that curriculum document and elsewhere. Where in the Introduction to that curriculum document, it said:
“Te Mātaiaho is designed to give effect to Te Tiriti o Waitangi and to be inclusive of all ākonga.” . . .
I would prefer to read something like:
“This Curriculum is designed to support high-quality teaching and effective learning of each and every child across each and every school in New Zealand.”
Surely the Labour Party view was genuine and heartfelt, but so are the opposing views of others. What we need is more constructive and polite debate.
I want our tertiary environments to be welcoming to students of all backgrounds and to be politically neutral and I want a mainstream media that publishes scientifically robust material. However, as one example, several pieces have appeared on the lunar cycle as a guide to managing agriculture but there is no scientific evidence whatsoever for the idea of the lunar cycle as a guide to farming. Unfortunately, for the most part, the responses of scientists to such pieces do not get published and often are not even acknowledged. The same happens on the very difficult subject of climate and the environment. In addition, mainstream media have printed other pieces that in effect endorse traditional or folk medicine for sick people – potentially a very dangerous message to give to desperate people who are themselves very ill or who perhaps have a sick child. In some cases, traditional or folk medicine can complement clinical medicine, but the research evidence is very clear that traditional or folk medicine yields mostly negative outcomes for cancer and other serious conditions.
New Zealand has to get much better at constructive dialogue and accepting that others have their own considered points of view.
I agree with David over cultural studies but the whole area has been captured by the Marxist DEI , victim. hood mentality which encourages destruction of all the values of Western Culture.
This is the actual agenda. This is Western Culture self-destructing. Take away the Marxism element of eg Paulo Freire and there would be a more reasonable discussion.
But there is no desire or intention of the radicals in having balance in this . The theme is victimhood , victimhood and more victimhood .
Victimhood is not a virtue . It is a festering sore that rots the whole body . There is nothing constructive about it .
Congratulations to Prof. Schwerdtfeger . He is fighting a great evil .
Everything about the ToW can be taught in a morning.
Maori myths pretending to be science is a primary school reading subject.
Matauranga "science " being a mandatory subject before being allowed to study at university is abhorrent.
Please Professor Peter Schwerdtfeger continue to push back against the indoctrinated academics that are distorting the value of every NZ degree.
MfK
The way to help high equity ( low decile) students of any race is to teach subjects in a highly structured , disciplined way.
The way to have them fail, even more is to build their 'self -esteem' by saturating any subject with their specific culture and call that equity and social justice. Value loaded words that have come to mean in practice to produce the exact opposite of what is intended.
There is no evidence whatsoever that dousing students in their culture will aid their achievement. For example giving students maths examples using Te Reo terms .
Once again I mention Katherine Burbalsinghe who has coloured immigrant low decile children achieving at the highest levels in national testing , by using traditional methods . These align with cognitive science like rote learning tables , repetition , building up long term memory with knowledge ,firm discipline, constant revision, explicit instruction, homework ie all that stuff we used to have earlier last century and had a world class education system at all levels.
The AEC has agendas completely counter to what works for all children . These include identity politics, post modern ideology , biculturalism, and radical equity shifting the curriculum away from academic excellence toward social engineering . It has a left wing . politically driven agenda. Radical academics from Unis like Massey are drawn into their site to defend their stance They are out to protect the progressive status quo., encouraging teachers to not do what Standford says.
Socioeconomic factors for the AEC are always given as the excuse for low educational results. They believe schools can't improve until society is 'fixed'. This is instead of of focusing on high quality . rigorous teaching methods that lift children out of of their circumstances.
In summary what is happening at Massey is repeated in all areas of education.
Ultimately the critique of this progressive /Marxist agenda is a romantic view of education that sounds compassionate , but fails in practice. lacking explicit instruction, accountability, structured knowledge -first curriculum and is and will continue contributing to the degradation of foundational skills for our children at all levels. .
Straw people, straw arguments. Light it on fire, and go home please. Your faux outrage is boring. Nothing will happen to anyone in this process. But the lecturers are constantly under threat for calling out tactics of Russia or Trump all over the world. Let's focus on something where politicial action rather bureaucratic form filling will ensue
What happened to "universitas" which was the prime purpose of universities allowing anything on the table to be open to any viewpoint and the crunch being that proponents had to justify their standpoints with debate and evidence. This was the basis of Oxbridge education inherited from earlier
philosophers and carried on in New Zealand
until some institutions hijacked the word "university" to apply to their own aggrandised organisations which fall far short of what a "university" should be.
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