Nature and natives: transforming and saving the indigenous in New Zealand

Abstract

Pakeha society in nineteenth-century New Zealand was conditioned to believe in the colony as a 'Britain of the South'. Collective expectation deemed that settlers would predominate over the Maori and that a rustic English landscape would be created where once had been 'savage wilds'. Though some acknowledged redeeming qualities in the Maori, and the bush, civilising the savage and clearing 'unimproved' land were the bottom line of colonial objectives. Wars to impose British sovereignty, the acclimatisation of English plants and animals, and the large-scale felling of native bush were thus key elements in the transformation of nature in New Zealand. By the 1890s, however, New Zealand nationalism began to emerge, with the majority of settlers by this time having been born in the colony rather than in Britain. Growing national consciousness led to the popularisation of the indigenous as symbols of nationhood, as Pakeha sought increasingly to grant themselves a distinctly New Zealand identity. 'Old-time' nature and natives became romantic emblems of the new-found identity, but this incorporation remained essentially superficial: massive bush clearance continued unabated, and the contemporary Maori was still often disparaged. Yet the desire to 'save' the indigenous marked a departure from the tenet of transforming, and reflects the transition of settlers from displaced Britons to New Zealand 'natives'. The quest for identity thus elevated the indigenous to the status of national icons. But the Pakeha self-image was, and still is, an inherent contradiction: New Zealand's quintessence has traditionally been depicted as either one of pioneering and farming - the transforming of nature - or scenic and untouched native beauty - nature's salvation. It is difficult to reconcile this dichotomy, and it seems that Pakeha remain unsure of whether New Zealand is best characterised by forests or farms, by the kiwi or the sheep.