Professor Rawinia Higgins, FRSNZ (Māori Language Commissioner)
“Ki ētahi, ko te oma roa a Tōhē, engari ki a au nei he oma tukutuku i te rākau, i te mea he rautaki āta tuku i te reo i tētahi whakatupuranga ki tētahi. Ka roa tonu e omangia ana. Waihoki, ki te taka te rākau kōrero, ka ngaro te reo i te whakatupuranga kotahi noa. Engari ka toru whakatupuranga rawa hei hāpai ake anō, hei whakaora ake anō. Nō reira, he tauwhāinga roa.”
Ko Ahorangi Higgins te Tumu Ahurei o Te Herenga Waka. He tino mātanga whakarauora reo, he wahine kura wānanga, he kaituhi anō hoki. He mema anō nō te Rōpū Whakamana i te Tiriti o Waitangi me Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga. Nō te 2015 ka kopoua ki te Kāhui Whakamāherehere Reo Māori nāna i āwhina ki te tārai i Te Ture mō te Reo Māori 2016 me tōna anō anga kaupapa-here e kōpūtahi ana. He maha ngā tohu whakamānawa kua uhia ki a ia, tae atu ki te Pou Aronui a Te Apārangi i te 2020, me Te Waitī, mō te reo me ngā tikanga, i Ngā Whetū o Matariki 2017. I kōwhiria anō a Ahorangi Higgins ki te UN Global Task Force for Making a Decade of Action for Indigenous Languages i te Huitanguru 2021. Nō te 2015 i kopoua ai hei kaiwhiri o Te Taura Whiri i te Reo Māori, ā, nō te tau 2018 ka tū mai hei toihau mōna. Ko ia te wahine tuatahi kua eke ki tēnei tūranga.
“Some people call it a marathon, I like to call it a relay, because it’s an intergenerational strategy. It takes a lot longer than what people want. It takes one generation to lose the language, it takes three generations to restore it, so it’s a long game.”
A leading language revitalisation expert, academic and author, Professor Higgins is Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Māori) at Te Herenga Waka - Victoria University of Wellington. She is also a member of the Waitangi Tribunal and a board member of Ngā Pae o Te Māramatanga (Māori Centre of Research Excellence). In 2015 she was appointed to the Māori Language Advisory Group which helped shape Te Ture mō te Reo Māori 2016 (The Māori Language Act 2016) and the associated policy framework. She has been honoured with several awards including the 2020 Pou Aronui Award by the Royal Society Te Apārangi and the Matariki Te Waitī Award for te reo and tikanga in 2017. Professor Higgins was elected to the UN Global Task Force for Making a Decade of Action for Indigenous Languages in February 2021. Appointed to the board of Te Taura Whiri i te Reo Māori in 2015, in 2018 she became the first woman to chair the commission.
