PhD research excellence recognised by PGSA

Three doctoral candidates from the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences were awarded PGSA Research Excellence Awards for their doctoral research late last year, for remarkable research that shows the breadth and depth of research in the Faculty.

Creative writing PhD candidate Maraea Rakuraku received the award for her research into the representation of Wāhine Māori, English literature candidate Yuanyuan Liang for her research into trauma in Margaret Mahy’s young adult literature, and Criminology candidate Angus Lindsay for his research into digital capitalism and the far-right.

The PGSA Research Excellence Awards are presented to several research students for ‘research which displays academic rigour, excellence, originality, and/or creativity; demonstrates an impact within the scholarly or wider stakeholder communities; displays clarity of expression; and contributes to knowledge.’

The three awards represent a quarter of all the PGSA Excellence Awards given last year.

Maraea Rakuraku and the Manawahine test

Maraea Rakuraku of Tūhoe and Ngāti Kahungunu ki te Wairoa is conducting a doctorate with the International Institute of Modern Letters where she is investigating the portrayal of wāhine Māori onstage and onscreen, while writing two plays and a feature film. “I'd never heard of the award and decided to give it a go,” says Maraea, “primarily to assess how my work stands up amongst peers. It's affirming my work was recognised as being of an awardable quality”.

Using a selection of contemporary plays written by Māori and wāhine Māori appearing in film, Maraea identified character tropes. Comparing these tropes with wāhine Māori central to her life and her lived experience, she then wrote her film and two plays populated by wāhine Māori who disrupt, play to and then break, self and culturally imposed limitations.

An unexpected component of the process was creating a set of criteria, similar to the Blechdel, Riz Ahmed, and Ava Duvernay Tests that respectively assess the inclusion of women, Muslims, and people of colour on screen. The manawahine Test does the same for wāhine Māori. “I view it as my responsibility to disrupt and to create space and dialogue about what it is to be wāhine Māori in 21st Century Aotearoa while grounded within my Tūhoetanga,” she says.

Ken Duncum, Maraea’s supervisor from the International Institute of Modern Letters, is thrilled to see her research being recognised. “Maraea’s work on representations of wāhine Māori has already proved to be both cutting edge and crucial—both in the insights she has provided and the power of her theatre scripts that make up the creative side of her PhD thesis.”

Maraea’s research won one of two of the PGSA’s Māori Knowledge and Development Research Excellence Awards.

Yuanyuan Liang and Margaret Mahy’s young adult literature

Yuanyuan Liang is inspecting trauma in Margaret Mahy’s young adult novel characters. Her thesis explores the relationships between intergenerational trauma (passed down from one generation to the next), intersecting trauma (when multiple traumatised characters interact with one another), colonial trauma, and political trauma.

“I have always been curious about the universal conditions of life and I wanted to understand how trauma shatters and (re)shapes people,” says Yuanyuan.

“It is a significant contribution to the study of a major New Zealand writer,” says her supervisor Dr Geoff Miles.

“Her PhD success is all the more impressive because of the difficulties she overcome during her enrolment, when COVID-19 restrictions resulted in her being stranded in Beijing for more than a year with limited access to research material and supervision. The English Programme is proud of her success and delighted that it is being recognised with this award.”

Angus Lindsay and the rise of the far-right

Angus Lindsay’s doctorate in Criminology explores the rise of New Zealand’s far-right and their global connections, and digital capitalism and the growing economic, political, and cultural power of the ‘big-tech’ industry.

“Several faculty members in the School of Social and Cultural Studies reached out me to apply for the award and after initial hesitancy and a case of imposter syndrome, I finally applied,” explains Angus.

“Angus is a well-deserved winner for this award,” says his PhD supervisor Professor Elizabeth Stanley. “He has also been involved in wider research and publications and his enthusiastic contributions, at this point in his career, are especially impressive.”

It was while completing his Master’s research on incels and masculinity that Angus became interested in contemporary fascism and digital capitalism, which kickstarted his PhD research. “I began to think about how I could one day use my postgraduate research skills to help contribute to the cause of fighting the rise of contemporary fascism.”