Māori masculinity and mental health
Current research projects in Māori masculinity and mental health
Te Whare Kōrero o Te Ure Tārewa
For many Indigenous people, knowing a heritage language is attributed to healthier people. In Aotearoa for example, knowing te reo Māori gives people a positive identity which makes them less likely to exhibit anti-social behaviour and gives them better employment opportunities.
Informal conversations with language experts suggest something slightly different – that language excellence can correspond to ill-health. Language experts are routinely required to conduct burials, exhumations and other culturally specific activities which are both common and stress-inducing. So, language revival efforts might actually contribute to ill-health through the stress of carrying out such things. To add to this, Māori males generally experience higher rates of mental illness than others. To this end, Te Whare Kōrero o Te Ure Tārewa is a small scoping project that examines how high Māori language proficiency affects the wellbeing of Māori males. It seeks better health outcomes for those at this level of proficiency, and for those who aspire to be at that level of proficiency. A related project for our wāhine of language excellence is also to come.