Ko Aotearoa Tatou/We Are New Zealand

An Anthology

Paula Morris, James Norcliffe, Michelle Elvy

• Publisher: Otago University Press
• Year: 2022
• eBook ISBN: 9781990048296
• Edition: 0
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Art General
• Index: Literature

In the aftermath of the Christchurch terrorist attacks of 15 March 2019, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern declared: 'We are all New Zealanders.' These words resonated, an instant meme that asserted our national diversity and inclusiveness and, at the same time, issued a rebuke to hatred and divisiveness. Ko Aotearoa Tatou | We Are New Zealand is bursting with new works of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and visual art created in response to the editors' questions: What is New Zealand now, in all its rich variety and contradiction, darkness and light? Who are New Zealanders? The works flowed in from well-known names and new voices, from writers and artists from Kerikeri to Bluff. Some are teenagers still at school; some are in their eighties. Maori, Pakeha, Pasifika, Asian, new migrants, young voices, queer writers, social warriors...Aotearoa's many faces are represented in this unique and important compendium. In a society where the arts, especially marginalised arts, are under threat, this anthology shows that creative work can explore, document, interrogate, re-imagine—and celebrate—who we are as citizens of this diverse country, in a diverse world.

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Dedication Page
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Introduction
• Massacre poetry
• Gardenia nonfiction
• New Zealand Gothic fiction
• To write poetry
• Welcome to the family fiction Melanie Kwang
• Silence, Part 2 poetry
• On love nonfiction
• What happened, Mike? nonfiction
• No one likes to hear it poetry
• Isobar Precinct: Symonds Street Cemetery fiction
• Go back to the pā/Hoki ki tou maunga poetry
• Skimming stones with God nonfiction
• Language poetry
• I, the ghost nonfiction
• Mr Zhou’s kitchen poetry
• Fatayer fiction
• Offering poetry
• Hyphenated identity nonfiction
• I’m Mama Aiwa poetry
• Via Kadhumba poetry
• The fastest girl in the world nonfiction
• Childhood by definition poetry
• Fill-in family pop quiz poetry
• Stones and vein fiction
• When they ask you where you are really from poetry
• Duckie fiction
• How about being a woman? poetry
• Tūpuna wahine poetry
• The packers nonfiction
• My own special sun poetry
• Reflection of a forked tongue poetry
• Breaking up with Captain Cook on our 250th anniversary poetry
• How to be a good native poetry
• Nevis poetry
• Whananaki. One dairy and a fish- and-chip shop for the entire population nonfiction
• Neil Avenue. A path runs around the outside of the park nonfiction
• My street is narrow and quiet nonfiction
• The lampposts that line our street compete with the pōhutukawa tree to see who is tallest nonfiction
• Whenever I see my gran she’s either cleaning or cooking nonfiction
• Treading water fiction
• Are we there yet? poetry
• Call of the void fiction
• We lost our medicine mama poetry
• Goods poetry
• Rapurapu/Searching fiction
• Love letters from Glen Innes poetry
• Just another New Zealand bloke? nonfiction
• Freestyle fiction
• The first day of my divorce / 离婚第一天 poetry
• Multiculturalism in the making: One man’s life in Aotearoa New Zealand nonfiction
• Seven old bastards of Auckland poetry
• I am not New Zealand poetry
• A is for Arabs poetry
• Passages, shadows, braids poetry
• Huozhuzi poetry
• You need to speak good English fiction
• List poetry
• MAK nonfiction
• One world sleeps in an apple poetry
• The stories we tell ourselves nonfiction
• Laundromat poetry
• Earth poetry
• Afterword: So let poetry
• Notes on contributors
• Acknowledgements