Taking readers to the farms and factories, the marae and churches where
Māori lived, worked and raised their families, Te Hau Kāinga tells the
story of the profound transformation in Māori life during the Second World War.



While the Māori Battalion fought overseas, the Māori War Effort
Organisation and its tribal committees engaged Māori men and women throughout
Aotearoa in the home guard, the women’s auxiliary forces, and national
agricultural and industrial production. Māori mobilisation was an exercise of
rangatiratanga and it changed how Māori engaged with the state. And, as Māori
men and women took up new roles, the war was to become a watershed event for
Māori society that set the stage for post-war urbanisation.



From ammunition factories to kūmara fields, from Te Puea Hērangi to Te
Paipera Tapu, Te Hau Kāinga provides the first substantial account of
how hapori Māori were shaped by the wartime experience at home. It is a story
of sacrifice and remarkable resilience among whānau, hapū and iwi Māori.



Te Hau Kāinga is
published alongside its companion volume Raupanga: Ngā Pito Kōrero o te
Pakanga Tuarua nō te Hau Kāinga, edited by Angela Wanhalla and Lachy
Paterson. Raupanga features thirty-five succinct,
illustrated essays exploring the Māori home front, translated into te reo Māori
by Lachy Paterson.