Cultures of Imperial Power Class Receives Maori Guest Lecturer From New Zealand

14/02/2007

On February 5, Professor Alessio's history class and a few guests listened to Dr. Khyla Russell of Kai Tahu and Otago Polytechnic explain what it meant for her people and other indigenous groups in New Zealand to go through colonization and how that has affected them to this day. As an expert in this field and obviously well tied to her people through national pride and traditions such as the Ta Moko body art that she displayed with distinction, it would be hard to find someone more qualified to talk about this.

Her history was informative and interesting. To deal with such a trying subject as imperial rule and exploitation is no easy task, but she threw in jokes and gave the class a good laugh by making Professor Alessio attempt to spell all of the Maori words (which he did admirably). With anecdotes about controversies over "proper terms" and the discrepancies in dating major events, the audience was given an excellent idea about what life was like there and how the society and peoples changed.

Everyone in the class would like to give thanks again to Dr. Russell for her talk and hope that she may come back in future years to do something similar again.

Richmond News Provided by:
Whit Carter & Alex Gorton

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