Talk:Waka (canoe)

Pronunciation
I have added the IPA pronunciation of waka in Māori. Yes, it does rhyme with the NZ English pron. of 'rocker'. No, it does not rhyme with 'parker'. No, it is not pronounced wah-kah. The pronunciation in NZ English is very similar to the correct Māori pronunciation, except that the English pronunciation ends with a schwa instead of -a. Kahuroa 19:40, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
 * The correct pronunciation is Faka, Since maori are obsessed with putting h after all w's and pronuncing it 'f'.210.185.4.193 (talk) 03:24, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
 * No, they also have plain w. kwami (talk) 04:39, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, it's a plain 'w'. And there is an allophonic pronunciation of 'a' between 'w' and 'k' as 'o' as in rock. As I said above. Kahuroa (talk) 06:20, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Waka ama
Talk: Waka Ama The idea that waka ama was practiced in ancient times by Maori is patently false history mongering and I would request that such inferences be deleted. It debases Maori history with falsehoods that can do no good from the perspective of cultural integrity no matter how wishful such correspondents may be. Ofcourse some verifiable literature may still surface in the future - 'never say never' - however I suggest all sources need to be thorougly vetted and their authors also questioned before 'publishing'. Also the word 'ama' does not exist as a singular word in any Maori dictionary.(ssossoss) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ssossoss (talk • contribs) 01:23, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I have no particular knowledge of this subject. I have been modifying some of your edits to try to keep the article from becoming too polemical. Thank you for the references you have provided.


 * I am still concerned by the sentence beginning "A handful of kiwi business entrepreneurs..." which I tagged with [neutrality disputed]. You have provided a source which supports the previous sentence; ie that the sport of waka ama racing was introduced into NZ in the 1990s. It doesn't support the language such as "hoodwinking" you have used. You have not shown that there is deliberate deception. Please reword that sentence in a more neutral fashion, or remove it.- gadfium 01:47, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Just added a second source, dating to Cook's voyages in the 1700s, for Māori outrigger canoes. And just for the record, it's also not true as stated above that "the word 'ama' does not exist as a singular word in any Maori dictionary." Williams dictionary (7th ed), for instance has this entry on page 8: ::Ama (i) n, 1. Outrigger on the windward side of a canoe. Hei roto koe, hei te ama o to taua waka. (N. 20). And this is from the Ngata online dictionary: Amatiatia: Ko ētahi o nga waka o mua i kitea e te Pākehā, he amatiatia. Outrigger canoe: Some of the early canoes seen by Pakeha were outriggers. That was found by doing a Maori to English search for amatiatia. Kahuroa (talk) 06:40, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

I have some knowledge of this subject, having researched the early modes of Maori transport. I assure you there were no outrigger water sports as such but there were waka hoehoe and similar single hulled canoe. For transport of goods to market double hulled canoes were put together, but these could be quickly converted into single hulled canoes for the rivers. Ancient Maori did have waka which were basically 2 canoe hulls strapped together, such as the ones which greeted Tasman in Golden Bay, 1642. Any referece to 'ama' would have been done by Cook and other explorers who had first visited the mid-Pacific and would have seen true waka ama craft and perhaps used the 'waka ama' term incorrectly to describe the Maori craft. They were not 'waka ama'. It is correct that those craft were first introduced into NZ in the early 1980s and for verification ask Parekura Horomia who I interviewed - he was one of the first people to crew the boats on the East Coast. I would not recognise the terms with ama in dictionaries, a poor source, as they are not specific with the origins, so one shouldnt assume they are referring to ancient Maori craft. I am amazed that the Ngata Dictionary has an entry with waka ama all of a sudden (?) and would question who is behind that entry. It seems to be a case of manufacturing a source (if you can call that entry one)to backup a false premis. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.124.103.234 (talk) 04:28, 3 May 2011 (UTC)
 * My superpowers don't extend to inserting information into online dictionaries - I don't have a printed version of Ngata handy, but I am sure it contains the reference mentioned above, and it way predates Wikipedia, so no one is manufacturing sources here. And Cook and the early explorers can hardly have influenced Wiremu Maihi Te Rangikaheke when he included the word ama in his story of Maui which he wrote for Governor Grey in the 1840s. If 'kuru' - the word for the breadfruit tree found only in the tropics - survived into 19th century Te Arawa chants it shouldn't surprise us that in the 18th century - just a few hundred years after Maori arrived here - technologies like waka ama were still just clinging on and were lost along with a whole heap of stuff as the culture adapted to the influx of Europeans. BTW the Williams usually gives its sources Kahuroa (talk) 23:40, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Again I can only reiterate what is known. Early explorers may have mistaken the Maori waka for those from the Mid-Pacific. There are no records of 'waka ama' in any text, or in any reliable whakapapa published. Peter Buck, Apirana Ngata ...the list goes on do not record or refer to waka ama. It is a fanciful notion to suggest they were used in early NZ. After the 1950s mention did creep into the general vocabulary, and there are smudged lines between what is Maori and what is of Pasifika origin. It would be more correct to say that Maori ancestors in the mid-Pacific used the craft in lagoon settings, and that there was a 700yr gap until Maori today have taken it up again, a bit of an intermission. As passionate as you may be on this subject please remember all of Cooks diary entries were rewrites from people in England. But good luck in the ongoing promotion of a mid-Pacific sport, it does not need a fabricated Maori history to serve as a means for enthusing Maori to get out for a bit of exercise, as it has been layered with tikanga Maori and is a fun activity. everyone likes a bit of a paddle and if waka ama was not recently introduced to our shoress as a sport then dragon boating would have filled that niche. The old time Maori did race waka taua, now that would be worth backing as of indigenous origin - I ask that you please do not degrade our waka histories with your fabrications. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.124.103.234 (talk) 22:04, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Just to clarify, my edits are about the canoe as a physical object as reported in the earliest sources - and I'm not at all interested in promoting the sport. Nor have I ever claimed to have seenany reference to it as a sport, rather than as a type of canoe, in early sources. I have provided verifiable sources; I have never tried to "degrade our waka histories" at all. I dispute your claim that there are no records of waka ama in any text, the fact is there are such references, and the survival of ama and the related terms like kiato into the Māori language as recorded by early sources is also beyond dispute. Kahuroa (talk) 10:14, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Museum displays as sources
I've just taken out two references to "Museum displays" apparently intended as sources. They don't qualify as reliable sources because they are not "published" and hence not verifiable. They can change at any time and are open to individual interpretation. If the museums concerned, or someone else, had published an account in a verifiable source about the displays etc, that would be different, but personal observation constitutes original research IMHO. Kahuroa (talk) 20:57, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Anyone can read a book ,anyone can visit a museum.A book is an interpretation, a museum display is the real McCoy.From memory the Waka tiwai has been on display somewhere in TA since it was fished out of the lake many years ago.It is a taonga that is not going to be sold!The entry above represents very strange and limited thinking in terms of what is verifiable! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.153.158.149 (talk) 08:50, 17 December 2010 (UTC)
 * That's the way it works around here. Published verifiable sources are required.  Kahuroa (talk) 09:52, 17 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Then its about time some clear thinking individual challeged that-it is clearly a nonsense rule in the 21st century!  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.153.158.149 (talk) 04:59, 21 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Feel free to discuss your proposed changes at Wikipedia talk:Verifiability. Kahuroa (talk) 06:33, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress
There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Waka which relates to this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 02:46, 15 February 2013 (UTC)

Waka ama archaeological evidence
Just added a reference to archaeological finds of Maori waka aka outrigger floats. This disproves the assertions above that early European explorers mistook double canoes for outrigger canoes and adds to the linguistic and observational evidence that Maori did indeed use proper outrigger canoes. Piwaiwaka (talk) 11:08, 26 July 2014 (UTC)

Importance of E Pacific culture to Maori
It is well established the Maori originally came from the East pacific about 1280. Recently there have been some finds that narrow down the location. The evidence -a shell chisel ,pearl lure, burial traditions, linguistics and DNA points to the Society Island. Old Maori traditions often mention Raiatea or nearby Huahine island as the origin. Science is coming closer to supporting these origins. James Cook mentioned that these islands had a tradition of mid sized voyaging canoes -which he saw on shore at Raiatea. He mentions that the islanders took voyages of up to 30 days on these vessels-far more than was needed for local travel where many islands could be reached in 1-2 days. Recently a 600 year old waka was found in NW Nelson that has decoration and construction detail that are very "un Maori".The timber however is Matai from New Zealand .The caulking in the waka is dated to about 1400. Matai is a hard durable wood that could last 30 years without difficulty possibly taking the waka back to 1350ish.The turtle design is not one ever seen before on a waka. It is a common pacific motif but turtles are found in NZ waters. The construction details suggest the stern section of a catamaran roughly 50feet long. Claudia — Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.62.226.243 (talk) 09:17, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

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This is not Wakanui!
There is a redirection for the word 'wakanui' to this page. Wakanui is not mentioned on this page. There is a Aotearoa/New Zealand electorate called Wakanui, a wiki page about this, and 2 wiki pages about elections held in the electorate. Given that this page does not mention Wakanui, that people searching for Wakanui may want to read something about the actual thing called wakanui, can somebody with more expertise than me remove the redirection please. Brunswicknic (talk) 09:05, 25 March 2020 (UTC)