Fresh off another Ockhams nomination, here’s one of New Zealand’s foremost historians on the realities of research – and the end of a golden era at our national archive. It felt like I had finally reached the inner sanctum of New Zealand historians. In January 1993 I arrived in Wellington on a three-month contract researching … Read more
Summer reissue: The standoff at Ihumātao has deep roots in the legacy of colonialism and land confiscation. Historian Vincent O’Malley writes about how it was taken by the Crown, and why that matters today. First published 27 July, 2019. The New Zealand Wars may have ended nearly 150 years ago. But their consequences continue to … Read more
The current standoff at Ihumātao has deep roots in the legacy of colonialism and land confiscation. Historian Vincent O’Malley writes about how it was taken by the Crown, and why that matters today. The New Zealand Wars may have ended nearly 150 years ago. But their consequences continue to be felt today. Nowhere is that … Read more
Right about now, Vincent O’Malley is delivering a mighty Michael King Memorial Lecture at the Auckland Writers Festival. In this startling extract from his new book, The New Zealand Wars Ngā Pakanga o Aotearoa, O’Malley explains how the decimation of Māori in Tūranga (Gisborne) “completely eclipsed” the country’s losses in Gallipoli. Actual fighting may have … Read more
All week this week we feature tangata whenua writings to mark Waitangi Day. Today: Vincent O’Malley reviews a new history of the battle of Gate Pā. Head up Cameron Road, one of Tauranga’s main arterial routes, a few kilometres out of the city centre and you drive over one of New Zealand’s most important historical sites. … Read more
Historian Vincent O’Malley conducted his own survey over the weekend on what people did and didn’t learn about New Zealand history at school. The results, no matter how unscientific, still paint a clear picture. By now many people know something of the story of the small-town petition from which big things grew. In December 2015 … Read more
The Stories of Ruapekapeka is a special online project by RNZ and Mihingarangi Forbes about Northland’s most infamous armed conflict. Historian Vincent O’Malley writes about the importance of acknowledging the darker episodes of New Zealand’s past. The battle of Ruapekapeka, fought in January 1846, was the final engagement in the war that Britain lost, as James … Read more
In The Great War for New Zealand, historian Vincent O’Malley tells the story of the Waikato War of the 1860s – how it set back Māori-Pākehā relations by generations and changed the course of New Zealand history for good. Here, in an original essay for The Spinoff, he explains how the war helped create modern … Read more