On November 24th and 25th, members of CEVAW gathered beneath the watchful presence of  Taranaki Maunga for the Kaupapa Māori Research Methodologies Wānanga. Hosted by Dr  Acushla (Dee) Sciascia and the community of Kānihi-Māwhitiwhiti Pā, this two-day  gathering was more than a research workshop. It was an opportunity to learn about the  importance of relationships.

Over two days, we experienced wānanga, an Indigenous Māori space of learning, theory,  story, and ceremony that rejected the sterile neutrality of Western academia. It called  participants to consider how rangahau (research) itself is entangled in systems of power, how  universities continue to profit from Indigenous dispossession, and how decolonisation  demands more than good intentions. 

Organised by the Macquarie University node’s Research and Ethics Training Program and  facilitated by Māpuna Consultants in partnership with mana whenua, the wānanga brought  together CEVAW researchers for an immersive learning experience grounded in Māori  worldviews. Participants included: 

Macquarie Node: Distinguished Professor Bronwyn Carlson DD, CI; Dr Innez Haua, AI;  Tetei Bakic, PhD; Jo Kāmira, PhD; Scarlet Lumby, node admin; James Murphy-Haua, cadet;  and Aunty Dixie Link-Gordon. 

Monash Node: Professor Jacqui True, Director; Professor Kyllie Cripps, CI, Priya Dhanani,  PhD, Nadira Irdiana, PhD, Melkie Anton, PhD, Elisabeta Torava, PhD 

Griffith Node: Celeste Harris, PhD, Taravat Bamdad, PhD, Wilasinie Sopapol, PhD, Katy  Desmond, PhD 

ANU Node: Aryana Mohmood, PhD 

Curtin Node: Tobdent Tobdent, PhD, Dr Panos Sotirakopoulos, RF

Rather than rehearsing abstract discussions of “method,” the wānanga required participants to  walk, listen, and learn through the relational ethics of place. From the first moments of the  pōhiri, the formal welcome onto Kānihi Māwhitiwhiti Pā, it was clear that this gathering  would not follow academic conventions. Within the wharenui Te Torokiki o te Rua o te  Moko, carved by mastercarver Pahi O’Carroll, the ancestors Puawhato and Koro  (Grandfather) Taranaki were ever-present. Each carving, each story, each karakia was a  refusal of the colonial abstraction that has long severed research from relationship.

Katrina Taylor provided a moving presentation on grief and loss drawing on whakapapa as  methodology which traces the layers of perspectives, time and space of moving through the 

world with grief. She highlighted the ways that Indigenous knowing and being in the world  encompasses so much more that western objectivity and research offers, highlighting that  Indigenous research is not just an exercise in knowledge production but also healing and  transformation.

Dee, host and key facilitator, presented on Kaupapa Māori Research: From Taranaki  Perspectives. Her kōrero illuminated how Māori methodologies emerge from whenua and  whakapapa, not from imported frameworks. She reminded participants that kaupapa Māori is  not a set of techniques to be borrowed, but an ethical and political practice grounded in tino  rangatiratanga – Māori self-determination. It is an orientation toward justice, care, and  transformation.

For CEVAW, whose mission is to eliminate gendered violence, this message cut to the heart  of our collective challenge. Violence is not only interpersonal but structural. It is embedded  in systems of governance, law, and knowledge production that continue to marginalise  Indigenous peoples. To do research that seeks to end violence, we must first confront how  our institutions reproduce it. 

The first wānanga session traced the whakapapa of kaupapa Māori, exploring genealogies of  method and meaning carried through story, resistance, and practice. The second examined  frameworks for engagement with Māori communities, with a particular focus on the pōhiri  process as a model of ethical encounter. This exchange between Māori hosts and CEVAW  participants underscored that Indigenous methodologies are not “alternatives” to Western  systems. They are sovereign systems in their own right. 

That evening, following a shared hākari (feast) and a powerful kapa haka performance by kura kaupapa (Māori immersion Primary School), Te Tira Haka o Ngāruahine, participants  reflected on the day’s learning. Many spoke of the clarity that comes when research is  grounded in kinship and Country rather than metrics and funding cycles. The wānanga  reminded us that scholarship divorced from accountability to community is simply another  form of colonial appropriation. 

On the second day, participants travelled to Te Rere o Kāpuni for karakia and a hikoi up  Taranaki Maunga. Guided by haukāinga, the group learned about the recent settlement that  restored both the name and legal personhood of Taranaki Maunga, and the new arrangements  for its guardianship by local iwi. Standing before the mist-covered Maunga, Dee spoke of the  mountain not as landscape but as ancestor, living, sentient, and protective.

For many CEVAW participants, this was a transformative experience. To stand on the  Maunga was to feel, viscerally, that knowledge is relational, not extractive. It challenged us  to confront how research too often mirrors the colonial project, mapping, claiming,  categorising, and possessing. In Taranaki, the Maunga teaches another way – knowledge as  reciprocity, accountability, and collective care.

Tikanga, customary protocol, shaped every moment of the wānanga. As Dee explained,  tikanga is “the correct and respectful way of doing things according to Māori values and  worldviews,” yet it is not static. In Taranaki, tikanga bears the legacy of Te Whiti o  Rongomai, Tohu Kākahi, and Tītokowaru, leaders whose philosophies of peace and  resistance remain vital political teachings. Their influence infused the wānanga, reminding us  that decolonising research is inseparable from resisting state violence in all its forms.

The closing session at Pā was one of gratitude and resolve. Participants shared reflections on  what they would carry forward including deeper respect for Indigenous sovereignty, stronger  cross-community relationships, and a renewed determination to ensure CEVAW’s research  practices are led by Indigenous leadership and governance rather than institutional  convenience. 

For CEVAW, the lesson was unmistakable. Research that aims to eliminate violence must  first eliminate the colonial conditions that make violence possible. It must privilege  Indigenous leadership, protect cultural integrity, and centre relationships. To decolonise  research is not to integrate Indigenous perspectives into existing frameworks, it is to  transform those frameworks entirely. 

Dr Sciascia modelled what that transformation looks like, it is grounded in community, led by  Indigenous peoples, and accountable to the ancestors whose presence guides every word and  action. As CEVAW members departed the Pā, Taranaki Maunga stood silent but sovereign. A reminder that knowledge, like land, is not owned but shared; not extracted but lived.