Decolonizing the dictionary: a preliminary investigation into country names in Maori

By November 17, 2016,
Page 859-866
Author Philip W. Matthews
Title Decolonizing the dictionary: a preliminary investigation into country names in Maori
Abstract Three questions are asked. (1) To what extent have Maori names for countries been influenced by British colonization and the assimilationist policies (including the focus on learning and using English rather than Maori) of the colonialists, settlers and their descendants in Aotearoa/New Zealand? It is shown that almost all the names are transliterations of the English names for the countries. (2) To what extent can Mäori names for countries be decolonized? It is shown that three approaches to reforming the names can lead successfully to this end. (3) What role could the first Mäori monolingual dictionary, now being prepared, play in dealing with any change from the colonized names to decolonized names? Three alternatives are put forward and it is suggested that, making the decolonized name the main entry and cross referencing the colonized names to the main entry, could lead to decolonized names gradually becoming those most used.
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BibTex 
@InProceedings{ELX04-093,
	   author = {Philip W. Matthews},
	   title = {Decolonizing the dictionary: a preliminary investigation into country names in Maori },
	   pages = {859-866},
	   booktitle = {Proceedings of the 11th EURALEX International Congress},
	   year = {2004},
	   month = {july},
	   date = {6-10},
	   address = {Lorient, France},
	   editor = {Geoffrey Williams and Sandra Vessier},
	   publisher = {Université de Bretagne-Sud, Faculté des lettres et des sciences humaines},
	   isbn = {29-52245-70-3},
	}
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