Matariki: An Invitation to Return

EDITORIAL | ISSUE SEVEN | MATARIKI

Written by Tashi Donnelly (she/her) | @tashi_rd | Editor

Nau mai, haere mai ki Debate.

Appearing in the early morning skies of midwinter, Matariki has long served as a time for remembrance, celebration, and reflection. It is an opportunity to honour those who have passed, give thanks for the present, and look ahead to the future. The cluster itself, part of the Taurus constellation, consists of nine stars: Tipuānuku, Tipuārangi, Waitī, Waitā, Waipunarangi, Ururangi, Hiwa-i-te-Rangi, and Matariki. But its significance extends far beyond astronomy.

As Matariki becomes an increasingly familiar part of public life in Aotearoa, it offers all of us an opportunity to engage more deeply with the histories, traditions, and knowledge that have shaped this place we call home. Like many Pākehā in Aotearoa, I have felt disconnected from te ao Māori for most of my life. It felt unfamiliar to me, but unfamiliarity is not the same thing as exclusion. At a certain age, and after a fair amount of studying New Zealand history, I found only myself to blame for this feeling. Like any language, history, or body of knowledge, connection grows through participation. As Elizabeth Bennet put it, ‘I do not play this instrument so well as I should wish to, but I have always supposed that to be my own fault because I would not take the trouble of practising.’ Matariki offers an invitation to do exactly that: to learn, to reflect, and to deepen our relationship with the stories and traditions that shape Aotearoa.

In these pages, you will find a small but significant ode to Matariki. In For Everyone. On Whose Terms?, Jamal asks what it actually means to frame Matariki under the language of “Herenga Waka – For Everyone” in a political climate where recognition and resistance sit uneasily beside one another, and where inclusion is never neutral. Piremina Ngapera’s Whetū Do Not Arrive, They Return turns instead to mātauranga Māori itself, reminding us that Matariki is not an introduction to time but a different way of understanding it entirely: cyclical, relational, and rooted in whakapapa between whetū, whenua, and people. Ronik Shah’s Matariki rāua ko Puanga traces a personal journey of learning and return, showing how revitalisation can be felt through language, education, and shared practice, and how Matariki continues to grow meaningfully within both community and public life. Koromiko Jacob-Williams’ Kohinga brings this into an urban, embodied space, where Matariki is carried through city nights, memory, movement, and whakapapa held in motion, an affirmation that even in environments of disconnection, the whetū remain a point of return and recognition. Together, these pieces do not settle Matariki into a single definition, but instead hold it open as a site of tension, continuity, and care: something remembered, contested, celebrated, and lived all at once.

I’m excited to celebrate Matariki and for the mātauranga I will gain, little by little, each passing year. The contributors of this issue are far better qualified than I to write about Matariki, and I would like to thank them all for their mahi. I would also like to thank Skye Lunson-Storey, our Te Ao Māori editor, who has curated most of this issue’s content. The care, intentionality, and abundant creativity they bring to their work inspire me every day.