FormalPara Key Points

  • The Te Mauri program supports Māori families living with cancer based upon Māori principles, including making, seeing, and bringing to life meaningful images.

  • The tohu (symbol) of Te Mauri is an example of deep engagement with an image as a component in developing and maintaining a Māori approach to living with cancer.

  • Used as a symbol on all promotional material and resources, the tohu is a daily reminder, or iteration, of the values of Te Mauri.

Te Mauri is an Indigenous support program for Māori living with cancer that has become key to creating positive change and better health outcomes in Aotearoa New Zealand. This case study presents some of the theoretical, philosophical, and spiritual underpinnings within the Te Mauri framework and in the initial design of the tohu (symbol). The tohu is an example of how a Māori approach to living with cancer may represent a different paradigm for ensuring Māori wellbeing. The healing involved in this deeper understanding of whanau (family), based on social justice work, reveals priorities and measures likely to align with other Indigenous, poor, and people-of-color communities internationally.

Te Mauri seeks to address the critical gaps in cancer care for Māori in Aotearoa New Zealand. At every stage of an individual’s process with cancer, the attention, diagnoses, and treatment that Māori receive are mediated by their status as tangata whenua (people of the land), including in the ways that ethnicity intersects with gender, sexuality, levels of disability, geographical location, class status, and spirituality.

Te Mauri is offered by three Indigenous health providers in the greater Wellington area. In 2017, the Mana Wāhine collective identified three Māori health providers (MHPs) with expertise in kaupapa Māori (knowledge) and working with cancer patients. The three MHPs are Whaiora, a Masterton-based service established in 2000 that provides comprehensive health and social services within the Wairarapa catchment area; Hora Te Pai Health Services (Hora Te Pai), established in 1990 in Paraparaumu on the Kapiti Coast north of Wellington; and Kōkiri Marae Health and Social Services (Kōkiri), a service based in Seaview, Wellington, with over 30 years’ experience as an urban marae-based education, health, and social service provider, committed to the holistic wellbeing of whanau (families), hapū (subtribes), and iwi (tribes).

Our communities said they wanted a “by Māori for Māori” kaupapa (program) that spoke of traditional values and belief systems and of knowledge handed down to us by our ancestors. Based on this goal, mātauranga Māori (knowledge) concepts were chosen to guide the Te Mauri framework. These choices also reveal how European-centered structures and health systems typically fail and further damage Māori communities.

The Te Mauri Framework

The Te Mauri framework is epitomized by the image created during the kaupapa (program) development. The image represents the overlaps between the three different sites; it simultaneously demonstrates the collaborative nature of this work while retaining the local strengths of each site. It also is an invitation to Māori whānau being affected by cancer to remember a way of moving through periods of taimaha/taumaha (difficult times) using Māori concepts to sustain our mauri (flourishing).

A Māori worldview is deeply embedded in the way Te Mauri is structured—with, for example, biweekly meetings, transportation to and from the meetings, the use of a marae (traditional communal space), karakia (invocations), the singing of waiata (songs), speaking circles that involve passing a meaningful object, the inclusion of elders and youth, a welcome to family members, the provision of nourishing homemade food, the sharing of Tribal and genealogical affiliations, and visits from community speakers from hospice, cancer hospitals, and traditional wellbeing practitioners. The program seeks to whakamana te whakapapa (strengthen ancestral connections) of each person and whānau participating.

Fundamental to the Te Mauri service is the belief that living with cancer is a wairua (spiritual) journey. The program creates a space for healing to occur, it provides a connection and relationship to the Atua (Divine); it moves beyond providing information and scheduling support to creating an opportunity to assist whānau to prepare for Mātangireia (a secular heaven). We take the position that a transformation from Te Pō i te Ao (the darkness into the light) is necessary to achieve mauri ora (wellbeing) for the whānau navigating the treatment of cancer. The intent is to aki aki te ti o te tangata (nurture the ineffable light of a person).

Early in the development of Te Mauri, artist John Kingi (coauthor JK) theorized a tohu that represented a Māori epistemology, or a way of thinking, for those affected by a cancer diagnosis:

The name of the rōpū (group) “Te Mauri” is interesting in itself. All things created have a mauri (flourishing), from animals to trees, people, stones, and dirt. It takes all forms and is present in both living and inanimate objects. Therefore it is continuous and a part of the unbroken cycle of existence. We exist, we pass away, we continue to exist on another plane. We are connected via this whākaaro (understanding) to the world around us.

John explained the origins of the tohu as follows:

The overall design is a representation of the journey each person must take in the physical world and in the spiritual world. Time does not dictate the life and death of an individual, it is immaterial. What matters, and is reflected in the many histories, whakatauki (sayings) and waiata (songs) of our people is the importance of striving to achieve excellence in life.

Contemporary in its design, the Te Mauri tohu references aspects of different types of Māori design using traditional symbols to convey messages and meaning and an exhortation to attain knowledge (through the step-like design in the lower half of the two sides). The sacred teachings of aligning with the flow of the essence or mauri of spirituality are held within the image (Fig. 31.1).

Fig. 31.1
The TE MAURI cancer support symbol with Maori design elements. The symbol presents 2 vertically oriented panels connected at the center by an ovoid shape. The upper part is pointed while the lower part presents a step like design.

The Te Mauri tohu created by John Kingi

Full size image

Components of the Te Mauri Tohu

The tohu includes a number of components that communicate its message:

  • Waka (canoe): the overall design is in the shape of the hiwi (hull) of a waka. Imagine looking up at the underside of a waka while it glides through the water: this is a significant symbol for Māori. The waka is used to move people in this world and to send—both literally and figuratively—people into the spirit world.

  • Poutama (pattern) and kaitiaki (guardian figures): the lower half of the design, the poutama, is a step-like pattern that represents the “journey of life” and lifelong learning. The design represents the possibility from which we value each day we have been given, to live it with the grace inherent in each of us.

  • The two kaitiaki at the top of the tohu are wheku (carved depictions of a human face with slanting eyes). At each side at the top of the tohu, these figures represent Māreikura (an order of female supernatural beings) and Whatukura (an order of male supernatural beings). They are the guardians of the uppermost heavens and a gateway to the most sacred and sought-after knowledge. John Kingi commented: “I have used these elements here to symbolize the importance of valuing each day we have, and striving to achieve our greatest potential in our time.”

  • Ngā Tae (the colors): the blue represents the color of mauri (life force); the red represents toto (blood), whakapapa (genealogy), and rangatiratanga (sovereignty); and the white represents dreaming as part of the eternal slumber.

  • Ira Atua (supernatural life): the space between the two kaitiaki represents the next stage in our journey and an eternity of, among other things, a dream time. It is the threshold that separates the spirit world and the world of light.

  • The kākano (circle or seed) suspended in between the two sides symbolizes the unbroken continuous line between both worlds. John Kingi commented:

Once we cross this threshold, we are reconnected with Ngā Atua (the Gods) who are the source of all creation. The only way to access this realm is for each of us to take “the eternal sleep” and when we sleep we also DREAM. Therefore we must lose our physical essence to be able to experience not only the eternal slumber, but also an eternity of “DREAM TIME” among other things.

Conclusion

The tohu captures one aspect of the multifaceted Te Mauri approach. It is part of a dynamic framework that is deeply embedded within a broader program that supports Māori individuals and whānau who are on a cancer journey. We draw upon traditional principles to understand the stages that may be involved in living with cancer. The process for Te Mauri members is less about the demands of a struggling medical administration; instead, we focus more on the inherent divinity in each individual, supporting their movement through challenges in living with cancer with dignity, integrity, and sovereignty. The tohu designed for Te Mauri is a visual and epistemological icon that demonstrates an Indigenous paradigm for healing in a way that exceeds the goals of inadequate health administration and focuses instead on the flourishing of Māori who are living with cancer.