Time to reassess historic figures
As the Black Lives Matter movement sweeps around the world, the momentum for change has found different forms of expression. Grief and anger at George Floyd’s death is moving from mass protests to find a channel for reforms that will make a difference.
One of the most immediate expressions is a renewed focus on statues, names and symbols that commemorate those associated with slavery or racist exploitation.
In Bristol, protesters took issues into their own hands, pulling down a statue of slave trader Edward Colston and rolling it into the harbour. Others in the firing line from campaigners are colonialist Cecil Rhodes, and explorer
James Cook, whose 18th-century voyages shaped the path to colonisation of New Zealand.
In the wake of the worldwide protests, there are now calls from the Ma¯ori Party for a commission of inquiry to identify and potentially remove racist memorials here.
There will undoubtedly be problems with this. History is not a static or indisputable narrative. It can be viewed through many different lenses, each colouring that narrative through the viewer’s own education, experience and opinions.
Cook, for example, has an increasingly complex legacy. Generations of New Zealanders were given a largely sanitised, white-skewed version of our history at school. Cook was painted in a lead role as a heroic discoverer and paragon of virtue, with little or no attention to his faults or the deaths and abuse of Ma¯ori at his crew’s hands.
To others he is awhite supremacist and colonialist murderer.
The truth lies in the middle of these caricatures, and it’s been progressively revealed through the efforts of historians such as Dame Anne Salmond. ‘‘It is irresponsible to twist the past to whip up hatred and anger – in either direction,’’ she wrote of the extreme views on Cook.
It’s in this educational space that real progress could be made. While the impulse in Bristol to take direct action is understandable, the way forward in New Zealand seems better suited to a series of community conversations about the history of monuments and names and whether they are still appropriate.
This process is already under way informally. The owners of the Bully Hayes restaurant in Akaroa have agreed to change its name after an academic questioned its use of the name of a notorious Pacific slave trader.
A Gisborne partnership between iwi, local and central government last year points another way forward. After long consultation, a statue of Cook was replaced on a historic hilltop site by a large tukutuku sculpture and stories giving amore balanced historical account.
Other conversations would be more uncomfortable and polarising. The Marlborough town of Picton is named after Sir Thomas Picton, a military hero but also a slave trader. Awelsh council leader is supporting the removal of his statue in Cardiff, but any push to change the name of the New Zealand town is sure to provoke plenty of debate.
On the horizon, the Government’s requirement for New Zealand history – including the arrival of Ma¯ori, colonisation, and land wars – to be taught in all schools from 2022 should equip younger generations with better tools to shape their own views. Race relations will benefit from that and from a continued willingness to learn from our past, warts and all.
History can be viewed through many different lenses, each colouring that narrative ...