'The language is the gateway to our culture': Hēmi Kelly on what Te Wiki o te Reo Māori means to him
by Waimirirangi Lee-reiri · RNZTe reo Māori advocate Hēmi Kelly did not always have his reo. It is something, like many Māori, that he had to work on.
"We had bits and pieces in the whare, but we didn't have a lot of reo. Mum definitely taught us a lot of tikanga."
Uri nō Ngāti Maniapoto and Ngāti Tahu-Ngāti Whaoa, Kelly's journey started during his high school years.
"That's when I got the option to learn te reo and then it just progressed from there.
"After high school I ended up doing a range of courses and then by that time, a whole group of my friends were also doing the same thing, or they were already fluent. So I was exposed to te reo in the flats I was living in."
Now a published author and te reo Māori kaiako, Kelly has a passion for the revitalisation of the Māori language.
"I believe the language is the gateway to our culture. And through the language, we have a deeper understanding of our tikanga, of our connections to each other, and of our connections to our lands."
For Te Wiki o te Reo Māori 2024, the TAHI podcast's Waimirirangi Lee-Reiri spoke with Hēmi Kelly about his haerenga and aspirations for the next 50 years of te reo in Aotearoa.
Kelly was a graduate of Te Panekiretanga o te Reo, the country's most exclusive and top Māori language academy.
The course was established by esteemed reo Māori Rangatira, Tā Pou Temara, Tā Tīmoti Kāretu, and the late Dr Te Wharehuia Milroy to improve the standard of reo Māori, with the hope that proficient speakers would take the language back to their marae.
Te Panekiretanga trained some of the nation's best Māori orators and broadcasters, including Paraone Gloyne, Rangi Mātāmua, and Stacey and Scotty Morrison, before closing in 2019.
Kelly was part of the eighth intake of Te Panekiretanga, which he said was a huge privilege.
"We would have wānanga throughout the year that would focus on developing our knowledge of te reo further to a standard of excellence and then developing also our knowledge of tikanga Māori, widening our knowledge of tikanga Māori, and really getting into it about, what is tapu? What is noa? What is mana? What are all of these things that we know and we understand but on a deeper level?
"We were very lucky, when I think back and still now, to be around Tīmoti. It was a privilege, because they grew up in a world that was very different to the world we know today. They grew up in the thick of te reo Māori, te mātotorutanga o te reo me ngā tikanga. And so they provided us an insight into that world."
Kelly said he learnt a lot through the course, but there was one thing that stuck with him.
"They really encouraged us to return home, back to our own people, to our marae, our hapū and our iwi. They taught us so many things, but that was the one thing that they pushed - was for us to return back to our own people.
"After 12 or 13 cohorts of Te Panekiretanga, seeing my friends, the graduates, now working throughout the country, within their iwi, and then passing on that knowledge to others, that's the legacy of Te Panekiretanga."
Te Wiki o te Reo Māori was a really busy time for Kelly, but he said it was also a celebration.
"I do liken it to a festival, or a party. Every year the party gets bigger and bigger and bigger, and you're seeing more and more people come to the party now to the point where it's like, if you're not coming to the party we're noticing."
It was an opportunity for everyone to get involved, he said.
"It isn't everyone's bread and butter. It isn't everyone's focus, day in, day out throughout the year. So for organisations who, [like] an architect's firm or something, it is their opportunity to really give it a go, and perhaps they'll be inspired and carry on throughout the rest of the year."
Next year will mark 50 years since the first Te Wiki o te Reo Māori. Kelly says he could not even comprehend what the next 50 years would bring.
"Look at what we have today in terms of technology, apps, podcasts, ebooks, all of this stuff that just didn't exist 50 years ago."
Kelly highlighted the need for technological advancements to support the language's future.
"With AI coming in now and ChatGPT, those sorts of technologies, our language does have to move into those spaces, and we're having those conversations now about how that happens in terms of, say, ChatGPT or (ChatGPT creator) OpenAI.
"We do need those developments for our language to have a place in the world that is the future and that is the world of our tamariki mokopuna, and their world is largely on devices and our language needs to be there."
A lot of Kelly's mahi focused on implementing te reo Māori in everyday situations. He has written two books to aid this - A Māori Phrase a Day and A Māori Word a Day - both practical guides to using more Māori.
"If we're going into a space that's not speaking te reo Māori, it can be a little bit daunting to go 'kia ora' even, and so we have to actively make this decision: 'I'm going to say kia ora when I go into the shop, until it becomes normal and maybe that person will respond back.'"
Kelly said learning te reo was vital for everyone to understand Aotearoa's history.
"For all of us who are learning te reo Māori, Māori and non-Māori, I believe that we have a deeper understanding of our connections to each other and to the places that we live."
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