The new book Secret History: State Surveillance in New Zealand, 1900-1956 by Richard S Hill and Steven Loveridge (Auckland University Press, 2023) opens up the ‘secret world’ of security intelligence during a period in which counter-espionage a

Prison Labour and the Making of New Zealand’: Jared Davidson

Oct 27th, 2023 43m 49s

Forced labour haunts the streets we walk today and the spaces we take for granted. From 1814 onwards, the unfree work of prisoners was used to forge roads, ports, buildings, harbour defences and other public works across New Zealand and its Pac

Adoption: From severance and secrecy to connection and openness

Sep 20th, 2023 1h 27m

In this month's Public History Talk, the authors of two recently published books discussed the profound impact of closed stranger adoption in New Zealand and the drive for change. Closed stranger adoption under the 1955 Adoption Act, still in f

Downfall: The destruction of Charles Mackay

Sep 7th, 2023 59m 17s

Paul Diamond's book, Downfall: The destruction of Charles Mackay, examines the startling ‘Whanganui Affair’ of 1920, when the mayor Charles Mackay, shot a young gay man, D'Arcy Cresswell. The affair and subsequent events reveal the perilous exi

Te Motunui Epa – making history from the underground

Aug 17th, 2023 1h 7m

For more than 150 years, five carved panels that once formed the back wall of a pātaka, slept in a small swamp just north of Waitara. The carvings, which uri of Taranaki now call the Motunui Epa, emerged from their long sleep in 1971 setting of

‘An overview of New Zealand’s radical right tradition’: Matthew Cunningham

Jul 28th, 2023 42m 57s

In seeking to understand the terrorist attacks of March 2019, several commentators observed the similarities with the murder of an elderly Chinese man named Joe Kum Yung by Lionel Terry in 1905. It is tempting to draw a direct causal line betwe

Archives in Place: Deep Histories in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland

Jul 7th, 2023 41m 12s

In this podcast, Dr Lucy Mackintosh discusses aspects of her recently published book, Shifting Grounds: Deep Histories of Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland (Bridget Williams Books, 2021), which explores the layered histories embedded in three landscapes

Katherine Mansfield’s Europe: Station to Station: Redmer Yska and Cherie Jacobson in conversation

Jun 27th, 2023 54m 50s

Katherine Mansfield was a New Zealand author of international renown. Her short stories and poetry have been translated into more than 25 languages and her work continues to have an impact one hundred years after her death in France in 1923. M

Musicians, Myths and Manifestos

Jun 21st, 2023 43m 26s

What can popular music tell us about a country and its culture?As the 2023 Lilburn Research Fellow, Nick Bollinger is looking at ways in which pop music in Aotearoa New Zealand has reflected, contradicted, and contributed to our national stori

Solidarity and the Right to Strike

Jun 14th, 2023 48m 2s

Cybèle Locke’s recently published biography of Bill Andersen, Comrade, examines labour activism, communism and social change, from the 1930s until the turn of the twenty-first century. This talk offers possibilities for how Bill Andersen’s Comm

Making Space: A history of New Zealand women in architecture

Dec 14th, 2022 44m 44s

Brilliant, hardworking and creative, women architects have made many significant contributions to the built environment, creativity and community of Aotearoa New Zealand. A ground-breaking new book, Making Space, tells the story of women making

New Zealand’s Foreign Service: A History

Dec 1st, 2022 1h 13m

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFAT) is a remarkable organisation that has represented New Zealand for more than 75 years.A new book, New Zealand’s Foreign Service: A History examines how MFAT (and its predecessors) responded to ever-evolvi

A Biography of Lake Tūtira

Oct 26th, 2022 46m 3s

This talk sketches Lake Tūtira’s history from formation to today. Historian Jonathan West will follow in the traces of Herbert Guthrie Smith, whose obsessive records of the changes witnessed while farming by the lake made him the founder of env

Women Will Rise! Recalling the Working Women’s Charter

Oct 12th, 2022 49m 39s

It's over 40 years since the Working Women's Charter was adopted as policy by the New Zealand Federation of Labour. The 16-clause Charter demanded rights for women in all aspects of life and work, including equal pay; ending discrimination; edu

Mahuru Māori: Māni Dunlop and Jamie Tahana

Sep 22nd, 2022 56m 4s

Māni Dunlop (Ngāpuhi) and Jamie Tahana (Ngāti Pikiao, Ngāti Makino, Te Arawa) are journalists and national broadcasters who actively champion te reo Māori me nga tikanga Māori through their work.Māni was the first Māori journalist at RNZ to h

Shifting perspectives about colonial conflict: The Wairau Affray and the Battle of Boulcott’s Farm

Aug 1st, 2022 49m 44s

Liana MacDonald (Ngāti Kuia, Rangitāne o Wairau, Ngāti Koata) is a lecturer in the Faculty of Education, Victoria University of Wellington. She is interested in how racism, whiteness, and settler colonialism manifest in national institutions.

With the Boys Overseas: radio listening during World War II and New Zealand’s first broadcast war correspondents

Aug 1st, 2022 51m 32s

In the 1940s radio played a central role in the life of the New Zealand household as a source of news and entertainment. Sound historian Sarah Johnston is researching radio during this era, particularly the role of our first radio war correspon

Learning in and from primary schools: Teaching Aotearoa New Zealand’s histories at Years 1 to 6

Jul 8th, 2022 50m 16s

In September 2019, Hon Chris Hipkins announced Aotearoa New Zealand's histories would be taught in all schools and kura from 2022 (later extended to 2023).In this talk Dr Genaro Oliveira shared findings from a comprehensive survey of primary s

‘There was no honour in it’: Two aspects of New Zealand’s military history

Jun 8th, 2022 45m 51s

Please note: This talk contains material that may be distressing to some listeners, including the discussions of war crimes. If you wish to skip this discussion, it runs from 9:19 through to 16:36. Please take care of yourself, and if you don't

The Platform: the radical legacy of the Polynesian Panthers

Mar 3rd, 2022 55m 13s

In this talk, Melani Anae, Associate Professor in Pacific Studies at the University of Auckland discusses aspects of her recent book, The Platform: the radical legacy of the Polynesian Panthers. In the book she writes, ‘Fifty years ago the Pol

Crossing the lines: the story of three homosexual New Zealand soldiers in WW2

Oct 4th, 2021 50m 39s

In this talk author Brent Coutts discusses his recently published book, Crossing the Lines, a history of New Zealand homosexual soldiers in the Second World War.While he uncovered fifty homosexual men who served in the military during the war

Reflecting on the value of social media as a history-research tool

Jul 28th, 2021 50m 1s

In this talk, historian Ryan Bodman explores the value of social media as a 21st century history-research tool. Over the past five years, Ryan has been researching and writing Rugby League: A New Zealand History, which is a social and cultural

Dissenting Voices – New Zealand and the South African War 1899–1902

Jun 1st, 2021 34m 28s

In this talk, Nigel Robson, author of Our first foreign war (Massey University Press, 2021), examines opposition within New Zealand to the South African War 1899–1902.At a time when patriotic fervour engulfed the country, those who questioned

Kei roto i te miru: inside the bubble

Apr 8th, 2021 45m 10s

What happens when a pandemic hits and the country is locked down? How can we help keep New Zealanders connected?In collaboration with Sue Berman, Principal Oral History Advisor Auckland Libraries, staff at Manatū Taonga Ministry for Culture a

‘Palmy Proud’? Audience and Approach in Writing the History of a Provincial City

Mar 3rd, 2021 41m 33s

In this Public History Talk, co-editor and a writer for City at the Centre: A History of Palmerston North Margaret Tennant will discuss the dilemmas faced by its editors and the question of audience for such a volume: whether to take a themati