Editorial: Alternative names for islands would celebrate dual heritage

Opinion

The public response to the proposal that alternative Maori names for what we habitually call the North and South Islands might be made official suggests that quite a lot of people are not familiar with the meaning of the word "alternative".

The New Zealand Geographic Board, which has the statutory responsibility for place names, is looking at Maori names that could be used alongside the current English names for two main islands. It has plainly stated that "North Island" and "South Island" will be retained, but many people reacted as though common parlance was to be swept aside by politically correct fiat.

Far from discarding the existing names, the board plans to formalise them - oddly, they have never been made official. At the same time it has decided that alternative Maori names should be made official and iwi will be asked to suggest what Maori names might be considered.

That, in itself, will be an interesting exercise: Te Ika a Maui (The Great Fish of Maui) and Te Wai Pounamu (The Place of Greenstone) are the most commonly heard, but are far from the only ones recorded.

The neatly symmetrical Te Waka a Maui (Maui's Canoe) has been applied to the Mainland and Te Tumuki is the oldest name recorded for that island, which was known at times by pakeha as Middle Island. Meanwhile New Ulster and New Munster were in favour until 1852, for North and South Islands.

There has never been any suggestion that the names North Island and South Island - names whose precision rather exceeds their poetic resonance - are to be scrapped. That course of action was, in fact, proposed by a member of the public - anyone is entitled to make place-name suggestions - and specifically ruled out. And all New Zealanders will be consulted as to which of the alternative Maori place names should be given official status.

Third, and most important, no one is going to require anyone to use either name. The country's tallest mountain has been officially known as Aoraki Mount Cook for more than a decade but nobody has to call it that. Some choose to; most choose one or the other. More than 21 years after Maori became an official language, according official status to place names used for several hundred years before English-speaking peoples set foot here is scarcely a radical idea.

The proposal has drawn a hostile and often uniformed reaction, however, including from one talkback host who said he knew of no other place where dual place names were used. He may not have heard of South Africa (where Durban is also iTheku) or Wales (where Holyhead is also Caergybi). Places that rejoice in two names probably number in the tens of thousands worldwide.

It is hard to avoid the suspicion that the reaction is driven by a belief that Maori are trying to put one over everybody else. That idea, which had faded, seems to have regained hold in recent years on the public imagination; it has driven much of the opposition to Maori seats on the proposed Supercity council, for example.

The proposed name changes do not abridge anyone's right to be who they are. They simply give expression to our dual heritages. We would do better to celebrate that than resist it.