How do we commemorate the New Zealand Wars? The history of Anzac Day can be a guide

• Historians and Māori leaders are now worried about the mixed impact of the day – known as Te Pūtake o te Riri – amid wider fears it is already slipping from public attention.
• Unlike Anzac Day, however, Te Pūtake o te Riri was not made an official holiday – and this may partly explain its struggle for wider recognition.

A question of timing

• It emphasises Māori experiences, and each year’s commemoration is hosted by different hapū and iwi.
• In 2023, for example, it focused on Ngai-te-rangi perspectives of the battle of Pukehinahina – “Gate Pā” – in Tauranga.

Evolution of Anzac Day

• The comparison with the first world war invites an intriguing question: what lessons might we learn from the history of our most visible war commemoration, Anzac Day?
• Indeed, in 1965, the 50th anniversary of Gallipoli, there were real doubts Anzac Day could survive the passing of the last Anzac veterans.
• Read more:
  New lessons about old wars: keeping the complex story of Anzac Day relevant in the 21st century

  Instead, it has survived as a sacred day – helped perhaps by the 1920 Anzac Day Act which made it an official public holiday.

War memorials and public memory

• The growing public ownership of Anzac Day ran parallel to the decline of Armistice Day, which marked the end of the World War I on November 11.
• As the sculptor Brett Graham has noted, war memorials became the dominant sculptural form of public life.
• Nowadays, they are among the nation’s most prominent public sites, including the Auckland War Memorial Museum, the Pukeahu National War Memorial in Wellington, and Christchurch’s Bridge of Remembrance.

Gallipoli and national unity

• Significantly, the Gallipoli story – the central focus of our Anzac mythology – has been adapted and retold by each generation.
• Māori Television (Whakatā Māori) established a national Anzac Day broadcast in 2005, deepening the shared cultural languages and motifs of April 25.
• Since the 1990s, successive governments – especially Helen Clark’s in the early 2000s – invested in Anzac Day as a commemoration of national unity.

Need for a national policy

• Some have suggested Te Pūtake o te Riri will never achieve the necessary public attention until it becomes a statutory holiday.
• As Joanna Kidman noted, many New Zealand Wars cemeteries, memorials and battlefields have been neglected or are on private land.
• The issues raised all point to the need for a national policy on the commemoration of the New Zealand Wars – guided by iwi, with critical input from scholars – that enhances community relationships.

New ways of remembering

• After its service on October 28, the museum hosted whānau descendants of 28th Māori Battalion veterans who had never claimed their medals for serving in World War II.
• By choosing Te Pūtake o te Riri for the ceremony, the organisers were able to bridge past and present through themes of service, sacrifice and citizenship.
• As trusted institutions of public memory, museums are ideally placed to tell the stories of the New Zealand Wars.

Rowan Light does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.