Linguistic enablers of Pākehā racism: Excuses from the health sector in Aotearoa New Zealand

Authors

  • Heather Came Te Herenga Waka - Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand
  • Toni Shepherd Independent Scholar
  • Tim McCreanor Te Rōpū Whāriki, Massey University, New Zealand https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2295-9605
  • Dougal Thorburn Independent Scholar

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.55016/ojs/jcph.v2i1.78565

Keywords:

Aotearoa, Racism, Anti-racism, Excuses, Linguistic enablers, Health system

Abstract

Racism is a modifiable determinant of health that permeates the practices, relationships and environments of the health sector. Having produced and maintained grievous health disparities and injustices for generations, racism has done harm to the wellbeing of communities that is well understood but under-acknowledged. Questions arise as to how racism continues to flourish. We argue that everyday relational discourses within the health sector, especially explanations used by people in clinical, public health and bureaucratic roles, maintain systemic and localised inaction in the face of injustice. In this commentary we curate sets of excuses for racism garnered from our cumulative experience and organise them into narratives: i) resource allocation, ii) responsibility, iii) Māori blaming, iv) too hard, and v) we tried. We highlight the power of words in promoting racist agendas, but also the value of identifying such usage and acting to change the discourse toward an antiracist future. We believe these excuses or similar may be used in other settler-colonial contexts.

Author Biographies

Toni Shepherd, Independent Scholar

Toni Shepherd (Kai Tahu, Kāti Māmoe, Rapuwai, Waitaha) is a Māma of four, a scholar, an activist, an environmentalist, a clinician who is devoted to protecting the integrity of whakapapa. Working as the Tumu Whakarae of Starship Child Health, Toni leads TamaAriki Ora who are embedded in the daily fight for child health equity and social justice. Their mission to ensure that we continuing moving towards a mokopuna-centric, whānau focused and whānau led child health system.

Tim McCreanor, Te Rōpū Whāriki, Massey University, New Zealand

Tim McCreanor is a senior researcher at SHORE and Whāriki Research Centre, within the College of Health at Massey University in Auckland. His broad public health orientation and interest in the social  determinants of health and wellbeing, provide a platform for social science projects that support and stimulate social change. In particular his research seeks to foreground, critique and redress the mechanisms of talk, text and other forms of communication that operate to produce, maintain and naturalise the disparities, exclusions and inequities so evident in our society. Discourse analysis and other qualitative methods have been a central theme in Tim's approach to research domains around ethnicity and culture, inclusion and exclusion and health inequalities. Key topics include racial discrimination, youth wellbeing, alcohol marketing, media representations and social cohesion. His work combines a vigorous programme of externally funded research, peer-reviewed publication, postgraduate supervision, community development and capability building.

Dougal Thorburn, Independent Scholar

Dougal Thorburn (Tainui) is a General Practitioner (FRNZCGP) and Public Health Medicine Specialist (FNZCPHM).  He focuses on Māori wellbeing and supporting healing within the communities he is accountable to.  He grew up around the hills of Te Waipounamu and completed much of my training at Otago University (MBChB, DPH, MPH).   In his GP and Public Health roles, he feel privileged to haved worked alongside Ngati Porou Hauora;  Māori Health Workforce Development Unit University of Otago;  Public Health South;  Hutt Union Community Health Services and Ora Toa Health Services. 

 

References

Ajwani, S., Blakely, T., Robson, B., Tobias, M., & Bonne, M. (2003) Decades of disparity: Ethnic mortality trends in New Zealand 1980-1999. Ministry of Health, Public Health Intelligence Group and University of Otago

Borell, B., Moewaka Barnes, H., & McCreanor, T. (2018) Conceptualising historical privilege: The flip side of historical trauma, a brief examination. AlterNative : An International Journal of Indigenous Peoples, 14(1), 25-34. https://doi.org/10.1177/1177180117742202

Came, H., Doole, C., McKenna, B., & McCreanor, T. (2018) Institutional racism in public health contracting: Findings of a nationwide survey from New Zealand. Social Science & Medicine, 199, 132-139. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.06.002

Came, H., McCreanor, T., Haenga-Collins, M., & Cornes, R. (2019) Māori and Pasifika leaders’ experiences of government health advisory groups in New Zealand. Kōtuitui: New Zealand Journal of Social Sciences Online, 14(1), 126-135. https://doi.org/10.1080/1177083X.2018.1561477

Fairclough, N. (2013) Critical discourse analysis : The critical study of language. Second edition. Routledge.

Geronimus, A.T. (1992) The weathering hypothesis and the health of African-American women and infants: evidence and speculations. Ethnicity and Disease, 2(3), 207-221.

Healy, S., Huygens, I., & Murphy, T. (2012) Ngāpuhi speaks. Whangarei, New Zealand: Network Waitangi Whangarei, Te Kawariki.

Hewitt, J.P., & Stokes, R. (1975) Disclaimers. American Sociological Review, 40(1), 1-11. https://doi.org/10.2307/2094442

Marmot Review Team (2010) Fair society, healthy lives: The Marmot review: strategic review of health inequalities in England post-2010 (The Marmot Review). Global Health Equity Group, Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, University College London.

Matike Mai Aotearoa (2016) He whakaaro here whakaumu mō Aotearoa. Matike Mai Aotearoa.

McCreanor, T. (2005) ”Sticks and stones may break my bones ...”: talking Pakeha identities. In: L.H. Liu (Ed) New Zealand identities: Departures and destinations (pp. 52-68). Victoria University Press.

McCreanor, T. (2012) Challenging and countering anti-Maori discourse: Practices for decolonisation. In: R.G. Nairn (Ed) Ka Tū, Ka Oho: Visions of a bicultural partnership in psychology. Invited keynotes: Revisiting the past to reset the future (pp. 280-300). New Zealand Psychological Society.

Mills, C., Reid, P., & Vaithianathan, R. (2012) The cost of child health inequalities in Aotearoa New Zealand: A preliminary scoping study. BMC Public Health, 12(384). https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-12-384

Ministry of Health (2024) Funding to Maori health providers, 2018/19 to 2022/23. Ministry of Health. https://www.health.govt.nz/system/files/documents/publications/funding-report-2023-fi.pdf (Accessed 1 May 2024)

Moewaka Barnes, A., Borell, B., Taiapa, K., Rankine, J., Nairn, R., & McCreanor, T. (2012) Anti-Maori themes in New Zealand journalism-toward alternative practice. Pacific Journalism Review, 18(1), 195-216.

Phelan, S., & Shearer, F. (2009) The "radical", the "activist" and the hegemonic newspaper articulation of the Aotearoa New Zealand foreshore seabed conflict. Journalism Studies, 10(2), 220-237. https://doi.org/10.1080/14616700802374183

Robson, B., & Harris, R. (2007) Hauora: Māori standards of health IV. A study of the years 2000-2005. Te Rōpū Rangahau Hauora a Eru Pōmare, University of Otago.

Smith, L.T. (1999) Decolonizing methodologies: Research and indigenous peoples. University of Otago Press.

Spender, D. (1980) Man made language. Pandora Press.

Waitangi Tribunal (2014) Te paparahi o te raki [Wai 1040]. Waitangi Tribunal.

Waitangi Tribunal (2019) Hauora report on stage one of the health services and outcomes inquiry. Waitangi Tribunal.

Waitangi Tribunal (2021) Haumaru: The Covid-19 priority report. Waitangi Tribunal.

Wetherell, M., & Potter, J. (1992) Mapping the language of racism: Discourse and the legitimation of exploitation. Columbia University Press.

Wetherell, M., Taylor, S., & Yates S.J. (Eds.) (2001) Discourse theory and practice: A reader. Sage.

Downloads

Published

2025-03-07

Issue

Vol. 2 No. 1 (2025)

Section

Commentary

License

Copyright (c) 2025 Heather Came, Toni Shepherd, Tim McCreanor, Dougal Thorburn

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

All articles in the Journal of Critical Public Health are published under a CC-BY-NC-ND license, or a CC-BY license if authors or their funders require this. The default CC-BY-NC-ND license means that authors and users may copy and distribute the material in any medium or format in un-adapted form only, for non-commercial purposes only, and only so long as proper credit is given (as is customary in academic work). Authors retain copyright of their work published in Journal of Critical Public Health.