2010/09/01 by Philip Armstrong · 1 citation
Arts and Humanities · Social Sciences · #Afterlife #Anthropology #Archaeology #Art #Classics #Ethnology #Folklore, Mythology, and Literature Studies #Genealogy #Geographies of human-animal interactions #Hierarchy #Historiography #History #Ideology #Law #Literature #Mythology #Narrative #Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies #Political science #Politics #Sociology
paper · doi:10.1177/0021989410376799
openalex publication_date 2010/09/01 · openalex created_date 2022/05/12 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/21
The archaeological consensus is that all species of Moa ( Dinornithiformes) have been extinct for three or four centuries. Yet these giant birds still enjoy a vigorous and prolific afterlife in New Zealand’s literature, art, historiography and popular culture. Arguing that narratives about moa function as myths, in the sense given that term by Roland Barthes, this essay analyses their deployment in the construction of theories about human settlement in New Zealand, and about the development of an endemic (Māori) culture. I suggest that a shift occurred, during the second half of the twentieth century, from a moa mythology based on theories of racial hierarchy to one based on theories of evolutionary ecology. I then consider the ideological investments of the currently dominant theories about moa, and conclude by contrasting these with the very different kinds of affect evoked by accounts of live moa sightings.