A published paper from the ST PAUL St Symposium 2018 Ko au te au / I am the ocean

Ko au te au / I am the ocean was a two-day symposium which began a collective enquiry that continues in 2019 through all ST PAUL St programmes. This collective enquiry is shaped by three interrelated kaupapa: knowledge, language, and love.1 The kaupapa relate to, are conditioned by, and exist within each other.

Now in its seventh year, the annual Symposium has consistently focused on knowledges, and questions of knowing – of how we come to know, and the cultural conceptions within which knowledge

is defined. Knowledge is embedded in practice, language and culture; it cannot be decontextualised. In addressing this, we attend to lawyer Moana Jackson’s reminder that “if knowledge is power then we need to be clear about whose knowl- edge we are using or defining...”2 With a focus on artistic and curatorial practices, we ask questions such as: what is the relationship between knowledge, knowing and understanding?

Language too is a significant ground of power relations. Language is culture; world-views are expressed in language, in its words and structures, its forms and limits. In thinking about language, we consider the annihilating effects ofsuppression as per Ngũgĩ Wa Thiong’o’s ‘cultural bomb’, as a weapon of imperialism, asking who speaks and who is heard, what stories are told, who is telling them, and what we ask with the language we have…

The authors would like to thank:
Cameron Ah Loo-Matamua, Jordana Bragg, Ioana Gordon-Smith, Ara Ariki Houkamau, Local Time, Iokapeta Magele-Suamasi, Bruce E. Phillips, RISE2025, Valance Smith, Pita Turei and our volunteers Lindsey De Roos, Tim Restieaux and Bareeka Vrede.

Te Reo Māori translations by Alvie Poata McKree