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Mātauranga Māori and GIS

Mātauranga Māori is not simply another dataset waiting to be digitised.

GIS works by separating the world into locations, attributes and relationships a computer can store. That can be useful for some parts of a kaupapa. It can also strip away sequence, practice, language, whakapapa and the relationships through which knowledge makes sense.

A more useful question than How do we put mātauranga into GIS? is:

What part of this kaupapa benefits from spatial technology, and what context needs to remain with the people, practices, records and knowledge systems that already carry it?

GIS can support the mahi without pretending to become the knowledge system itself.

Start with how the knowledge exists​

Before creating a layer, understand what kind of information you are dealing with.

Useful questions include:

  • Is the kōrero connected to particular whānau, hapū, kaitiaki, tūpuna or places?
  • Is it carried through practice, seasonal observation, oral history, written records or several of these?
  • Does its meaning change by season, circumstance, whakapapa or purpose?
  • What part of it needs a coordinate or geometry for the work at hand?
  • What would be lost if a future user encountered only the GIS record and not the surrounding kōrero?
  • Would a reference to another record be more useful than copying the kōrero into GIS?

A database cannot answer these questions. It can only store the representation that the project chooses to create.

See What belongs in GIS? and Things GIS cannot represent well.

Mātauranga is not a layer beside science​

A common pattern is to load environmental monitoring data, model outputs and government layers, then add one layer called Mātauranga Māori or Cultural Values.

That can make the institutional or scientific dataset look like the normal description of the environment, with Māori knowledge reduced to an extra theme.

A stronger approach is to start with the kaupapa and ask what each source contributes.

For an awa restoration project, for example:

  • long-term local observations may explain changes that a short monitoring series cannot
  • scientific monitoring may quantify particular conditions at particular times
  • historical imagery may show physical change
  • whānau kōrero may explain use, relationships, access and change in practice
  • council data may explain current statutory classifications or infrastructure
  • field observations may show what is happening now

These are different forms of evidence. They do not need to be collapsed into one hierarchy.

See Awa as the organising geography, Taiao data and Ngā Kaitiaki o Ngā Wai Māori.

Record that more kōrero exists without copying all of it​

Sometimes GIS only needs to point toward fuller information.

Useful patterns can include:

  • a feature noting that additional kōrero is held elsewhere
  • a reference to an archive item rather than duplicating the item
  • a broad locality rather than an exact point when that serves the map better
  • a source field that links back to the report, oral-history catalogue or research record
  • a note that the mapped geometry is only a working representation
  • a separate narrative product when story, sequence or voice matters more than the coordinate

This lets GIS help people navigate the kaupapa without pretending the GIS itself contains the full knowledge.

Some knowledge is temporal​

Mahinga kai, species presence, customary practice, access and environmental conditions can change through time.

A single permanent polygon can hide that.

Where time matters, useful fields can include:

  • season or maramataka context where it helps explain the observation
  • date or period
  • whether the record describes historical, current or desired future conditions
  • the circumstances under which the observation was made
  • source and observation context

A time-enabled layer, repeat field observations or several dated records may represent change better than one feature treated as timeless.

Some knowledge is relational​

A place can matter because of its relationship to another place, a tūpuna, an event, a resource, an ara, a neighbouring hapū or a sequence of movement.

Conventional GIS often stores the locations and loses the relationship.

Ways to retain more context include:

  • narrative records linked to several places
  • route or sequence fields
  • relationship tables rather than one significance score
  • audio, image or archive references held beside the spatial record
  • maps that show journeys, catchments or networks rather than isolated points
  • StoryMaps or other narrative outputs when they help the intended audience follow the connections

See Whakapapa and mapping and StoryMaps and interactive maps.

Avoid significance scoring unless the mahi needs it​

A field such as cultural_significance = 1–5 can be convenient for analysis. It can also imply that places, relationships and taonga sit on one comparable numerical scale.

Before creating a score, ask:

  • What decision will the number support?
  • What different relationships are being collapsed into one value?
  • What happens to places that receive a lower number?
  • How will uncertainty or differing accounts remain visible?
  • Could the score later be reused in a different planning or investment process and appear more definitive than it was intended to be?

Often a better model is to record different kinds of relationship, condition, concern or evidence separately.

Keep provenance as whakapapa of the record​

Te Mana Raraunga identifies whakapapa and context as important parts of Māori Data Sovereignty. In practical GIS terms, an important record should make it possible to understand:

  • where it came from
  • who or what source contributed to it where that context matters
  • the kaupapa for which it was created
  • what transformations or interpretations were made
  • whether it is draft, checked, current-for-purpose or superseded
  • which audience or output this version was prepared for
  • what fuller kōrero or source material sits elsewhere
  • what should happen to the useful record when the original project ends

That is more than technical metadata. It is the whakapapa of the digital record.

See Whakapapa of data and Metadata and documentation.

Digitisation changes what can be done with information​

Scanning, transcribing, georeferencing and indexing can improve access and preservation. It can also create new technical consequences:

  • more copies can exist
  • searching and extraction become much easier
  • metadata can reveal relationships or locations
  • records can be joined with other datasets
  • AI systems can analyse large collections quickly
  • a digital record may travel further than the original medium ever did

Those are useful things to understand when designing the system. They do not produce a universal answer about whether something should be digitised.

Sometimes the useful digital object is a full record. Sometimes it is a catalogue reference, a summary, a working spatial representation or nothing new at all.

For document-heavy research, Local AI shows how to search collections while keeping candidate findings tied to their source.

A practical sequence​

For a mātauranga-related GIS task:

  1. Define the kaupapa and the audience for the work.
  2. Understand how the relevant knowledge or evidence is currently carried.
  3. Identify the part that actually benefits from a spatial representation.
  4. Decide what context should stay with the GIS record and what is better held elsewhere.
  5. Choose geometry and attributes that do not manufacture false certainty.
  6. Keep source, date, relationships, uncertainty and purpose visible.
  7. Make different working or shared versions when different audiences need different detail.
  8. Revisit the representation as the kaupapa, sources and people involved change.

The aim is not to make GIS contain more mātauranga. It is to make GIS useful without flattening what gives the kōrero meaning.

Sources and further reading​

Last reviewed: 26 August 2026

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