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| Tusiata Avia |
As part of Fulbright New Zealand's annual alumni lecture series,
Fulbright alumni and renowned Polynesian women writers Tusiata Avia
and Ngahuia Te Awekotuku will give a free public lecture in October,
to discuss their Fulbright experiences in the US and read from their
recent writings about mythic women of the Pacific.
Poet Tusiata Avia held the Fulbright-Creative New Zealand Pacific
Writer's Residency at the University of Hawai'i in 2005. While on
her three-month residency at the University's Mānoa campus,
she worked on an epic semi-autobiographical series of poems drawing
inspiration from Samoan goddess Nafanua. An acclaimed performance
poet and writer of poetry, radio dramas and children's books, Avia's
first collection of poetry, Wild Dogs Under My Skirt, was published
by Victoria University Press in 2004 and has been performed widely
by the author as a solo stage show.
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| Ngahuia Te Awekotuku (centre)
pictured with Toni Morrison and Gayatri Spivak |
Dr Ngahuia Te Awekotuku received a Fulbright New Zealand Travel
Award in 2004 to speak alongside writers Toni Morrison and Gayatri
Spivak at the Modern Language Association's annual convention in
Philadelphia. A researcher for the University of Waikato's Māori
& Psychology Research Unit, Dr Te Awekotuku is an expert in
tā moko (Māori tattoo), and has authored many non-fiction
and fiction books including Ruahine: Mythic Women - a collection
of modern retellings of traditional Māori myths published by
Huia Publishers in 2003.
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