Two anthropological assemblages : Maori 'culture areas' and 'adaptation' in New Zealand museums and government policy

In this paper we investigate two anthropological assemblages in Aotearoa/New Zealand in the 1920s and 1930s and how each were used in the adjudication of forms of governmental regulation of MÄori populations. We explore the radically different agencements and socio-technical arrangements of people, things and ideas that were formulated within these contexts. Henry Devenish Skinner, curator of the Otago Museum and Anthropology lecturer at the University of Otago, Dunedin, formulated his assemblages based on archaeological fieldwork, ethnology and Wissler's culture area concept. Indigenous anthropologist Peter Buck and his associates the politicians Ä€pirana Ngata and MÄui PÅmare formulated their distinct assemblages for operating on the MÄori social according to living performative culture and anthropological fieldwork. Through these contrasting collecting, fieldwork and ordering regimes, different views of MÄori as liberal subjects emerged to articulate ways the Indigenous population could enter into the cultural life of the emerging nation. Indigenous agency was ultimately to become of paramount importance in liberal governance.