Re-placing “Place” in Internationalised Higher Education: Reflections from Aotearoa New Zealand

Abstract

Aotearoa New Zealand is a small, island nation located on the rim of Oceania. Since colonisation by British settlers in the mid-1800s, the internationalisation of higher education (HE) in Aotearoa New Zealand has reflected shifting notions of nationhood – from an extension of Great Britain, to a (separate) bicultural nation, to a player in the global knowledge economy. Since the late 1980s, internationalisation policy has reflected the primacy of market concerns; the internationalisation of HE has been imagined primarily as a means to attract export revenue and human capital to Aotearoa New Zealand, and to increase brand recognition. However, internationalisation, as the movement of people and knowledge between places, can also be seen as pre-dating the development of nations, particularly in the Oceania context. Within mātauranga Māori, or Māori (indigenous) epistemological traditions, place is central to identity. To be human is to be part of something bigger than oneself; care for the land is care both for ancestors and the wellbeing of future generations. In this paper, we (re)consider internationalised HE in light of three questions that are central to mātauranga Māori: “Who am I? What is this world that I exist in? What am I to do?” (Royal, 2012, p. 35). After tracing the connections between internationalisation, colonisation, and nationhood in Aotearoa New Zealand, we consider how attention to Māori place-based epistemologies and values drawn from mātauranga Māori might challenge, stretch and ground contemporary internationalisation policies and practices in Aotearoa New Zealand.