Dr Madi Williams
Dr Madi Williams (Ngāti Kuia, Ngāti Koata, Ngāti Apa ki te Rā Tō, Rangitāne o Wairau) is the author of an important new book about the history of Ngāti Kuia, which is titled Ngāti Kuia He Pūtake, Hei Pakiaka Ora | A History. Madi is a senior lecturer at Aotahi – School of Māori and Indigenous Studies at the University of Canterbury, Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha. She completed her doctorate on Ngāti Kuia in 2021 at the University of Canterbury. She is also the author of Polynesia, 900–1600: An Overview of the History of Aotearoa, Rēkohu, and Rapa Nui (Canterbury University Press, 2021). Madi is currently working on a book about taniwha with Dr Kirsty Dunn.
2026 festival sessions
Ngāti Kuia He Pūtake, Hei Pakiaka Ora | A History
Ngāti Kuia History Book Launch
Dr Madi Williams in conversation with Dr Peter Meihana
4pm-5.30pm, Saturday 25 July, Whitehaven Theatre Marlborough, $25
The Marlborough Book Festival is honoured to host the launch of this significant new book on the history of Ngāti Kuia. The iwi descend from the ancestress Kuia; their marae, Te Hora, is at Canvastown, near Blenheim. Drawing on hundreds of whakapapa, pūrākau, waiata and karakia recorded in nineteenth-century tribal manuscripts and court records, Dr Madi Williams presents Ngāti Kuia history in Ngāti Kuia voices. From the pūrākau of Kaikaiāwaro and Hinepopo, through early encounters with neighbouring iwi and European settlers, to recent events such as the Treaty settlement process, this expansive account places Ngāti Kuia at the heart of the region’s living, layered history.