University of Otago

The aim of Postgraduate Study in Aotearoa New Zealand: Surviving and Succeeding is to help postgraduates in their studies. What sets it apart from other books currently available is its focus on studies in an Aotearoa New Zealand context. Its authors share narrative, advice and wisdom in practical and down-to-earth ways. Many share their raw feelings and vulnerability with you, especially as they work to deadlines, at a distance, in isolation, under pressure, while sick or with English as a second language. Postgraduate Study in Aotearoa New Zealand : Surviving and Succeeding is written primarily for postgraduates in the social sciences, with applicability to the humanities, rather than the sciences.

The premise of each chapter was simple (and was the remit given to each contributor by the editors of the book): “If you could go back in time to when you started your postgraduate studies, what would you tell your younger, less experienced self? What advice could you give to prospective or current postgraduate students now, with the wisdom of your hindsight?”

Key features of the book include supervision, preparing for the viva voce, writing and publishing, maintaining wellness, working full time, juggling life’s many challenges, and navigating culture.

Christopher McMaster is completing a PhD in education based on a critical ethnography of developing inclusive culture in an Aotearoa New Zealand high school. He designed a thesis topic that incorporated two of his passions—community activism and inclusion—and builds on the experience of 15 years as a teacher and 25 years as a parent. He received a Master of Arts from the University of London, specialising in post-war United States foreign policy, before becoming a primary teacher in the UK. Returning to his native US he specialised in special education, earning a postgraduate diploma from the University of Alaska Southeast. He emigrated to New Zealand over 7 years ago, where he has taught at the primary and secondary level, and has worked for the Ministry of Education as a special education adviser and as a Resource Teacher: Learning and Behaviour.

Caterina Murphy (PhD) has had an interest in the stories and aspirations of postgraduates since she first became one herself in 2001. That period in her career was pivotal: she published early, conducted small research studies, enjoyed the complexities of higher-level study, and gained confidence in her research capability. She has completed two theses. A Master of Education (Hons), undertaken at Massey University, utilised case study methodology and focused on giftedness in the early years. Her PhD in indigenous studies, undertaken at Te Whare Wānanga o Awanuiārangi, focused on how knowledge transmission through cooking traditions is perceived and interpreted across cultures. That study utilised an oral history methodology and was guided by a kaupapa Māori ethic of care. Caterina has been a recipient of Ako Aotearoa funding, has 14 years of experience in tertiary education across a range of academic roles, and enjoys motivating and mentoring others.

Indigenous peoples around the world face similar challenges pertaining to their ancestral territories in planning, protection, policy, and advocacy. For Maori, of Aotearoa New Zealand, issues related to mana whenua, mana moana, demarcation and the protection of ...

Indigenous peoples around the world face similar challenges pertaining to their ancestral territories in planning, protection, policy, and advocacy. For Maori, of Aotearoa New Zealand, issues related to mana whenua, mana moana, demarcation and the protection of ...

Museums face similar challenges to those encountered by managers of fast-moving consumer goods. For instance, both must determine what things (factors) attract consumers (visitors) to their products (museums). Several methodologies have been applied in this area to find out what matters to visitors. In general, these methods produce lengthy lists and do not discriminate between items in terms of relative positioning. In this paper, we explore the use of best-worst scaling (BWS) to reduce and to quantify factors in their order of impact or importance. BWS is simple to use, producing results that are easy to communicate to non- technical audiences, fostering links between research and actionable implications. We use an example with museum visitors to provide insights into the applicability of this technique to the arts sector, its limitations and areas for further research.

People with disabilities are the largest minority in the world; a minority that continues to face high instances of direct, structural and cultural violence during times of peace, as well as during times of conflict and displacement. Exacerbating their marginalisation has been the absence of the disability community from Peace and Conflict Studies (PACS) research, literature and practice, which has perpetuated ableist ideologies and hindered the pursuit of “positive peace”. This research responds to this absence by investigating the intersectionality of disability, conflict and displacement from a PACS perspective. Its purpose is two-fold. The first aim is to conduct pure research that challenges the on-going marginalisation of people affected by disability, conflict and displacement, by intentionally de-subjugating and valuing their knowledge and experiences. The second aim is to use applied research to conceptualise and demonstrate ways in which PACS might actively advance inclusi...

In this chapter, I examine the treatment of University of Otago (New Zealand) students within the broader historical context of anti-pacifist sentiment and conscription policies in New Zealand during the Second World War. During the war, the university administration at Otago considered loyalty to the State to be the highest priority, and as such expected nothing less than full cooperation and commitment from its various constituents. Consequently, the university administration deemed it unthinkable for its staff and students (as citizens of the state and as members of the university community) to baulk from answering the nation’s call of duty—in particular, duty in the form of military service. Those students who resisted service faced public ridicule and institutional penalties.

This dissertation asks a challenging question: how can we explain the origination and, more importantly, the intensification of Sino-Japanese rivalry? It elucidates what led to rivalry between China and Japan in the first place and what causes the variance in the intensity of their rivalry by examining factors based on realism, constructivism, and the rivalry approach. It shows that the shift in dyadic power distribution, a much more long-term and relatively static factor, initiates rivalry in the case of Sino-Japanese relations. In addition, nationalism with a malignant aspect (offensive goal) and/or alliance dynamics with specific characteristics (targeting the rival outside the alliance) can influence the intensity of the rivalry. This dissertation examines the effects of the interplay between these causal factors in initiating and intensifying Sino-Japanese from the 1910s until 2016. The hypothesis of rivalry origination is tested by investigating Japan’s continual rise in the 1910s, China’s ascendancy in the 1990s, and China’s persistent rise in the 2000s. I find that a shift in power distribution between China and Japan is closely associated with the development of their rivalry, as either rising China or Japan will expand its activities and interests outward, leading to conflicts of interest between them. Rivalries between them are found in the case of Shandong and Manchuria/Mongolia in the 1910s-30s, the East China Sea in the 1990s-2000s, and the East and South China Seas in the 2010s. Regarding variance in rivalry intensity, the empirical findings demonstrate that nationalism with an offensive goal, such as those appearing in 1920s-30s Japan and in 2010s China, leads to a dangerous rivalry escalation when it emerges in the context of a dyadic power shift. Lastly, the investigations into the Sino-Soviet alliance in the 1920s-30s and the U.S.-Japan alliance from the end of the World War II until 2016 reveal that the alliances considerably contributed to increased hostility when they were directed against either of the rivalry dyad. In contrast, nationalism and alliances without the aforementioned characteristics, or those that did not occur in the context of a power shift, are not primary causes of rivalry intensification, but they can help to create an environment conducive to it. I reach the conclusion that the Sino-Japanese rivalry since the beginning of the 2010s may be escalating dangerously, given the role of offensive nationalism in China and the incipient development of such nationalism in Japan, coupled with the change in the nature of the U.S.-Japan alliance that continues to promote Japan’s growing military power in an attempt to contain China

This thesis is an investigation into the socioemotional apology-forgiveness cycle, specifically the role of forgiveness in pre-peace agreement peacebuilding. Using an epistemological approach of narrative inquiry into disqualified subjugated knowledge (Foucault, 1980), local Israeli and Palestinian narratives together with survey responses, are used to examine alternative offense-related responses to forgiveness, barriers to forgiveness and antecedents of successful forgiveness. Research findings reveal both the models’ shortcomings and benefits, as well as the importance of using local knowledge in academic peace and conflict research. The main findings of this research are first, that alternatives to the apology-forgiveness cycle fulfil the socioemotional needs of the victim and perpetrator unilaterally, but are not conducive to a bilateral goal such as reconcilation. Second, conflict specific conditions such as demonisation of alternative in-group voices, unequal contact, and conditional forgiveness can act as barriers to socioemotional reconciliation. Third, when defined as a decision to give up a justifiable right to revenge, successful forgiveness commonly entails human contact, narrative and shared goals

Environmental security literature has devoted a significant amount of attention to the nexus between resource abundance and conflict. Important research has assessed this relationship by focusing on non-renewable resource wealth as a causal determinant of conflict, but little is known about the conditions that influence the emergence and intensification of conflict in water abundant environments. By most accounts, New Zealand is one of the most water-rich countries in the world. Even though violent conflict over water does not normally materialise in New Zealand, conflicts and incompatible claims motivated by water bottling, the growth of some types of agriculture, tourism, and water treatment strategies, continue to surface. Little, however, is known about how and why these conflicts emerge and intensify in a country such as New Zealand. To address this lacuna, this project asks the following research question: How and why does the commercialisation of freshwater influence the emer...

The Kiwi and the Garuda: New Zealand and Sukarno’s Indonesia, 19451966 Andrew Lim This thesis examines New Zealand’s relationship with Indonesia during the Sukarno period, and locates this relationship within the various crucial historical forces, movements, and ideologies of the mid-twentieth century. Indonesia serves as a case study of how New Zealand’s traditional Commonwealth linkages to Britain and Australia, the “winds of decolonization” after the Second World War, and the Cold War shaped New Zealand’s engagement with the newlyindependent countries of Southeast Asia. In addition to such international forces, the New Zealand-Indonesian relationship was also influenced by domestic developments in Indonesia and Sukarno’s personal stamp on Indonesian foreign policy. While the focus is on the bilateral political relationship between the two countries, I also examine the New Zealand public debate around two major flash-points in modern Indonesian history: the Indonesian Revolution a...

Cardiac stem cells (CSCs) have been implicated as the most suitable source of stem cells for regenerating the diseased heart. However, diabetes is known to cause a progressive loss in the functional efficacy of CSCs. The mechanism behind this loss is unclear. MiRNAs are small, non-coding RNA molecules that regulate genes at the post-transcriptional level. In this study, I used a mouse model of type-2 diabetes to investigate if miRNAs are dysregulated in diabetic CSCs, and whether genetic manipulation of such miRNAs can provide novel insights into their pathophysiological role in improving the function of these cells in the diabetic condition. Sca-1 CSCs were isolated from type-2 diabetic (n=6) and non-diabetic (n=6) db/db mice. Among 598 miRNAs evaluated by an n-counter miRNA expression assay, the expression profiles of 16 miRNAs were significantly altered in the diabetic condition. Among these 16 miRNAs, miR-329 (1.7 ± 0.9 (P=0.01)), miR-376c (2.8 ± 0.8 (P=0.01)) and miR-495 (1.8 ±...

Lecture invited by Prof. Dr. P.A. Whigham, Director of the Spatial Information Research Centre, and Prof. Dr. Nazim B. Madhavje, Spatial Information Research Centre, Department of Information Science, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand. Members of the Information Science, Physics, Surveying and Geography departments were in attendance.