Our congratulations to Ned Fletcher, winner of the General Non-Fiction Award for The English Text of the Treaty of Waitangi!
The Ockham awards judges said that 'Ned Fletcher’s extensively researched and meticulously constructed book provides a valuable contribution to scholarship, history and law, and makes a timely and evolved interjection into the conversations of this country.'
'The English Text of the Treaty of Waitangi will shift and inform debates about the intentions of those who constructed and signed the Treaty and how we interpret it today. Fletcher’s comprehensive examination sheds new light on the document's implications and contributes fresh thinking to what remains a very live conversation for all of us that call this country home.'
Te Motunui Epa by Rachel Buchanan (Taranaki, Te Ātiawa), was shortlisted for the Illustrated Non-Fiction Award. As described by the judges, 'Te Motunui Epa is a triumph of storytelling and a challenge to the confines of traditional historiography ... Generous while unafraid to confront the colonial hurt at the heart of the story, this is a deceptively powerful and enduring work.'
We also extend our congratulations to Alice Te Punga Somerville (Taranaki, Te Ātiawa), whanaunga of Rachel and winner of the Poetry Award for Always Italicise: How to Write While Colonised (Auckland University Press). Alice is also the author of Two Hundred and Fifty Ways to Start an Essay about Captain Cook in the BWB Texts series.
See here for the full results.