Linda Tuhiwai Te Rina Smith

Linda Tuhiwai Smith is an internationally recognized scholar who has significantly influenced the field of Māori education and health for decades. Her groundbreaking book Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples (1998) remains a seminal work that serves as a foundational resource for critiques of the existing relationship between dominant institutional research protocols and Indigenous knowledge systems. Known as the Mother of Indigenous Studies, she co-developed the first undergraduate and graduate courses on Māori education and Indigenous education to be taught at a New Zealand university. Tuhiwai Smith has held several positions, including the founding Co-Director of the Māori Centre of Research Excellence, the Pro-Vice Chancellor Māorii, and Dean of the School of Māori and Pacific Development at the University of Waikato in New Zealand. She is currently Professor of Māori and Indigenous Studies at the University of Waikato. In 2013 she was honored as a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for her services in education and to Māori people. She was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand in 2016. In 2017 she received the Prime Minister’s Award for Lifetime Achievement in Education. She serves or has served such organizations as the Marsden Fund, the Waitangi Tribunal, the Māori Economic Development Board, and the Council of the Royal Society of New Zealand. She is the past president (2009) of the New Zealand Association for Research in Education.