William Edward Moneyhun - The New New Zealand: The Maori and Pakeha Populations

This pronunciation guide is intended for readers who have had little or no exposure to the Mori language. While it is not a complete treatment and cuts corners in many ways, it should be adequate as an aid for such persons to comfortably peruse this book.

As in English, the Mori language has five vowels: a , e , i , o , and u , and each has a long and short sound. A macron appearing over a letter (, , , , and ) indicates a long vowel; short vowels have no macron ( a , e , i , o , and u ). The macron is quite important because its presence sometimes indicates the plural form of a word while in other instances it differentiates between word meanings. For example, tipuna is ancestor; tpuna is ancestors; and tpna (a word borrowed from the English language) is teaspoon. Even though contextual usage would be an indicator of the writers or speakers intent, we must not undervalue either accurate spelling or proper enunciation.

The more curious and adventurous readers will find that an internet search turns up a number of resources which use English word examples for pronouncing Mori vowels; one set of words for the long vowels and a separate set for the short vowels. Those who peruse these aids should keep in mind that their authors, when speaking English, may voice their vowels somewhat differently than people from other places. Therefore, while the examples may adequately communicate proper Mori vowel sounds to persons who articulate vowels in the same way as do the authors of the aids, they may be of less help to persons who voice vowels differently. Unless the resource includes a feature which audibly sounds the vowels, the effectiveness of the examples may be less than optimum. Moreover, there appears to be a lack of consistency among some of the online resources.

Consequently, it may be advantageous for most of the readers of this book (who might not have access to either someone who speaks Mori or audible internet files) to use the following pronunciations which do not strictly differentiate between the articulation of long and short vowels except to hold the long vowel a count longer than the short vowel; specifically, aa as compared to a; ee as compared to e, ii as compared to i, oo as compared to o, and uu as compared to u. But keep in mind that they are proffered by a speaker of Midwestern-Midsouthern American English.

• Pronounce a like a in balm.
• Pronounce e like e in egg.
• Pronounce i like ee in beep.
• Pronounce o like o in home.
• Pronounce u like oo in spoon.

There are also diphthongs in the Mori language. If you pronounce them gliding the first vowel sound into the second in a way that retains the quality of each letter in the diphthong, you should be in the ballpark, e.g., pronounce ao to rhyme with cow and au to rhyme with toe.

The Mori language has only ten consonants: h , k , m , n , p , r , t , w , ng , and wh . Actually, two are digraphs, i.e., two letters which represent one sound. You may enunciate the consonants as you would in English with the exception of the digraphs.