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Comment by secondcoming | Hacker News Reader

What is this? Is this an official government policy? How is a publisher supposed to identify if someone is Maori?

I don't think it's official going by other commenters but as background,

They're probably making the argument that their information is mana (spirit~) and therefore tapu (sacred/don't touch).

I don't think many follow it but in traditional Maori culture you're not even allowed to let someone get ahold of your cut hair or nail clippings because they contain your mana and someone could curse you if they get ahold of it.

https://teara.govt.nz/en/te-ao-marama-the-natural-world/page...

Edit:

More or less, yes

> 2.1 Context. All data has a whakapapa (genealogy) and a mauri.

> They're probably making the argument that their information is mana (spirit~) and therefore tapu (sacred/don't touch).

Usually spelled "taboo".

Tapu is a Maori word, it's a bit more nuanced / not quite the same as taboo but close. It's not like nobody can touch, just not everyone can touch. And not really about touch at all but it's part of it.

It's close because it's the same word. But in English we spell it "taboo". Would you say "colour is a British word, it's not quite the same as color but it's close"?

Māori is a completely separate language from English. Although it uses the English alphabet with some accents.

The word tapu has completely different etymology than taboo.

https://maoridictionary.co.nz/search?idiom=0&phrase=0&prover...

> The word tapu has completely different etymology than taboo.

No, it doesn't. What do you think the etymology of taboo is?

It is apparently from Tongan or Fijian words, not Maori words.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taboo#Etymology

I think it's weird to try and correct a person using the accurate cultural terms with a mis-hearing of some european in the 1700s. If anything "tapu" is the technically correct term when referring to a concept in the context of Maori culture specifically, and taboo is a shitty mishearing of a foreigner of a different language.

Similar to say, if I was talking about java's methods. In C# they're functions. But since I'm talking about Java, and specifically Java's basic behavior, method is the correct technical terminology to signify the context of what I'm talking about. It'd be weird for a C# person to show up, tell me that "actually, these are functions", if I'm saying "in Java, X is called a method".

> It is apparently from Tongan or Fijian words, not Maori words.

All of the Polynesian languages are closely related, to the extent that many of them are mutually intelligible. A simple shift in phonology, like /p/ to /b/, isn't enough to render /tapu/ and /tabu/ different words. The connotations of those words may differ from one culture to another, but the basic concept is the same.

But it is true that the word "taboo" came from a foreigner talking about Tongan peoples beliefs, which is important when the topic we're trying to talk about is Maori beliefs. Even if Maori and Tonga people are closely related in culture, they are not the same culture and Tonga people do not have the same co-sovereignity agreements over New Zealand that Maori do.

They're part of the same language family, but pretty far apart. The Lithuanian, Latin, and Saskrit words for fire are ugnis, ignis, and agni. Are they the same word? Nah. They just share an ancestor. Same thing with tapu and taboo. They are for sure related but if we're gonna talk about the Māori concept and not the English or Fijian one we can signal that so easily by calling it tapu, not taboo.

OP is not writing an English word.

> Tapu is a Maori word

That the english word taboo is derived from it doesn't make them "the same word", since we don't use it the same way in English.

The English word "guru" is derived from the Sanskrit word "guru" but their meanings couldn't be more different. In English it's used to mean someone who's really good at something, like a "digital marketing guru."

You need to stop, man. It's a different word.

It's not the same word mate. They're literally different words in different languages.

It's not a misspelling.

Colour and color are literally the same word, different spellings.

Tapu and taboo is not literally the same. They may have derived from the same thing but they are now, different words with different meanings.

Suggesting tapu is a misspelling of taboo is like suggesting "Koran" is a misspelling of the word "Bible".

No, literally always spelt tapu, a different word with completely different meaning and connotations than taboo.

The English word "taboo" actually comes from the Polynesian family of languages (tapua/tupua/tapu), of which Māori is a part.

The term has been reconstructed even further back to Proto-Malayo-Polynesian and cognates exist across a large number of related languages. https://www.trussel2.com/acd/acd-s_t.htm#30099 Of course that doesn't mean it's used the same in all of them.

That it has origins in the same language family doesn’t make it the same word. Once again - it has a very different meaning to taboo.

The 2021 Ford F-150 comes from the same historical family as the Ford Pinto therefore they are the same car.

This part is where the author explains his views on current government policy: https://www.taiuru.maori.nz/maori-data-sovereignty-licences/...

It's just a proposal by an academic. Probably intended to spark a conversation, as NZ is reviewing its privacy and data sovereignty law.

The last memo said all identity was fluid and pre defined identities were social constructs of the oppressors, so one must infer that one should say one identifies as Maori to be Maori.

See RFC7231 section 5.5.4 - User-Race header

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