Small Stories of Colonisation: Richard Shaw

What does it mean to own our past? Richard Shaw made contact with Pākehā with long settler histories who were coming to grips with the truth of their respective families’ ‘pioneer stories’. They were questioning the foundation of aggressive acts of colonisation and land confiscation on which those stories had been constructed. His book The Unsettled weaves those stories with Shaw’s own and is an indispensable companion for the journey towards understanding the complex history of the New Zealand Wars and their ongoing aftermath. He joins Claire Mabey in conversation.