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Story: Daily life in Māori communities – te noho a te hapori

State housing, Ōtara, 1960s

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State housing, Ōtara, 1960s

Clutching a portable tape-recorder (popularly known as a ghetto blaster) outside his newly built state house in the south Auckland suburb of Ōtara, this young man represents the huge numbers of mainly young Māori who arrived in cities after the Second World War. They often encountered suspicion and hostility from longer-established residents, and found few facilities intended to support their integration into urban patterns of life.

Using this item

Auckland War Memorial Museum Tamaki Paenga Hira

Reference: RM B_W 338 - Otara 1981 N5_2 neg 4

by Robin Morrison

Courtesy of the Estate of Robin Morrison

Permission of the Auckland War Memorial Museum Tamaki Paenga Hira must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

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How to cite this page

Mark Derby, Daily life in Māori communities – te noho a te hapori – Daily life in modern Māori communities, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/40905/state-housing-otara-1960s (accessed 14 June 2026).

Story by Mark Derby, published 19 February 2013.