Aroha and Manaakitanga-That's What It Is About: Indigenous Women, "Love," and Interpersonal Violence.

Maori women (Aotearoa New Zealand's Indigenous women) experience a high burden of harm and homicide associated with intergenerational family violence, complicated by the ongoing effects of colonialism. Also, the historical, social, and cultural complexities, such as poverty and structural racism, challenge further Maori women seeking help. In this project, we sought to answer two questions: What are Maori women's sociocultural constructions of "love" within relationships with violent partners? What roles do traditional cultural values play in their relationships? Using Kaupapa Maori (by Maori, for Maori) methodology, we conducted in-depth semi-structured interviews with 27 Maori women and analyzed them using thematic analysis. We identified three core themes that explain how Maori women enter into, stay in, and leave a relationship with a violent partner: (a) it begins with a connection, (b) downplaying the signs, and (c) needing to leave. We found that Maori women's compassion and caring for their partner was underpinned by their recognition that partners had the potential to be nonviolent and resembled Maori cultural concepts of aroha (compassion, empathy, and respect) and manaakitanga (hospitality, sharing, and caring for others). Through sharing their stories, these women revealed the strength of cultural imperatives that include the importance of whakapapa (genealogy) and whanaungatanga (connections) of which aroha and manaakitanga are integral parts. Our findings highlight the complexity and competing tensions underpinning Maori women's decision-making when entering and exiting violent relationships. These cultural imperatives are essential for understanding how these influence the decision-making of Maori women, which can position them at odds with those who would tell them they must walk away and not look back.

Reflecting and learning: A grounded theory on reframing deficit views of young indigenous women and safety.

Often young indigenous women are framed in ways that problematize and pathologize them, which overlooks their strengths. We interviewed 16 young Indigenous Maori women aged 14 to 18 years about their understandings of safety, being safe, and how they kept themselves and their friends safe. Reflecting and Learning, aided by progressing age and maturity, is the process that mediated their feeling unsafe and keeping safe and resulted in being safe. Young Maori women's reflecting and learning facilitates relatively mature levels of resourcefulness for navigating being safe, including situations they encountered appear unsafe.