Maxine Ngarangi Kamaea Naden

Maxine Ngarangi Kamaea Naden was born in Auckland and was educated in Auckland, Wellington, and Lytton High School in Gisborne. She went to Palmerston North Teachers’ Training College and graduated with Diploma of Teaching and also completed some papers at Massey University towards a B.Ed. She moved to Auckland and pursued music and did relief teaching. She became a resource teacher of Māori, lecturer in Early Childhood Education at Auckland College of Education, and taught Māori language at primary and secondary schools. She also taught te reo at the Faculty of Theology at Auckland University. She got her B.Ed in 1995 and graduated with an M.A. (second class honours) in Māori Education from Auckland University. She teaches courses for teachers in Auckland in te reo Māori, making resources for the teaching of Māori language and te reo kori (Māori perspectives on P.E). She is a solo guitarist/singer who performed in Canada and America for a year in 1988. She has appeared on T.V. in New Zealand on a few occasions with various bands. She has recorded an album with Sweet Harmony. She put out children’s albums which go with the resource packages produced by her mother, Ngarangi Kamaea Naden (McLaughlin). These are entitled Te Reo Kuri 1, Te Reo Kuri 2, Ngaru, and A Aporo. The last two have all Naden’s own original songs; with A Aporo she has one song. Her songs are all in te reo. She is composer and vocalist and prefers to perform in studio. She has appeared in New Zealand, Canada and the United States, touring clubs in New Orleans and Florida. Her mother is a well-known educationalist, involved in bringing a Māori perspective to physical education. Some of Maxine’s songs from children have been recorded on Te Reo Kori, a cassette released by Ngarangi Naden. She writes children’s songs for kura Kaupapa Māori.

Biographical sources

• Phone conversation with Maxine Naden, 14 Sept. 1998.
• Te Ao Mārama: Contemporary Māori Writing. Comp. and ed. Witi Ihimaera. Contributing ed. Haare Williams, Irihapeti Ramsden and D. S. Long. Vol. 3: Te Puāwaitanga O Te Kōrero: The Flowering. Auckland, N.Z.: Reed, 1993. 218.