‘Māori Language Week is a special time every year to focus on and encourage and celebrate the use of Māori language. This year it takes place from 21 – 27 July 2008.

‘The week targets Māori language speakers, encouraging them to use the language more often and in more places. Many beginners and non-speakers are becoming more and more involved in celebrating the week too…’

Check out the full featured article on NZLive.com:

• Read it in English.
• Read it in te reo Māori.

We bring poetry to the people this week with a rundown of the finalists in the poetry section of the Montana NZ Book Awards.

It’s a special week for NZ poetry, culminating in Montana Poetry Day on Friday 18 July 2008. The winner of the poetry category will be announced on Montana Poetry Day.

Montana Poetry Day is now a major occasion all over New Zealand and every year it gets bigger and bigger. It’s a fun way for people to express themselves – for published poets and for those who just want to give poetry a go. Whether it’s poetry read on buses, stand up poetry slams or multimedia poetry competitions there is bound to be an event to take your literary fancy.

This week NZLive.com is giving away a special prize pack of all the books that have made the finals in the poetry category. Make sure you get your entry into this week’s draw.

Poetry

Cold Snack by Janet Charman (Auckland University Press)

Janet Charman was born in Taranaki, New Zealand and spent part of her childhood in the Hutt Valley. She now lives in West Auckland with her partner and children.

Janet is now a secondary school teacher after a mid-life career switch and retraining. She originally qualified as a nurse before working in psychiatric hospitals and social welfare situations. She has also been among other things, a radio copywriter, a telephone operator for a TV channel, a tutor at The University of Auckland and runs occasional writing classes.

She has published poems widely in Australian and New Zealand journals and anthologies. Drawing Together, her first collection of poems, written with Marina Bachmann and Sue Fitchett was published by Spiral in 1985. She has since published five critically acclaimed collections with Auckland University Press: Red Letter (1992), End of The Dry (1995), Rapunzel Rapunzel (1999) , Snowing Down South (2002) and Cold Snack (2007).

Cold Snack brims with poems of suburbia, families, workplaces, ordinary life, from the pleasures and pains of becoming a schoolteacher in midlife to a television station receptionist’s view of the ebullient 1980s. All these poems show Charman’s ear for the spoken language and her acute awareness of the sounds, shapes, colours around us and the way they are inhabited by our emotions.

Read work from Janet Charman’s Cold Snack
More about Janet Charman at the NZ Book Council
Buy Cold Snack online

Read the rest of this entry

‘Being a Central Pulse supporter has been a test of loyalty for Wellington netball fan Joanne Krieble.

‘The team failed to win any games during the inaugural ANZ Championship, coming in bottom of the ladder after 14 rounds in the trans-Tasman, semi-professional netball league. But it hasn’t dampened Mrs Krieble’s enthusiasm for netball… ‘

Read this NZLive.com featured article.

This week we pay attention to some good-looking books….

Remember to enter the NZLive.com giveaway, giving you the chance to win either a copy of Aberhart or Shot in New Zealand.

Lifestyle & Contemporary Culture

InForm: New Zealand Graffiti Artists Discuss Their Work by Elliot O’Donnell (Raupo Publishing)

Elliot “Askew” O’Donnell has been at the forefront of New Zealand graffiti for many years. He is part of the world-conquering T.M.D. crew – the team that won the 2006 Write4Gold competition held in Germany.

“Graffiti as an art form is, and has fast become a recognised cultural phenomenon worldwide. InForm investigates the development of graffiti art in New Zealand, showcasing 15 influential and innovative graffiti artists. Each artist is profiled by a contributing writer, and each essay is accompanied by imagery that showcase techniques used through the progress of a single piece.”

Read the rest of this entry

‘Artist Grahame Sydney may have been the first to popularise the Central Otago landscape, but now mountain bikers and walkers are joining art-lovers soaking up the area’s wild natural beauty.

‘The Otago Central Rail Trail, formed along 150km of dis-used railtrack from Clyde to Middlemarch, has made it by popular vote to AA Travel’s list of 101 Must Do activities in New Zealand…’

Read the rest of this NZLive.com featured article.