The Legal Māori Archive: Construction of a Large Digital Collection

Abstract

This article reports on the establishment of the Legal Māori Project, and in particular on the construction of the first funded output from the Legal Māori Project, the Legal Māori Archive. The Archive is a freely accessible online digital collection of around 14,000 pages of 19th century texts hosted by the New Zealand Electronic Text Centre (NZETC) at Victoria University of Wellington. This collection comprises Māori language texts (including some English translations or versions) that reveal the bilingual nature of New Zealand's legal history. This article will explore the nature of the Legal Māori Project itself as well as some of the challenges faced by the NZETC in establishing the Archive, often typical of those associated with the generation of large digital collections.

Keywords: Legal Māori Project, New Zealand's legal history, digital collection

JEL Classification: K