I recognise the haka is a valuable bit of cultural heritage for the Māori people. And in all of the videos I see, it’s like the participants all seem to know exactly when to do what.
Which leads me to wonder—are the words/movements in the haka standardised? Or are there just popular or historic versions of it that happen to be particularly widely known?
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Hakas have a lot of variation across the cultures that practice them – they’re mostly thought of as a Māori tradition, but they are also a part of many Pacific Island cultures.
Every iwi or kapa haka group has their preferred haka. That doesn’t mean that a haka is hyperspecific to one group though. New hakas get written all the time and people borrow too. The All Black’s have had several hakas since the practice was introduced.
That said, when a haka is written or decided on, it gets rehersed like any form of performance art. Have you ever seen a video of The Rockettes and wondered how they all seem to know what to do and when? It’s the same thing here
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