Tangihanga: The ultimate form of Māori cultural expression - overview of a research programme

Death, observed through the process of tangihanga (time set aside to grieve and mourn, rites for the dead) or tangi (to grieve and mourn), is the ultimate form of Māori cultural expression. It is also the topic least studied by Māori or understood by outsiders, even after televised funeral rites of Māori leaders and intrusive media engagements with more humble family crises. It has prevailed as a cultural priority since earliest European contact, despite missionary and colonial impact and interference, and macabre Victorian fascination. Change is speculative rather than confirmed. Tangi and death rituals have yet to be rigorously examined in the Māori oral canon, or in the archival and historic record that may be discarded or reinforced by current practice. As researchers we are committed to studying tangi, conscious of the belief that such work carries the inherent risk of karanga aituā (inviting misfortune or even death itself) by drawing attention to it. Contemporary Aotearoa New Zealand is constantly touched by aspects of tangi practice through popular media and personal exposure. This volatile subject nevertheless demands careful and comprehensive scrutiny in order to extend and enrich the knowledge base, reveal the logic that guides ritual, inform the wider New Zealand community and, more importantly, support the cultural, social, ritual, economic and decision making processes of bereaved whānau (family, including extended family), people affiliated with marae (communal meeting complex) and iwi (tribe, tribal). This paper provides an overview of a research programme that began in July 2009, based at The University of Waikato. The programme is funded by Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga, the Marsden Fund of New Zealand and the Health Research Council of New Zealand

Indigenous knowledge, methodology and mayhem: What is the role of methodology in producing indigenous insights? A discussion from Mātauranga Māori

The emergence of an academic discourse called Indigenous knowledge internationally, and mātauranga Māori in Aotearoa New Zealand, presents some substantive challenges to concepts of knowing and being, of knowledge creation, knowledge work and the making of meaning. These challenges engage us across philosophical, disciplinary, institutional, inter-generational, territorial and community boundaries, presenting an opportunity to imagine this field anew, and the theories and methodologies that inform contemporary Māori or Indigenous Studies. This article raises some discussion about ‘research methodologies’ being used when discussing mātauranga Māori and Indigenous knowledge (hereafter referred to as IK mātauranga). Research methodologies are often associated with specific disciplines of knowledge and viewed as the primary if not singular way in which knowledge is generated. Arguably, IK mātauranga occupies a different knowledge space from traditional academic disciplines, including their transdisciplinary interstices. This article speaks to a gnawing sense that mayhem is at play, as the academic work around IK mātauranga begins to consolidate and become institutionalised away from its indigenous communities and contexts, where it began and where it still informs identities, ways of living and being

Maximizing Penetration Testing Success with Effective Reconnaissance Techniques using ChatGPT

ChatGPT is a generative pretrained transformer language model created using artificial intelligence implemented as chatbot which can provide very detailed responses to a wide variety of questions. As a very contemporary phenomenon, this tool has a wide variety of potential use cases that have yet to be explored. With the significant extent of information on a broad assortment of potential topics, ChatGPT could add value to many information security uses cases both from an efficiency perspective as well as to offer another source of security information that could be used to assist with securing Internet accessible assets of organizations. One information security practice that could benefit from ChatGPT is the reconnaissance phase of penetration testing. This research uses a case study methodology to explore and investigate the uses of ChatGPT in obtaining valuable reconnaissance data. ChatGPT is able to provide many types of intel regarding targeted properties which includes Internet Protocol (IP) address ranges, domain names, network topology, vendor technologies, SSL/TLS ciphers, ports & services, and operating systems used by the target. The reconnaissance information can then be used during the planning phase of a penetration test to determine the tactics, tools, and techniques to guide the later phases of the penetration test in order to discover potential risks such as unpatched software components and security misconfiguration related issues. The study provides insights into how artificial intelligence language models can be used in cybersecurity and contributes to the advancement of penetration testing techniques. Keywords: ChatGPT, Penetration Testing, ReconnaissanceComment: 12 pages, 1 table, research articl

The Role of Cooperative Principle in the Creation of Narrative Jokes in Jokelopedia: the Biggest, Best, Silliest, Dumbest, Joke Book Ever!

Keywords: Cooperative Principle, Conversational Maxims, Humor, Jokelopedia. In human communication, the participants must speak cooperatively to be understood in a particular way. The cooperative principle, along with the four conversational maxims, describes how effective and efficient communication in conversation is achieved. However, comedians often purposefully flouted these maxims for the humorous effect of their story. The writer conducted a study about the role of cooperative principle, more specifically, the flouting of conversational maxims in the creation of humor in narrative jokes in Jokelopedia: The Biggest, Best, Siliest, Dumbest, Joke Book Ever!. This study aims at finding out the flouted maxims in the narrative jokes, the implicature in the narrative jokes, and how the implicature is expected to create humorous effect in the narrative jokes.This study focuses on the flouting of conversational maxims in three chapters with the most number of narrative jokes in Jokelopedia. This study uses qualitative approach in relation to the use of clear and systematic description about the phenomena being studied. Descriptive study in textual analysis is applied in this study to analyze the narrative jokes in the book.This study reveals that all conversational maxims are flouted in order to create humorous effect in the narrative jokes. From 40 narratives analyzed by the researcher, maxim of relation is the mostly flouted maxim with 15 occurrences.The maxim of quantity is the second with 10 occurrences. Then, the maxim of quality and manner are the least flouted maxims with 9 and 6 occurrences. These flouting of conversational maxims gives access to hidden meanings called implicature with which humorous effect is generated. Mostly, the implicature is expected to create humorous effect by showing a contrast between the development of the reader's expectation and the fact in the story, or by showing the foolish or inappropriate behavior of the characters.The conclusion of the study shows that humor can be invoked by the flouting of conversational maxims. In addition, the emergence of the humor caused by the flouting of maxims also depends on the interpretation of the readers and their encyclopedic knowledge. The writer suggests future researchers to use other theories such as Leech's politeness principle or Sperber & Wilson's relevance theory, to find other materials such as visual and auditory media as the source of data, and to analyze the humorous effect which is not caused by the flouting of conversational maxims

ANALISIS DAMPAK TRANSFORMASI DIGITAL TERHADAP KINERJA PERUSAHAAN (Studi Kasus di PT Bank Mandiri, Tbk)

ABSTRAK Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui seberapa besar dampak transformasi digital terhadap kinerja perusahaan pada PT. Bank Mandiri, Tbk. Penelitian ini dilakukan pada perusahaan PT. Bank Mandiri dengan menggunakan deskriptif dan verifikatif, dan jumlah sampel 31 responden. Teknik pengumpulan data yang dilakukan menggunakan primer dengan menyebarkan kuesioner. Analisis statistic yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini adalah uji validitas dan reabilitas, uji asumsi klasik, analisis regresi linier sederhana, pengujian hipotesis dan koefisiensi determinasi dengan bantuan program SPSS 25.0 for windows. Berdasarkan hasil penelitian yang telah dilakukan dapat diketahui bahwa transformasi digital secara parsial berpengaruh signifikan terhadap kinerja perusahaan dengan konstribusi pengaruh sebesar 67,7%. Kata Kunci : Transformasi digital, Kinerja perusahaan

"He Matapihi ki te Mana Raraunga” - Conceptualising Big Data through a Māori lens

Advances in computer technology and analytical processes create an environment where data becomes the raw material mined to create valuable information and insights. The idea of Big Data emerges from the collation of increasing vast amounts of data enabled by the shift towards an increasingly open data environment. How this changing context alters the relationship between Iwi/Māori collectives and their mātauranga, cultural information and data has yet to be fully explored. However, the concept of Māori Data Sovereignty, which anticipates Māori governance over Māori data, has a natural appeal. This chapter outlines some of the Māori concepts and presents a framework which may be used to inform how data and data use may be conceptualised through a Māori cultural lens