Southland rocks and rolls online

Kiwi encyclopaedia spotlights region

JOHN HAWKINS/ID 130434

SOUTHERN FLAVOUR: Historian David Grant and Te Ara general editor Jock Phillips presenting Southland's latest online presence in Invercargill's Civic Theatre last night.

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Southland's "rolling r" helps to "pull all the chicks".

So testifies a Gore youth in a video clip on Southland on www.TeAra.govt.nz — an online encyclopaedia of New Zealand.

New Zealand's southernmost region is the latest entry on the Ministry for Culture and Heritage website and was officially launched in a ceremony at the Invercargill Civic Theatre last night.

The entry now opens the region to an average of 8000 to 10,000 online hits a day, 40 percent of which are made by web surfers in other countries on what is the first national encyclopedia produced for the web in the world.

Launched by associate Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Mahara Okeroa, the Southland component of the website went live to the public simultaneously at the ceremony.

Historian and former Southlander David Grant, who authored the Southland entry, said he was contracted in 2006 to research and write about the region.

That involved a three-month stint away from his Wellington home to reacquaint himself with his former stomping ground, he said.

However, his research turned up some surprises, he said.

"I didn't know there was a shale works near Orepuki at the turn of the 20th century or the battle between Maori tribes Ngai Tahu and Ngati Toa at Tuturau near Gore.

"What I enjoyed was writing about things that are uniquely Southland — swedes, oysters and rolling r's." The unique dialect harked back to the region's largely Scottish roots and set the region apart from the rest of New Zealand, he said.

Te Ara general editor Dr Jock Phillips said the 10-year Te Ara project, which has been done in stages since it was launched in 2005, was a complete encyclopaedia of New Zealand on the web.

"We're only about halfway." The project included "big" core-themes and one of those was places, hence the Southland entry — one of 11 completed regions out of 22 online, Dr Phillips said.

Of the regions he had visited in the course of working on the project, Southland had stood apart, he said. "Southland has a stronger sense of itself and its identity than the rest of the country." The Southland entry is divided into two parts; Southland, its landscape, plants and animals, people, history and townships; and Southland Places, which looks in detail at the cities and towns from Milford Sound to Bluff.

Te Ara is one of three linked websites run by the ministry. The other two are nzlive.com, which lists cultural and sporting events throughout New Zealand, and NZHistory.net.nz.