The changing face of the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography – Stuff

In a small library in the Ministry for Culture and Heritage's capital headquarters, senior historian and writer Tim Shoebridge proudly sits by a stack of well-maintained books.

These are the early physical copies of the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, containing life stories of more than 3000 dead New Zealanders who shaped the countrys culture and history.

Originally produced as five print volumes between 1990 and 2000, the dictionary moved online in 2001, catapulting it from its specialist audience readership to the public sphere.

Since 2017 Shoebridge and a small team of researchers have been working to release new entries in small batches, beginning with Polynesian navigator Tupaia. Since then people the team have worked on include architect Ian Athfield, activist Tuiawa (Eva) Rickard, broadcaster Selwyn Toogood, sex worker and transgender personality Carmen Rupe, diver and aquarium entrepreneur Kelly Tarlton and photographer Marti Friedlander.

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Tim Shoebridge is a senior historian at the Ministry for Culture and Heritage who helps run the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography.

"It's both exciting and daunting," Shoebridge says.

Shoebridge was at high school in the 1990s when he first became interested in the printed dictionaries. The self-described history nerd regularly used copies in his schools library while writing essays, and he asked his parents to buy him volume one as a fifth form graduation present. They fascinated me, he says.

He eventually discovered that volume one contained entries on three of his own ancestors, Thomas Buddle, and Charles and Sarah Barraud.

Now out of print, the digital space has afforded richer entries and can be freely accessed by anyone with an internet connection. Whats more the biographies are accompanied by photos, videos and audio. It also means they can be updated easily and can run longer.

In 2010 the dictionary was merged with Te Ara, the online encyclopaedia of New Zealand. Collectively, they constitute the most extensive reference work covering all aspects of Kiwi life and society, and contain the largest body of te reo Mori content available anywhere. (The five English-language print volumes produced between 1990 and 2000 were accompanied by volumes featuring the 500 entries relating to Mori subjects in te reo Mori).

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The first five volumes of the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography were printed between 1990 and 2000.

While Shoebridge alone leads the work on the dictionary these days, he says entries are the product of years of work by hundreds of people. Those of us fortunate to be working on them today are keenly aware of our responsibility for maintaining the high standards of those who began them.

Entries are written by commissioned subject experts, specialists or professional writers before being fact-checked and edited by a team of ministry researchers.

The team tries to commission entries which illuminate different aspects of society and how it functions, rather than producing a listicle of saints and heroes.

Mostly, this means movers and shakers from a wide variety of fields. But other entries of less well known people are commissioned if its thought their lives can tell readers something interesting about their times. They dont have to be people the public admires.

The lives of people like anti-Semite activist Arthur Field, brothel-keeper Flora McKenzie or race relations campaigner Hilda Phillips tell us just as much about their society as people we might find more admirable, Shoebridge says.

Others might be chosen to help provide a balance of individuals from across society.

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The dictionary is online and freely accessible to the public.

Selections are made by a committee which meets annually, drawing on the advice of subject experts. Only dead people have entries, however the living can be nominated for future consideration.

The print volumes covered people who had risen to prominence before 1960 and died before the late 1990s, so Shoebridges main focus now is on the post-1960 period, however entries occasionally are published from earlier times.

Up to 20 entries are released each year sometimes grouped by a particular theme, sometimes just an interesting mix of people.

Its most obvious competitor is internet biographical source Wikipedia, which features biographies of varying lengths on hundreds of New Zealanders both living and dead.

But unlike Wikipedia, which draws on anonymous volunteer contributors, the dictionary relies on specific subject experts whose work is rigorously checked. Entries are published with a named author to ensure accountability and accuracy, while Shoebridge oversees well-rounded and researched consideration of subjects lives, with an eye to the time in which the person lived.

Both models have their advantages and disadvantages, but I think therell always be a place for the more authoritative texts we produce, Shoebridge says.

MONIQUE FORD/Stuff

Shoebridge asked his parents to buy him volume one of the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography as a fifth form graduation present.

Over the coming months, two more groups of entries will be released. The first relates to Kiwis and the natural environment and features Don Merton who helped save the black robin and kkp from extinction, kiwifruit industry pioneer Roly Earp, mountaineer and ecologist Mavis Davidson, forestry administrator Lindsay Poole, botanist Joan Dingley and illegal fish breeder and polluter Stewart Smith.

After that two rounds of storytellers are being released people who made significant contributions to national dialogues and debates. These include Footrot Flats creator Murray Ball, novelist and broadcasting administrator Ian Cross, Otago poet Ruth Dallas, broadcaster Paul Holmes, academic and commentator Ranginui Walker, and Womens Weekly editor Jean Wishart.

The Holmes entry was particularly interesting to work on with the TVNZ-RNZ merger on the horizon, Shoebridge said.

Its only been 25 years or so, but a lot has changed since Holmes heyday, when most people were still tuning in to the nightly news on television, and broadcasters like Holmes were really influential. Its easy to forget how central he was to public debates of that time. Were no longer all watching the same thing and people get their news from all over the place.

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The changing face of the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography - Stuff