Melissa Matutina Williams

Melissa Matutina Williams is a historian, author and academic in the field of indigenous studies. She has contributed research about the urbanisation of Māori in New Zealand that started in the 1960s.

Early life and education Williams was born in Auckland, and affiliates to the Māori nations of Te Rarawa and Ngāti Maru. Her doctoral thesis was titled Back-home and home in the city: Māori migrations from Panguru to Auckland, 1930–1970.

Career

Since 2013, Williams has held a lecturer position at the University of Auckland. Reviewer Coll Thrush praises the book saying, "the fertile intersections between past and present and between the urban and the Indigenous shape this important work, which should take its place among the best scholarship on urban Indigeneities." In 2025 Panguru and the City: Kāinga Tahi, Kāinga Rua: An Urban Migration History was recognised as one of the 180 most significant works of Māori-authored non-fiction.

Williams and Aroha Harris collaborated on the book Te Ao Hurihuri : The Changing World, 1920-2014 (2018). Williams and Harris received a Marsden grant about how Māori held onto their aspirations for a healthy family while encountering state welfare policies.

Selected publications

Awards

Post-Doctoral Research Award - Kate Edger Educational Charitable Trust / Dame Joan Metge Copyright Licensing New Zealand Writers’ Award E.H. McCormick Best First Book Award, Ockham New Zealand Book Awards (2016) for Panguru and the City: Kāinga Tahi, Kāinga Rua: An Urban Migration History Bert Roth Award (2016)