Died 2007 | Books Springtime Is Here | |
Teupoko'ina Utanga Morgan QSM (1934–2007), also known as Teupoko Ina Morgan and Poko Morgan, was a Cook Islands writer of children's books and song books.
Biography
Morgan was born in 1934 in the village of Ruatonga in Rarotonga and in 1973 moved to New Zealand. She was director of the Anau Ako Pasifika project in Tokoroa in the North Island, which specialised in creating resources for learning Pacific languages. As part of this work, she collected oral histories from her home village and published them in 1986 as Te Ma'ara'anga - Te 'Imene e te Pe'e. The narratives are accompanied by original melodies and can be read or sung. In the 1990s she wrote and published a series of children's books in Rarotongan, which were translated into Samoan, and two volumes of Cook Islands songs and verse for children.
In 1986, Morgan was awarded the Queen's Service Medal and in 1990, she received a Fulbright Program study grant.
Morgan also wrote a non-fiction work on the experiences of Cook Islands women in New Zealand, titled Cook Islands women pioneers : early experiences in New Zealand = Vainetini kuki airani (2001).
After her death in 2007, Anau Ako Pasifika established the Teupoko'ina Utanga Morgan Memorial Award to encourage the development of Pacific early childhood education services.