whakananu

Maori

Etymology

whaka- +‎ nanu (“mixed, jumbled”).

Verb

whakananu (passive whakananua or whakananutia)

1. to contaminate
   • 1903 December 1, Rēweti Kōhere, “Te Reo Maori”, in Te Pipiwharauroa‎^[1], page 2:

     Kua whakananu te reo inaianei, kua tapiritia ki te reo kihi...E kitea ana e ahau i roto i ngā pukapuka tuku mai ki Te Pipiwharauroa ētahi kupu a te pākehā kahore nei i mārama ki a au he aha rā te tikanga.

     [Māori] language is now contaminated, it has been made gibberish...I have seen letters sent to Te Pipiwharauroa with English [loan] words which I did not understand their meanings clearly.

2. to confuse, to make something incoherent or unintelligible
3. to jumble
4. to mix

   Synonyms: natu, konatu, ranu, whakaranu, whāranu

Related terms

• whakaranu

Further reading

• Williams, Herbert William (1917) “nanu”, in A Dictionary of the Maori Language, page 254
• “whakananu” in John C. Moorfield, Te Aka: Maori–English, English–Maori Dictionary and Index, 3rd edition, Longman/Pearson Education New Zealand, 2011, →ISBN.