Talk:Oamaru

Otago

The region of Otago is one of New Zealand's 16 regions. North Otago is not an official region. Oamaru is part of Otago. That we call this part of Otago, logically, 'north Otago', is obvious, but there is no North Otago local council nor is there a regional council for North Otago. The article should reflect what really exists, the very real and governable Otago region. I am reverting changes made which completely removed Otago from the equation. Enzedbrit 10:59, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

• I have reverted those changes. The version trhat is there does not "completely remove Otago from the equation". Otago is mentioned and linked in the first paragraph, where it is mentoioned that Oamaru is Otago's second centre, along with a link. It is also mentioned int the infobox. Oamaru is the main centre in North Otago, and as such, not to link the article on North Otago to this one in the first paragraph would be crazy. Speaking as someone who spends his time shuttling between Dunedin and Oamaru on a regular basis, the current paragraph, linking both North Otago and Otago prominently, makes far, far, more sense than trying to ignore North Otago. Grutness...wha? 00:34, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I think the fact that there are many things in Oamaru and surrounding areas, such as the North Otago Rugby Football Assn, North Otago Motor Group, etc etc is evidence enough that while 'North Otago' is not a sovereign region or province in its governence, it certainly is a region seperate to, say, Central Otago, or East Otago. East Otago, is another region in Otago which is not seperate in Governence but is seperate none the less, take for example the fact that there is East Otago High School, East Otago Cricket, East Otago Rugby, and the list again once goes on. A region or province does not need to be sovereign or under its own Governence to be recognised in an article.

I just noticed this while answering the other question. The issue here is the difference between a region and a Region. North, South, East, West and Central Otago are regions but not Regions. The word 'region' in New Zealand English has its usual English meaning while the word 'Region' is a specific level of local government. (The region names also don't fit the compass directions very well; most of Central Otago is west of West Otago and north of North Otago. Central, North and South Otago are large areas while East and West Otago are comparatively tiny). Daveosaurus (talk) 03:24, 11 October 2025 (UTC)

Pronunciation of "Oamaru"

I've been going across Aotearoa articles adding pronunciations in te reo Māori by Lilith Itou (who is, full disclosure, a friend of mine), a professional-level te reo Māori speaker. She has recorded a Māori pronunciation of Oamaru on Wikimedia Commons (at Oamaru Pronunciation.wav). I've added this to the article, alongside two sources that show her pronunciation of Oamaru as acceptable pronunciations, and a source that verifies it is a Māori word. However, this article also lists an English pronunciation of Oamaru, which has a different pronunciation to the file I just added. The file description for that pronunciation states that "The local southern dialect of Maori ignores the first A in the name (AUH-muh-ROO). Sadly, northern Maori speakers tend to regard this (correct) variant as incorrect, preferring to stress the A (o-UH-muh-ROO). It is thus possible to tell whether the speaker is from Otago or further north."

I don't think this is correct, however. I haven't been able to find any sources verifying it, the closest being from the source from Stuff/Timaru Herald that discusses the pronunciation of Oamaru (August 2015), where a local librarian states "I was taught the pronunciation of the name is Awe-ah-mah-roo." Additionally, if the origin of the town's name is from te reo Māori (as the Stuff article asserts), why is there an English mispronunciation on this article? I am unclear with the local context, or how Oamaru is pronounced in New Zealand English, but it seems to me like the English IPA and pronunciation should be removed from this article. LivelyRatification (talk) 02:01, 11 October 2025 (UTC)

The "English pronounciation" file is how it's normally said in English in southern New Zealand. Whether or not this is the correct pronunciation has been the matter of considerable debate, especially in the 1970s and 1980s when correct pronunciation of te reo Māori began to be encouraged. A memorable political cartoon of that era showed a driver passing a road sign reading something like "Welcome to Oamaru. Pronounced "OM-AH-ROO". Please boil the water. Pronounced "DANGEROUS" " (the latter part being a reference to Oamaru's substandard water supply of that era). Being from about 1980 it's impossible to find at the moment (unless someone has a few spare weeks to spend looking through old issues of the "Otago Daily Times", "Southland Times" or "Oamaru Mail" inspecting each Sid Scales or Neville Lodge cartoon until they find the right one...)

As far as I've been able to tell (and this is all original research so you can't use it in the article) the actual pre-European name of the area would have been compressed to make "Oamaru". There is Puna-o-Maru land block up at the Waitaki River and the full name of Timaru seems to be Te Tihi o Maru. Whoever Maru was I have no idea.

It's probably going to have to wait until someone publishes some authoritative research on the matter, or else Papers Past gets a bit more up to date with southern papers (they do have the Press of that era but don't seem to have any useful discussion of the pronunciation of Oamaru). Daveosaurus (talk) 03:05, 11 October 2025 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, when speaking English, almost everyone pronounces it OM-a-roo or OH-ma-roo. So here on EN.wikipedia.org, the "English pronunciation" audio file should remain. But adding separate audio files for the Māori-language pronunciation (labeled as such) is OK too.PatricKiwi (talk) 19:44, 11 October 2025 (UTC)