This story is from Sunday magazine
Tyson Beckett talks to Stephanie Gibson, curator of New Zealand Histories and Cultures at Te Papa, about the book she has co-authored with senior curator Claire Regnault, documenting the big place small badges have held in Aotearoa’s social history.
Like the objects in its pages, Tiny Statements: A Social History of Aotearoa New Zealand in Badges is small but mighty. The petite tome highlights 200 of the some 1600 badges Te Papa holds in their collections, covering everything from military pins and promotional souvenirs through to human rights and cultural paraphernalia, many of which have been directly donated by the original wearers.
“Badges are often one of things that have survived in household clean ups," Gibson says. “They're often the things that get tucked away in drawers, where larger things will get disposed of.”
When in 2004 activist, writer and editor of trailblazing feminist magazine Broadsheet Anne Else offered her collection to Te Papa, Gibson was on hand to receive and catalogue the donation.
“They were very powerful, [because] they covered a lot of really interesting historical moments,” Gibson reflects. “Some of the badges are feminist, three were anti nuclear badges and one was around Treaty of Waitangi activism. So they represented a lot of concerns in the 70s and 80s.”
This breadth of causes is also represented in Te Papa’s collection and the place of badges in Aotearoa’s social history. From the suffrage movement to mana motuhake, with sports clubs and music months in between, there’s a badge from it.
Their power is not just as historical relics but endures, in their ability to distill complex issues onto a small visible surface. "It's a tiny object that tells a big story," says Gibson.
Though they're often "quite reductive", their design is the real maker of a good badge. Often, Gibson says, these feature a "marriage of the symbol and the slogan."
“The whole race tour split heart symbols has been one of our most successful symbols. It's really simple. It pretty much tells you what it means that everybody is part of the same human race, their heart is the same size, regardless of the colour of their skin.
It was a really easy symbol to draw and share and it was really graphically strong and it lasted for the entire period of that movement, from around 1970 to 1985.”
Badges aren't exclusively the domain of protest action though. They're just as often used as a way to signify belonging rather than resisting. "Anne herself told us a few years ago that wearing those badges helped give her a sense of community because you could see other people wearing them and you felt like you were part of a larger like-minded community."
Even when simple to the eye, badges are particularly effective as discussion starters and fostering a sense of belonging.
"I think that's why people like them, particularly around identity, the fact that you could wear a rainbow ribbon which declares yourself as either an ally or somebody from the rainbow community. It signals that you're interested in social justice movements, that you are a safe person to talk to. The space around you becomes safer."
Gibson reflects on the beginning of her own experience with badges to illustrate her point. “"The first political badge I can remember wearing was the HUG badge which is in the book. It's by Heterosexuals Unafraid of Gays, a bright pink badge.
“I remember the absolute fear of putting that badge on the first time, but feeling really strong and like a good ally... I think that saying, the badge of courage, can be quite pertinent. It might be small but it still can take quite a lot of courage to wear it.”
Gibson attributes the humble badge’s broad appeal partly to ease of accessibility. Affixing a badge to your chest can be a first step into allyship and activism, but economically they’re also relatively easy and affordable to manufacture.
“It's really cheap and easy to order your own badges online, there's so many manufacturers in this country.”
Because of this, Gibson hopes "there will always be a time and place for badge wearing" in our protest and cultural movements, even when modern society is increasingly turning to online social movements.
“I never think the physical world will ever end in this way. I think there will always be a time and place for badge wearing.”
The physical legacy of badges carries on, to protest another day.
Tiny Statements: A Social History Aotearoa New Zealand in badges, published by Te Papa Press, is available from April 13. $40
