以上のような歴史的経緯から、今日、ニュージーランドに住むマオリにとって、英語を話すことは当たり前のことに過ぎない。今日例外なくマオリは英語を話すといっていい。それは、マオリが生きるために、まさに好むと好まざるとにかかわらず、身につけてこざるをえなかった過程なのである。
けれどもと言うべきなのか、だからと言うべきなのか、その一方、マオリであってもマオリ語を話せないマオリはたくさんいる。ワイカト大学（The University of Waikato)の初級マオリ語の私のクラスメートは、一見白人のようにみえてもマオリの血を受けつぐ青年も含めて、圧倒的にマオリの若者が多かった。マオリ語を流暢に話す学生も多かったが、その一方で、血縁的・文化的にマオリ文化との接触はありながらも、言語的には、あたかも日本人が英語を学ぶように、大学でマオリ語を学んでいた者も少なくなかった。これは伝統的なマオリの共同体が破壊され、都市化した結果に他ならない。流暢にマオリ語を話すマオリはマオリの中でも5％くらいではないかと、私の知人の一人のマオリが言っていたくらいなのだ。
祖父母の世代はマオリ語を流暢に話していたのに、父母の世代はマオリ語よりもイギリス語が主流という世代に、いわばねじれてしまった。つまり、生活のために、祖父母の世代は、自らの母語の将来に悲観して、母語であるマオリ語よりむしろ英語を自らの子どもたちに奨励したのである。だから今日の子どもたちの親の世代は、マオリ語を奪われた世代といってよい。
祖父母の世代はマオリ語が主言語であったにもかかわらず、親の世代は、圧倒的にイギリス語が主言語にねじれてしまい、そうして奪われた自らのコトバを、自分の子どもたちにはコハンガ・レオ（コトバの巣）と呼ばれている幼稚園の中で奪い返そうとしている世代なのである。
繰り返して強調することになるが、マオリを取り巻くこうした悲しむべき実情の原因は、イギリスによるキリスト教化と英語化の歴史によるものに他ならない。
Clumsy English Writing of Mine
'Aotearoa New Zealand and the Two Official Languages' (5)
“Māori Without Exception Speak English, But There Are Māori Who Do Not Speak Māori”
Because of the above historical background, it is only natural for Māori living in New Zealand today to speak English. It is safe to say that Māori speak English today without exception. It is a process that Māori have had to acquire, whether they like it or not, in order to survive.
However, or I should say because of this, there are many Māori who do not speak Māori even though they are Māori. In my elementary Māori class at the University of Waikato, there were many young Māori students, including a young man who looked Caucasian but had Māori blood in his veins. Many of them spoke Māori fluently, but on the other hand, there were also many who were in contact with Māori roots by blood and culture but were learning Māori linguistically at university as if they were like Japanese learning English. This is nothing but the result of the destruction of the traditional Māori community and its urbanization. One Māori acquaintance of mine told me that only about 5% of Māori speak fluent Māori.
Their grandparents' generation spoke Māori fluently, but their parents' generation was twisted, so to speak, into a generation where British English is more dominant than Māori language. In other words, for the sake of their own livelihood, the grandparents' generation, being pessimistic about the future of their own mother tongue, encouraged their children to speak English rather than their own mother tongue, Māori. Therefore, the generation of parents of today's children can be said to be the generation that was robbed of the Māori language.
Although Māori was the main language of their grandparents' generation, their parents' generation is the one that has been overwhelmingly twisted to English as the main language and is the one that is trying to regain their own language, which has been stolen from them, in the kindergarten that they call Kohanga Reo (language nest).
Again, it bears repeating that the cause of this sad state of affairs for Māori is none other than the history of Christianization and Anglicization by the British.
