Warrior Genes

This essay reads Māori writer Alan Duff’s controversial Once Were Warriors trilogy in relation to a scientific study on Māori “warrior genes.” It analyzes the novels’ “epigenetic imaginary,” tracing their staging of the nature-nurture debate and their motifs of degenerated warriorhood and genetic memory. It shows how Duff’s genetic determinism reduces occasions for social justice and postcolonial reparation. The essay argues that the interpretation of scientific research data was conditioned by Duff’s fictional construction of violent contemporary Māori warriors, and that the warrior genes controversy forms an instructive warning regarding the power of fiction to shape scientific realities.