Dame Aroha Reriti-Crofts, DNZM, CBE, JP, (née Crofts; 1938 – 2022) was a New Zealand community worker who was national president of the Māori Women’s Welfare League. Of Māori descent, she affiliated to Ngāi Tahu.
Greta Regina Aroha Yates-Smith, known as Aroha Yates-Smith, is a New Zealand performer and academic, who affiliates to Te Arawa, Tainui, Takitimu, Horouta, and Mataatua. She is known for her research into forgotten Māori female deities.
Aroha Awarau is a New Zealand journalist and playwright. He won the 2008 New Zealand Magazine Journalist of the Year (Mass Market) at the annual Magazine Publisher's Association Award.
Aroha is also used as a masculine name in Maori. However, it's more common for females. So, I think that the "Gender" of this name should be changed from "Feminine" to "Feminine & Masculine". Some evidence for this is that Aroha is also used as a name element in unisex and masculine Maori names such as Tearoha (cognate with the Hawaiian name Kealoha). A notable male bearer of this name is Aroha Awarau, a journalist and playwright from New Zealand. Sources: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aroha https://forebears.io/x/forenames/aroha [noted -ed]
The Māori word for love, "Aroha", is cognate with the Hawaiian word "Aloha" and the Samoan word "Alofa", all meaning "love". Māori, Hawaiian, and Samoan are Austronesian languages. Also, Aroha can function as a short form of Tearoha (for both genders) and other Māori names containing this element.
I personally love the name Aroa, which is Spanish (Originally Basque, I think). I think this is pronounced the same way, like Arr - oh - ah, but it might just be that that's how Spaniards pronounce it because of the silent H. I've only heard the name in Spain. Beautiful name!
I don't think you should get too excited about the Aloha-Aroha connection. Another Polynesian country Samoa has the word Alofa for love. Almost all Polynesian countries have very similar languages. Rarotongangs, Nuewans, Tuvaluans, Maoris, Samoans, Tongans, Cook Islanders. And they usually mean the same thing. Like in counting and colours or basic words like 'dog' or 'kick' or 'house', all sound similar but the languages are all different. I don't think there's much of a relationship between Hawaii and Maori. The context is most similar around the closer islands. Maori seems to come from Rarotongan. It's like Latin and English. A Maori could speak Maori to a Raro and the Raro could understand fully, but speak Raro to a Maori and the Maori wouldn't understand a thing. There's hardly a relationship between Hawiian and Maori. They originate from different places and are very far apart. I'd say Samoan and Maori and Raro are the most similar.
By the way you have stated that it sounds like you are implying that Maori are from Hawaii. Even though Aroha and Aloha both might mean love and sound similar that doesn't mean the origin of these races are from the same place. It has been proved that Maori migrated from South East Asia, not Hawaii.I think Aroha is a really lovely name and one of the better sounding Maori names.
― Anonymous User 9/9/2006
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