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    A new beginning : the establishment of the biodynamic movement in New Zealand 1930-50 : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in History at Massey University, Manawatu, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2018) Dib, Guilherme Barreto
    One of today’s greatest societal concerns is environmental and health issues. The understanding that these issues are strongly linked to conventional agriculture and its widespread use of pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers is becoming more widely accepted. To this end Biodynamic farming and gardening has presented itself as an alternative way to produce food, arguably of the highest quality, while maintaining a sound natural and sustainable method of working the land. Growers in New Zealand began to apply this form of farming developed in Germany in 1924 and taken up in New Zealand by 1929/30. By 1939 they organized themselves in order to promote Biodynamic principles and methods by forming the ‘Rudolf Steiner Bio Dynamic Association in New Zealand’ in 1939, later renamed the ‘Biodynamic Farming and Gardening Association in New Zealand’. For a period of time the Association was “the best organized and the fastest growing organic group in the country”.1 Within their Association, meetings and gatherings were held as well as field days and farm visits. They also produced numerous publications. Since then, an increasing though still relatively small number of people, approximately 25 in 1940 to over 300 members in 1950, has committed themselves to this unique way of growing food. Biodynamic farming advocates influenced a group of farmers, gardeners and food growers in this country and properties were converted into a Biodynamic regime. Biodynamic farming and gardening has offered an alternative reference point to the mainstream pastoral agriculture in New Zealand which was orthodox and based on use of fertilizers, scientifically driven, increasingly industrialized and predominantly export oriented as the 20th century unfolded.
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    Anthroposophy in the antipodes : a lived spirituality in New Zealand 1902-1960s : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Religious Studies at Massey University, Manawatu, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2013) Turbott, Garth John
    Anthroposophy is the spiritual philosophy and pathway (the “spirituality”) taught by the Austrian philosopher and seer Rudolf Steiner, from 1902 until his death in 1925. Since then it has become established as a worldwide movement, with particular strength in German speaking countries, and it has developed a small but significant following in New Zealand. This began in 1902, after New Zealand’s first Anthroposophist heard Steiner lecture during a trip to Leipzig, and in 1933 led to the establishment of the Anthroposophical Society in New Zealand, linked to the parent body the General Anthroposophical Society in Dornach, Switzerland. This is the first substantial academic study of Anthroposophy in New Zealand and traces its growth from 1902 until the 1960s. It examines the development of the core of the movement, the Anthroposophical Society in New Zealand, and also of the daughter movements, Steiner childhood education, biodynamic gardening and farming, and anthroposophical medicine. Together these comprise the broad anthroposophical movement in this country. Many of the early New Zealand Anthroposophists came from an Anglican background. Most were middle-class and well-educated, farmers, business people, artisans or professionals. Although relatively small in number, the anthroposophical movement has had a significant influence in the arts, education, horticulture and agriculture, and the practice of complementary medicine in New Zealand. The presence of Anthroposophy, and the influence exerted by the broad anthroposophical movement, adds weight to the argument that European New Zealand society was not exclusively as materialist and secular as was alleged in much historiography of the second half of the twentieth century.