In Aotearoa, how do we position ourselves within an academy pervaded by Western philosophical thought? During the 1980’s Post-structuralist theory was the main stay in my education as an architect. Although we live in a colonised country, local research oriented by post-structuralist thinking seemed to be unable to interrogate how our cities and rural areas are socially and ethnically segregated. Suspicious of collectives and racial or ethnic identity, Poststructuralism, has been strangely indifferent and disconnected to social, political or environmental concerns relating directly to indigenous peoples but in spite of this, Post Structuralist theory is seen as critical to supporting research within the academy. My PhD research is involved with Māori communities in the Far North of Aotearoa, to which I am affiliated, but disillusioned by Western philosophical frameworks, I have found myself unlearning its principal doxa to reposition my research practice.