Fifty years of applied linguistics in Australia and Aotearoa has undoubtedly been marked by repeated crossings: between research and action, communities and institutions, Indigenous resistance and state intervention. Te reo Māori (Māori language) revitalisation sits squarely at these intersections, not just as a case study of technical success, but as an ongoing struggle over power, authority, and responsibility.
This address speaks about the Māori language movement, drawing on decades of activism, policy contestation, and institutional change to ask what it really means for applied linguistics to cross paths with Indigenous language futures. Te reo Māori did not revitalise itself through elegant theory or neutral planning frameworks alone. It survived through protest, refusal to give up, community labour, intergenerational commitment, and the insistence that language is inseparable from whenua (land), governance, and self determination.
The speech critically reflects on how language revitalisation is not primarily a problem of method, but of systems: who defines success, who controls resources, and who lives with the consequences when policies fail.
As you mark fifty years, this keynote challenges applied linguistics to move beyond observing Indigenous language movements from the sidelines. Crossing paths, I will argue, requires taking a position: being accountable to communities, unsettling colonial norms embedded in language policy and education, and embracing applied linguistics as a field willing to be reshaped by Indigenous priorities. The future of Indigenous languages will not be secured by description alone, but by disciplines prepared to stand alongside resistance, regeneration, and Indigenous sovereignty.