Digital Commons Network^™

The Fringe Or The Heart Of Things? Aboriginal And Torres Strait Islander Musics In Australian Music Institutions, Clint Bracknell, Linda Barwick

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Teetering on the fringe of Australian music scholarship and knowledge institutions, research and teaching of local Indigenous musics hold a marginal place, belying the positioning of Indigenous music-makers at the centre of international representations of Australian culture, and the dynamic local connections of Indigenous music-making to Australian landscapes and social realities. Music’s ubiquity and diversity worldwide show its potential as a tool to manage the changing world in societies of the past and present, yet this potential is largely neglected in contemporary Australia, and our theories and evidence base are limited by the narrow western focus within our knowledge institutions. …

The Knowledge, Attitudes And Beliefs Of Midwives On The Vaccination Coverage Rates In Perth’S Aboriginal Children, Rebecca Carman, Lesley Andrew, Amanda Devine

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Background:

Midwives are well placed to promote vaccination awareness throughout a women’s pregnancy and strengthen childhood vaccination demand following hospital discharge. In Perth, Western Australia, Aboriginal children experience some of the lowest vaccination coverage rates across the nation. To identify factors preventing greater vaccination uptake amongst the target population, a theory-based study was conducted with midwives across two Perth maternity hospitals to explore behavioural attributes, knowledge, attitudes and beliefs surrounding vaccination provision and the vaccines administered to Aboriginal children.

Methods:

A purpose-designed questionnaire was distributed to midwives working in two Perth public maternity hospitals. The proximal constructs of The Theory …

Rebuilding As Research: Noongar Song, Language And Ways Of Knowing, Clint Bracknell

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

In Australia, language and song are integral to maintaining Aboriginal knowledge systems. British colonisation and ensuing Australian government policies of assimilation have adversely impacted these knowledge systems, at least partially by functioning to dramatically diminish the vitality of many Aboriginal languages and song traditions. As a Noongar researcher motivated by community-oriented goals, I employ a multidisciplinary approach to enhance the revitalisation of the endangered Noongar language and its song traditions in the south coast region of Western Australia. This work draws on established methods from ethnomusicology and linguistics, engaging with community knowledge-holders and archival records to rebuild repertoire while increasing …

The Emotional Business Of Noongar Song, Clint Bracknell

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

This article explores connections between history, emotion and Aboriginal song in the south of Western Australia. Songs performed in the Noongar language in the 19th and early 20th centuries provide insight into the emotional worlds of Western Australia’s past. Historical documentation reveals how Noongar sang to deal with rapid changes associated with colonisation, with song acting as a conduit for cultural resilience. Today, the Noongar language is endangered, and few people remember the old songs. Community aspirations to claim, consolidate and enhance cultural heritage have driven a collaborative process of translating, interpreting and revitalising some of this repertoire. Listening to …

The Uluru Statement: A First Nations Perspective Of The Implications For Social Reconstructive Race Relations In Australia, Jesse John Fleay, Barry Judd

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

From every State and Territory of Australia, including the islands of the Torres Strait over 200 delegates gathered at the 2017 First Nations National Constitutional Convention in Uluru, which has stood on Anangu Pitjantjatjara country in the Northern Territory since time immemorial, to discuss the issue of constitutional recognition. Delegates agreed that tokenistic recognition would not be enough, and that recognition bearing legal substance must stand, with the possibility to make multiple treaties between Aboriginal peoples and Torres Strait Islanders and the Commonwealth Government of Australia. In this paper, we look at the roadmap beyond such a potential change. We …

Ever-Widening Circles: Consolidating And Enhancing Wirlomin Noongar Archival Material In The Community, Clint Bracknell, Kim Scott

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Returning archival documentation of endangered Indigenous languages to their community of origin can provide empowering opportunities for Indigenous people to control, consolidate, enhance and share their cultural heritage with ever-widening, concentric circles of people, while also allowing time and space for communities to recover from disempowerment and dislocation. This process aligns with an affirming narrative of Indigenous persistence that, despite the context of colonial dispossession, can lead to a positive, self-determined future. In 2007, senior Noongar of the Wirlomin clan in the south coast region of Western Australia initiated Wirlomin Noongar Language and Stories Inc., an organisation set up to …

Review Of Taboo, By Kim Scott, Picador-Australia, 2017, Rashida Murphy

Landscapes: the Journal of the International Centre for Landscape and Language

Kim Scott's Taboo is a story about beginnings and endings.This novel reminds the reader of the circularity of stories, and how those stories are shaped by intent and weighed by landscape. Scott speaks of dispossession, abuse, colonialism, addiction and racism in lyrical and melancholy prose. The men and women who walk through these pages are startlingly aware of their failings and equally forgiving of those failings in others. There are no quick fixes and the story vacillates between despair and hope. Yet this is not a grim story. The lucidity of its prose lifts it beyond the despair in its …

Aboriginal Research And Study Protocols, Dan Mcaullay, Colleen Hayward

Research outputs 2012

The Aboriginal Research and Study Protocols have been developed as a guide for ECU staff and students undertaking research, projects or fieldwork that involve Indigenous Australian issues, people or knowledge or that impact on Indigenous people or communities.

These protocols fulfil a strategic priority of ECU’s Reconciliation Action Plan: Develop clear and agreed protocols around Indigenous Australian research to ensure that research activity is informed by thorough cultural awareness and respect.

They also reflect the requirements of key documents that must be addressed by applicants as required by the ECU Human Research Ethics Committee. If the proposed project relates to …

Illustrated Topical Dictionary Of The Western Desert Language : Based On The Ngaanyatjarra Dialect, Wilf Douglas

Research outputs pre 2011

The dictionary is based on the Ngaanyatjarra dialect of the Western Desert Language. It was designed originally to bridge the gap between my description of the grammar of the Western Desert Language (Oceanic Linguistic Monographs, No 4 Revised 1964) and the anticipated comprehensive dictionary which has been submitted by Misses A Glass and D Hackett for publication in Alice Springs this year. Some spelling alterations have been made in this edition to be consistent with those in the Glass and Hackett work.

Aboriginality And English : Report To The Australian Research Council, Ian G. Malcolm, Marek M. Koscielecki

Research outputs pre 2011

The relation of aboriginality to English has important implications for communication between Aborigines and other Australians, and especially for the education of Aboriginal and other Australian children within a context of reconciliation.

The investigation of which this is the final report derives from the assumptions that Aboriginal English has been maintained at least in part because of its function' as a bearer of aboriginality and that, by exploring the nature of the distinctiveness of this dialect and the historical circumstances of its formation and ongoing development we may better understand how to provide appropriately for the communicative and educational needs …

Kwobba-Keip Boya: The Place Of Pretty Water And Rocks, Glenys Collard, Tim Thorne, Neville Williams, Steve Bark

Research outputs pre 2011

No abstract provided.

An Introductory Dictionary Of The Western Desert Language, Wilf Douglas

Research outputs pre 2011

THE WESTERN DESERT LANGUAGE is the most widely spoken Aboriginal language in Australia. Dialects of this language a.re spoken in the vast area between Kalgoorlie and Alice Springs, Ceduna (South Australia) and Wiluna (Western Australia).

Today, radio waves speeding across the Central Desert a.re bristling with two-way chatter in the speech sounds of Pitjantjatjara, Ngaanyatjarra, Pintupi and other variants of the Western Desert language.

'YANAP' - short for the Yankuntjatjara-Ngaanyatjarra-Pitjantjatjara Air Service - carries speakers of these dialects from the Alice to Kalgoorlie, to the Aboriginal communities at such places as Docker River, Ernabella, Amata, Mt. Davies, Jameson, Blackstone, Warakurna, …

Working With Aborigines In Remote Areas, John De Hoog, John Sherwood

Research outputs pre 2011

This Handbook has been written to answer an urgent need expressed by people whose jobs involve working with Aboriginal people in remote areas. This includes a wide range of positions in health, welfare, police and law, employment, construction, community advice, missionary endeavour, linguistics and research. Almost all people in these positions have a common need: to gain some background information about Aboriginal people, life in remote communities, and ways of developing good communication with Aboriginal people.

The First South Westerners : Aborigines Of South Western Australia, Lois Tilbrook

Research outputs pre 2011

The task of preparing material on the Aboriginal inhabitants of the south western region of Western Australia before 1827, is both a fascinating and a challenging one. Fascinating, because these people lived in a unique part of the continent and were amongst the most remote of all the Australian Aborigines, pursuing their traditions in the wet forest lands and open bush country. Challenging, because so little is recorded of them in a way which paints a clear picture of their lives.

The main observers of Aboriginal life and customs in the early days of European settlement of the region were …

South West Aboriginal Studies Bibliography : With Annotations And Appendices, Anna Haebich, Lois Tilbrook

Research outputs pre 2011

The south west of Western Australia was the first region of the state to experience the impact of European settlement, when the Swan River Colony was founded in 1829. Yet the Aborigines of this unique area have remained largely obscured in its history for almost a full 150 years. This is ironical, as their counterparts of the Pilbara, Goldfields and Kimberleys, feature prominently in literature, and have captured the imagination of artists, writers and academic researchers alike.

There are several reasons for the neglect of the original inhabitants of the south west by observers of the day, and later by …

Wangka Pirnitjarra: Ngaanyatjarra, Amee Glass, Wilfred H. Douglas

Research outputs pre 2011

This is a pre-reading booklet designed for the Ngaanyatjarra speaking people of Warburton Ranges and others scattered at various centres throughout the Desert areas of Western Australia.

There are usually about 300 Ngaanyatjarra speakers at the Warburton Ranges settlement.

The initial syllables of the illustrated words are organized alphabetically throughout the book, words having the same initial syllable occurring on a single page. It is intended that the saying of the words on each page will help the pupil to develop aural awareness of the sounds in the language.