Tag Archives: Connection to the Land

Creative Spirits

Creative Spirits is a website built by and for the Aboriginal people of Australia.  This website introduces all things Aboriginal in Australia including art and culture to health and history.  Related to this unit I found the section on land to be an especially good introduction and noted how closely linked the struggle of Aboriginals in Australia is to Aboriginals in North America.  The section titled the “Meaning of Land to Aboriginal People” discussed the role the land played to Aboriginal people in the past and their vision for land going forward.  The site is largely self contained and I found few external links of note.

The Girl Who Silenced the World

Somewhere in my readings over the past weeks I came across the mention of an impassioned speech given by a young girl, David Suzuki’s daughter, Severn to the U.N. At the age of just 13, Severn articulated all that is wrong with the way that we exploit, commodify, and destroy our ecological resources. Even if you’ve seen it before I think it is worth seeing again, as it offers such a great reminder of all that we have, all that others don’t, and the need to share our knowledge to restore the world in which we live and the land which we rely on. It is an excellent additional to this module’s readings on ecological traditions and ways of knowing. In the words of Severn Suzuki: “If you don’t know how to fix it, please stop breaking it!”

Australian Aboriginal Elder’s Stories

Nganyinytja – Aboriginal Elder of the Pitjantjatjara people of Central Australia.
http://www.yoni.com/cronef/nganyinytja.shtml

This site was an interesting but frustrating find.  I do love the title:  “Much harm has come from forgetting the land..”  It goes on to describe: “The Australian aboriginal people have lived in harmony with this huge and mainly desert continent for many thousands of years. They know the secrets of the land and they respect and care for it.”  This site compares Western mainstream culture which they term “white government” and Indigenous peoples’ culture through specific Elders stories.  Elder, Nganyinytja, stories and her contributions will be an great addition to my list of resources for future work.  Others who are interested in learning about authentic Elder stories and traditions would also find this an interesting read but they may be discouraged to read further due to the organization of the information.  Although this site includes interesting information, I was disappointed in the aesthetics and design of the site.  The links are all at the bottom and not embedded in the text (perhaps on purpose to ensure you scroll through everything to the bottom).  I would have liked to see more diversity in the topics and suggested links and sources included.  I think it was meant to be a stand-alone piece of writing.