Browsing by Subject "Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Environmental Knowledge"

The interrelationships between humans and nature are an essential element of the culture of Aboriginal peoples. In contrast to 'western' or 'European' utilitarian views of ecosystems, Aboriginal peoples value landscapes in a more integrated and holistic style. Following European settlement of Australia, policies and actions for natural resource management resulted in fragmentation of people from their landscape and fragmentation in the management of natural resources. This contrasts with the Aboriginal people's holistic view of the land. Holistic system views are more akin to the modern approach to sustainable development of landscapes; however, our understanding and our actions in managing landscapes are still disjointed. Increasingly, the knowledge of Aboriginal people and their approaches to natural resource management (NRM) are being recognised in the governance structures of Australia. Climate change is an emerging threat to both humans and natural systems, particularly in environments already stressed by past land management practices. In this paper, we present both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal conceptual understandings of a system under the threat of climate change, and we discuss how Aboriginal knowledge can add to our understanding of climate change impacts in Australia. Our focus area is the Central West of NSW, a system with a developed rural economy and ecological values of international significance.

'B. Australian' Bibliography describes a listing of resources, arranged by subject, and includes sources on Etymology, Lists of Names, Sources - a) Toponymy, b) Anthroponymy, c) Ethnonymy, Names of Languages and d) Other Names. Grammar: Phonology, Morphology, Syntax, Semantics, Typology; and Sociology, Psychology of Names sources are also listed.

Oral traditions, especially contrasted with written history, are typically portrayed as inaccurate. Commenting on native title claims in the US, Simic (2000) made the specific claim: "As a general rule, unwritten legends that refer to events more than 1,000 years in the past contain little, if any, historical truth". So can preliterate Indigenous languages tell us anything factual about the distant past, or does the transmission of historical facts become inevitably corrupted? Changes in sea levels around the Australian coast are now well established. Marine geographers can now point to specific parts of the Australian coast and know with some confidence what the sea levels were at a particular time before the present. This paper reports on a substantial body of Australian Aboriginal stories that appear to represent genuine and unique observations of post-glacial increases in sea level, at time depths that range from about 13,400-7,500 years BP. This paper makes the case that endangered Indigenous languages can be repositories for factual knowledge across time depths far greater than previously imagined, forcing a rethink of the ways in which such traditions have been dismissed.

Across western New South Wales agricultural practices have led to significant changes in the distribution and abundance of many native plant species. These changes have occurred due to past clearing practices and the introduction of grazing and pest animals. It is likely that such changes have affected the distribution of plant species used by Aboriginal peoples, and that formerly rich plant resource areas may also have changed. Here an attempt is made to map contemporary high aboriginal plant resource areas in the Yantabulla area (lat 29° 55'S, long 150° 37'E) of far western New South Wales, using kriging interpolation. High aboriginal plant usage resource areas were not found to be correlated with any particular vegetation assemblage, although Lignum Shrublands comparatively had the lowest scores. Site species richness was correlated strongly with sites of high abundance of aboriginal resource use. It is hoped that by identifying contemporary high resource locations, new understandings of the landscape can be developed by traditional owners and conservation land managers.

For over twenty-five years, Dr. Ian McIntosh, an anthropologist born in Australia but now long-based in the United States, has been a meticulous chronicler of the life and writings of David Burrumarra, M.B.E. (1917-1994), long his close friend and colleague. From 1986, they had worked together in the enclave of Elcho Island, in north-east Arnhem Land, in Australia's Northern Territory, on cultural and community projects, as well as on serious and time deep research. Already in the year of Burramurra's death, McIntosh recounted some of their contacts in a finely wrought and illuminating composition, 'The Whale and the Cross: Conversations with David Burramurra, MB.E.', (1994). Since then, he has treated us to a stream of his own ever insightful and eminently readable essays, while also returning to present further perspectives on his friend and the latter's culture that remain both fresh and perceptive, fascinating and significant, despite the passage of the years.

VII. Oceanic Languages Bibliography describes a listing of resources, arranged by subject, and includes sources on Etymology, Lists of Names, Sources - a) Toponymy, b) Anthroponymy, and c) Ethnonymy, Names of Languages.

Maku palya lingku ngalkunytjaku. Tjana ngarripayi watiya kutjupa kutjupangka. Maku ngarrinyi marrpurringka. = Maku are really good to eat. They live in lots of different kinds of trees. Maku live in the roots of trees.