BOOKS-AUSTRALIA: Author Reopens Row Over Sacred Land

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Carolyn Court

MELBOURNE, Dec 8 1998 (IPS) - A new book by anthropologist Diane Bell has reopened the controvery over sites in Australia held to be “sacred” by aboriginal communities and the question of land rights for the nation’s native peoples in general.

The book takes as an example of the complexity of the issue, the case of Hindmarsh Island in the state of South Australia. A group of aboriginal women insisted that certain sites on the island were sacred to their people but many in their own Ngarrindjeri tribe said they had no idea of what the women were talking about.

Last year, the Royal Commission investigating the Hindmarsh Island case ruled against declaring the sites protected and labelled claims by the women that the area had religious significance a “fabrication.”

Shortly after the finding was announced, the Hindmarsh Island sites were excluded from the regulations of the Heritage Act by a special act of Parliament. This opened the way for a planned bridge project on Hindmarsh – called “Kumarangk” by the Ngarrindjeri community, but the furure over the case is far from over.

In her book “Ngarrindjeri Wurruwarrin: A World That Is, Was and Will Be” Bell’s attempt to explain the involved complications of the case, runs to 700 pages. “Wurruwarrin” means ” knowing and believing”.

The book’s daunting length also is partly due to Bell’s determination to document the people’s stories faithfully, and to present as much detail as possible.

The work may have been better had it included the views of the Ngarrindjeri who told the Royal Commission that they never heard about any site on Hindmarsh having significance to their people. Unfortunately, says Bell, these people declined to participate in her research.

Bell makes full use of stories from the women called by the Commission as “fabricators”. What she comes up with gives readers a sense of the careful way the tales had been passed down from generation to generation, as well as refreshing insights on Ngarrindjeri folklore and traditions.

More important perhaps, readers can also glean from the stories why not all Ngarrindjeri – a community of some 3,000 people – are aware of the sites’ significance.

The reason is deceptively simple: According to some Ngarrindjeri, the sites were particularly sacred to the women of the tribe. But the women could not talk about what they do there and why, to men – and even some certain female members of the tribe.

This was why some Ngarrindjeri do not know about the sites’ importance to the tribe. This in turn made it more difficult to prove the areas’ significance to Western political and legal institutions.

Bell believes that while the book presents only the side of those who “know” the stories, it is a “dense weave of voices – and I use the weaving metaphor to show how when these voices are woven together, you get a very strong piece of weaving that endures, as does their traditional basket-weaving.”

The irony is that the women who talked to Bell did not testify before the Royal Commission on Hindmarsh, which had decided against declaring the sites protected. Apparently, they had considered it “offensive” to present what they knew in a forum where, they felt, their views would not be respected.

Today, Ngarrindjari opposed to development on Hindmarsh are still trying to find ways to stop construction of the bridge, which is supposed to link a boat marine on Hindmarsh island itself to the mainland, at a place called Goolwa.

Bell says she hopes “Ngarrindjeri Wurruwarrin” will be useful to the tribe, adding that it is her “gift” to the Ngarrindjeri.

The academic says the book is especially important to the women who have been insisting on the Hindmarsh sites’ significance because committing the stories to print may help future generations realise that these were not “fabrications”.

She also wishes that the work will help educate more people about aboriginal land claims in south-east Australia – “the land that land rights forgot,” quips Bell, who holds the Henry R Luce Chair in religion, economic development and social justice at Holy Cross College in Massachusetts, in the United States.

“Maybe,” she muses, “this book will make it possible to talk about the south-east in a different way, a politicised way.”

Bell confesses to being unhappy over how laws on aboriginal rights have been interpreted and implemented thus far. She points out that in 1967, the Constitution had been changed “so that the Commonwealth government could pass laws for aborigines”.

“The High Court this February had to decide: was that for ‘with respect’ to aborigines or ‘for the benefit’?” she says. “It decided it was ‘with respect to’ …so we’re at a stage now where the federal government could pass laws (that) are to the detriment of aboriginal people, which to me is a very sorry place to be.”

‘Ngarrindjeri Wurruwarrin’, published by Spinifex Press, is Bell’s second book. Her other book ‘Daughters of the Dreaming’ deals with the lives of Central Australian Aboriginal women.