Pessimism, cussing, dishonesty and betrayal seemed to recur week-by-week during 2023 as governments worldwide struggled (or refused) to deliver basic human rights and a peaceful, habitable planet.
I needed to read something uplifting.
I found an article by two University of Newcastle academics, Lara Daley and Sarah Wright, co-authored with a team of Indigenous people from the Mangalili clan, from Bawaka Country, on the east coast of Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory.
The piece is about the Milky Way, or 'Mulniyawuy' as Mangalili people call it, the river of stars.
This year we travelled to central Australia, for the first time. Next we must visit Arnhem Land and see the places Daley and Wright and their co-authors write about. Most of the places don't appear on Google Maps.
The setting for the article is Bawaka Country, centred on the settlement at Djarrakpi on the Milniya River, at Cape Shield. For the Mangalili, however, Bawaka Country is more than a township and its surrounds. Country is also the river and coastal waters, and the people, the animals, the rocks, the sea and the weather. And beyond, Bawaka Country is the moon, sun, stars, the Magellanic Clouds and Mulniyawuy, the Milky Way, the river of stars. That's a fair bit.
Lying on the ground on a balmy, clear summer night, we've all stared in wonderment at this river of stars. It is so far away, we muse. We get philosophical, feel our insignificance and we wonder what else could be out there.
Yet, say Daley and Wright and their co-authors, the river of stars has close presence in the lives of the Mangalili people. Central to songlines passed from generation to generation by the Mangalili is the story of the Guwak, a messenger bird which travels the night sky. The Mangalili hear it in flight, guuuuuu-wak it shrieks. For the Mangalili, it is the guide to the celestial side of Bawaka Country.
For two Mangalili men, help from the Guwak bird comes one night while they are fishing for turtles in Blue Mud Bay, where the Minliya River meets the sea. Their canoe overturns in strong winds. A passing log, filled with mangrove worms, offers help, so does the sea monster Dhala and the ancestral king fish Noykal, but each offer is declined. The men drown.
So it's for the Guwak to guide the men's spirits into sky country. A possum-fur string shows the route, the navigation tool used by spirits as they move between Mulniyawuy/Milky Way and country at Djarrakpi.
So when Mangalili people stare into the river of stars they see their ancestors and see the connections.
Who they are, their past and future, is embedded in country, the earth bits and the celestial bits, always looking out for each other.
The idea of something called 'outer space', way-out-there galaxies waiting for human exploration and conquest, therefore has no meaning among the Mangalili, says Daley, Wright and their team.
There are many lessons from this piece. One, for me, is its demonstration of how little we know about differences among Indigenous people across Australia, their long distinctive histories, knowledge, and stories.
It's wonderful that the University of Newcastle has scholars such as Lara Daley and Sarah Wright to demonstrate the importance of respectful, trusting relationships with remote communities like the Mangalili clan at Djarrakpi. Carefully co-authored stories and analysis become available for others to read.
Yet pieces like this are rare, which is sad. They are important elements of Australian history, especially the multiple histories of Indigenous people, their knowledge and beliefs, richer than what we find in more general accounts of Aboriginal Australia. Having access to pieces like this one means non-Indigenous Australians like me are better placed to understand what reconciliation should be about. Finally, non-Indigenous people need better ways to live on this planet, no? Reading stories like those of the Mangalili clan can only help.
You can find the piece on Lara Daley's page at ResearchGate.net.
Happy Christmas.
- Phillip O'Neill is professor of economic geography at Western Sydney University
