Warlpiri Lexicon
Yapa Indigenous people
Kardiya non-Indigenous people
Skin groups/Skin names classificatory names assigned to people that determine how people are related and how they relate to each other (including who can marry) above and beyond biological kinship.
Jardiwarnpa a traditional conflict resolution ceremony involving dancing and singing that lasts about 2 weeks.
Purlapa a type of ceremony performed by men for public entertainment (these aren’t held anymore)
Kuruwarri the marks that Warlpiri people paint on their bodies, on material culture items or on canvas that represent the Dreaming
Jukurrpa Dreaming/the Dreamtime
Yuwayi yes
Soakage/soak A permanent underground water source in the desert that has to be dug out.
Sorry/Sorry business Walpiri English terms for the rituals performed when a death has occurred.
Jaru Pirrjirdi Talking strong. Also the name of a program that runs through Mt Theo.
The on-the-ground implications of the intervention are still yet to have a noticeable impact in Yuendumu. While a house has been installed for the community's government business manager, he is employed on a fly-in fly-out basis and is often away from the community. His plan to have children collect rubbish to increase attendance has not been put into place and the welfare quarantining measures have yet to begin. Child health checks were conducted a month ago; however there has not been any official communication to the clinic about what the next step is regarding child health. There is still no official information source for communities involved in the intervention and rumors about what is to come and what is happening elsewhere are rife. There is confusion about the changes to the permit system and CDEP. The community has heard that the CDEP changes - transitioning participants into work for the dole, STEP or funded jobs - will be rolled out around the end of the year but that is unconfirmed. The Central Land Council (CLC) held a well-attended meeting in the community on the 3rd of October to provide some clear information about the intervention and to hear community views about what's happening.
In the Northern Territory community of Hermannsburg in late August John Howard laid out a vision "…whilst respecting the special place of Indigenous people in the history and life of this country, their future can only be as part of the mainstream of the Australian community," he said. "Unless they can get a share of the bounty of this great and prosperous country, their future will be bleak." This statement raises many questions for Indigenous people who live in places like Yuendumu. What is the mainstream? What does it mean to be in the mainstream? What are the implications of that statement for cultural practice and Indigenous ways of life? For Walpiri people in Yuendumu where their language remains the first language and where traditional ceremonies and practices still occur, what does joining the mainstream mean for their way, the yapa way? This week in voices from the heart of the nation we talk to the community about how they think and feel about their culture and where it's going.
Cherylyn lives in Yuendumu with her young daughter. Cherylyn is training to become a counsellor. She has been involved in remote area video production and radio broadcasting and has worked with a number of Yuendumu organisations including the Yuendumu Old People's Program and the Mt Theo Youth Program.
Keeping our culture strong, it's all about not forgetting our elders. Lots of young people out there – they forget their people because of drugs and alcohol. Drugs and alcohol don't belong to yapa culture, to Aboriginal people - it’s from Europeans. They’re the ones that brought and made all those things…because of that, that’s how people lose their culture and families. I want my people to keep their culture strong – not to lose it.
I think of my family and also I also think about my ancestors. That’s the main one – the main thing in our culture, it’s our ancestors. That is because they were the first ones who’ve been here for thousands and thousands of years. With ancestors… it's for yapa – we can feel it – it’s right here and it’s always there. It’s always inside you – you can feel it. That’s how I can feel my ancestors. It’s like – it’s really amazing.
(Culture) is in language and painting, it’s in everything. It’s just there. I believed in my grandmother, she was the main woman – the most important woman for all women ways of culture like ceremonies and Sorry… she was my role model.
(My daughter) Donisha she’s seven years old, I always talk to her about Jukurrpa – Dreamtimes – and we always …like every year we go out on country visits and that’s the really main one for young kids and even for me to learn more. I’m really interested about learning more culture, about my people and to know more how they used to live before Yuendumu was established. Where did they live? Their life was so amazing. They had really good lives. They didn’t have any diabetics or stuff like that…sickness. Now everything’s just changing. We want to keep our culture strong for our kids.
When we have ceremonies, most of the time it makes me cry. I just want everyone to keep their culture strong.
Sebastian is a young Warlpiri man who has been an Aboriginal Community Police Officer for the past year. He is also a leader of the football team and lives in Yuendumu with his wife and two children.
What’s strong in yapa way is our culture and the freedom of our life. There’s a lot of strong…a million things that are strong. What makes me strong as an Aboriginal person is – I mean you can’t be too far away from your family and friends so the support from family and friends is what makes us strong and also living with strong relationships and speaking together as one as Aboriginal people and trying to fight for our rights. I hope we do fight for our rights.
It (the intervention) will make a big difference… I don’t know what they’re going to take away from us. Maybe they’ve already taken out the permit system and I don’t know what’s next. I don’t know what’s up ahead in the future. I don’t know what they’ll take. But if they do take something out most of us as Aboriginal people will talk for our rights to keep our culture.
These changes will affect us. I don’t know what we’re going to live on in the future. I don’t really know – a lot of changes will truly hurt us Aboriginal people in many different ways if they change things.
The things for them (my kids) to hold on to is the culture and what we had before and we want to share it on to them and to give it as a gift from the elders. I hope they do.
I hope that people don’t push us away from the communities like Yuendumu or Lajamanu or Papunya. We just want to live normally. And to still live in the same way that we’re living today for our kids. I hope that happens.
Cecil was born in his country at Mt Theo (near Yuendumu) around 1940. An elder of the Warlpiri community, he spent years working as a drover, stockman and labourer in Alice Springs, Darwin and Mt Isa. He now lives in Yuendumu where he works as a Mental Health Worker and Counsellor for WYN Health and the Mt Theo Program. He was recently seen in the documentary ‘Aboriginal Rules’ teaching children how to play the traditional Warlpiri game of ‘purlja’.
In yapa culture, I’d like to see young kids enjoy the life of yapa. Like getting them out there to the homelands and to teach them how to hunt for themselves and live for themselves and their family and grow up themselves as they become a Warlpiri tribe.
I used to sit down with old people when I was young, going out hunting. Where my family used to live at Mt Theo, I stayed with my people, that gave me more experience to live at homelands and for my ownership of the land. We used to get around places in the whole area around Mt Theo; soakages and undergrounds, we go out to and dig up yams or get kangaroo, porcupine or goanna, blue tongue lizards.
Every time I walk around (Yuendumu) …it makes me feel like being out bush. Even when I go out to Mt Theo to visit those kids – it just opens my heart when I get out of here. Yuwayi, I feel like being back out there, in the bush, walking around free or doing things like making boomerangs.
My father and mother and uncle and everybody used to travel around to other places, like to other soakages where there was a big mob. They might have had a corroboree there – purlapa. My father used to go ‘We’ve got to go’ – he liked to join the old people – that’s what he was like – even the young people, he used to take me and my brothers so they can join the dance. Yuwayi.
(Today) I work for (young people) because what they’re doing now is just getting on sniffing and that and I do counselling for them and coach them and talk to them and advise them not to do this type of thing. If you’re going to grow up like that you won’t last long, it’s wearing your life out.
This Jaru Pirrjirdi mob now, well they’re doing good because they take them out camping out and showing them how to hunt and showing them the places where old people – their grandfathers used to hunt from the waterhole and around that land.
In the old days, they (the government) brought us here and then brought the houses and made us stay here. So my family stayed here and old people got sick and passed away in the wrong area. They should’ve passed away in their own homelands to protect their own land and to look after their homeland.
(Kartiya) they’re probably reading (about us) in newspapers and a lot of those things. They might come and find out for themselves. If they come out here and we’ve got an open ceremony out on any of these camp areas and then we’ll just ask them ‘come in’. This is our culture. This is how old people taught us, we’ve got to stick to this law and ceremony. That’s what makes us feel like being Aboriginal, strong.
This government that’s changing the laws – that kills all the yapa. Especially Aboriginal people hurting – it’s hurting. Nearly all this community here we’ve got this Sorry now – we feel sad for ourselves from now. Yuwayi. Like when we went to this (CLC) meeting we felt no good. This area has been – it’s got a map around it – the governments owning it. We don’t want to live on that government lease – we want to live being free like in the old days Yuwayi. Land is important. Why land is important for yapa is because it’s more like our – it’s like my father’s spirit is still there and my great grandfather and grandmother are still there.
The government should’ve just left us alone. We can’t leave our culture behind – it’s just bringing sadness for us. Yuwayi. We can work both ways, with the good organisations and yapa here, we can go together. This, it’s more like interfering. We want to be free and live together or work together. In that way everyone will come together and feel … being Aboriginal, European - and both things will work. Like in cattle stations, we used to enjoy life with the station managers and the stockmen, even with the drovers we used to share, travelling, mustering and working together. That was good. Then after when work used to finish we used to come out on walk-about.
Yapa culture has been strong all the way. We can’t just turn our back on our culture. We can’t just leave and walk out without our culture. We’ll be lost. Like when I went to Darwin, I lived there for 13 years working and talking in English and I said to myself, too much… that’s why I don’t enjoy my city life, I don’t enjoy my town life. It’s alright out here – just here in this small community. It’s more close to my area.
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Connie was born in Yuendumu in 1954 and has lived here all her life, she has 3 children, 6 grandchildren and one great-grand daughter. She lives with her husband, daughter, grand daughter and great grand-daughter. Connie is an active community member and strong participant of the Jardiwarnpa ceremony. Connie is a Board Member of PAW Media & Communications and on both the TMAAC and GMAAC committees which are the bodies responsible for distribution of royalty funds from the Granites and Tanami Gold Mines.
Valerie was born in 1955 and raised in Yuendumu. She has 4 children (including 1 foster child) and 10 grandchildren. Valerie is on the board for Yuendumu Council and PAW Media and Communications. She works at the Yuendumu Womens Centre during the day and spends her evenings on Night Patrol and is the president of the Yuendumu Softball Club.
Connie speaking in Warlpiri, Valerie translating for her.
Connie Our culture is very strong and we want to keep it strong for our kids and we want to keep it as it is for the future. Culture is like dances and the ceremonies like Jardiwarnpa and all that. Not only that but to keep on teaching them all our cultural side from our great-great grandfathers and our great-grandmothers. We want to keep on going so we can teach our young kids nowadays so they can keep carrying it on teach the other generations.
I teach young girls how to dance. Sometimes we do dances in the corroborees. There’s two parts in it – one can sit down quiet like the mothers and the others like to sing out – to teach them to sing out and dance along the way in the corroborees. That’s how we can have our culture strong and also do dances in Jardiwarnpa.
My kids and my grandkids know where it (culture) came from, how to go about it. My grandchildren know how to go through the young men’s business way and they also show the girls how to dance and to go about how to do the Dreamings and all that – Kuruwarri. They know about their great-great grandfather and great-grandfather and their histories, about the cultural way – who the Dreamings belong to and who not. That’s the way that they can learn and teach one another as well and to keep it strong.
(The intervention) is very devastating for us. It’s going to be very sad – how are we going to teach them how to make young men and young women, how are they going to do that?
Valerie It's going to be very hard about the changes that are coming in – into our community. It is going to break us. How are we going to go about teaching our young kids about our cultural side? It’s at breaking point at the moment now because of the laws that are being handed down to us, it's very hard.
We need our kids and our great-great-grandkids to go out and to know where they came from, where they’re really from, where their ancestors are from, which country, how they are connected to it. They need to know by visiting that country.
I can see more or less they want us to teach our kids the kardiya side, the white man’s side, instead of teaching our own. But we want our own kids to know about our culture as well as the white man’s way. They need to know where they stand too. For a start we need our rights not taken away from us. Without our cultural side; the country, the ceremony, the sacred sites that we are connected to… the land – absolutely we are nothing. Our dignity is going to be taken away and our rights. We are nothing then.
I hope whoever’s listening can support us because this is not right for us. Somebody should come and support us. This is not the right way to go about it teaching our kids the other way. We need someone to support us so we can teach our kids the right way, our way, the Aboriginal way, who they really belong to.
Francis was one of the founders of Warlpiri Media and starred in its most well known production 'Bush Mechanics' and more recently in 'Aboriginal Rules.'
Families will always be there taking part with the culture and customary laws and all that, it’ll always be there but kids need to learn more. In the skin groups we’ve got Japanangka, Jakamarra, Japangardi, Jupurrurla, Jungarrayi, Nungarrayi, Jampijijinpa, Nangala and Jangala - all those. The eight skin groups are practiced and there’s a law in there that you can’t mix, you’ve got to stay in that group or stay in this group because they are guardians in those areas to look after it.
John Howard’s just talking out of the blue just saying this and that but he’s never been to remote areas sitting down with old people or practicing our law. Kardiya have got by-laws, Aboriginal people have got cultural laws. By-laws means like constitutions – they stick to that, the law written down and they have to act on that but Aboriginal law, yes you can take it out change it here, change it there or here but the law is still the same. It’s not a written law. It's in the mind and the ceremonies.
We have forgotten about some of the good things. In the past people used to footwalk for their hunting but today the quickest way of doing hunting is by motor car now. And people don’t use spears anymore they use rifles now these days to get something out there in the bush for their families. Everything has been changed all the way along because it’s about two laws and two cultures. One is the culture that Aboriginal people used to exercise on strongly and believe. Today there’re two beliefs.
Outstations, homelands are good things, People go there for country visits – take kids back down there and learn about their culture and stories and songs.
Today people are recognising that we should be getting those cultural laws back for young people. Young people are important because they are the future for us. None of us won’t be around. Like this government plan now, they’re putting it for 99 year lease and 5 year lease. What’s the young people’s future going to be? That’s really important. We should have our cultural laws mixed into the government law.
Ceremonies will always be there because they know how to operate those in their skin groups you know - whose turn this year and whose turn next year – it’s like for fire ceremonies and Jardiwarnpas and travelling to other communities for the ceremonies. Ceremonies are still really strong but who is going to take it on when these (old people) are not going to be around?
We got a language policy at the school and Warlukurlangu Arts to teach kids old people’s ways like drawings on canvas, dot paintings and plus they go to school and they’re teaching young people dancing and songs. And a few white people are involved in it to encourage others. Language is always there. But the main foreign language is English. My grandchildren can’t talk good English, they speak Warlpiri and they can write it. English is the most struggle languages for the kids to learn. It's better to have both languages. Well, kardiya culture, there’s everything in there. We can pick up the kardiya culture but kardiya can’t pick our culture – they have to be taught. That’s important. Yapa culture – spreading it out – showing other people that the culture is strong and has spiritual feelings.
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