Living on Stolen Land by Ambelin Kwaymullina

Image source: photo by the artist (purchased by Yarn Strong Sista)

Reading Reflection written October 2022

Ambelin is a wordsmith with bullseye precision. With minimalistic style, she writes with the authority of an academic, the creativity of a poet and the nurturing undertones of a mother. There’s an ineffable way master storytellers like Ambelin share history and reframe historiography in a way that speaks to you and not at you. If I were ever to meet Ambelin in a social setting, I imagine she’d possess that magnetic quality, the quiet-confidence of someone who’s living an extraordinary life and yet humbly chooses to listen to others over speaking about themself.

This book surprised me in more ways than one. I originally thought this was a children’s book and then after reading, it propelled me into such a state of self-reflection. The Bias and Behaviours elements of this book were so thought provoking; How often am I a passenger or driver in structural, explicit and unconscious bias? How often am I a ‘do-nothing person’, a ‘saviour’, a ‘discoverer’? Who do I know that’s a ‘change-maker’ and how can I be more like them? 

Accepting that I will never understand Indigenous cultures is a humbling exercise. In a world where the powerful have historically been untouchable abusers, understanding the importance of certain knowledge as being sacred adds new meaning to the truism knowledge is power. Translation and interpreting silence are themes I’d love to transcribe through painting. The concept of timing and its significance is something that has also grounded roots in my mind to become an artistic line of enquiry. Would I have appreciated this book if I hadn’t previously read anything written by Indigenous authors? Yes, anyone reading this with any amount of previous exposure to Indigenous perspectives will intimately hear Amblelin’s messages. 

Read this book when you feel like decluttering your tendencies. Read again and again when you're open to replacing your dated rose-coloured glasses.

Every Mother’s Son is Guilty by Chris Owen

Image source UWA Publishing

Reading Reflections written January 2022

How can the garden of national identity flourish when its soil is poisoned?

Every Mother’s Son is Guilty is life-changing; it uncovers the shockwaves of British imperialism. This book is a step-by-step recipe for how people in power facilitated unqualified authority-figures to impose draconian laws (and worse, undocumented dishonourable practices). Chris tells the story of the infancy of evil where silence and turning a blind eye is the catalyst for national cancer. Like a paedophile looking at the dark web through an incognito window, the systems and prejudices that stemmed from this period are an ever festering petri dish for dehumanisation.

Reading this is the unwrapping of an unwanted present containing historiographical accounts of: idealistic dreams, escapism, monetary gain, unaccountability, pacification and violence all wrapped up with an altruistic bow of solving a supposed problem. I wonder if the current Prime Minister of Australia has read this. I doubt it, which brings me to the question of, what do they read over there when being 'inducted' to the most prestigious role in the country? I'd love to see their ‘training/ introductory slides’. I’d love to know the material they are ‘required’ to look at (not to mention the material they read by their own will). What do the libraries of the most powerful people on the planet contain? I'd love to know how many Aboriginal sources (written by Aboriginal people) call home to these libraries. 

When I drive past the Parliament building (with its obnoxiously oversized flag holder- holding one flag), I'm struck by the realisation that it's obvious that the majority of Australia’s national representatives don’t care about Aboriginal people. If they did, then the national anthem, the national flag and the national education system would consistently reflect joint cultures. 

I still can’t believe how long it took me to read this book, over three years. I had to stop myself at times, spending weeks slowly (sometimes a page at time) reflecting on what was unfolding. There’s such a sinister connection between the silenced accounts of men taking (and being ‘given') Aboriginal girls and women to be raped and sold for prostitution, all the while these same men are raping gold and pearls from the earth. (I must remember to investigate this line of inquiry for an art series, something along the lines of ‘all that shines is not golden’ / ‘The true price of natural resources’ / ‘taking what's not yours', give more thought to this and revisit in the future).  

How would my family and friends feel celebrating with a public holiday and feast to celebrate the date Germany invaded Poland, the seed of WWII? I’m certain no-one I know and love with a beating heart and conscious mind would ever enjoy a BBQ feast and parade union jack flags to celebrate the the 26th of January (so called 'Australia Day'), if they truly understood that this day doesn't represent discovery, it so fittingly represents what happened as a result of this date, the denied-annihilation of human lives valued less than others. This book makes me feel anxious for Australia's future because our foundations are not honest. 

Read this book when you care about truth and justice. Read again and again when you are ready to explore; If words can be daggers, what can silence be?

Dark Emu by Bruce Pascoe

Image source Audible

Narrated by the author on Audible

Reading Reflection written September 2020

I wish I had read this sooner. I wish this was one of my bedtime stories read to me when I was a little girl.

I wish that my exposure to the actual history of Australia, the physical land and Aboriginal Peoples that have called it home for thousands and thousands of years wasn’t white-washed. What a beautiful breath of fresh air to contrast the previous accounts of bloodshed I've found when learning about so-called ‘Aboriginal history’, more accurately Australia’s-European history/ the shock waves of colonialism. I feel as if I’ve been stopped in my tracks, at a roundabout of shock-disbelief-disgust-gratitude-sorrow. I’m grateful that Aboriginal agricultural methods are documented through this book, preserved for my son to read.

Dark Emu is written and spoken with such endearing-sophistication by Bruce, I wish to meet him and hear his warm voice in the flesh one day. Dark Emu evokes a gut wrenching sadness in me, the kind you feel when there’s an injustice so close to you and you feel helpless, like when someone in your family is physically and emotionally traumatised. I also feel frustrated that the imagery of Aboriginal people that I was presented with growing up, was not only gross misrepresentations, they were part of an intricate blanket of lies designed to suffocate those not in the decision making hierarchies. 

Read this book when you want to feel small, not in a way that you don’t matter, small as in young, as if you have been away from home too long and are being read a bedtime story. Read again and again when you wish that history was not filled with nightmares and you need to awaken rejuvenated.