Southward movement of water - the water ways

• Main Author: Kerwin, Dale Wayne
• Format: Doctoral or Postdoctoral Thesis
• Language: unknown
• Published: 2020
• Subjects: First Nations laws; Earth­centred laws; spiritual beliefs; religious beliefs; water; natural environment; cultural heritage; First Nations
• Online Access: https://research.usq.edu.au/item/q6783/southward-movement-of-water-the-water-ways; https://research.usq.edu.au/download/e638f005e37e4b3376eae87b30475466c8cc9398762c0a62e253b5a158b9a8af/9731654/PDF%20Dale%20Kerwin%20Thesis.pdf; https://doi.org/10.26192/1z6k-mk53

This thesis explores the acculturation of the Australian landscape by the First Nations people of Australia who named it, mapped it and used tangible and intangible material property in designing their laws and lore to manage the environment. This is taught through song, dance, stories, and paintings. Through the tangible and intangible knowledge there is acknowledgement of the First Nations people’s knowledge of the water flows and rivers from Carpentaria to Goolwa in South Australia as a cultural continuum and passed onto younger generations by Elders. This knowledge is remembered as storyways, songlines and trade routes along the waterways; these are mapped as a narrative through illustrations on scarred trees, the body, engravings on rocks, or earth geographical markers such as hills and physical features, and other natural features of flora and fauna in the First Nations cultural memory. The thesis also engages in a dialogical discourse about the paradigm of 'ecological arrogance' in Australian law for water and environmental management policies, whereby Aqua Nullius, Environmental Nullius and Economic Nullius is written into Australian laws. It further outlines how the anthropocentric value of nature as a resource and the accompanying humanistic technology provide what modern humans believe is the tool for managing ecosystems. In response, today there is a coming together of the First Nations people and the new Australians in a shared histories perspective, to highlight and ensure the protection of natural values to land and waterways which this thesis also explores. As a Worimi man I have been part of this community coming together of Australians which recognises the First Nations people’s cultural obligations to water and land. This has also extended to the legal theatre where Aboriginal jurisprudence is slowly being recognised in land Rights and Native Title. Hence it is like the Lore for the Kadaitcha man and the Illapurinja (female Kadaitcha) pointing the bone at Australian common law for recognition ...