AustLit

'This volume is dedicated to Deborah Bird Rose (1946—2018) who is deeply missed by many in the extended cultural studies community. Her unforgettable creativity, initially as an anthropologist working with the Yarralin people the Victoria River District, produced Dingo Makes Us Human (1992). In Reports from a Wild Country (2004), Deb took an Indigenous-inspired philosophical turn to consider what decolonisation might look like if it were attentive to Yarralin ontologies. Then, in Wild Dog Dreaming (2011) she turned to fully-consider relations with the more-than-human in a time of extinction. More than explicating or exploring the persistence and power of Indigenous cultures, Deb invited readers to learn from those who have triumphed despite invasion and colonisation. The power of her work makes her reader feel country and be inspired to move our feet differently across land as a ‘nourishing terrain’. Her capacity to evoke and hold out for kinship between human and non-human animals was vital and inspiring. So, it seems fitting that this volume is titled ‘Extinction’ given Deb contributed so much to alerting us to the multiple orders of extinction, be it the silencing of country when its stories were lost or the vulnerabilities of flying foxes. Her blog featured these simple words against a photographic image of a sunset over what looks like desert country: 

‘Deborah Bird Rose

Love at the Edge of Extinction’

(Katrina Schlunke, Chris Healy Extinction)