BlackWords - The BlackWords Essays

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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Writers and Storytellers

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The BlackWords Essays by Dr Anita Heiss

This collection of essays has been produced for teachers, students, researchers, and readers in order to highlight AustLit’s BlackWords project, the most comprehensive resource of Indigenous Australian writing available. The essays aim to assist readers to better understand the impact of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander writing and publishing on Australia’s literary landscape.
The essays showcase recent trends in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander writing and highlight the diversity of voices, the range of themes, the genres authors are publishing in, and the ongoing importance of storytelling in contemporary Indigenous society. Common themes emerge in the concerns of Indigenous writers: identity; connection to country; urban life; language maintenance and reclamation. While Indigenous authored books to assist with literacy at a community level is a growing aspect of publishing.
Terminology
A range of terminology has been used in these essays in order to define Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander writers and storytellers who make up the BlackWords dataset. In each case, the chosen term reflects the context of the work being considered. The term ‘First Peoples’ and ‘First Nations’ will mean Aboriginal only, while Indigenous and Black are inclusive of both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples.
The Essays y
From 'Avoiding Mr Right'

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Celebrating the New Australian Literature

From the essay:
The last 40 years have seen a steady rise in the volume of Aboriginal writing published as authors across genres write stories that reflect not only the diversity of who we are today, but also demonstrate the skills we have collectively and individually honed over time. This paper looks at writing and publishing over the past decade (2005 - 2014 ) and explores the resources and milieu around Indigenous authored and controlled activities during the period.
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From 'The Swan Book'

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Writers on Identity

From the essay:
Man y authors are inspired by the need to redress historical government definitions of Aboriginality, to reclaim pride in First Nation status, to explain the diversity of Aboriginal experience, and to demonstrate the realities and complexities of ‘being Aboriginal’ in the 21 st century. This paper discusses some key texts that deal with the topic of Aboriginal identity in a range of genres.
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Writers on Country

From the essay:
While Aboriginal people live in cities, often away from our own traditional lands (many travel for work, education and relationships), it does not mean as individuals we are not aware of communal responsibilities for maintaining stories and knowledge of traditional areas and showing respect for custodians of country. It does not mean, either, that city-dwellers are ignorant of clan groups or language groups, or roles as owners and managers of country. Rather, what it means is that Aboriginal authors today are considering connections to country not only through familial lines, but connection s also through the long political, social and other cultural associations to particular places.
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From 'Too Afraid to Cry'

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Writers on The Stolen Generations

From the essay:
This paper extends the discussion of other papers in this collection in its use of government policy as a stimulus to writing. It shows how Aboriginal literature – and the ways its stories have morphed into other forms of media narratives – foregrounds broad political and social debates in the most intimate and engaging of ways. I aim here to demonstrate that stories, poetry, songs, plays and memoirs are ‘living’ evidence of truths otherwise untold or appropriated. The works referred to here are powerful and challenging.
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From 'Indigenous Australian Voices: A Reader'

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Indigenous Stories Told Collectively

From the essay:
The competitive nature of such literary mainstream productions in some ways reflects the western values of competition over cooperation, and the individual over the community. Such values are diametrically opposed to Aboriginal value systems, which highlight cooperation and community benefit. These two values are demonstrated in the production of Indigenous literature and all – Indigenous anthologies – where authors are joined together (most of them gratefully) to share stories and visions for the benefit of all. For most writers – regardless of heritage – being published in an anthology is a professional achievement and often a personal thrill. But with Indigenous anthologies, there is nearly always a specific cultural, social or political reason for the anthologies beyond their literary worth.
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From 'Dingo's Tree'

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Children's Literature about Country

From the essay:
This paper addresses stereotypical ideas about living on/in ‘Country’ and explains the complexities and contemporary usages of the term in engaging and understandable ways. The sub-headings map and direct the flow of ideas, themes, issues and dreaming(s) addressed in each location and the texts explore and illustrate the subtleties and layers of usage.
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From 'Stolen Girl'

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Aboriginal Children's Literature

From the essay:
There is far more to Aboriginal authored children’s books than telling the expected Dreaming or creation stories through text and brightly coloured artwork. Rather, for the past decade, books in this genre have raised the bar in terms of the greater worth of children’s literature and literature for young readers in Australia, with Aboriginal titles being increasingly defined by their social, cultural, historical and political value.
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From 'Rusty and JoJo'

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Serious Issues for Young Readers

From the essay:
This paper explores some texts written for young or inexperienced readers. It introduces some useful texts that can be used in teaching or in literacy acquisition. The works discussed here can also be used to share ideas about and discuss matters relating to Indigenous identity in the context of self-identification, self-esteem, and cultural belonging. Students and young people from all cultural backgrounds will be able to relate to the experiences of the Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander characters in the stories .
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From 'Dig Dig Dig' (Honey Ant Readers)

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Indigenous Literacy

From the essay:
Literacy is essential to Aboriginal people's self-determination. As someone who has had the good fortune of English literacy since my childhood and enjoyed all the benefits it brought me as a teenager and adult, I know that if we cannot read we cannot make the decisions that inevitably impact on our lives. Self-determination requires each of us to have the literacy to have the power to make our own decisions and control our own futures. Only when we are self-determined as individuals will we be self-determined as a nation of peoples.
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Acknowledgements y

The author, Dr Anita Heiss, would like to thank Emeritus Professor Gus Worby, Flinders University and Yunggorendi First Nations Centre, for his professional support and good will in undertaking a scholarly edit of these essays; and to Kerry Kilner for textual editing and for recognising the importance of having them as part of the AustLit database.
Dr Heiss would also like to acknowledge the support of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Arts Board of the Australia Council who granted her a literature fellowship to research and write these essays, and thereby making them freely available to visitors to BlackWords. AustLit maintains BlackWords through the support of The University of Queensland and the generosity of our subscribers.