13. Learning Practice Wisdom from Elders
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BARBARA HILL, AUNTY BERYL YUNGHA-DHU PHILIP-CARMICHAEL AND RUTH BACCHUS 13. LEARNING PRACTICE WISDOM FROM ELDERS Wisdom Moments and How to Recognise Them Ngiyeempaa Woman I’m a Ngiyeempaa Woman Fighting all the way For my people’s needs are many And I’m growing older each day The struggle seems to build up No matter how hard we fight on It’s our young people we care about When to them what we do seems all wrong We are rejected and cursed from morning ‘til night But we must fight on regardless and try to make things alright For I’m a Ngiyeempaa Woman standing steadfast and sure True to my ancestors Eagle Hawk’s and Crow’s very strong law. Aunty Beryl Yungha-Dhu Philip-Carmichael (2019) INTRODUCTION Most of the great battles are fought in the creases of topographic maps. Michael Ondaatje (2018) We are all volcanoes. When we women offer our experience as our truths, as human truth, all the maps change. There are new mountains. Ursula K. Le Guin (1997) Aunty Beryl is 83 years old – a mother of 10 with five children still living. She is a grandmother and great-grandmother, and Aunty to many people from all cultures and walks of life. She is one of the last Ngiyeempaa-speaking Elders left in her community. She has fought for her Country all her life and she still does. She has always fought for education. She has fought for space in curriculum and she has fought for space in the topographic creases of our University maps. She is a tireless fighter for her people and for reconciliation between cultures. She is one of the Traditional Owners and Knowledge holders who has the cultural authority to speak for Ngiyeempaa Country. © KONINKLIJKE BRILL NV, LEIDEN, 2019 _DOI: 9789004410497_013 Barbara Hill, Aunty Beryl Yungha-Dhu Philip-Carmichael, and Ruth Bacchus - 9789004410497 Downloaded from Brill.com10/02/2021 08:47:11PM via free access HILL ET AL. What we can know about wisdom is that it has a geography. It is located in time – however we define it – and it is located in our connection and relationship to each other and to our connection to Mother Earth – to the places where we have learned to grow. This map – this chapter – is a story woven by the three of us: a meditation if you like on what we feel wisdom is; how we get it, how we recognise it and how we keep it alive. It is about wisdom moments and it is about reaching out for wisdom. It is about everyday wisdom practice that has been developed through our work as teachers and leaders and by our personal experience as human beings. It is a mix of many things and so is multi-layered, fluid, unfixed and both simple and complex. Every decision we make is influenced by the practice wisdom which is formed by our life experience and extends into everything we do in all our various identities: in Aunt’s case as a knowledge holder, but for us all – as friends, parents, teachers, scholars and poets. Poetry and stories – indeed all narrative – is a way of inter- weaving ideas and thoughts and it is the love of poetry that brought us together. At least 65,000 years of continuous Aboriginal culture in this country mean our shared stories also shape and change as we learn more about Australia's ancient past. Before western archaeologists, there were ancient ones who could read the land like a map – and read the creases of those topographical maps – to tell the story not only of what was/is there but of what was/is not. Billy Griffiths, in Deep Time Dreaming: Uncovering Ancient Australia (2018), suggests that the revelation of deep time has indeed meant a profound shift in how [non–Indigenous] Australians relate to their country. Reviewing Griffiths’ book, Rebe Taylor (2018) suggests Archaeology has made deep time dreamers of us all. Griffiths quotes Indigenous activist Charlie Perkins from Peter Read’s Charles Perkins: A Biography (1990): My expectation of a good Australia is when White people would be proud … when they realise that Aboriginal culture … is all there waiting for us all. White people can inherit … 60,000 years of culture, and all have they to do is reach out and ask for it. (p. 315) As Taylor (2018) suggests, the powerful thing about Charlie Perkins’ offer is not only the generosity but the obligations it carries. Similarly, Mark McKenna (2018), in his essay Moment of Truth: History and Australia’s Future, acknowledges all that has been forgotten and lost in the past 200 years since colonisation. Where Taylor suggests the deep past has “bequeathed a living, complex Indigenous culture” that “requires a collective recognition and respect to ensure its endurance into the future” (p. 1), historian Mark McKenna (2018) writes of what Mick Dodson calls “the Australian psyche” and its fear of facing truth, as well as W. E. H. Stanner’s (1968) idea of an “Australian Consciousness” that is resistant to confronting a profound historical truth: the recognition that the material successes of Australian society, with its inherent power structures, are built upon the dispossession of Indigenous Australians – and that this still “causes so many to avert their eyes” (pp. 15-16). 142 Barbara Hill, Aunty Beryl Yungha-Dhu Philip-Carmichael, and Ruth Bacchus - 9789004410497 Downloaded from Brill.com10/02/2021 08:47:11PM via free access LEARNING PRACTICE WISDOM FROM ELDERS AUNTY BERYL’S STORY – HOW WISDOM RELATES TO COUNTRY, SPIRITUALITY; HOW WISDOM RELATES TO KNOWLEDGE AND LEARNING AND TEACHING Guthi Guthi mookamigdar ngalia! Sacred Ancestral Being watch over us all We must have great respect for our Ancestral spiritual beings who created the land for us along with all life forms to live in peace and harmony. Grandmothers/ grandfathers have and maintain all decision-making power inside their Nations. Everything that our Spiritual beings created is very sacred, and our guidance and directions are shaped by this sacred powerful force. It is this sacredness linked to our Spiritual self which watches over and around us at all times in today’s ever-changing society. The Ancestral spiritual beings made sure all other Spiritual beings through all lifeforms kept true to their obligations to the Universe and fulfilled their Dreams. These were the keepers of water, vegetation, sun and moon, stars, animals, birds and reptiles. Special objects of stone along with the lore that was created to govern their lives for evermore were shown to Grandmothers and Grandfathers as well as law men and women to be used only for special ceremonies, about how to look after the land – our Mother – for this is where we came from and return to after death. We should always be on alert for signs from birds, animals, ants and all life forms for these signs are imparting to us how and when we must act to protect ourselves against rough weather, floods and drought. All laws passed onto us were very strict and to break them meant banishment form the tribe. Young people were very important and they were taught only what was right and just when very young. When old enough they would be instructed in the lore/law of their tribal lands that would govern their lives for evermore, in being good hunters and gatherers, fathers, mothers and teachers. So too men and women had various stages of the law to go through to enable them to be good hunters and gatherers, and good respectful parents to all their children, nieces and nephews. We must teach our children from an early age to be good and kind to their family, pets, parents and grandparents and to listen carefully to sound advice whilst out walking, hunting and gathering. They are told – this will keep you from getting lost. Listen carefully whilst out gathering food and all resources that will help you survive by identifying it all. If you are thirsty a little bird called the Zebra Finch will lead you to water; he cannot survive without sucking up water. How the wind blows will also be imparting messages to you, sometimes good, sometimes sad, and likewise the whirly wind. Grandmothers are full of knowledge and must be respected at all times. Listen to the sound advice they impart to you as it will give you great guidance, great respect for different cultural values and it will equip you for a holistic lifestyle wherever you wander. It is like a shield to you from within her Spiritual self. Guide all and advise them well. 143 Barbara Hill, Aunty Beryl Yungha-Dhu Philip-Carmichael, and Ruth Bacchus - 9789004410497 Downloaded from Brill.com10/02/2021 08:47:11PM via free access HILL ET AL. Life on the River The Elders I have walked with are Granny Nancy Biggs and Granny Rosie Johnston. Granny Nancy Biggs taught all us girls on Menindee Mission how to identify raw material for the manufacturing of string for making and weaving of string bags or dilly bags for carrying, as well as identifying basket grass and reeds for mats. Granny Rosie Johnston taught us how to find witchetty grubs in the ground for fishing as well as Bardi grubs from the tree trunks as bait for fishing. She also taught us where were the right places to go and fish so we would get a good feed. Ancestral beings who created the river, waterholes and tributaries of the Murray/Darling Basin need the water to enable lifeblood to flow freely throughout the Basin. Aboriginal people who still remember the stories are saddened to know how much destruction has occurred and is still continuing along our natural waterways by blockages to stop the natural flow, for self-usage.