Indigenous Science Network Bulletin http://members.ozemail.com.au/~mmichie/network.html August 2014 (Volume 17, Number 4) ISSN 1449-2091 Editor: Michael Michie Tiwi designs by Jennifer Coombs, Melville Island, NT NEWS and VIEWS What do you call that plant or animal in Bininj Gunwok? A new online resource documenting Aboriginal names for plants and animals in Kakadu and west Arnhem Land is now available. For more than twenty years, linguist and anthropologist Murray Garde has been learning and working together with Bininj people to document and support the Bininj Gunwok dialects of the region. Bininj Gunwok is a dialect chain that stretches from Kakadu National Park in the west through to the Mann, Liverpool and Cadell rivers districts south of Maningrida. The online resource includes the Bininj Gunwok names for common plant and animal species from the region, and features beautiful artwork and photographs. Murray says that many people working and living in the region need to know the Bininj Gunwok names for natural species, because it is a basic first step in land management and ecological knowledge recording. “Indigenous land management rangers, scientists, linguists, arts centre workers, tourists, students and others who have an interest in Indigenous ecological knowledge will find this online resource useful,” he said. “Making lists of names may sound straightforward, but there are six different Bininj Gunwok dialects which often have vocabulary differences for various species, and Indigenous systems of taxonomy are different to those used in western science.” It was decided at a Kakadu Board meeting in 2013 that making the names more accessible would take the burden away from Bininj involved in land management and non-Indigenous researchers, who are regularly asked for the correct names and spelling. The interactive database includes audio files of the Bininj Gunwok name so that users can hear how to pronounce words. Users can also upload their own photos of natural species. The resource is a work in progress, as it will take some years to fill all the categories out for all dialects. Please help us by contributing information or photographs. Log on to http://mayh-dja- kundulk.bininjgunwok.org.au/, call (08) 8946 7619 or email [email protected]. 1 Bora Ceremonial Grounds and the Milky Way: a Connection? By Robert Fuller and Duane Hamacher As we learn more about how Aboriginal people utilized the night sky, we find increasing complexity and intellectual depth in this knowledge. This article discusses some research about the orientation of Aboriginal ceremonial sites and their connection to the the Milky Way. Most Aboriginal language groups in Australia practiced initiation ceremonies. In some places, this tradition continues. During this ceremony, teenage boys were taken through a rite of passage, where they would perfectly recite the stories, laws, and customs they were taught, and perform the dances with extreme precision among other things. The initiation also involved a form of body modification, but most of these details are considered secret. This ceremony proved to their elders that they were ready to be men. In southeastern Australia, it was generally known as a Bora ceremony, taken from the Kamilaroi term for the word. The Bora ceremony was commented upon by the earliest European arrivals in Sydney. One of the first Bora sites identified was at Farm Cove in Sydney – what is now the Botanic Gardens near the Opera House. Most Bora grounds have a distinct shape. They tend to consist of two rings of flattened earth, with an embankment of raised earth or stones, and a pathway connecting them. One is a larger “public” circle, where women and other people can attend. The other is a smaller sacred circle, which is considered sacred and secret. This is where the final part of the initiation and body modification takes place. Secret parts of the ceremony are not discussed out of respect to the Aboriginal elders. Bora ceremonies take place between August and the following March, which are the summer months. The ceremonial grounds are often laid out long before the ceremony is held, or even renewed from previous ceremonies. Although Bora ceremonies were held at any time over this long period, it seems many of them were held in August and September. And this may have astronomical significance. 2 Left: Photograph of a Bora ceremony, taken in 1898 by Charles Kerry (National Library of Australia). Right: Casino Bora Ground, Richmond Valley, NSW (Sandra Bowdler) It seems the Bora ceremony is connected to the Emu in the Sky. The Emu in the Sky is a spirit emu found in the Milky Way. This Aboriginal constellation is not made up of bright stars, but instead comprises dark patches in the Milky Way, stretching from the Coalsack Nebula near the Southern Cross down to the centre of the galaxy in Scorpius. Since male emus brood, hatch, and rear the emu chicks, it is symbolic of the initiation of adolescent boys by their male elders. In southeast Australia, the culture hero Baiame is believed to live behind the Milky Way. The son of Baiame, is a being called Daramulan, who watches over, and even comes down from the sky for, the Bora ceremony, and his wife is an emu. Left: The Emu in the Sky. Right: The Sky Bora in the Milky Way at the time of year ceremonies were held, usually in the evenings in August and September. One elder said that the Bora ceremonial ground was reflected in the Milky Way as the Sky Bora: two dark patches within the Milky Way that mimic the two earthly Bora circles (Figure 4). These dark patches are also within the celestial emu: the larger one is the Coalsack (the Emu’s head) and the other is down the Milky Way towards the Emu’s body. As it turns out, August and September is when the Milky Way is vertical above the south-southwest horizon in the evening sky. Because of this connection, the researchers – Robert Fuller (Macquarie University), Dr Duane Hamacher (University of New South Wales), and Professor Ray Norris (CSIRO/Macquarie University) – wondered if the Bora ceremonial grounds were oriented to the direction of the Sky Bora/Emu in the Sky when Bora ceremonies were held. Information collected by 3 anthropologists learning from Aboriginal elders suggested as much, but Fuller, Hamacher, and Norris needed to demonstrate this. Fuller and his colleagues collected data for a significant number of Bora grounds in New South Wales and southeastern Queensland. They identified a subset that contained clear information about the site’s orientation, from the large circle to small circle (mostly within 200 km of Brisbane). The remaining sites showed that a significant number of them were oriented to the southern quadrant – more so than any other direction (and by quite a bit more!). This is interesting, but could these results be a product of chance? To test this hypothesis, the researchers used a statistical technique called a Monte Carlo simulation. This is where random orientations, like those of the Bora grounds, were simulated millions of times over. If these orientations were common, the simulation would confirm that. The researchers ran the simulation 100 million times. Only 303 of the simulations gave a result like the one found by Fuller and his colleagues. This means the probability of these orientations occurring by chance is one in 3 million, or 0.0003%! This confirms that there is definitely a preference for Bora grounds to be oriented towards the south. This coincides with the position of the Milky Way in the evening sky during August and September. Is this conclusive proof that Bora ceremonial grounds were oriented to the position of the Milky Way in August and September? No. But it takes us one step closer to finding out. Fuller and his colleagues are currently working with elders across NSW to learn more about the Bora ceremony and its connection to the sky, which is starting to reveal new and interesting facts about this initiation ceremony. To learn more about the research, see the paper “Astronomical Orientations of Bora Ceremonial Grounds in Southeast Australia.” Australian Archaeology, No. 77, pp. 30-37. Engaging Indigenous students through science The power of science to lift the educational outcomes of Indigenous high school students in regional areas has been highlighted during a national conference on engagement in higher education at Charles Sturt University. Read More National Association for Research in Science Teaching Distinguished Contribution to Science Education through Research Award Dr. Glen Aikenhead has made distinguished contributions to science education during the course of his career. His scholarship and research have focused on curriculum and instruction, cross-cultural school science, student assessment, and teachers’ practical knowledge. He has influenced policy and the science education community in all of these areas and his career has been punctuated by seminal work with respect to science-technology-society and nature of science. His body of research includes many research and theoretical publications that can be found in the most prestigious journals in science education. He is especially well known for his work in the area of indigenous knowledge, and the associated phrase, “Border Crossings” along with his work on the development and applications of the Views on Science – Technology – Society test (VOSTS). Most recently, he synthesized over four decades of research in his four areas of interest culminating in the book: Science Education for Everyday Life. Most impressive about his scholarship is the balance struck between theory and practice. His work has clearly influenced both classroom teachers and science education researchers. Glen Aikenhead has made distinguished and continuing contributions to science education research through his mentoring of PhD students throughout the world.