Description:
This paper is concerned to re-examine Aboriginal spatial organization in the far northwest region of Victoria from Mildura to the Victorian border with South Australia. RMW Dixon (Working Papers) has noted that there is a multiplicity of names of groups in this region, and their status must be resolved. It does this by examining the primary sources and nineteenth century reconstructions such as Thomas, Goodwin, Smyth, Mathews, and Howitt, and then through a more critical analysis of twentieth century reconstructions such as Tindale. It finds that south of the Murray River and west of Mildura there were two language groups: Keramin (which included Jarijari at Mildura) and Yuyu to their west. Keramin at Mildura claimed country on both sides of the Murray River, however the Yuyu were only on the southern side of the river. The northern side of the Murray River belonged to Marawara, the southernmost dialect of Pakantji. The presence of the Marawara south of the Murray River is considered a post-contact adaptation.
Description:
As a result of recommendations from the New South Wales Legislative Council Select Committee appointed in June 1849 to assess the success or failure of the Aboriginal Protectorate system in Port Phillip, the protectorate was dismantled in late 1849. The abolition of the Protectorate heralded a decade of laissez faire policy and neglect of Aboriginal people in Victoria. William Thomas, the assistant protector responsible for the Melbourne or Western Port Protectorate District, was retained and given the title of 'Guardian of Aborigines', but he concentrated on Aboriginal people living or visiting Melbourne.
Description:
The determination of Aboriginal languages in north-east Victoria has been acknowledged by a number of authors as one of the most problematical areas in the reconstruction of Victorian Aboriginal languages and dialects at the time of first contact.[1] Of particular interest is the Omeo district and resolution of the labels ‘Jaithmathang’ and ‘Gundungerre’. This article will provide a systematic analysis of primary sources relative to language, dialect and social group names. It also provides an overview of lexicostatistical analyses of vocabulary from the study area and undertakes a preliminary analysis of vocabulary from the Omeo district to determine its similarity with neighbouring languages. Finally it analyses previous research into constituent social groups.
Description:
The determination of Aboriginal languages in north-east Victoria has been acknowledged by a number of authors as one of the most problematical areas in the reconstruction of Victorian Aboriginal languages and dialects at the time of first contact.[1] Of particular interest is the Omeo district and resolution of the labels ‘Jaithmathang’ and ‘Gundungerre’. This article will provide a systematic analysis of primary sources relative to language, dialect and social group names. It also provides an overview of lexicostatistical analyses of vocabulary from the study area and undertakes a preliminary analysis of vocabulary from the Omeo district to determine its similarity with neighbouring languages. Finally it analyses previous research into constituent social groups.
Description:
In 2005 the so-called 'Aboriginal History wars' moved from Tasmania to a new convincing ground in Victoria. Michael Connor contested the historiography behind an alleged Aboriginal massacre at a site known as the 'Convincing Ground', at Allestree, on the coast some ten kilometres north of Portland. The site came to public attention in January 2005 when Aboriginal Cultural Heritage Officers halted bulldozing and development work that had begun as part of a proposed coastal residential development. It subsequently became the subject of a Federal Court Native Title case and a Victorian Civil Administrative Tribunal hearing. The dispute with the residential developer was settled in February 2007 when it was agreed that an area of land that encompasses the Convincing Ground would be set aside as a reservation.
Description:
The purpose of this article is to describe and document the nascent state of hospitality in colonial Victoria from the 1830s until the gold rushes of 1850s. The primary source of such an account is the personal journal of a public servant, George Augustus Robinson, the Chief Protector of the Port Phillip Aboriginal Protectorate Department, perhaps the European with the most experience of travelling throughout the Port Phillip District. Accounts from other contemporary sources are used to complement Robinson's observations.
Description:
The purpose of this article is to describe and document the nascent state of hospitality in colonial Victoria from the 1830s until the gold rushes of 1850s. The primary source of such an account is the personal journal of a public servant, George Augustus Robinson, the Chief Protector of the Port Phillip Aboriginal Protectorate Department, perhaps the European with the most experience of travelling throughout the Port Phillip District. Accounts from other contemporary sources are used to complement Robinson's observations.
Description:
This book showcases current research into Indigenous and minority placenames in Australia and internationally. Many of the chapters in this volume originated as papers at a Trends in Toponymy conference hosted by the University of Ballarat in 2007 that featured Australian and international speakers. The chapters in this volume provide insight into the quality of toponymic research that is being undertaken in Australia and in countries such as Canada, Finland, South Africa, New Zealand, and Norway. The research presented here draws on the disciplines of linguistics, geography, history, and anthropology. This book includes meticulous studies of placenames in central NSW and the Upper Hunter region; Gundungurra cave names; western Arnhem Land; Northern Cape York Peninsula and Mount Wheeler in Queensland; saltwater placenames around Mer in the Torres Strait; and the Kaurna in South Australia.
Description:
This article examines the evidence for land succession in western Victoria and considers the fission, fusion, and extinction of some clan groups at the time of contact with non-Aboriginal people in the late 1830s and 1840s. A special study is made of the intriguing scraps of evidence surrounding Knenknenwurrung. This appears to be the case of a cluster of related clans fragmenting and being absorbed into contiguous language groups¾some into Djadjawurrung, some Jardwadjali, and the majority absorbed into Djabwurrung. Exactly when this fragmentation and fission occurred is unclear, but certainly within the living memory of Aboriginal people in the early 1840s.
Description:
The principal aim of this study was to provide a close examination of nineteenth-century archival records that relate to Victorian Aboriginal people’s associations with koalas, in order to gain a greater understanding of the utilitarian and symbolic significance of koalas for Aboriginal communities, as recorded by colonists during the early period of colonization. The etymology of “koala” is discussed, before an examination is made of the animal’s spiritual importance, associated cultural traditions, and simultaneous utilitarian role. At the time of European colonization in 1788, koalas were probably found in coastal and lowland forests and woodlands across southern, central and north-eastern Victoria.
Description:
This paper offers a fundamental critique and re-evaluation of the historical sources and more recent reconstructions which have been used to determine the language area of the Birrdhawal people of far eastern Victoria. In relation to Birrdhawal tribal territory, this paper addresses three critical issues: first, whether the Birrdhawal language is related to the Ganai language, is part of the Yuin language cluster or is a standalone distinct language; second, whether or not their country included any coastline or was landlocked; and, third, whether or not any of their country was subsumed into that of the Krauatungalung through land succession as argued by Wesson (1994, 2000, 2002). The paper offers a comparative and quantitative analysis of vocabulary from the study area and critiques previous research into constituent local group organisation.
Description:
This paper concerns the question of why there are so few named groups in the Woiwurrung language area compared with other language groups to its west and north-west. It does this by analysing the 1863 Governors levee in which representatives from three Aboriginal groups-the Boonwurrung, Woiwurrung and Tara-Waragal-presented gifts to royalty. In seeking to understand who this third group-the Tara-Waragal-was, Stephens (2003) has suggested that they were a Woiwurrung patriline. Wesson (2001) has suggested that the name was a pejorative label applied to a Gippsland group by the Kulin. This study finds that both interpretations are wrong. First, it finds that the name applies to a Brataualung clan, the Yowung, whose country centred on the Tarra and Warrigal creeks-hence the name. Second, it finds that the attempt by Stephens to identify the Tara-Waragal with a possible Woiwurrung patriline identified in a series of sketches by William Thomas found in the RB Smyth Papers was also a failure. Nevertheless, the implication that the sketch maps may reveal up to 53 patrilines is a possibility worth exploring, as it may address the issue of the apparent under-representation of Woiwurrung named groups with which I began. Analysis reveals the possibility of an additional 27 Woiwurrung patrilines. Although the exact number of additional patrilines will never be known, at least we have addressed the issue that within the ethno-historical record it is possible to find additional named groups in Woiwurrung. Thus there was in all likelihood greater internal division in the Woiwurrung than has been reconstructed by Barwick (1984) and Clark (1990).
Description:
Plants feature prominently in Aboriginal remedies chiefly used to relieve symptoms such as fever, congestion, headache, skin sores, tired or swollen aching limbs and digestive problems. Treatment can involve drinks, washes, massages and aromatherapies. The drinks are made by heating water with plant additives, and in Aboriginal English are commonly referred to as ‘tea’. Since European colonisation, washes are prepared by boiling plants, with the cooled liquid applied externally to the body. Some plants are heated, then rubbed or massaged into swollen parts of the patient’s body. The aroma of plants is generally transferred to the patient through contact with steam and smoke (Clarke 2008b, pp. 12– 13).
Description:
In a recent paper on transparency versus opacity in Australian Aboriginal place names, linguist Michael Walsh (2002: 47) noted that in ‘Aboriginal Australia it is relatively common for a given place to have multiple names’. In providing an overview of multiple naming practices Walsh (2002: 47) stated the ‘simplest case is one place having two names. Such doublets can be intralectal or crosslectal. For intralectal doublets where there are two names for the one place in the same lect, both placenames may be opaque, both transparent, or one opaque and one transparent. … The same applies to crosslectal doublets where two names for the one place come from different lects’. Walsh (2002) observed that he was unclear on how multiple naming works and what its function is. Other than some case studies (Schebeck 2002 re Flinders Ranges, Sutton 2002 re the Wik region, Cape York, and Tamisari 2002), we are yet to gain a comprehensive picture for Aboriginal Australia. This paper adds to this discussion through a consideration of multiple naming in western Victoria using the results of research conducted by Clark and Heydon (2002) into Victorian Aboriginal place names. The paper also considers the policy implications of multiple indigenous naming for place name administration in Victoria. Victoria has adopted a dual naming policy that recognises a non-indigenous and an indigenous toponym for the one place but is yet to accept multiple indigenous naming.
Description:
In a recent paper on transparency versus opacity in Australian Aboriginal place names, linguist Michael Walsh (2002: 47) noted that in ‘Aboriginal Australia it is relatively common for a given place to have multiple names’. In providing an overview of multiple naming practices Walsh (2002: 47) stated the ‘simplest case is one place having two names. Such doublets can be intralectal or crosslectal. For intralectal doublets where there are two names for the one place in the same lect, both placenames may be opaque, both transparent, or one opaque and one transparent. … The same applies to crosslectal doublets where two names for the one place come from different lects’. Walsh (2002) observed that he was unclear on how multiple naming works and what its function is. Other than some case studies (Schebeck 2002 re Flinders Ranges, Sutton 2002 re the Wik region, Cape York, and Tamisari 2002), we are yet to gain a comprehensive picture for Aboriginal Australia. This paper adds to this discussion through a consideration of multiple naming in western Victoria using the results of research conducted by Clark and Heydon (2002) into Victorian Aboriginal place names. The paper also considers the policy implications of multiple indigenous naming for place name administration in Victoria. Victoria has adopted a dual naming policy that recognises a non-indigenous and an indigenous toponym for the one place but is yet to accept multiple indigenous naming.