Garma Festival

The cultural traditions and structures of Indigenous Australians – the first Australians – are being broken up and are disappearing, with horrendous consequences, Deputy Director of the Yothu Yindi Foundation, and former Australian of the Year, Mandawuy Yunupingu, has told a major meeting of high profile Australian and international corporate, governmental and community leaders.

Invited to address the “Australian Leadership Retreat”, hosted by the Australian Davos Connection*, Yunupingu said the cultural framework of any community or society was vital for community well-being and development, including economic development and opportunities.

He said that for much of the Indigenous population of Australia, “major cultural traditions and beliefs – more than 40,000 years’ worth – and the way they are expressed, and practiced, and used to hold together communities, have been broken down, or broken up”.

“Art, language, the mountain of traditional knowledge, the spirituality, much of it borne of the land, has gone, or is going. Cultural traditions and practices of traditional dance, song, ceremony - our social rituals and belief expressions - are being lost, not passed on to the next generation. The bonds, the ties are being broken. Aboriginal Australia – the First Australia – is disappearing.”

“This cultural structure is vital for social cohesion, for holding communities and clans and families together and therefore for community development – and that includes economic development and even economic opportunities through that culture,” he told the 250 attendees at the Leadership Retreat at Hayman Island at the weekend. “It is vital for the cultural identity so crucial for any society, or community”.

“In many ways, Yolngu (the Indigenous people of north-east Arnhem land) culture is just hanging on by a thread. And while I am not pretending things can or should ever return to the way they were 220 years ago or so in Australia, we must try to nurture and maintain those cultural traditions and practices which are so important for the overall well-being and cultural identity of Indigenous Australia and, frankly, for the overall worth of Australia as a nation”, he said.

He explained that was the reason one of the key programs the Foundation is working in is a national project to systematically record and document the important traditions of Australian Indigenous ceremony performance, dance, and song: pillars of Indigenous culture. At a practical, regional level the Foundation has coordinated, as part of this National Program, the development of a training program for Indigenous students from communities to be trained in the recording and documenting of these traditions. ...

“Please just think a little bit about what your cultural beliefs, your cultural traditions and practices mean to you – everything from your belief system and the way your express it and carry it out, through to daily habits and codes of behaviour,” he asked the attendees. “...What you teach your children, the way you bring them up, the way your social community works, the way you interact with each other, communicate with one another. Now think what would happen if that got broken up, fell apart, or you were dispossessed of it and the pillars of it”.

The vision of the Yothu Yindi Foundation, which also presents the annual Garma Festival, Australia’s most significant Indigenous cultural exchange event, is for Yolngu people and other Indigenous Australians to have the same level of well-being and life opportunities and choices as non-Indigenous Australians.

“At the moment, a huge gap exists between the well-being and life opportunities of Indigenous Australians and those of non-Indigenous Australians. Whether it be in health levels, life expectancy, infant mortality rates, levels of diabetes, access to adequate education and training, and, thereby, literacy and numeracy levels, employment levels, living conditions, provision of basic services....whatever it is....there is a huge gap,” he said.

“I’m not going to talk at all about the politics of this, and who and what is to blame – I am just telling you straight up that this situation exists, is only improving in patches, and is unacceptable”.

“And it is why we are investing in and working in a practical way towards that vision through programs which create the sharing of knowledge and culture; create economic opportunities for Yolngu and other Indigenous Australians; and nurture, maintain and enable the presentation of cultural traditions and practices,” he said.

“We are, in short, trying to stop the destruction of Indigenous culture, and give a vital hand up – not to be confused with a hand out! – to Indigenous Australia. And we need support.

“I think it is reasonable to suggest that it is a role and responsibility of people in power – corporate, community, and governmental power – to help,, by helping us, to protect Indigenous culture, rather than just sitting back and watching or even worse playing a part in its destruction, and the consequential effect on economic and social well-being,” he told the Leadership Retreat..

“Suffice to say, we need support for the National Recording Program, the Indigenous Community Youth Leadership program (assisting Indigenous communities to build the leadership skills and capabilities of their young people), Garma, and our growing infrastructure and management requirements – including good advice - if we are to make the most of the opportunities and plans, and to maximise the social, cultural and economic results we are already starting to achieve”.

“Any contribution will help – each year now, we need to raise more than a million dollars to conduct our programs and achieve the results needed”.

For further information on The Yothu Yindi Foundation, visit www.garma.telstra.com
Media inquiries; Simon Balderstone, Adviser, Yothu Yindi Foundation; 02-99774578

(*The Australian Davos Connection is a wholly Australian, non-political, not for profit leadership organization which brings together leaders from business, government, the public sector, academia and the broader community to address issues facing Australia and the world. The Leadership Retreat also hosted Federal Government Ministers, State Premiers, and chief executives from the top 100 companies in Australia. www.ausdavos.org).