Part Two: Listening to the space 'in between'
Welcome to Ngambaa Country. We’re now at a place called the Golden Hole, which is a very special and bountiful place.
Part Two of this learning experience is about listening to Aunty Shaa tell a story about this place in the video.
The Golden Hole is the largest midden in the southern hemisphere, and is home to Ngambaa people. Have a listen to Aunty Shaa talk about this place in the video here. As you listen, take note of what she is listening to… the wind meeting the oak trees, the song that emerges in the space between.
This “in-between” is where something new is created, where different ways of being meet and shape each other.
This is a moment to pause, to listen deeply, and to consider how you relate to land and the stories it holds.
Aunty Shaa reflects on two ways of relating to land: one grounded in deep belonging and connection, the other in ownership and transaction. These ways are in conflict, not just in her own story, but across this continent. She speaks from a place of sitting with Country, listening, and asking for support, yes, but also asking people to step into the story with her.
This is an invitation to come into a different kind of relationship with land, one beyond conflict, beyond possession, into a shared space of peace and connection.
As you listen, reflect:
What happens when you stop to listen - what can you hear right now?
What does it mean to belong to land, rather than to own it?
How can we step into this story with Aunty Shaa, not just as observers, but as participants and in relation with the land?
For non-Indigenous people living on stolen Aboriginal land, this raises urgent and uncomfortable questions:
If land is not something to be owned, what does that mean for the land you live on?
What responsibilities come with living on land that was never ceded?
What would it take to move beyond acknowledgement into action… into repair, into restitution?
How do you sit with the discomfort of knowing that the system you benefit from is built on the dispossession of others?
How will you respond?
-
Yandaarra including Smith S., Marshall, UB., Smith, N., Murphy-May, L., Daley, L., Hodge, P., and Wright, S. (2024). ‘What does Country-led mean from who/where we are on Gumbaynggirr Ngambaa Country?’Australian Geographer, 55(4)
Smith, A. S., Marshall, U. B., Smith, N., Wright, S., Daley, L., & Hodge, P. (2022)Ethics and consent in more‐than‐human research: Some considerations from/with/as Gumbaynggirr Country, Australia.Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers.