‘A relationship with the land that western culture knows nothing of’: sacred claims of First Nations Australia, 1960-1990

Abstract: Over a period of only two decades, First Nations people transformed Australia’s Christian churches from supporters of mining on Indigenous land to among its most vocal opponents, joining First Nations people in describing the land as ‘sacred’. In this paper, I examine the ways in which First Nations people articulated their relationship to Country as religion to claim sovereignty over their lands. I seek to reveal the ways in which their articulations of occurred in dialogue, resistance to and entanglement with Christianity, with important insights for the ways First Nations people read settler cultures to create opportunities in the absence of other decolonial options.

Presenter bio: Laura Rademaker is an historian at the Australian National University. Her work focuses on histories of Indigenous self-determination movements and Christian missions, drawing on oral histories in partnership with communities. She is the author of Found in Translation (University of Hawaii, 2018) and, together with Traditional Owner Mavis Kerinaiua, Tiwi Story: Turning History Downside Up (Newsouth, 2023).

Affiliation: Australian National University