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Sarah Wright

The University of Newcastle, School of Environmental and Life Sciences, Faculty Member

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Dr Sarah Wright is a senior lecturer in geography and development studies from the University of Newcastle, Australia. She works in critical development studies, particularly on geographies of food, and Indigenous and post-colonial geographies, working with Yolngu co-researchers to explore Indigenous ontologies of connection in North East Arnhem Land. She has a strong commitment to collaborative work and praxis and works closely with community groups, NGOs and social movements in Australia, the Philippines and Kenya.
Address: Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

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Papers by Sarah Wright

Unsettling time(s): reconstituting the when of urban radical politics

by Sarah Wright and Lara Daley

Unsettling time(s): reconstituting the when of urban radical politics, 2022

In Indigenous/settler colonial contexts, cities are both rich and lived, multitemporal Indigenous... more In Indigenous/settler colonial contexts, cities are both rich and lived, multitemporal Indigenous places/spaces and sites of ongoing Indigenous dispossession. In this paper, we aim to unsettle linear notions of time associated with mainstream constructions of colonization. We suggest that doing urban politics on stolen land requires a reconstitution of the when of urban struggles to engage with colonising pasts, presents and futures, and with multi-temporal survivances of Indigenous peoples and Country, in the here and now. Time in and as city-as-Country is multiple, non-linear, active, and made through/as relationships. As we engage with the gifts and responsibilities of non-linear time, we are led by Meanjin [socalled Brisbane, Australia], the teachings of activists from the Brisbane Aboriginal Sovereign Embassy and week-long protest actions that took place to coincide with the G20 Leaders Meeting in 2014. We do this as two settler geographers, with complicities and responsibilities in/to the present, past and future as uninvited guests on unceded Aboriginal land. We signal a need to deepen the engagements of urban geographical and anti-capitalist politics with the specificities of the urban as Indigenous place/space/Country in order to complicate geographical conceptualisations of the urban and work towards decolonising the city in Indigenous/settler-colonial contexts.

Welcome to My Country

Come and spend some time with us at Bawaka. Get a taste of what it is like at different times of ... more

Caringas Country: Towards an ontology of co-becoming in natural resource management

Asia Pacific Viewpoint, 2013

This collaboratively written paper takes the reader on a journey to Bawaka, in North East Arnhem ... more This collaboratively written paper takes the reader on a journey to Bawaka, in North East Arnhem Land, northern Australia, to explore how a Yolŋu ontology of co-becoming can inform natural resource management (NRM) theory and practice. By focusing on the process of gathering and sharing miyapunu mapu (turtle eggs) and the foundational Yolŋu concept of wetj, we challenge NRM to take seriously Indigenous ways of knowing and becoming, and to attend to the vibrant, more-than-human relationality of our world. We discuss this relational cosmology, highlighting the importance of being aware and attentive, as well as the underlying ethical imperative of responsibility and obligation. We argue that as important as the concept of Caring for Country has been for NRM in Australia, it is critical that the human imperative to care for Country is balanced with a multidirectional and beyond-human understanding of the human-Country relationship. This requires engagement with the ways Country also cares and acknowledgement that humans are part of Country and not separate from it. We therefore propose a reframing, that we not only Care for Country but Care as Country. This has implications for understanding the ways that humans can and should relate to the environment as they exist together through co-becoming.

Reframing Development through Collaboration: towards a relational ontology of connection in Bawaka, North East Arnhem Land

Third World Quarterly, 2012

This paper draws on the collaborative experiences of three female academics and three generations... more This paper draws on the collaborative experiences of three female academics and three generations of Yolŋu women from an Aboriginal family from Bawaka, North East Arnhem Land to contribute to debates in development around participation, power and justice. Through a reflection on the process of collaboratively co-authoring two books and associated outputs, the paper discusses the way the collaboration is guided by collective priorities that are held as paramount: trust, reciprocity, relationships and sharing goals. The paper draws particular attention to the essential role that families and non-human agents play in shaping these priorities. The relational ontology which underlies this collaboration is inspired by a Yolŋu ontology of connection that requires us to acknowledge ourselves as connected to each other, to other people and to other things. Guided by this Indigenous ontological framework, we reframe the concept of collaboration and of development as inherently and always relational.

Transforming Tourists and "Culturalising Commerce": Indigenous Tourism at Bawaka in Northern Australia

International Indigenous Policy Journal, 2015

There is currently an increasing interest in Indigenous tourism in Australia. Policies in Austral... more There is currently an increasing interest in Indigenous tourism in Australia. Policies in Australia often use the rhetoric of sustainability, but position Indigenous tourism as a means for economic growth and development (Whitford & Ruhanen, 2010). This study shows that interpersonal relationships, cultural and social interactions, and learning are key to achieving the goals of Indigenous tourism providers or “hosts,” and to the experiences of tourists. This article explores tourist experiences of activities run by the Indigenous-owned tour company Bawaka Cultural Enterprises (hereafter BCE) in North East Arnhem Land, Northern Territory. BCE is an example of an Indigenous tourism business that aims to achieve social change by sharing of Indigenous ways of being, knowledges, and practices with non-Indigenous people during tours, whilst also ensuring that the business is sustainable and manageable for the family who runs it. In this sense, BCE’s tourism activities can be understood as...

Yandaarra is living protocol

by Lara Daley and Sarah Wright

Social and Cultural Geography, 2018

We call ourselves Yandaarra, which is Gumbaynggirr for a group shifting camp together. We are Aun... more We call ourselves Yandaarra, which is Gumbaynggirr for a group shifting camp together. We are Aunty Shaa Smith, story holder for Gumbaynggirr Country (mid-north Coast, NSW, Australia), her daughter, Neeyan Smith and three non-Indigenous academics. In this article, we share the meaning of Yandaarra for our work together. We see Yandaarra as binding beings together, living the protocols of Maangun, the Law, of the Dreaming. We do not talk of Dreaming to imply we were, or are, asleep, but to share this story as part of the creation time, that exists now. For we see Yandaarra, our research, as a re-creation story. It’s about remembering what was/is as part of re-creating, rebinding, remaking protocols as we honour Elders and custodians, human/non-human, past, present and future. Importantly too, our collaboration requires us to know our place and our different histories as Gumbaynggirr and non-Gumbaynggirr people living and working on unceded land. Our focus in Yandaarra is to learn to care for Country and ourselves from a Gumbaynggirr perspective. We are at a stage where radical change is necessary, and Gumbaynggirr wisdom can help create a new pathway of how to live on and with Mother Earth as kin.

Geographies of belonging: why belonging? why geography? (editorial) | NOVA. The University of Newcastle's Digital Repository

Environment and Planning a, Apr 1, 2009

The Role of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and its Implications in the Global Economy

‘Patience, hormone replacement therapy and rain!’ Women, ageing and drought in Australia: Narratives from the mid-age cohort of the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health

Australian Journal of Rural Health, Dec 2012

Objective: This paper explores women's experiences of drought in Australia. Despite the significa... more Objective: This paper explores women's experiences of drought in Australia. Despite the significance of drought for rural life in Australia, there is little research seeking to understand its psychological consequences. There is also a need to recognise gendered experiences of drought and for research that addresses its long-term effects as people age in prolonged drought-affected areas.
Design: The study explores longitudinal qualitative data collected by the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health. Free-text comments (n = 217), collected via mailed survey at five time points (1996, 1998, 2001, 2004, 2007) from the same 77 women, were subjected to a narrative analysis.
Participants: Participants from the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health who were aged 45–50 when the study began in 1996.
Results: Findings indicate that drought has an impact on women as they age, particularly in reference to menopause, access to support systems and retirement.
Conclusion: This study concludes that the experience of drought cannot be disentangled from the realities of gender and ageing.

Small farmers and the future of sustainable agriculture

EcoFair Trade Dialogue Discussion Paper, 2007

Page 1. Discussion Papers No. 7 / March 2007 / English Version Small Farmers and the Future of Su... more

More-than-human theorising – inclusive communities of practice in student practice-based learning

To be Transformed: Emotions in Cross-Cultural, Field-Based Learning in Northern Australia

Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 2012

Students undertaking field-based learning, in which they work with Indigenous people in Northern ... more Students undertaking field-based learning, in which they work with Indigenous people in Northern Australia, describe a profound learning experience redolent with emotion. Inspired, challenged and transformed, the students are compelled in ways that require them to interrogate their own selves and taken-for-granted beliefs. In this paper, we draw on empirical work with undergraduate students in geography and development studies to

Cultivating Beyond-Capitalist Economies

Economic Geography, 2010

Revolutionary food [Cuba is leading the way in food growing and creating a more sustainable pathway of development.]

Ethical investment and the mining industry

‘More world, less bank’: movement, movements and the movement in Seattle and Washington D.C

It's 5am, dark with a light drizzle of rain. It's Seattle, it's winter and it won't be getting li... more It's 5am, dark with a light drizzle of rain. It's Seattle, it's winter and it won't be getting light for hours. When you walk into the convergence space it is a-buzz with energy and you start to feel a layer of excitement added to the nervousness that kept you awake all last night. It's confusing and you look for the people in your eight-person affinity group. You see them, greet each other with brief hugs -although you just met in legal training a few days before -and suddenly the call is on and people are moving out. Someone calls out that the giant puppet needs moving and you go over with the rest of your group to where it sits propped precariously on a shopping cart. Together, you slowly and clumsily move it out into the darkness. You have no idea what the others around you are planning. The structure of the action is such that you know only what your affinity group is planning, have a general sense of the action in your pie slice but little idea of anything else that will be going on. That is until the marches that will happen later on in the day, the students, the People's assembly, the labor march all play into the event. Around you more and more people seem to be melting into the crowd that is growing of its own accord. There's a feel of a pageant in the air; many of your fellow protesters are wearing exotic costumes. Some are dressed as jugglers and clowns, others as sea turtles, butterflies and trees. People carry banners rolled up under their arm -it's not time to unfurl them yet -that will come later. As you see all these people, you start to get hopeful, despite yourself, that this might actually come off.

Gardening for the revolution: urban food production, space and knowledge in post Soviet era Cuba

Seeds of dissent: Intellectual property rights, rice and globalization in the Philippines

Rice is life: The search for alternatives in the heartland of the Green Revolution

Strategies for food security: putting biotech industry claims in context

Unsettling time(s): reconstituting the when of urban radical politics

by Sarah Wright and Lara Daley

Unsettling time(s): reconstituting the when of urban radical politics, 2022

In Indigenous/settler colonial contexts, cities are both rich and lived, multitemporal Indigenous... more In Indigenous/settler colonial contexts, cities are both rich and lived, multitemporal Indigenous places/spaces and sites of ongoing Indigenous dispossession. In this paper, we aim to unsettle linear notions of time associated with mainstream constructions of colonization. We suggest that doing urban politics on stolen land requires a reconstitution of the when of urban struggles to engage with colonising pasts, presents and futures, and with multi-temporal survivances of Indigenous peoples and Country, in the here and now. Time in and as city-as-Country is multiple, non-linear, active, and made through/as relationships. As we engage with the gifts and responsibilities of non-linear time, we are led by Meanjin [socalled Brisbane, Australia], the teachings of activists from the Brisbane Aboriginal Sovereign Embassy and week-long protest actions that took place to coincide with the G20 Leaders Meeting in 2014. We do this as two settler geographers, with complicities and responsibilities in/to the present, past and future as uninvited guests on unceded Aboriginal land. We signal a need to deepen the engagements of urban geographical and anti-capitalist politics with the specificities of the urban as Indigenous place/space/Country in order to complicate geographical conceptualisations of the urban and work towards decolonising the city in Indigenous/settler-colonial contexts.

Welcome to My Country

Come and spend some time with us at Bawaka. Get a taste of what it is like at different times of ... more

Caringas Country: Towards an ontology of co-becoming in natural resource management

Asia Pacific Viewpoint, 2013

This collaboratively written paper takes the reader on a journey to Bawaka, in North East Arnhem ... more This collaboratively written paper takes the reader on a journey to Bawaka, in North East Arnhem Land, northern Australia, to explore how a Yolŋu ontology of co-becoming can inform natural resource management (NRM) theory and practice. By focusing on the process of gathering and sharing miyapunu mapu (turtle eggs) and the foundational Yolŋu concept of wetj, we challenge NRM to take seriously Indigenous ways of knowing and becoming, and to attend to the vibrant, more-than-human relationality of our world. We discuss this relational cosmology, highlighting the importance of being aware and attentive, as well as the underlying ethical imperative of responsibility and obligation. We argue that as important as the concept of Caring for Country has been for NRM in Australia, it is critical that the human imperative to care for Country is balanced with a multidirectional and beyond-human understanding of the human-Country relationship. This requires engagement with the ways Country also cares and acknowledgement that humans are part of Country and not separate from it. We therefore propose a reframing, that we not only Care for Country but Care as Country. This has implications for understanding the ways that humans can and should relate to the environment as they exist together through co-becoming.

Reframing Development through Collaboration: towards a relational ontology of connection in Bawaka, North East Arnhem Land

Third World Quarterly, 2012

This paper draws on the collaborative experiences of three female academics and three generations... more This paper draws on the collaborative experiences of three female academics and three generations of Yolŋu women from an Aboriginal family from Bawaka, North East Arnhem Land to contribute to debates in development around participation, power and justice. Through a reflection on the process of collaboratively co-authoring two books and associated outputs, the paper discusses the way the collaboration is guided by collective priorities that are held as paramount: trust, reciprocity, relationships and sharing goals. The paper draws particular attention to the essential role that families and non-human agents play in shaping these priorities. The relational ontology which underlies this collaboration is inspired by a Yolŋu ontology of connection that requires us to acknowledge ourselves as connected to each other, to other people and to other things. Guided by this Indigenous ontological framework, we reframe the concept of collaboration and of development as inherently and always relational.

Transforming Tourists and "Culturalising Commerce": Indigenous Tourism at Bawaka in Northern Australia

International Indigenous Policy Journal, 2015

There is currently an increasing interest in Indigenous tourism in Australia. Policies in Austral... more There is currently an increasing interest in Indigenous tourism in Australia. Policies in Australia often use the rhetoric of sustainability, but position Indigenous tourism as a means for economic growth and development (Whitford & Ruhanen, 2010). This study shows that interpersonal relationships, cultural and social interactions, and learning are key to achieving the goals of Indigenous tourism providers or “hosts,” and to the experiences of tourists. This article explores tourist experiences of activities run by the Indigenous-owned tour company Bawaka Cultural Enterprises (hereafter BCE) in North East Arnhem Land, Northern Territory. BCE is an example of an Indigenous tourism business that aims to achieve social change by sharing of Indigenous ways of being, knowledges, and practices with non-Indigenous people during tours, whilst also ensuring that the business is sustainable and manageable for the family who runs it. In this sense, BCE’s tourism activities can be understood as...

Yandaarra is living protocol

by Lara Daley and Sarah Wright

Social and Cultural Geography, 2018

We call ourselves Yandaarra, which is Gumbaynggirr for a group shifting camp together. We are Aun... more We call ourselves Yandaarra, which is Gumbaynggirr for a group shifting camp together. We are Aunty Shaa Smith, story holder for Gumbaynggirr Country (mid-north Coast, NSW, Australia), her daughter, Neeyan Smith and three non-Indigenous academics. In this article, we share the meaning of Yandaarra for our work together. We see Yandaarra as binding beings together, living the protocols of Maangun, the Law, of the Dreaming. We do not talk of Dreaming to imply we were, or are, asleep, but to share this story as part of the creation time, that exists now. For we see Yandaarra, our research, as a re-creation story. It’s about remembering what was/is as part of re-creating, rebinding, remaking protocols as we honour Elders and custodians, human/non-human, past, present and future. Importantly too, our collaboration requires us to know our place and our different histories as Gumbaynggirr and non-Gumbaynggirr people living and working on unceded land. Our focus in Yandaarra is to learn to care for Country and ourselves from a Gumbaynggirr perspective. We are at a stage where radical change is necessary, and Gumbaynggirr wisdom can help create a new pathway of how to live on and with Mother Earth as kin.

Geographies of belonging: why belonging? why geography? (editorial) | NOVA. The University of Newcastle's Digital Repository

Environment and Planning a, Apr 1, 2009

The Role of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and its Implications in the Global Economy

‘Patience, hormone replacement therapy and rain!’ Women, ageing and drought in Australia: Narratives from the mid-age cohort of the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health

Australian Journal of Rural Health, Dec 2012

Objective: This paper explores women's experiences of drought in Australia. Despite the significa... more Objective: This paper explores women's experiences of drought in Australia. Despite the significance of drought for rural life in Australia, there is little research seeking to understand its psychological consequences. There is also a need to recognise gendered experiences of drought and for research that addresses its long-term effects as people age in prolonged drought-affected areas.
Design: The study explores longitudinal qualitative data collected by the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health. Free-text comments (n = 217), collected via mailed survey at five time points (1996, 1998, 2001, 2004, 2007) from the same 77 women, were subjected to a narrative analysis.
Participants: Participants from the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health who were aged 45–50 when the study began in 1996.
Results: Findings indicate that drought has an impact on women as they age, particularly in reference to menopause, access to support systems and retirement.
Conclusion: This study concludes that the experience of drought cannot be disentangled from the realities of gender and ageing.

Small farmers and the future of sustainable agriculture

EcoFair Trade Dialogue Discussion Paper, 2007

Page 1. Discussion Papers No. 7 / March 2007 / English Version Small Farmers and the Future of Su... more

More-than-human theorising – inclusive communities of practice in student practice-based learning

To be Transformed: Emotions in Cross-Cultural, Field-Based Learning in Northern Australia

Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 2012

Students undertaking field-based learning, in which they work with Indigenous people in Northern ... more Students undertaking field-based learning, in which they work with Indigenous people in Northern Australia, describe a profound learning experience redolent with emotion. Inspired, challenged and transformed, the students are compelled in ways that require them to interrogate their own selves and taken-for-granted beliefs. In this paper, we draw on empirical work with undergraduate students in geography and development studies to

Cultivating Beyond-Capitalist Economies

Economic Geography, 2010

Revolutionary food [Cuba is leading the way in food growing and creating a more sustainable pathway of development.]

Ethical investment and the mining industry

‘More world, less bank’: movement, movements and the movement in Seattle and Washington D.C

It's 5am, dark with a light drizzle of rain. It's Seattle, it's winter and it won't be getting li... more It's 5am, dark with a light drizzle of rain. It's Seattle, it's winter and it won't be getting light for hours. When you walk into the convergence space it is a-buzz with energy and you start to feel a layer of excitement added to the nervousness that kept you awake all last night. It's confusing and you look for the people in your eight-person affinity group. You see them, greet each other with brief hugs -although you just met in legal training a few days before -and suddenly the call is on and people are moving out. Someone calls out that the giant puppet needs moving and you go over with the rest of your group to where it sits propped precariously on a shopping cart. Together, you slowly and clumsily move it out into the darkness. You have no idea what the others around you are planning. The structure of the action is such that you know only what your affinity group is planning, have a general sense of the action in your pie slice but little idea of anything else that will be going on. That is until the marches that will happen later on in the day, the students, the People's assembly, the labor march all play into the event. Around you more and more people seem to be melting into the crowd that is growing of its own accord. There's a feel of a pageant in the air; many of your fellow protesters are wearing exotic costumes. Some are dressed as jugglers and clowns, others as sea turtles, butterflies and trees. People carry banners rolled up under their arm -it's not time to unfurl them yet -that will come later. As you see all these people, you start to get hopeful, despite yourself, that this might actually come off.

Gardening for the revolution: urban food production, space and knowledge in post Soviet era Cuba

Seeds of dissent: Intellectual property rights, rice and globalization in the Philippines

Rice is life: The search for alternatives in the heartland of the Green Revolution

Strategies for food security: putting biotech industry claims in context

More-than-human, emergent belongings: A weak theory approach

Progress in Human Geography, 2014

Belonging is an ambiguous concept that has tended to escape the rigorous theorization of other ke... more Belonging is an ambiguous concept that has tended to escape the rigorous theorization of other key concepts in geography. Rather than viewing this as a weakness, I turn to weak theory to consider belonging in generative ways, to reflect on the texture of how it is felt, used and practised. I particularly consider its emotional aspects and the ways it is performed by myriad humans and more-than-humans. I conclude with an ontological consideration. Understanding belonging as emergent co-becoming may allow for hopeful and inclusive geographies that are diversely care-ing and careful.

Emotional geographies of development

Hope, despair, fear, hate, joy, desire and anger; the social scienceshave increasingly recognised... more Hope, despair, fear, hate, joy, desire and anger; the social scienceshave increasingly recognised the role of emotions in shaping society, and in defining and transforming people and place. Such concerns have clear implications for the study of development. Emotions help create development subjects and define subjectivities. They are imbricated in the production of exclusions and colonialisms yet they can also empower resistance and progressive change. In short, they are intimately bound up with the way development functions in all its messiness. In this paper I begin to explore the generative role of emotions in the discourses and practices of development. I draw on empirical work with land reform participants in the Philippines to consider the ways emotions are central to participants' experiences. Emotions inform how the land tillers act and react, and how they understand the past, present and future. I find that consideration of emotions, and indeed of all that is beyond-the-rational, is imperative if we are to move beyond development's modernist roots towards more postcolonial understandings.

Cultivating beyond-capitalist economies

Conceptualizations of the economy as diverse and multiple have garnered increased attention in ec... more Conceptualizations of the economy as diverse and multiple have garnered increased attention in economic geography in recent years. Against the debilitating mantra of TINA (there is no alternative), these conceptualizations use an ontology of proliferation to insist that many viable and vital alternatives to capitalism do, in fact, exist. I aim to contribute to this project with a close reading of the diverse formal and informal economic practices associated with the village of Puno in the Philippines. In doing so, I respond to calls for work that begins in the majority world and that focuses on the broader political project associated with diverse economies. Research in this area has frequently been critiqued for not paying sufficient attention to the unstable yet persistent exclusions that may endure in, and may even be enhanced by, alternative economies. With this article, I aim to investigate the ways that power relations work through the diverse economies of Puno and the ways that residents act to transform these relations. In doing so, I draw on the experiences of three residents of Puno and their involvement in three social movement organizations. I find that the economy is usefully understood as a site of struggle in which residents work to redefine themselves and the economy. The diverse spaces of their economic lives are neither strictly alternative nor mainstream, inherently oppressive nor radical. Rather, the people of Puno are engaged in willfully cultivating spaces-beyond-capitalism through which they transform the very meaning of economic practice.

Weaving lives together: collaborative fieldwork in North East Arnhem Land, Australia [L’entrelacement des vies : les pratiques collaboratives sur le terrain dans le Nord-Est de la terre d'Arnhem, Australie]

by Kate Lloyd, Sarah Wright, and Paul Hodge

Weaving lives together at Bawaka, North-East Arnhem Land is a book about basket weaving and cultu... more Weaving lives together at Bawaka, North-East Arnhem Land is a book about basket weaving and culture. In this paper, some of the co-authors of the text,non-Indigenous academics and an Indigenous woman from northern Australia,reflect on the process of creating the book. We argue that jointly authoring abook about weaving lives has in fact interwoven all our lives in a manner which confronts many traditional academic accounts of research and fieldwork. Through the process of researching and writing the book we have experienced a sharing of knowledge and a sharing of family. In particular, we have learnt that relationships cannot be planned and that uncertainty can lead to creative transformations.

Co-becoming Bawaka: Towards a relational understanding of place/space

by Sarah Wright and Kate Lloyd

We invite readers to dig for ganguri (yams) at and with Bawaka, an Indigenous Homeland in norther... more We invite readers to dig for ganguri (yams) at and with Bawaka, an Indigenous Homeland in northern Australia, and, in doing so, consider an Indigenous-led understanding of relational space/place. We draw on the concept of gurrutu to illustrate the limits of western ontologies, open up possibilities for other ways of thinking and theorizing, and give detail and depth to the notion of space/place as emergent co-becoming. With Bawaka as lead author, we look to Country for what it can teach us about how all views of space are situated, and for the insights it offers about co-becoming in a relational world.

Transforming Tourists and "Culturalising Commerce": Indigenous Tourism at Bawaka in Northern Australia

by Sarah Wright and Kate Lloyd

There is currently an increasing interest in Indigenous tourism in Australia. Policies in Austral... more There is currently an increasing interest in Indigenous tourism in Australia. Policies in Australia often use the rhetoric of sustainability, but position Indigenous tourism as a means for economic growth and development (Whitford & Ruhanen, 2010). This study shows that interpersonal relationships, cultural and social interactions, and learning are key to achieving the goals of Indigenous tourism providers or “hosts,” and to the experiences of tourists. This article explores tourist experiences of activities run by the Indigenous-owned tour company Bawaka Cultural Enterprises (hereafter BCE) in North East Arnhem Land, Northern Territory. BCE is an example of an Indigenous tourism business that aims to achieve social change by sharing of Indigenous ways of being, knowledges, and practices with non-Indigenous people during tours, whilst also ensuring that the business is sustainable and manageable for the family who runs it. In this sense, BCE’s tourism activities can be understood as an attempt to “culturalise commerce,” rather than commercialising culture (Bunten, 2010). In this article, we contribute to growing literature on transformative learning theory and tourism by considering tourists’ narratives of their experiences with BCE. We focus on the way in which tourists are transformed by an increased connection to their hosts and their country. We argue that BCE’s activities consciously introduce different ways of being to tourists and visitors. A growing awareness, understanding, and respect for these ways of being can inspire a sense of collective purpose and identity, and a deep emotional response to tours. Connection, however, is not always smooth and easy. Central to the process outlined in Mezirow’s (1978) transformative learning theory are encounters and engagements with other people and different and unfamiliar contexts, which may lead to disorienting feelings and experiences. We argue that the practical aspects of being at Bawaka, combined with the new skills, task requirements, and political realities that commitment to new ways of being bring, can be disconcerting and disorienting for tourists. The availability of spaces and processes to reflect on these points of disorientation may determine whether these experiences challenge and/or contribute to personal transformation. These factors highlight areas for further exploration in developing a theory of transformative learning in the Indigenous context, and a need for policies to move beyond a narrow focus on economic aspects of tourism to consider the social and educational aims of both tourism ventures and tourists themselves.

Writing difference differently

by Kate Lloyd, Karen Fisher, Michelle Duffy, Sarah Wright, Miriam Williams, and Stephen Fitzherbert

This paper investigates the writing of situated knowledge and explores the possibilities of enact... more This paper investigates the writing of situated knowledge and explores the possibilities of enacting difference by writing differently. We present a selection of research stories in which carrier bags, sounds, baskets, gardens and potatoes are interpreted less as objects of research or metaphors to aid in analysing phenomena, than as mediators of the stories. Our stories emphasise the ontological politics of engaging with and representing the relational, the messy, the spontaneous, the unpredictable, the non-human and bodily experiences. These stories demonstrate how writing is performative and how it is integral to the production of knowledge.

Caring as Country: Towards an ontology of co-becoming in natural resource management

by Kate Lloyd and Sarah Wright

This collaboratively written paper takes the reader on a journey to Bawaka, in North East Arnhem ... more This collaboratively written paper takes the reader on a journey to Bawaka, in North East Arnhem Land, northern Australia, to explore how a Yolŋu ontology of co-becoming can inform natural resource management (NRM) theory and practice. By focusing on the process of gathering and sharing miyapunu mapu (turtle eggs) and the foundational Yolŋu concept of wetj, we challenge NRM to take seriously Indigenous ways of knowing and becoming, and to attend to the vibrant, more-than-human relationality of our world. We discuss this relational cosmology, highlighting the importance of being aware and attentive, as well as the underlying ethical imperative of responsibility and obligation. We argue that as important as the concept of Caring for Country has been for NRM in Australia, it is critical that the human imperative to care for Country is balanced with a multi-directional and beyond-human understanding of the human–Country relationship. This requires engagement with the ways Country also cares and acknowledgement that humans are part of Country and not separate from it. We therefore propose a reframing, that we not only Care for Country but Care as Country. This has implications for understanding the ways that humans can and should relate to the environment as they exist together through co-becoming.

Reframing Development through Collaboration: towards a relational ontology of connection in Bawaka, North East Arnhem Land

by Sarah Wright and Kate Lloyd

This paper draws on the collaborative experiences of three female academics and three generations... more This paper draws on the collaborative experiences of three female academics and three generations of Yolŋu women from an Aboriginal family from Bawaka, North East Arnhem Land to contribute to debates in development around participation, power and justice. Through a reflection on the process of collaboratively co-authoring two books and associated outputs, the paper discusses the way the collaboration is guided by collective priorities that are held as paramount: trust, reciprocity, relationships and sharing goals. The paper draws particular attention to the essential role that families and non-human agents play in shaping these priorities. The relational ontology which underlies this collaboration is inspired by a Yolŋu ontology of connection that requires us to acknowledge ourselves as connected to each other, to other people and to other things. Guided by this Indigenous ontological framework, we reframe the concept of collaboration and of development as inherently and always relational.

Stories of crossings and connections from Bawaka, North East Arnhem Land, Australia

by Sarah Wright and Kate Lloyd

This paper engages with Indigenous peoples’ conceptualisations of borders which unsettle dominant... more This paper engages with Indigenous peoples’ conceptualisations of borders which unsettle dominant Eurocentric constructs of the border as terrestrial, linear, bound and defined through western legal frameworks. It does this by drawing on one aspect of the many story-telling experiences offered by members of the Indigenous-owned Yolngu tourism business Bawaka Cultural Experiences in northern Australia. We argue that stories told to visitors about multiple and diverse connections between Yolngu and Makassan people from Sulawesi, Indonesia, are intentional constructions which challenge dominant conceptions of Australia as an isolated island-nation. The stories redefine the border as a dynamic and active space and as a site of complex encounters. The border itself is continuously recreated through stories in ways that emphasise the continuity and richness of land and sea scapes and are based on non-linear conceptions of time. The stories invite non-Indigenous people to engage with different kinds of realities that exist in the north and to re-imagine Australia’s north as a place of crossings and connections.

Food security and farmer empowerment: a study of the impacts of farmer-led sustainable agriculture in the Philippines

Description This book contains the results of a study of farmer-led sustainable agriculture in th... more

Welcome to My Country

by Kate Lloyd and Sarah Wright

Come and spend some time with us at Bawaka. Get a taste of what it is like at different times of ... more Come and spend some time with us at Bawaka. Get a taste of what it is like at different times of the year, and listen to our stories.

Laklak Burarrwanga and family invite you to their Country, centred on a beautiful beach in Arnhem Land. Its crystal waters are full of fish, turtle, crab and stingray, to hunt; the land behind has bush fruits, pandanus for weaving, wood for spears, all kinds of useful things. This country is also rich with meaning. 'We can go anywhere and see a river, hill, tree, rock telling a story.'

Here too is Laklak's own history, from her long walk across Arnhem Land as a child to her people's fight for land rights and for a say in their children's schooling. She and her family stand tall, a proud and successful Indigenous community.

In the Yolngu world, we have a library in the land. You can't destroy it. If you burn it, it grows again. The land is full of more knowledge than you can imagine.

'Welcome to My Country is a beautifully warm, inviting experience. As soon as I read 'When the moon goes past you can see its reflection (in the water) like the inside of your heart', I knew this would be a very special read. Being immersed in an 'experience' is the way I would describe this book. It is an enticing journey into the heart of Yolngu life, in all its wonder across the physical, artistic and spiritual world. I love the conversational style - we walk, talk and sit down with family on every page. Lovely.' - Ros Moriarty, author of Listening to Country

Weaving Lives Together at Bawaka

by Sarah Wright and Kate Lloyd

n The book is a collaboration between five senior Yolngu women from north-east Arnhem Land, North... more n
The book is a collaboration between five senior Yolngu women from north-east Arnhem Land, Northern Territory, Australia and three academic women from Macquarie University and Newcastle University in New South Wales, Australia. The book is written from a Yolngu perspective and shares the processes and methods of weaving and its preparation. Importantly, its storytelling and images discuss the metaphoric and cultural significance of weaving for Yolngu women. ISBN:9780980424201

Responding to hunger in a globalizing world: the emergence of food sovereignty

Global Food Security - An Introduction

Decentring Fortress Australia: Borderland geographies as relational spaces

Proceedings of ARCRNSISS Methodology, Tools and Techniques and Spatial Theory Paradigm Forums Workshop, At University of Newcastle, Volume: pp 217-228., Jun 2005

This paper looks to the geographies of Australia’s northern borderlands to theorise borders as re... more This paper looks to the geographies of Australia’s northern borderlands to theorise borders as relational spaces through which identities are (re)created and performed. Dominant Australian perspectives on borders are influenced by a legacy of exclusion and fear including the concept of terra nullius. This fear has been reinforced through the Australian government’s response to asylum seekers in the form of the Pacific Solution. Alternative perspectives of borderlands as sites of coexistence, complexity and situated engagement challenge this dominant conception of borderlands. Seeing borderlands as relational spaces allows for an understanding of borders as having the potential for inclusion or exclusion, as flexible and rigid, as based on fear or respect, depending on the relationships of power at work. We draw upon post-colonial and indigenous studies literature with a case study of the Tiwi Islands to argue interconnected issues of power and identity are central to reimagining borders and borderlands.

Food sovereignty and an ontology of proliferation

Intercultural mathematics: Developing teaching skills and materials through/with Yolngu mathematics

by Kate Lloyd and Sarah Wright

Although there is commitment and a call to incorporate ATSI knowledges and cultures across the cu... more Although there is commitment and a call to incorporate ATSI knowledges and cultures across the curriculum, there has been little focus on the area of mathematics. Even for those who are interested in Indigenous mathematics it can be difficult for to find appropriate material or to map Indigenous perspectives onto the existing curriculum. Drawing on an established and successful research partnership between academic researchers and Indigenous Yolŋu knowledge authorities from North East Arnhem Land, this paper shares knowledge and cross-cultural understanding generated from our collaborative research on Yolngu mathematics to reveal ways of communicating the patterns, links and connections that underpin Yolŋu ways of being. Yolŋu maths is something that has been chosen by Yolŋu as a way of explaining their own connections to Country and asserting the validity of Yolngu knowledges and world views. As such, it represents a powerful way to bring Indigenous knowledge into schools by bringing ATSI knowledge into the inner sanctum of Western knowledge - mathematics. This paper takes an ethnomathematical approach to de-mystify mathematics and to actively recognise and engage with Indigenous knowledges (Stillman & Balatti, 2001). We illustrate this through a discussion of our book, Welcome to My Country (2013) (with teaching notes) and an activity on seasons, which emphasises Aboriginal knowledge of seasons, the connection to weather patterns, and special links to Country/place.

Presented at the Indigenous Content in Education Symposium: Engaging Indigenous Knowledges, Pedagogies and Curriculum, 21 September 2015, University of South Australia, Adelaide.

Researching diverse food initiatives: from backyard and community gardens to international markets

Local Environment, Jan 2014

Building networks of food sovereignty in South and Southeast Asia

A meeting in Bangung in Indonesia, in December 2006 brought together 35 representatives from farm... more A meeting in Bangung in Indonesia, in December 2006 brought together 35 representatives from farmers' organizations and farmers movements from across South and Southeast Asia. The conference, 'Asian Conference on Farmers Rights and Food Sovereignty', was convened by No Patents on Life - Asia (NPOL Asia) and the Asian Peasant Coalition (APC). The invited organizations were largely nationally- based networks of farmers' networks, or peoples' organizations, with some southern support agencies such as the Third World Network and the Pesticide Action Network, Asia Pacific. The participants were there to strengthen their critiques of the current globalized system of food production, to share information on peasant initiatives from different countries in the region, and to develop possibilities for action.