What did Indigenous Australians need to know to prosper as a people 65,000 years? What do they see when they look at the night sky? What are the principles of their system of law and democracy? What can we learn about fire management and farming? What are the Songlines? The First Knowledges book series answers these questions and more. In this lecture series we will focus on four of the six books to discover fascinating insights about astronomy, ‘future fire, future farming’, ‘Songlines’ and Aboriginal Australian law. Learn more about the wisdom generated by 60,000 years of continuous culture.

DELIVERY MODE

• Hybrid (F2F & Online simultaneously)

SUGGESTED READING

• The First Knowledges series, Thames and Hudson Australia
• Book Review: Country is an urgent call to learn from Indigenous knowledges to care for the land, The Conversation (ABC)
• Songlines: Tracking the Seven Sisters, The National Museum of Australia
• Songlines touring exhibition, The National Museum of Australia
• The First Inventors: A ground-breaking documentary series that aims to rewrite Australian history, NITV (SBS)

COURSE OUTLINE

• The first astronomers: How does the land reflect the sky? How does the sky reflect the land?
• Future fire, future farming: How to treat and manage Country respectfully in the 21st century.
• Songlines: The ‘oral libraries’ of ancient knowledge passed from one generation to the next about living together and with Country.
• Law: The system of Aboriginal Australian law that defines what it is to be human and enabled a people to survive for over 2000 generations.

LEARNING OUTCOMES

By the end of this course, students should be able to:

1. See Australia from an Indigenous perspective
2. Gain an eye-opening understanding of the land we call home
3. Gain a deeper understanding of the expertise and ingenuity of Indigenous Australians.
4. Gather examples of how ancient Indigenous practices can combine with modern practices to care for Australia now and into the future
5. Understand the contribution First Nations people can make to Australian society, science, agriculture and more