Archives September 2014

Half the country's rock paintings – some dating back 30,000 years – could disappear within 50 years, experts warn. Oliver Milman meets the Indigenous rangers and researchers working to protect delicate sandstone from the triple threat of mining, graffiti and feral animals.

It's a race to protect Australia's most ancient treasures. For the traditional owners of land near the remote town of Laura, a four-hour drive north-west of Cairns, Far North Queensland, the job is essential – and urgent.

When languages die, especially indigenous ones, a large part of culture and history disappears along with it

High rates of economic growth are a driving factor behind global language extinction, with one-quarter of all native tongues classified as "threatened," a new report has said.

Out of around 6,000 languages around the globe, 1,705 fit the criteria for "threatened" status.

The men at the forefront of the Aboriginal tent embassy at Airds are frustrated their site was valdalised on Saturday night. Tents were torn in half and banners were burnt when the site was unattended for just one hour on Saturday when the incident occurred.

The tent embassy was established local indigenous men to highlight their concerns over the protection of land and wildlife in Airds as part of the Airds Bradbury Renewal Project.

Old Parliament House, Canberra - 1 November 2014 - Agenda - Status of the Sovereignty Movement and updates, Setting up National Governance and Sovereign Independence, Q & A: Open mic - Defining pathways ahead, Aboriginal Law/Original Law - the law of the land and continental common law, Concept of Sovereign Immunity, Sovereign Union treaties between Nations, Setting up Nation courts and the Sovereign Union Court of Justice (purpose and functions)

Do yourself a favour and watch this unreal video of historians Henry Reynolds and Bruce Pascoe speaking at the Sydney Writers Festival.

They speak on wars, memorials, the lack of commemorations, agriculture and the mainstream denial of the rich history of one of the world's great continents ... and the world's first bakers, with more than 12,000 years experience baking bread before any other country in the world. - ABC News 24 - 'Big Ideas'.

A Territory government drive a train through the Land Rights Act if the Federeal government handed it over to them.

'So what', you may think, Land Rights as we know it is a farce, you might say. Well, thats all very well, but many of our brothers and sisters are locked into these contracts, and while they stay on country, they can't do anything about it. This article has some invaluable insights into how it was much better before John Howard smashed it, and how it can get much worse.

Joseph Roe, First Nations Activist from Broome in Western Australia defied money, arrests, threats and compulsory acquisition of his people's land to maintain integrity of First Nations culture and the environment.

"The law and song cycles of Walmadan are not ancient dreamtime history." Joseph Rowe said "This law has been kept alive through my grandfather Paddy Roe and now through me

"Remove law boss Joe Roe ... from history, and the massive gas factory planned by Woodside Petroleum for north of Broome would by now be wrecking the Kimberley coastline," Dr Bob Brown said.

We have seen enough of the poverty in our communities when the rest of Australia are growing rich on the proceeds of genocide through the loss of our homelands through real estate and mining.

We have seen enough of the self-medicating blocking out from our trauma and grief and the dysfunction this brings. We need our own healing camps and safe places for the community to come to in times of despair.