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The returns of recognition: Ngarinyin experiences of native title, encounter and indeterminacy in the Kimberley region of Northern Australia

Version 2 2024-06-13, 12:08
Version 1 2019-02-26, 15:40
journal contribution
posted on 2024-06-13, 12:08 authored by C Dalley
This article explores a contemporary politics of recognition as it relates to Ngarinyin Aboriginal people of the Northern Kimberley region of Western Australia. I focus on the reflections and experiences of a Ngarinyin man, ‘the Alchemist’, who was involved in a native title claim across the region during the 2000s. Through ethnographic examples drawn from along the Gibb River Road, I show that time on country is animated by unexpected encounters imbued with interpersonal recognition and indeterminacy. These encounters involve non-Aboriginal people (including tourists) and non-human animals: allies who are co-opted at a time when people's intimate knowledge of country is becoming further attenuated. This article contributes to a growing literature on Aboriginal people's perceptions of and experiences in country in post-native title contexts.

History

Journal

Oceania

Volume

88

Season

Special Issue: Shifting Indigenous Australian Realities: Dispersal, Damage, and Resurgence

Pagination

360-376

Location

Chichester, Eng.

ISSN

0029-8077

eISSN

1834-4461

Language

eng

Publication classification

C1 Refereed article in a scholarly journal

Issue

3

Publisher

Wiley

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