Story Map Released with Martuwarra Fitzroy River Council
The West Kimberley National Heritage Sites. Image courtesy Living Waters Heritage Story Map
A moment of climatic and cultural crisis
In late 2022 into 2023 tropical cyclone Ellie and subsequent flooding caused widespread damage to the ecological and cultural heritage of the Martuwarra Fitzroy River region. Plants, people, wild and domestic animals were uprooted, drowned and displaced and ~$322 million in direct damage caused.
The Martuwarra / Fitzroy River in flood. Image courtesy MFRC
Cultural sites from the last 50,000 years - including iconic Wanjina/Wandjina Beings (known as rock art, in Western understanding) - were also affected, along with people’s relationship to this culture. Immediate action and planning was required.
Wanjina from the West Kimberley. Image courtesy Frobenius Institute
Action
The Martuwarra Fitzroy River Council in partnership with UWA's Centre for Rock Art Research + Management, secured an Australian Heritage Grant from the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water, to map the heritage values of the river and its people. The Martuwarra (Fitzroy River) is part of the West Kimberley National Heritage listed area, meeting all 11 listing criteria. It is Western Australia’s longest listed Aboriginal Heritage Site at 733 km with a 96,000 km2 watershed. It is also a ‘Living Waters Museum’ under the UNESCO Intergovernmental Hydrological Programme. The region is home to thousands of rock art sites that demonstrate Aboriginal maintenance of Country from deep time until today.
The Living Waters Heritage project aims to improve Indigenous and non-Indigenous engagement and awareness of these heritage values and deliver digital resources people can use. Martuwarra contains 10 sub-bioregions and is home to 10 nations that include the Jarrakan, Nyulnyulan, Pama-Nyunga, Bunuban, and Worrorran language families who are linked by the ancient and evolving Wunan knowledge and exchange system and governed by First Law. Most people are very aware of how their actions affect their neighbours downstream – as exemplified by the common saying “water flows down”. Such actions include not taking excessive water, regularly being on Country and monitoring, advocating for Country, and renewing Wanjina ancestors by engaging with rock art.
Martuwarra’s Watershed, or Fitzroy River Catchment, is not only a geological feature and complex hydrological system – it is an interconnected spiritual entity and a living ancestor that is the sacred source of a holistic system of Law, leadership, and governance, which the people are born into and bound by a moral contract to nurture and protect.
Collaboration and Outputs
The primary project output is a publicly available interactive ArcGIS Experience with 20 embedded subject-specific Story Maps . This rich tapestry of Traditional owner voices, images, videos, and wisdoms – is overlain on specialist essays by allied academics and partners on ecological, geological, aesthetic cultural and historical values of the West Kimberley.
Edwin Lee Mulligan shares cultural foundations which have been passed on to him
Image courtesy Living Waters Heritage Story Map
Achieving this output took dozens of road trips, sleeping on the side of roads and in community offices, and community meetings to settle on how this story of the area’s heritage could be told. The Story Map format is ideal because stories and walking along the river, people say, are how you care for Country. To develop the message we have three core themes – Culture – Country – Truth and the project team populated these with filmed testimony and academic offerings. All material has been vetted, modified and adapted – and will continue to change as a dynamic record. High-quality videography and photography (why the site takes a while to load – sorry!) ensure individual and community voices are at the forefront. This work brought together an amazing group of people and skills to provide an on-the-river perspective of what heritage is and why it matters. Content covers the deep past through to events and institutions that have caused intergenerational trauma – like missions, pastoralism, and the Bungarun leprosarium– as well as chronicling resistance and triumph through Noonkanbah ....
Rock art
One of the region’s most prominent and engaging resources is rock art - that connects the wider cultural landscape through thousands of sites dating back as far as 41,000 years and through to European colonisation/invasion (did you know there are paintings of European pipes, ships, people and other objects?).
Australia’s oldest known rock art is a 41,000 year old ochre-smeared limestone slab uncovered by collaborative archaeological excavations in the West Kimberley. Image courtesy Western Australian Museum
Art is still made and maintained. This rock art is globally renowned across ancient Devonian limestone as well as Wunaamin Miliwundi sandstone. But most Australians are still largely unaware of this international treasure. There have been moments of national recognition – such as the famous Namarali Wanjina at the 2000 Sydney Olympics opening ceremony. We hope this Story Map will encourage more such moments and contribute to increasing awareness, appreciation, and creating a more inclusive Australian Identity.
Where to from here?
The work is not finished yet. We still have to develop teacher resource packs, and information for tourism and developers. The region is under increasing pressure from unregulated tourism, expanding pastoralism and water extraction and fracking (the world’s largest extant tropical savanna is juxtaposed with world’s largest known gas reserves – an uneasy juxtaposition). To help manage these demands we have created a Strategic Heritage Management Framework to explain the often confusing range of laws and protocols – from First Law to local, State and federal laws – as well as local customs – that apply to this region.
It is important for people be on Country regularly, in the right way, ensuring cultural and personal safety (relevant laws, protocols, and cultural competence 101). Climate change, which caused the floods that precipitated this project, as well as fuelling increasingly severe bushfires, adds a still further level of complication and urgency.
While released only in late October 2024, the Living Water Heritage Story Map has already received a positive reception from Traditional Owners:
“This is the true story that people should know, it should be taught to kids in school”
Kankawa Nagarra (Olive Knight), Walmatjarri Elder.
Martuwarra Fitzroy River Council, reviewing draft Story Map content at a strategic planning meeting, Broome, May 2024. Image courtesy MFRC
This Story Map is a work in progress and we welcome your thoughts and suggestions – please contact lachie@martuwarra.org or sven.ouzman@uwa.edu.au.
Authors
Sven Ouzman, CRAR+M, Social Sciences, UWA
Lachie Carracher and Anne Poelina, Martuwarra Fitzroy River Council
Reference
Carracher, L., Martuwarra, RiverOfLife, West Kimberley Traditional Owners, Poelina, A., Ouzman, S., Coles Smith , M., Bool, I., Pérez-Hämmerle, K.-V., Ward, C., Torres, P., Wilinggin Aboriginal Corporation, Mayala Inninalang Aboriginal Corporation, Hawke, S., Williams, J., George, A., Long, J., O'Leary, M., Pusey, B., Robinson, N., Vokes, R, and State Library of Western Australia (2024). Story Map - Living Water: River, Land and Sea Country and Indigenous People of the West Kimberley. https://livingwaterheritage.org/
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