Uncanny Brisbane:

New Ways of Looking at Urban Indigenous Place

Kelly Greenop
Aboriginal Environments Research Centre, School of Geography, Planning and Architecture
The University of Queensland, Queensland, Australia

Abstract

Revealing new types and forms of place and place networks can render a place
‘uncanny’ leaving the mainstream unsettled and disturbed from its previously
fixed and secure colonial version of the past. These forms of place are created
and used by contemporary urban Indigenous people both as part of their daily
personal lives, and as part of their self-consciously constructed Indigenous
identities with social and political motives.

The author’s current research into Indigenous places in suburban Brisbane

reveals a set of places and networks which are both unsettling to the mainstream
history of Brisbane’s origins and continue to offer alternative ways of inhabiting,
valuing and using the city. New versions of the traditional meeting and gathering
places are being created, maintaining and renewing traditions in the suburban
landscape. Contemporary types of places are also created which have no
equivalent in the traditional past, but support traditional values of holding
community and kin together, in the multi-cultural suburban context. Indigenous
geographies and places are both affirming traditional Indigenous place systems,
and creating new versions of Indigenous place, with unique and specific forms in
the suburban context.

This paper will examine initial findings from fieldwork currently being undertaken
in Inala, on Brisbane’s South West edge. It will reveal that far from being ‘not
proper blackfellas’ Indigenous people in suburban Brisbane have a proud and
continuing heritage of place, which is parallel to and unsettling for, the settler
version of Brisbane.

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Geelong, Australia, 3-6 July 2008 History in Practice 1
Uncanny Brisbane: New Ways of Looking at Urban Indigenous Place

Introduction
This paper examines the urban place making of Indigenous people in contemporary
Brisbane, and seeks to reveal some of the contemporary place attachments of Indigenous
people in Brisbane today. Links can be drawn between traditional ways of using and valuing
place, and new versions of place attachment, demonstrating cultural continuity as well as
change and the continuing development of contemporary place attachments.

This paper will explore the possibility of an ‘uncanny’ version of Brisbane, one that may
unsettle or disturb mainstream versions, or render the city unrecognisable to its residents.
This revealing of an uncanny version of place is part of a postcolonial approach to the human
geography of Brisbane by the author, attempting to decolonise it through a series of
revisitations of historical assumptions and an analysis of the use of places by contemporary
Indigenous residents.

Preliminary findings for current fieldwork being undertaken in the outer South West Brisbane
suburb of Inala will be used as a case study. The research was conducted during
involvement with the Inala community over the course of 2006-2007, including a deep
involvement with the Inala and Acacia Ridge National Aboriginal and Islander Day
Observance Committee (NAIDOC) celebrations in July 2007, where the author was a
member of the Inala NAIDOC committee and assisted in the Inala NAIDOC Family Day event
as a photographer and video recorder for the event.

Inala’s comparatively high proportion of Indigenous people (5.3% compared to a Brisbane-

wide average of 1.4%1) make it an ideal location to uncover non-White versions of Brisbane.
Indigenous resident’s concepts of Inala are at odds with common perceptions of it by
outsiders and the popular media, in which it is characterised by high levels of violence, crime
and poverty; yet to residents it is a beloved place, rich with positive associations and history.

The history of ‘the uncanny’ is initially examined, and its relevance to place in Brisbane
discussed. Traditional Indigenous gathering practices from literature sources are then

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outlined and the Indigenous place making constructs of the pre-colonial and colonial periods
in the Brisbane region are established. Contemporary events in South East Queensland will
then be examined to establish their similarities with pre colonial and colonial events. Events
in Inala were examined as part of ongoing fieldwork, and here the author seeks to position
them as part of continuing and reworked traditions, as well as reveal emerging customs
which reflect new Inala identities embedded in place. Far from being inauthentic or degraded
in culture, the research reveals that Inala’s Indigenous communities demonstrate diverse,
living cultural practices, rather than a degraded version of a traditional culture with a focus on
what has been lost.

Finally the paper examines how these Indigenous place responses position theoretical
questions of place for urban Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities. It is argued that
this Indigenous version of Brisbane unsettles the ‘mainstream’ version of Brisbane. If a
dynamic Indigenous culture is occupying the city and suburbs, assumed by most to be a
young place with a heritage of Queenslander houses and mango trees, where, in fact, does
this place the White version of Brisbane? Are non-Indigenous claims to these places less
legitimate and therefore are mainstream geographies on shaky grounds, themselves
‘degraded’? Or could a new acknowledgement of multiple layers of cultures and
understanding of places reward us all (Indigenous and non-Indigenous) with a richer
understanding of contemporary urban life? It is here we return to the notion of the uncanny to
explore these issues, offering new questions for contemplating this dilemma, rather than a
set of neat answers.

The Uncanny
Freud discussed the uncanny and the means by which it disturbs the familiar and unsettles
the comfort of the everyday feelings of being at ease.

“the uncanny is that class of the frightening which leads back to what is know of
old and long familiar”2

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I borrow the term ‘uncanny’ in its application to Indigenous Australia from Gelder and
Jacobs3 who seek to explore how contemporary accounts of the Aboriginal sacred in
Australia can make Australia unfamiliar and disturbing to its non-Indigenous inhabitants.
They see the Aboriginal sacred in contemporary Australia as being “identified only in order to
be restricted, bounded, fenced off: neutralised”4

The translation of the term uncanny is from the German unheimlich, the antonym of heimlich,
a word not directly translatable, but meaning approximately homely, cosy comfortable and
companionable.5 The notion of the uncanny, the unheimlich is not merely that which is
uncomfortable, but that which has been rendered strange when it is usually heimlich, it is the
heimlich turned back on itself, the familiar made unfamiliar, with a particular kind of
disturbance being felt by the onlooker. Freud points out that it is not merely the unfamiliar
being brought to attention, but a combination of “what is familiar and agreeable, and what is
concealed and kept out of sight” and what has in fact, been repressed.6 This is particularly
relevant to our attempts to revisit the places of our neat, clean young city of Brisbane. To
reveal a side, a parallel set of places which transform, for example, suburban parks into
places of tradition and ceremony linking back to a classical Aboriginal past, can disturb the
assumptions many have about Brisbane, and unfix Indigenous people from ancient history
and remote locations where they are ‘safely’ away from White suburbanites.

Said7, in his classic work, uncovers the ambition of ‘orientalism’ to fix and control the notion
of the Orient, and hand it over to a Western scholarly process to speak for, and about, the
Orient with authority and confidence8. A similar process has been undertaken in Australia
with the colonisation of the land and its peoples, such that authority for places is now vested
in registers of sacred sites and the legal structures that regulate them, rather than people, as
was the case in the Classical Aboriginal past. The revealing of secret information is now
required in order to protect the sacredness of the place, ironically, potentially eroding its
integrity during this process9. Control of information has been an important part of the
colonial project, with the idea of ‘secret information’ being dangerous and meaning that “the
concept is escaping from…control”10. Yet if it exists in a manner that is ‘beyond control’ of

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colonisers, it retains its authority and power, parallel to the systems that attempt to fix and
control it. This could be seen as a decolonising effect, one which has been described as
necessary, by anthropologists11 and geographers12, who seek to unpick the work of
colonisation in these disciplines and re-stitch the pieces more loosely into a new and fuller
version which remains flexible and changeable, and out of (total) academic or legal control.

The process of how this decolonisation of academic practices is actually done, what work it
entails, is emerging with new versions of history, anthropology and geography surfacing, and
the previously unheard voices of Indigenous academics, and historical actors being
revealed.13 Carter’s attempt to make all of Australia ‘uncanny’ with the Lie of the Land14 was
a complete rethinking of the process of settlement. Jacobs15 has examined Brisbane in
sketch form some time ago, and also written a selective account of Indigenous urban issues
in Melbourne.16 AIATSIS have published non-academic Indigenous interpretations of
Melbourne17, Sydney18 and Darwin19 and Adelaide has also been examined in terms of
Indigenous interactions within the city20 and within an historical context by Gara.21 Indigenous
authors make important contributions to the lived history of Brisbane and South East
Queensland,22 and recent Indigenous academic work of note by Bond23 examines Inala
Identities in the context of health. Memmott24 and Memmott & Long25 have demonstrated the
sophisticated use of place and architecture in traditional and contemporary remote
Indigenous Australia. However, the lives of urban and suburban Indigenous people have not
featured in our academic understanding of cities in Australia to any great degree, Merlan26,
Morgan27, Birdsall28, and Keen29, are significant exceptions. These authors are notably
primarily within the fields of anthropology and geography, while few urban planners or
architectural theorists deal with these issues of contemporary Indigenous life in cities and
how it is reflected in place. The author has begun with an initial critical examination of the
history of Brisbane settlement and geography relating to Indigenous prior occupation30. This
paper seeks to continue this exploration, and demonstrate the connections between the
theorising of the city and lived places, and give Indigenous occupants of the city a voice often
unheard in research.

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Traditional Gathering and Place Making in South East Queensland

There is a global, cross-cultural tradition of people gathering to share food, news and to
trade, for celebration, ritual and the enforcement of law. Many gathering events for Aboriginal
people occurred in South East Queensland in the pre-colonial and colonial eras. People from
distinct groups and disparate regions gathered to feast together in times of abundance, to
help initiate each other’s young adults, and to share songs, stories and settle disputes. There
was a traditional of hospitality, and the reciprocation of hosting events.31 Social obligations
created strong bonds, which helped to define relations within and between groups. The
importance of extended kin and welcoming them with food and hospitality was a key part of
gathering events. From the historical and archaeological literature a number of place
constructs are able to be attributed to the gathering sites and their associated events.

Physical Features of Place

The creation of a gathering place was physically specific and followed a highly coded pattern
not only in terms of its actual construction, but how it was located with respect to other
gathering sites in the region. Satterthwaite & Heather32 provide archaeological evidence of
Earth circle sites33 in the Moreton Region, which were locations of ceremonial and social
activity. The physical construction of the sites was one to two cleared circles on the ground,
with built up earth mounds forming the edge of the circles. In some cases there has been
evidence of one circle, in others two (and in rare cases, three or more), and typically with a
path joining the two circles. It is generally believed that the larger earth circle was for more
public ceremonies and gathering, and the smaller circle was for the conducting of secret or
sacred events, following a 100-200m walk down the connecting path away from public
gaze.34 Earth circle grounds were specially marked out, so that the uninitiated, and women35
would keep away.36 The blazing of trees around sacred ceremonial grounds37 was used to
deter people from a approaching the area, carved tree trunks visible to those using the earth
circle site,38 and, indeed the raised earth mounds of the circle defined the area itself.39

The location of the enduring earth circles gives an indication of the spread and distribution of
Aboriginal ceremonial activities in the region. Satterthwaite & Heather discuss site selection

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and possible requirements for the suitable selection of earth circle locations, the criteria for
which included, distance from the nearest neighbouring site, which was likely to be a device
to manage resources to avoid over-exploitation of an area;40 proximity to resources such as
fresh water,41 sources of game and plant foods;42 and specific physical features, such soil
suitable for the creation and maintenance of the earth circle43. Importantly Satterthwaite &
Heather conclude that it is likely that the earth circle sites formed a site system that
developed to support the practice of culture over the region in a sustainable manner.44 They
argue that

earth circles constituted principal elements of the region’s Aboriginal built

environment…by establishing these sites the Aboriginal people of the region
signalled their appropriation of it by transforming its natural landscape into a
cultural landscape.45

Timing of Gathering Events

The timing of the use of earth circles is also discussed by Satterthwaite & Heather who point
out that there were favoured times for gathering. Obvious rallying times were those of natural
abundance of food, such as that provided by the Bunya (Bonyi) Pines whose annual nut
ripening provided a rich food source, with extra large crops every two to three years. The
plenitude of sea mullet46 was also a feasting and assembly opportunity. Other times were
also favoured according to Satterthwaite & Heather47 which coincided with the most reliably
abundant rainfall in the region, around March and April, following the long wet-season
summer. The approximate time is known from descriptions of gathering events occurring at
the time that particular constellations appeared: the ‘coal sacks’ which were also described
as “the sky bora rings”,48 dark patches in the night sky which would be visible during those
particular months of the year, and also later in September-October.

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Figure 1. Map of earth circle locations in South East Queensland,

based on Satterthwaite & Heather (1987), 46.

Activities which Create Place

In addition to the physical aspects of the gathering places, there were associated activities
which were essential to the proper use of the earth circles, and without which the place
would not be activated into its full potential.

The gathering of the people at these events was to bring the place to life, to make the place.
Petrie describes the ‘Bonyi Nut’ festivals, which were held in the Blackall Ranges. These
events gathered people from a wide area, and fulfilled an important social function in the
cultural system. The inviting of people, strengthening of connections and the creation of
reciprocal ties was an important aspect of the gatherings.

These gatherings were really like huge picnics, the aborigines belonging to the
district sending messengers out to invite members from other tribes to come and
have a feast…The these tribes in turn would in turn ask others. For instance, the
Bribie blacks (Ngunda tribe) on receiving their invitation would perchance invite
the Turbal people to join them, and the latter would then ask the Logan or
Yaggapal tribe, and other island blacks, and so on from tribe to tribe all over the

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country, for the different tribes were generally connected by marriage, and the
relatives thus invited each other. Those near at hand would all turn up, old and
young, but the tribes from afar would leave the aged and sick behind49…
tribes were assembling from every part of the country, some hailing from the
Burnett, Wide Bay, Frazer Islands [sic], Gayndah, Kilcoy, Mount Brisbane, and
Brisbane.50

Langevad in his transcripts of Winterbotham’s original documentation of Gaiarbau, an

Aboriginal man from Kilcoy born in the 1880s, describes large gatherings of Aboriginal
groups in that region “for initiations, for the settlement of tribal quarrels, for the playing of
organized games such as wresting and other sport, for trading, and for the bunya feasts”51.

The use of fire is well documented as a special place-making practice in many Australian
Indigenous cultures,52 and it was also a key component of classical coroborree events and
other gathering events in South East Queensland.53 Fire here was not only used for warmth,
but as a marker and creator of a comfortable place, and as a way to demonstrate hospitality
to a visiting guest.54

Ceremonial activities that occurred during gathering were the ultimate goal of the creation of
place in these specially designed locations. The purpose of these events was varied and
included initiation of young into adults, ritualised settling of disputes through fighting and law
procedures.55

Social and Behavioural aspects of Place Making

Ceremonial gathering was accompanied by specific behaviours, and dress which including
head-dresses of flowers or feathers,56 body painting57, and other body ornaments58 not
usually worn which marked these occasions. Ritualised language for ceremonial events was
used.59

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Elders had a special function at gathering events, particularly at initiations, where they were
central in educating and enculturating their young adults, and handing down important
knowledge, both sacred and practical, which would keep the group spiritually and physically
sustained. Winterbotham60 explains the importance of different meetings of Elders61
separately held for men and women, who would make major decisions and act as the law
keepers of the group. Particular relationships of kin had ritualised roles in ceremonies62 and
while men and women took on different roles,63 they each were important and the obligation
to fulfil that role was strong.

Summary of Classical Era Place Constructs

From this literature we can see that a number of different constructs were used to create
ceremonial gathering places, including but also beyond the physical locations that were
constructed. A model of earth circle construction was developed with attributes that
supported the ceremonies being conducted and markers to ensure privacy and protocols
were respected, creating boundaries to the place. The development of a system of places
and how it was used was important, allowing a sustainable distribution of places with the
opportunity to reciprocate hospitality and share in seasonal abundances of food with
neighbouring groups. Places were used at specific times of the year and ceremonies
conducted at particular times of the day following seasonal and celestial patterns, and
ceremonial protocols. Particular activities were associated with the gathering places,
including fires as both practical and symbolic gestures, special dress, body decoration and
language, and naturally highly valued ceremonial events. At these events, not only gathering
and ceremony occurred, but sport, feasting, socialisation, enculturation of the young, law
making and dispute settlement occurred. These activities were associated with these places
and help to create the place.

A comparison will now be drawn with places, created and maintained in contemporary
Brisbane for Indigenous gathering at NAIDOC events.

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Contemporary Place Making In Urban Brisbane

A key event in the national Indigenous calendar is the week now known as NAIDOC.
Originally begun in 1937 as the ‘Day of Mourning’ for Aboriginal people on 26th January, the
National Aboriginal Day Observance Committee (NADOC)64 has become NAIDOC65, a week-
long celebration and remembrance of the past and gathering of people at NAIDOC events
around the country each July66. These events have a ‘grass-roots’ instigation: established by
Aboriginal people for their own cultural and political purposes, they have remained relevant
to diverse range of Indigenous people.

Brisbane and South East Queensland Indigenous people have developed a network of
NAIDOC events, which draw through cultural parallels from classical Aboriginal traditions.
Despite many NAIDOC events being funded primarily from Federal through to local
governments and their agencies with cash and in-kind support, cultural practices remain the
focus of the events and bureaucratic requirements are negotiated to create a valid
Indigenous event.

Physical Features of Contemporary Place

Similar criteria to that which determined earth circle location are applied today to networks of
NAIDOC sites. NAIDOC activities are typically conducted at a free, open invitation ‘Family
Fun Day’. There have been numerous NAIDOC sites in Inala over the past 10 years since its
inception, including a local park, considered by some locals to by their ‘sacred site’ for Inala;
an oval adjoining the current site of the Inala Elders; and a football oval where local Junior
Rugby League play and train. Parks and outdoor locations are favoured as ‘natural settings’
more suitable for traditional dancing, children’s rides and activities, and able to accommodate
the thousands of people attending events. In 2007 Inala NAIDOC Family Fun Day was held
in a park which is on a prominent corner, and has significance for the community in the
contributions that have been made there by Indigenous community members during
community service activities and programs. The park featured benches decorated in an
Indigenous theme, a skate bowl, and a community shelter featuring murals painted by
Indigenous locals. Other sites for the event have been mooted, however there are a number

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of physical criteria which need to be met in order to stage the event, such as flat land for
stage and sound set up, public toilets, power supply for food stalls, rides and stage, access
for vehicles and even the ability to peg safely into the ground for marquees. These practical
considerations restrict the number of suitable sites, and sometimes remove favoured
locations, which have positive historical associations from the available options. As NAIDOC
events expand and government funding body’s fears of litigation grow, insurance and public
liability become issues, which must be woven into the mix of cultural requirements.

There are inevitable differences of opinion on which sites should be considered as NAIDOC
event locations and this sites reflects the diversity of Indigenous experiences and place
attachment in Inala. There is no one ‘Indigenous Inala’ but, like any other group, a diverse
range of place experiences positioned by age, gender, social and economic status and other
factors shapes each person’s place attachments.

A key point on physical location is the distribution of sites which reflects the concentration of
Indigenous populations in the South East Queensland region. While there may be some
changes to the location of NAIDOC events in Inala, there is no thought to moving it outside
Inala to another location altogether, reflecting Inala itself as a centre for cultural activities, not
only Indigenous residence. The availability of funding resources in Inala primarily from
Brisbane City Council and other smaller funding grants to help fund the events creates a
geographical spacing of NAIDOC events, reflecting the tendency of funding bodies to spread
their grants physically across their region. However, this does also operate on a level where
Indigenous communities that are strong and populous, in effect create funding centres and
traditions, with adequate catchment populations to make the event suitably popular and
worthwhile, reflecting a cultural dimension to the location of funded events. The neighbouring
suburb of Acacia Ridge now has its own NAIDOC event, in 2007 mentored and supported by
Inala’s NAIDOC committee.

The resulting layout of NAIDOC event sites across greater Brisbane gives what could be
described as a fragment of a similar network pattern to Satterthwaite & Heather’s earth circle

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analysis, and a similar social function is fulfilled. Importantly, similar to Satterthwaite &
Heather’s claims for a system of sites developed to facilitate and maintain cultural
expression, a system of NAIDOC sites can be conceptualised reflecting a contemporary
Indigenous cultural landscape.

Figure 2. Map of NAIDOC Family Day locations in South East

Queensland. Source: author.

Timing of NAIDOC Events

The selection of the days for the events is also given careful consideration, finding a day in
NAIDOC week that does not clash with nearby events, so that people can travel to other
NAIDOC events in neighbouring communities or where there are family or other connections
which oblige attendance, is important. Acacia Ridge has staged its event, held for only the
second year in 2007, outside the official NAIDOC week, possibly in order to ensure
maximum support and attendance for its event, or in an attempt not to crowd calendar filled
with more established events. The more established Inala event (conducted in various forms
since the early 1990s) is traditionally on the Wednesday of NAIDOC week, in the middle of
the NAIDOC calendar. This reflects its importance as the largest NAIDOC event outside the
central city of Brisbane, and keeps it with a day’s ‘rest’ between Inala NAIOPC and the
traditional Friday of Brisbane city’s Musgrave Park NAIDOC event, at which a number of

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Inala dance troupes, singers and other performers participate, and at which the Inala Elders
have a ‘tent’ for meeting friends and watching the events.

NAIDOC Activities which Create Place

Activities at Inala NAIDOC include a similar range of cultural activities to those which
occurred at the traditional Bonyi Festivals, and other corroborees, including traditional
dancing from local and visiting groups, passing down of stories from Elders to young people,
sport and games, family gatherings reuniting kin from local and distant areas, displays of art
and craft and selling of cultural items. There is an emphasis on hospitality, overt cultural
displays of belonging, and unity of Indigenous people.

The way I see it, the Aboriginal and Islander people need a day of celebration
you know, or a week as it is, and I think it’s great everyone gets out…has a good
feed, has a good sing along.67

NAIDOC in Inala is really community spirit and the good thing about this is that
we’re celebrating our survival, and this is the 50th year of the NAIDOC
celebration and it’s absolutely awesome. And I think as I said, pride in the
community is displayed here because here’s heaps of people, children enjoying
themselves and most of all it’s about building up our community strength and
giving the Elders the opportunity to showcase their mentorship, and leadership I
think that’s’ terrific. That’s what these special celebrations are all about.68

The 2007 event was similar in ambience to a local fete, with an array of stalls from local stall-
holders selling arts, crafts and food, to government agencies promoting safety, health and
community services. Free children’s rides, slides and art activities, as well as raffles and café
style seating created a family day out.

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NAIDOC is really fun and the rides are fantastic and I love doing the paintings
and all the people are really, really fun and you can see all the tents that you can
do activities and the train, slide, yeah and there’s babies that play too.69

There was a mix of elderly people catching up to chat and hear news about each other’s
families. Young children gathered balloons and sample bags of stickers, pens and give-
aways, older children and teenagers came to meet up with mates and be seen with their
friends, in an environment where parents were happy to let them wander. There was a busy
atmosphere of community and celebration, a central stage with music and events with a
vibrant MC to keep the atmosphere going and the crowds interested.

Inala NAIDOC to me is, it’s more spiritual over here, even though Musgrave Park
is big, you meet more family, but this is close, compact. I grew up in Acacia
Ridge, it’s always over here.70

NAIDOC in Inala is good, good little spot here…you get all the Aboriginal and
Torres Strait Islander people all together, mix it up, listen to some music, talk to
each other, yeah, stuff like that.71

Inviting of important local families and friends from outside Inala to the event is common.
Many Inala Elders attended Acacia Ridge’s event and in their turn reciprocated by hosting
Acacia Ridge Elders at the Inala event. The reciprocity of the neighbouring groups shows
the obligation to share knowledge at attend events by proximate groups is still apparent. In
addition, local politicians and dignitaries are invited, as the NAIDOC event moves beyond
sharing and reciprocity within the Indigenous community, to showcasing and welcoming non-
Indigenous community members to cultural events.

It brings all of us people together…not only us Murri people, but the non-Murri
people, multi-cultural, they’re from everywhere, I mixed with so many last night,

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international guests and they are celebrating NAIDOC as well. I did the Welcome
[to Country] last night and it was so wonderful to see all these other people.72

There is certainly an element of being proud of Indigenous culture and showing the rest of
the community that they can organise, and successfully host a major event which offers a
positive version of Indigenous identity.

Traditional ceremonial activities, including dancing, singing and fire making were amongst
the most popular at Inala NAIDOC where large crowds gathered to watch the traditional
dancing in particular. Inala has a diverse range of Indigenous cultures and some local
troupes have been given permission and instruction in dance from traditional owners of
dances originating elsewhere, such as Stradbroke Island,73 so that despite their apparent
lack of cultural ‘depth’, groups with heterogeneous memberships and whose knowledge of
classical culture was disrupted by past settlement practices, there is a maintenance and
revival of traditions. Far for being ‘inauthentic’ the passing of dances and songs from one
group to another was one of the main functions of traditional gatherings, as described by
Petrie

At night during the bonyi-season, the blacks would have special great
corroborees, the different tribes showing their special corroboree (song and
dance) to each other, so that they might all learn something fresh in that way. For
instance a northern tribe would show theirs to a southern one, and so on each
night, till at last when they left to journey away again, they each had a fresh
corroboree to take with them, and this they then passed on in turn to a different
tribe.74

Other dancers at Inala NAIDOC, included one family originating from Cape York Peninsula.75
This family dance only their traditional dances from that area and only members of their
family may participate. They take their protocols directly from the ‘Uncles’ in Kuku-Yalanji
country and were required to complete instruction and testing in their home country before

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being given permission to dance in Brisbane by their home country Elders. So it is clear that
there is no one set of standards, but a continual process of negotiating behaviours and
protocols, depending on family history and background. Culture is in this case not only racial,
but personal.

In Inala, NAIDOC dancing in 2007 included a fire making ceremony, where the tradition of
making a fire using two sticks briskly spun on each other using their hands, was performed
by a local dance troupe. The young men dancers performed the fire making to the sounds of
a droning didgeridoo, and then as smoke appeared, the crowd began an escalating cry of
anticipation, and they called out with joy as the dancers waved the burning grass bundle
above their heads, then flung the fire high up into the air to the whoops and applause of the
large crowd. This is significant, in that it is not only maintaining the tradition of fire being used
to create a special place, an Indigenous place, but it is the showcasing of a highly skilled
traditional cultural practice, being demonstrated by young urban men today.

A key feature of the day in Inala is showcasing young contemporary performers, who sing
and dance in many styles from hip-hop to country, rap and ballads. Country music is hugely
popular, especially with many Elders who grew up in rural areas, and the songs and the
repetition of music from their past draws out many stories and memories for people, as the
tradition of oral history and song has always done. Two songs have particular significance in
Inala and are played at nearly every major event, including NAIDOC. The first was originally
recorded by ‘Mop and the Drop-Outs’ in the 1960s titled “Brisbane Blacks”, which is still
known and loved by all ages, who sing along to the words, and the second is a song written
in the 1980s called “The Inala Song”76, which gives a potted history and affirmation of love for
Inala, sung by the Inala Elders Yarning Place Singers.

Social and Behavioural aspects of Inala NAIDOC Place Making

The social aspects of Traditional gathering are maintained and strengthened during NAIDOC
events. Key business conducted at NAIDOC events is the acknowledgement of Traditional
Owners who generally perform a ‘Welcome to Country’ ceremony as the first item of activity

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Geelong, Australia, 3-6 July 2008 History in Practice 17
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on the event day. The speech, though generally short, is significant as it both invites people
to be welcome in the country still acknowledged to be rightfully owned by that Traditional
Owner group, and it reinforces that group as having rights to speak for and give permission
for others to be in their country. Similar to the special function of words used at classical
ceremonial events, this short speech transforms one’s awareness beyond that of the
dominant colonial system of cartography and suburban streetscape, into an awareness of
another layer of ownership and meaning, and in fact transforms that place into part of a
wider, pervasive Indigenous cultural landscape. At Inala NAIDOC in 2007, the Traditional
Owner wasn’t available to perform the Welcome to Country ceremony, but a local Elder who
could be described as having historical ownership due to length of residence, spoke to
acknowledge the traditional owners and welcome people to the event. Rights to ‘speak for
country’ or speak ‘about’ country such as this were also prevalent in the classical era, when
these rights could also be established through residence and caring for country, as well as
genealogical connections.77 For some the seeking of permission from traditional owners for
events is a key part of protocols which must be enacted in order to ensure a proper and
happy event. “You don’t muck around with those ancestors, they’ll let you know!…If you get
the right people, it all goes right”.78 The fact that the Traditional Owner has been asked, even
if they are unable to attend, constitutes a following of protocol that then permits others to
then perform this act. In 2007, not only was Indigenous culture highlighted in the welcoming
speeches, but Inala as a place with it’s own Indigenous identity is conceptualised, made real
through the speeches and the crowd is bonded through these words.

The community and family support that you have clearly demonstrated, this is
what Inala’s all about, bringing all us Murri people together, and I think that’s
fantastic. [Crowd applause]79

Elders and other community members are acknowledged at NAIDOC events through the
giving of yearly awards, voted on by the local community. Paraphernalia such as Aboriginal
and Torres Strait Islander flag stickers, ties, lapel pins, bags, earrings, and many other forms

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Geelong, Australia, 3-6 July 2008 History in Practice 18
Uncanny Brisbane: New Ways of Looking at Urban Indigenous Place

of overt cultural identification are available. It is a day when unity as Indigenous people is
emphasized and people are encouraged to be proud and feel strong within their culture.

NAIDOC is important in the enculturation of children, with kindergarten and pre-school

children from Inala’s Indigenous community-run pre-school being brought along to watch the
dancing and have their faces painted with flag colours. Older children are given the day off
school to attend and in some cases perform in events, with culturally specific activities being
provided at the event, such as flag painting, traditional games, stories told by Elders, and
traditional practices such as Torres Strait Islander basket weaving. Teens are also strongly
enculturated through a series of programs leading up to a separate, youth cultural event80 at
which young people develop their own dance routines and songs over weeks and months,
under the guidance of grant-funded arts workers and community volunteers. The resulting
routines and songs speak about pride in suburb and identity, strength of the community, and
defiance against pressures to be more ‘mainstream’. Some of these routines are then reused
at NAIDOC, giving the wider community the opportunity to see some of the youth festival’s
events. Emerging hip-hop and other artists (the youth group performers of the past) are also
given the opportunity to perform, as entertainers in their own right, and their gritty street
version of Inala identity, ‘raps’ about police and politicians, and the injustices of racism, as
well as the joys of friends and family, and ‘hanging out’ in Inala are all aired.

Laydeez, where you at?

Show the world you’re proud and black
Hey laydeez…81

To the mothers, the daughters, the aunties, the nieces,

We’re all representing for all the deadly sisters
Four-oh-double-seven82, we’re representin’
Four-oh-double-seven, we represent.83

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Geelong, Australia, 3-6 July 2008 History in Practice 19
Uncanny Brisbane: New Ways of Looking at Urban Indigenous Place

The localness of artists showcased and the specificity of the issues they describe bind the
performance to the place and people of Inala.

Conclusion
This paper describes a new attempt to understand Indigenous place in Brisbane through the
reexamination of history and comparison with contemporary gathering and celebration, to
reveal both persistence and change in place networks. Place systems based on Indigenous
cultural traditions continue to exist and these systems undergo continual development and
change, unsettling the view that Indigenous cultural practices are fixed ‘safely’ in the past,
without resonance or effect on the modern lived city. These networks of places are both a
revival and a continuation of a traditional social system reflected in place.

The existence of an Indigenous cultural landscape parallel to the settler understanding of

Brisbane places creates an uncanny version of Brisbane, which can unsettle the dominant
geography, an open up new understandings for settler group. NAIDOC events are just one
example of Indigenous events and activities which create a parallel human geography, which
is largely ignored by mainstream media and the dominant culture. Other events such as
informal gatherings of families to practice dancing, the use of parks and other public spaces
to gather paper-bark for seating or leaves for weaving; more organized events such as touch
football carnivals with teams based on Indigenous identity systems; and formalised
Indigenous events at self-consciously constructed Indigenous spaces, such at the
Queensland State Library’s ‘Yarning Circle’ all contribute to an alternative version of
Brisbane. Being confronted with this parallel version of Brisbane could bring forth an uncanny
experience for the general White suburban population who may typically think that
Indigenous people are somehow ‘elsewhere’, or are stereotyped as, for example, ‘drunks in
parks’, and not relevant to their own suburban existence. The revealing of what has
previously been suppressed, what could was familiar but now seems unfamiliar in these new
version, is the uncanny being conjured. This encounter with the uncanny can be a positive
experience however, an opportunity to learn, to discover and potentially embrace multiple
versions of places and systems which overlay one’s usual experience of the city, leading to a

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Geelong, Australia, 3-6 July 2008 History in Practice 20
Uncanny Brisbane: New Ways of Looking at Urban Indigenous Place

richer experience of, and understanding of one’s own place within the city. Indeed, not only
alternative Indigenous versions of the city exist, but versions of the city for different migrant
groups, genders, sexualities, ages and subcultures which inhabit it in distinct ways are
possible. A permanent unsettling of the notion that places are fixed and completely
knowable, limited to an official version, can be a called upon to encourage broader and
deeper readings of place in Australia.

Acknowledgements
Gratitude is extended to the Inala Indigenous community without whose generosity the
research would not be possible.

Many thanks to Dr Chelsea Bond and several anonymous reviewers who provided
constructive criticism.

The research is conducted within the Aboriginal Environments Research Centre, School of
Geography, Planning and Architecture, at The University of Queensland.

The Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies generously funds
research for this project.

This research is proudly supported by the Queensland Government’s Growing the Smart
State PhD Funding Program and may be used to assist public policy development. However,
the opinions and information contained in the research do not necessarily represent the
opinions of the Queensland Government or carry any endorsement by the Queensland
Government. The Queensland Government accepts no responsibility for decisions or actions
resulting from any opinions or information supplied.

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Uncanny Brisbane: New Ways of Looking at Urban Indigenous Place

Endnotes

1
Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2006, Census Table for Brisbane, Cat. No. 2068.0 - 2006 Census
Tables 2006 Census of Population and Housing Indigenous Status by Age by Sex, Australian Bureau
of Statistics Website www.abs.gov.au, date viewed 25th February 2008.
2
Sigmund Freud, “The ‘Uncanny’” in The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of
Sigmund Freud (London: The Hogarth Press, 1953), 219-253.
3
Ken Gelder and Jane Jacobs, Uncanny Australia Sacredness and Identity in a Postcolonial Nation
(Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1998).
4
Gelder and Jacobs, (1998), 2.
5
Freud, (1953), 219.
6
Freud, (1953), 224-225, 241.
7
Edward Said, Orientalism (London: Penguin, 2003 [1978]).
8
Said, (2003), 122.
9
Ken Gelder and Jane Jacobs, “‘Talking out of Place’: Authorizing the Aboriginal Sacred in
Postcolonial Australia”, Cultural Studies, 9:1 (1995), 154-155.
10
Kenneth Maddock, Your Land is Our Land: Aboriginal Land Rights (Ringwood: Penguin, 1991),
226.
11
Ritchie Howitt and Stan Stevens, “Cross-Cultural Research: Ethics, Methods, and Relationships” in
Iain Hay (ed.), Qualitative Methods in Human Geography (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 2005)
12
Nigel Thrift, “The Future of Geography”, Geoforum, 33 (2002), 291-298;
Jay T. Johnson, et al., Placebound Australian Feminist Geographies (Melbourne: Oxford University
Press, 2000).
13
Libby Connors, “Indigenous Resistance and Traditional Leadership: Understanding and Interpreting
Dundalli”, Journal of the Royal Historical Society of Queensland, 19:2 (2005), 701-712; Rod Pratt,
“The Affray at York's Hollow, November 1849”, Journal of the Royal Historical Society of Queensland,
18:9 (2004), 384-396; Ros Kidd, “Aboriginal History of South Brisbane”, Journal of the Royal Historical
Society of Queensland, 17:11 (2001), 463-480; Raymond Evans, “ ‘Wanton Outrage’: Police and
Aborigines at Breakfast Creek in 1860” in Rod Fisher (ed.) Brisbane Aboriginal, Alien, Ethnic Brisbane
History Group Papers No.5 (Brisbane: Brisbane History Group, 1987); Thom Blake, “Excluded,
exploited, exhibited: Aborigines in Brisbane 1897-1910”, in Rod Fisher (ed.) Brisbane Aboriginal,
Alien, Ethnic Brisbane History Group Papers No.5, (Brisbane: Brisbane History Group, 1987); Thom
Blake, “Excluded, exploited, exhibited: Aborigines in Brisbane 1897-1910”, in Rod Fisher (ed.)
Brisbane Aboriginal, Alien, Ethnic Brisbane History Group Papers No.5 (Brisbane: Brisbane History
Group, 1987).
14
Paul Carter, The Lie of the Land (London: Faber and Faber, 1996).
15
Jane M. Jacobs, Edge of Empire Postcolonialism and the City (London: Routledge, 1996).
16
Jane M. Jacobs, “Resisting Reconciliation the Secret Geographies of (post)colonial Australia” in
Steve Pile and Michael Keith (eds.), Geographies of Resistance (London: Routledge, 1997), 203-218.
17
Meyer Eidelson, The Melbourne Dreaming: a Guide to the Aboriginal places of Melbourne
(Canberra: Aboriginal Studies Press, 1997).
18
Melinda Hinkson, Aboriginal Sydney A guide to important places of the past and present (Canberra:
Aboriginal Studies Press, 2001).
19
Toni Bauman and Samantha Wells, Aboriginal Darwin A Guide to Exploring Important Sites of the
Past and Present (Canberra: Aboriginal Studies Press, 2006).
20
Gavin Malone, “Ways of Belonging: Reconciliation and Adelaide's Public Space Indigenous Cultural
Markers”, Geographical Research, 45:2 (2007), 158-166; Rob Amery and Lester-Irabinna Rigney,
“Recognition of Kaurna Cultural Heritage in the Adelaide Parklands: A Linguist's and Kaurna

Proceedings of the XXVth International Conference

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Geelong, Australia, 3-6 July 2008 History in Practice 22
Uncanny Brisbane: New Ways of Looking at Urban Indigenous Place

Academic's Perspective. Progress to date and future initiatives”, in Christine Garnaud and Kerrie
Round (eds.), The Adelaide Parklands Symposium A Balancing Act: Past-Present-Future (Adelaide:
The University of South Australia, 2006); Faye Gale and Joy Wudersitz, Adelaide Aborigines A Case
Study of Urban Life 1966-1981 (Canberra: Developmental Studies Centre, Australian National
University, 1982).
21
Tom Gara, “Aboriginal Fringe Camps in Adelaide, 1836-1911”, Presented to the Royal
th
Geographical Society of South Australia, June 28 , (2001).
22
Michael Aird, Portraits of our Elders (Brisbane: Queensland Museum, 1993); Michael Aird, Brisbane
Blacks (Southport, Queensland: Keeaira Press, 2001); Rita Huggins and Jackie Huggins, Auntie Rita
(Canberra: Aboriginal Studies Press, 1994); Albert Holt, Forcibly Removed (Broome: Magabala Books,
2001); Ruth Hegarty, Is that you, Ruthie? (St Lucia, Queensland: University of Queensland Press,
1999); Ruth Hegarty, Bittersweet Journey (St Lucia, Queensland: University of Queensland Press,
2003); Samuel Wagan Watson, Smoke Encrypted Whispers (St Lucia, Queensland: University of
Queensland Press, 2004); Yvette Holt, Anonymous Premonition (St Lucia, Queensland: University of
Queensland Press, 2008).
23
Chelsea Bond, “‘When you’re black they look at you harder’ Narrating Aboriginality within Public
Health”, (PhD Thesis, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, 2007).
24
Paul Memmott, Gunya, Goondie and Wurley The Aboriginal Architecture of Australia (St Lucia,
Queensland: University of Queensland Press, 2007).
25
Paul Memmott and Stephen Long, “Place Theory and Place Maintenance in Indigenous Australia”,
Urban Policy and Research, 20:1 (2002), 39-56.
26
Francesca Merlan, “European Settlement and the Making and Unmaking of Aboriginal Identities”,
The Australian Journal of Anthropology, 17:2 (2006), 179-195.
27
George Morgan, Unsettled Places Aboriginal People and Urbanisation in New South Wales (Kent
Town, South Australia: Wakefield Press, 2006).
28
Christina Birdsall, “All One Family: Family and Social Identity among Urban Aborigines in Western
Australia”, (PhD Thesis, University of Western Australia: School of Anthropology, 1991).
29
Ian Keen (ed.), Being Black Indigenous cultures in ‘settled’ Australia (Canberra: Aboriginal Studies
Press, 1988).
30
Kelly Greenop and Paul Memmott, “Urban Aboriginal Place Values In Australian Metropolitan
Cities: The Case Study Of Brisbane” in Caroline Miller and Michael Roche (eds.) Past Matters:
Heritage and Planning History - Case Studies from the Pacific Rim (Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars
Press, 2007).
31
John Mathew, Two Representative Tribes of Queensland with an inquiry concerning the origin of
the Australian race (London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1910), 114; Constance Campbell Petrie, Tom Petrie’s
Reminiscences of Early Queensland (St Lucia, Queensland: University of Queensland Press, 1992),
55.
32
Leonn Satterthwaite and Andrew Heather, “Determinants of Earth Circle Location in the Moreton
Region”, Queensland Archaeological Research, 4 December (1987), 5-53.
33
These are also commonly known as ‘bora rings’. Satterthwaite and Heather (1987), 6 use the term
earth circle site to avoid confusion with the term ‘bora ring’ which is properly used only for those
specific ‘bora’ (initiation) sites of north-central NSW, other terms were applied in SE Queensland.
34
Satterthwaite and Heather, (1987), 14.
35
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (([Brisbane]: Archaeology Branch, 1982), 70 suggests that
women in turn had their own ceremonies and grounds in the Brisbane region, and these too were
secret sacred places where men were not allowed to go. His information, gathered from Gaiarbau, a
man, is naturally lacking in this information.
36
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (1982), 70.

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Geelong, Australia, 3-6 July 2008 History in Practice 23
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37
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (1982), 70.
38
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (1982), 71.
39
Satterthwaite & Heather, (1987).
40
Satterthwaite & Heather, (1987), 21.
41
Satterthwaite & Heather, (1987), 44.
42
Satterthwaite & Heather, (1987), 45.
43
Satterthwaite & Heather, (1987), 43.
44
Satterthwaite & Heather, (1987), 48.
45
Satterthwaite & Heather, (1987), 49.
46
J.T. Hall, “Sitting on the crop of the bay: an historical and archaeological sketch of Aboriginal
settlement and subsistence in Moreton Bay” in S. Bowdler (ed.) The Coastal Archaeology of Eastern
Australia (Canberra: Department of Prehistory, Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian
National University, 1982), 82.
47
Satterthwaite and Heather (1987), 22.
48
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts, (1982), 77.
49
Petrie, (1992), 11-12.
50
Petrie, (1992), 16.
51
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts, (1982), 60.
52
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (1982), 71; Petrie, (1992), 21.
53
Lindsay P. Winterbotham, Some native customs and beliefs of the Jinibara and neighbouring tribes,
on the Brisbane and Stanley Rivers, Queensland (Unpublished manuscript held in Fryer Library:
University of Queensland, 1957), 62B.
54
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (1982), 70.
55
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (1982), 60.
56
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (1982), 65.
57
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts, (1982), 71, Petrie, (1992), 19-20.
58
Petrie, (1992), 20.
59
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (1982), 72-73.
60
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (1982), 75.
61
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (1982), 73-75.
62
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (1982), 76.
63
Queensland Ethnohistory Transcripts (1982), 75.
64
“A History of NADOC”, (1987) Land Rights News, 4:2, 20.
65
Now know as NAIDOC to include Torres Strait Islander peoples.
66 th
NAIDOC, National NAIDOC History website, www.naidoc.org.au/history, website viewed 14
February, (2008).
67
Inala NAIDOC July 11th, 2007, video interview.
68
Inala NAIDOC July 11th, 2007, video interview.
69
Inala NAIDOC July 11th, 2007, video interview.
70
Inala NAIDOC July 11th, 2007, video interview.
71
Inala NAIDOC July 11th, 2007, video interview.
72
Inala NAIDOC July 11th, 2007, video interview.
73
These dances are performed by a group with diverse home countries who dance Noonucal dances.
74
Petrie (1992), 19.
75
These dances are performed by the Gudanji Dancers whose traditional country is Kuku Yalanji near
Cooktown.
76
“The Place we want to Live in” also known as “The Inala Song”, by J. Driscoll, 1981.

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Geelong, Australia, 3-6 July 2008 History in Practice 24
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77
Peter Sutton, Native Title in Australia an Ethnographic Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2003), 27.
78
P.C. Inala NAIDOC Meeting, April 2008.
79
Inala NAIDOC 11th July 2007, speech recorded on video.
80
This event is the Stylin’UP Indigenous Youth Festival held in Inala every May, in it’s 11th year in
2008, which attracts upwards of 15000 people.
81
Laydeez Biz performance, Inala NAIDOC July 11th 2007, videocassette.
82
4077 is the postcode of Inala and is frequently used as code for ‘Inala’.
83
Laydeez Biz performance, Inala NAIDOC July 11th 2007, videocassette.

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