Speech notes launch of Aboriginal Sydney

Russell Taylor, Principal AIATSIS

Good morning ladies and Gentlemen.

On behalf of the Council, members and staff of AIATSIS, I would like to warming welcome you here today to the launch of Aboriginal Sydney. 

I would now like to ask Uncle Greg Simms, Aboriginal Elder of Western Sydney and to perform a Welcome to Country to official begin proceedings.

 

Let me also acknowledge that we meet today on ancestral lands of the Burramattugal people of the Darug Nation who for times beyond memory built their camps and camp fires on this country- I pay respects to their elders past and present and their continuing traditions on Country.

Again I thank Uncle Greg Simms for his Welcome to Country.

I must from the outset offer apologies from the authors of Aboriginal Sydney - Melinda Hinkson and Alana Harris  - who could not make today's launch because of a prior engagement and a family commitment.

Let me also acknowledge the staff of NSWALC and AHO who are also in attendance today. It's wonderful to see many familiar faces.

For those who don't know me, I am the Principal of AIATSIS - the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies in Canberra.

I am also a proud Kamilaroi man.

AIATSIS is the world's leading research and collecting institution in the field of Australian indigenous studies.

We are a keeping-place not only of a vast record of Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures, but also of expertise, of ideas, of capacity, and of vision.

I am proud to say that we are also an award winning publisher of outstanding writing that promotes an understanding of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures.

Under the name -Aboriginal Studies Press - we publish up to ten new titles annually.

These range across several academic disciplines; history, anthropology, archaeology, native title and cultural studies -  as well as general-interest books in the areas of children's, community and family histories, biography and autobiography.

AIATSIS is very proud of this publication Aboriginal Sydney.

We know of no other publication that has tried to show the Aboriginal history of Australia's first city, Sydney - and in fact there is probably no other publication like it anywhere in Australia.

A further source of my pride and enthusiasm over Aboriginal Sydney comes from other more personal influences.

While my Kamilaroi ancestral lands lie in NSW to the north-west of Sydney, as a youngster I grew up in the inner Sydney city waterfront district where sadly there was a lack of acknowledgement and apparent absence, even invisibility of any 'blackfella' history, culture and presence.

Aboriginal Sydney takes the invisibility of Sydney's Aboriginal heritage as its starting point. 

If offers a different perspective on one of the world's great cities by making this invisible heritage visible.

It does this by mapping and identifying many of the important Aboriginal heritage sites by can be visited in and around Sydney. 

Not all of them, of course, because the sites run into the thousands.

In fact, some of those mentioned in the book are only a stones throw away from this building; the contemporary Riverside Artwork of Jamie Eastwood, OR St Johns Park in the Church Street Mall, and the Parramatta Town Hall.

It is not widely known at the Parramatta Town Hall in 1814, Governor Macquarie held the first 'native conference' and feast. Governor Macquarie created this annual event to build friendly relations with the Burramattugal people.

It is time both Australia and the world knew more about Sydney's rich Aboriginal heritage.

I believe, very firmly, that the millions of international tourists who each year visit our first city would love to learn more about its pre-colonial - and post colonial - Aboriginal history.

The history of its first peoples - it has international appeal.

Surely, that is an opening for someone to fill this gap and concentrate on such tours as part of any organised visit to Sydney - a city which is still home to the greatest number of Aboriginal people anywhere in Australia.

Today, Sydney is home to well over 41,000 - perhaps more - of our people; that's more than 12 percent of our total Indigenous population.

Today, then, is a significant event. 

And I must add that we appreciate that the New South Wales' Land Council - through its CEO Geoff Scott - agreed to co-launch Aboriginal Sydney.

The Land Council, of course, represents perhaps the largest and one of the most important independent - and a might add self-funding - Aboriginal organisations in this Country.

Much of the work of the State's land councils is to ensure that Aboriginal people not only reclaim their culture but grow in strength and influence.

I hope that AIATSIS and NSWALC can work collaboratively on a diverse range of research and other projects in the future.

Let me also acknowledge the work and skills of our small and committed team at Aboriginal Studies Press. In particular its' Director Rhonda Black and graphic designer Rachel Ippoliti.

I would also - on behalf of ASP - offer our sincere thanks to Elaine Schultz who undertook the research for this edition.

In closing, I hope many people will read Aboriginal Sydney. 

It makes fascinating reading - even, I might add, for an Aboriginal person such as myself.  

To paraphrase a great contemporary Aboriginal leader, Charles Perkins - "Our history lives in us and we live our history."

Thank you all for attending today's book launch and I would now like to call on the NSWALC's Sol Bellear to officially launch Aboriginal Sydney.

Thank you.