CONNECTING PROJECTS, PROGRAMS AND PUBLICATIONS
Leanne Mulgo Watson, Colonisation (detail)
Dyarubbin project team members are involved in many projects exploring Darug culture and Language, while the Dyarubbin project itself has drawn inspiration from and contributed to other projects about Dyarubbin and Darug people.
BOOKS
Darug team members Jasmine Seymour and Leanne Mulgo Watson have published books on Darug Language and culture:
Cooee Mittigar
by Jasmine Seymour and Leanne Mulgo Watson (Magabala Press, 2019, RRP AUD 24.99. Purchase online or through any good bookshop)
Cooee Mittigar, meaning Come Here Friend, is an invitation to yana (walk), on Darug Country. In this stunning picture book, Darug creators Jasmine Seymour and Leanne Mulgo Watson tell a story on Darug Songlines, introducing children and adults-alike to Darug Nura (Country) and language. It is a gentle guide to how Darug people read the seasons, knowing when it is time to hunt and time to rest. It is Jasmine and Leanne’s wish that with this book, everyone will know that the Darug mob are still here and still strong.
Winner of the 2020 Prime Minister’s Literary Award for Children’s Literature
Shortlisted, 2020 Small Press Network Book of the Year Awards
Shortlisted 202 Speech Pathology Australia Book of the Year Awards
Notables, 2020 Children’s Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Awards
Baby Business
by Jasmine Seymour (Magabala Press, 2019, RRP AUD 24.99. Purchase online or through any good bookshop)
Baby Business tells the story of a Darug baby smoking ceremony that welcomes baby to country. The smoke is a blessing – it will protect the baby and remind them that they belong. This beautiful ritual is recounted in a way young children will completely relate to and is enhanced by gentle illustrations. Darug language words are integrated throughout, with a glossary at the back. Central to this stunning book is a message of connection to Country and the need to care for it.
Winner 2020 Children’s Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Awards, Award for New Illustrator
Notables, 2020 Children’s Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Awards, Picture Book of the Year
Shortlisted 202 Speech Pathology Australia Book of the Year Awards
Jasmine Seymour, Mother smoke, wiyanga gadjal
RADIO/PODCASTS
Oonagh Sherrard
Oonagh Sherrard is a composer, musician, producer and writer who creates music and sound works to bring stories to life.
Oonagh worked with Dyarubbin team members Leanne Mulgo Watson, Erin Wilkins, Rhiannon Wright, Jasmine Seymour and Grace Karskens for her radio feature Yarramundi and the people of Dyarubbin on the Darug people and their enduring relationship with this river country for ABC RN’s History Listen, 6 July 2021.
Oonagh’s public art project 11 Stories From the River Dyarubbin is a series of 11 site-specific audio walks downloadable at locations along the banks of Dyarubbin. This collaborative public art work aims to inspire, inform and deepen the listener’s experience of the river.
The first Story, Howe and Deerubbin Parks Audio Walk Balga-Ngurrang/Windsor was released in 2022. You can find it here or download directly from YouTube.
Lisa Needham
Lisa Needham is a radio producer at ABC Radio National. Lisa is curious about people and their stories and has produced audio content for many of the BBC networks including Radio 4, Radio 3, 5 Live and World Service.
In 2019-2020 Lisa worked with Grace Karskens to produce Nah Doongh's Story for ABC RN’s History Listen. Nah Doongh's Story tells of a life that was lost and found. Nah Doongh was born near Penrith on the Nepean River and her life spanned the entire 19th century. She saw and experienced the colonisation of Australia from invasion to Federation. It is also a story of love, loss and one woman’s determination to die on the Country where she was born.
Nah Doongh, probably in Penrith, early 1890s
(Penrith City Library Local Studies Collection)
NAMING AND DUAL NAMING PROJECTS
One of the aims of the Dyarubbin project is to encourage the re-introduction and use of the Aboriginal place names on Reverend McGarvie’s list, so that they become part of the landscape of Dyarubbin once more.
The Dyarubbin project team has begun working with the Geographic Names Board of New South Wales on Naming and Dual Naming projects.
We are delighted to report that in 2021 the Geographic Names Board officially approved the name Wiyingay for a previously unnamed creek at Cattai. You can find out more about Wiyingay on our Story Map in the section entitled Dugga.
More names have been nominated, and the GNB also proposes to add all the Dyarubbin place names to its Register of Aboriginal Place Names.
HAWKESBURY REGIONAL MUSEUM ONLINE CATALOGUE
Hawkesbury Regional Museum in Windsor holds a wonderful collection of Aboriginal implements and weapons from the local Dyarubbin area, including a series of beautiful guni or ganayi, women’s digging sticks, and grinding stones used by women to prepare food and grind ochres.
FURTHER READING
Here are links to more essays and articles about Dyarubbin, its people and the surrounding region
Eugene Stockton, Grace Karskens and Michael Jackson ‘Yellomundee: a human landscape’, in Kelvin Knox and Eugene Stockton (eds), Aboriginal Heritage of the Blue Mountains: Recent Research and Reflections, Lawson NSW, Blue Mountain Heritage and Education Trust, 2019, 33-44.
Leanne Mulgo Watson, Waterholes
