The books will be published for use by community members Ingahm where teacher and teacher aid community members will use them in schools and community programs.

Well done to Bridget Priman and all those who have been working on the texts.

At the same time Bridgit has been working with Jedda Priman, Robert Paul and Black Ink to continue the Language multimedia project for children. More information about this project will be posted soon.

Mirroma Workshop Participants Thursday Island

We have just started today and the workshop is going great. The Thursday Island mob are very excited and couldn’t help but comment that a black fella must’ve come up with the concept of Miromaa.

We got to customising Miromaa and entered in at least 5 word entries. It’s amazing just about all their custom labels and fields are in the different dialects of the Torres Strait languages. All five entries have sentences, translated and word for word!

Tomorrow, we will begin with multimedia recording etc, adding those to Miromaa and the dictionary, movie maker process.

In the breaks I have been talking with everyone about the traditional ways of the people here with their different islands and cultures. I am surrounded by lan

guage as they all help each other throughout the workshop.

There is a so much community support for the language and culture program they will be running in the schools.

I feel extremely privleged to be sitting here and welcomed by such beautiful and knowledgeable people.

The groundbreaking works of Caroline Tennant-Kelly, close friend of the famed American anthropologist Margaret Mead, were believed destroyed until uncovered by the detective work of a dogged team of two University of Queensland researchers — Mr Kim de Rijke and Mr Tony Jefferies.

The works contain recordings of Indigenous Languages of Southeast Queensland and Northern NSW.

You can read more about this in a media statement released by The University of Queensland.

St Peter Claver indigenous education liaison officer Kargun Fogarty is backing calls to introduce indigenous language into schools. Photo by Rob Williams.

AN INDIGENOUS Ipswich educator has backed calls for Aboriginal languages to be taught in primary schools and protected for future generations.

St Peter Claver College’s indigenous education liaison officer Kargun Fogarty said teaching the traditional language would benefit students, whether they were indigenous or not.

His comments came after Dr Dale Kerwin, a research fellow from the Griffith Institute for Educational Research, suggested the languages should be taught in school and protected by law.

Read the full article and make a comment on the Queensland Time website .

The article summarises the 2009 Social Justice Report released 22 January 2010, and highlights Indigenous Languages as one of three key themes to the report.

Major Reports on Social Justice and Native Title Reveal More Promising Future

Recently retired Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner Tom Calma released his sixth and final Social Justice and Native Title Reports on 22 January 2010.

The reports recognise a marked shift in the Indigenous policy landscape since the National Apology to the Stolen Generations and suggests a more inclusive and promising future for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

The Social Justice Report 2009 focusses on three themes: justice reinvestment to reduce Indigenous over-representation in the criminal justice system; the protection of Indigenous languages; and sustaining Aboriginal homeland communities.

The first theme outlines a convincing argument for an alternative to incarceration offered by the ‘justice reinvestment’ model, which diverts a portion of the funds planned for prison expenditure to local communities where there is a high concentration of offenders.

The second theme provides vital reading for anyone interested in the perilous state of Indigenous languages in Australia and argues that, without intervention, Indigenous language knowledge will cease to exist in Australia in the next 10 to 30 years.

The final theme of the Social Justice Report 2009 highlights the importance of ‘Homelands’ in providing social, spiritual, cultural, health and economic benefits to residents.  It outlines how policies that fail to support the ongoing development of Homelands will lead to social and economic problems in rural townships that could further entrench Indigenous disadvantage and poverty.

The Native Title Report 2009 comprehensively reviews developments in native title law and policy from 1 July 2008 to 30 June 2009 and considers principles and standards that should underpin cultural change in the native title system.

The Report argues for significant improvements to be made to the native title system if we are to close the disadvantage gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians and to achieve reconciliation.

In his final Report, Commissioner Calma outlines principles and standards that should be used to guide a new approach to native title and explains how the native title system ought to be viewed in the context of broader reforms to promote and protect the rights of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

The Report makes 27 recommendations for reform of the native title system concerning several key areas, including shifting the burden of proof, more flexible approaches to connection evidence, and promoting broader and more flexible native title settlement packages.  The Report also comprehensively reviews land tenure reform.

The reports can be accessed online at www.humanrights.gov.au/social_justice/sj_report/sjreport09/index.html

A CAIRNS filmmaker has the world in his lens, debuting a movie at the Berlin Film Festival.

Reflecting on his achievement: Rima Tamou’s film First Contact will screen at the Berlin Film Festival next week. Picture: JAKE NOWAKOWSKI

Rima Tamou, 46, will be at home at Manunda when his short film First Contact is screened as part of the omnibus film Embargo Project in Berlin this week.

First Contact features non-actors speaking in traditional Girrimae language – a challenge given to him by other filmmakers within the project.

Read the full article

HERVEY Bay is poised to pioneer an indigenous education revolution.

Scrub Hill Indigenous Education Forum. Attending: Sandy Strait State School principal Shane Urquhart, Fraser Coast councillor David Dalgleish, Paul Herschell and Will Davis of Qld Studies Authority with Butchulla elder Frances Gala and Butchulla community linguist Joyce Bonner. Photo by Daniel Tweed

A senior officer from the Queensland Studies Authority was told yesterday that the Fraser Coast is ready to trial a ground-breaking new school syllabus which could place the Butchulla language alongside Chinese, Indonesian, German and French as classroom subjects.

Paul Herschell, acting deputy director of the QSA’s teaching and learning division, met with Butchulla elders and education leaders at the Korrawinga Aboriginal Centre in Hervey Bay to present a statewide proposal to formalise the education of indigenous languages.

Read the full article

A Brisbane academic has called for indigenous languages to be taught in schools.

Griffith University’s Dale Kerwin says Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island dialects have been denied their rightful place as official Australian languages.

Dr Kerwin says the incorporation of indigenous language into the classroom will go a long way to create social cohesion and preserving indigenous cultural heritage.

Read the full article

Read the full article