Yanama Budyari Gumada named international Green Gown finalist

green-gown_web2

A Darug-led research collective supported by Macquarie University in partnership with Newcastle University and the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service has been recognised as a finalist in the International Green Gown Awards.

Yanama Budyari Gumada (‘Go/walk with good spirit’) brings together staff and students under the guidance of senior Darug custodian Uncle Lex Dadd to heal Darug Country at Yellomundee/Yarramundi Regional Park in Western Sydney.

The program was a winner in the ‘Benefiting Society’ category at the Australasian Green Gown Awards last year (see Awards and Recognition, December 2019) and will now compete on the world stage against 12 other outstanding international sustainability initiatives.

Program coordinators Associate Professor Sandie Suchet-Pearson and Dr Marnie Graham, a Formas Fellow hosted by the Department of Geography and Planning,  say this international recognition comes at a fitting time, with National Reconciliation Week’s 2020 theme being ‘In This Together’.

“Reconciliation is at the heart of our work, bringing together many different people with diverse knowledges to heal Country and prioritising learning from the old ways in order to do something new.

“We are so proud of our work together and of Uncle Lex’s commitment to yanama budyari gumada. Through our regular culture camps on Darug Ngurra (Darug Country) we have enabled more than 700 people to connect with Darug Ngurra culture and knowledges, and we’re excited to share our work with the world through this nomination.”

The International Green Gown Award winners will be announced on 8 July as part of the United Nations High Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development.


Yanama Budyari Gumada acknowledges the generous support of NSW Environmental Trust in funding this project.

Date:


Share:


Category:


Tags:


Back to homepage

Comments

Leave a Reply

Required fields are marked *

We encourage active and constructive debate through our comments section, but please remain respectful. Your first and last name will be published alongside your comment.

Comments will not be pre-moderated but any comments deemed to be offensive, obscene, intimidating, discriminatory or defamatory will be removed and further action may be taken where such conduct breaches University policy or standards. Please keep in mind that This Week is a public site and comments should not contain information that is confidential or commercial in confidence.

  1. In Australia today the governments spend approximately $2 supporting aboriginal and torres strait islanders verses $1 for the broader Australian population. In 2015-16, $33.4 billion of Australian, State and Territory government expenditure was spent on services provided to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians. This is a fact. In 2008 Kevin Rudd said sorry to the aboriginal people in the Federal Government. Despite everything done to support our aboriginal communities we still have major societal issues; alcoholism, sexual assault of children, domestic violence, and so on. Are the universities really suggesting that we need to be reconciling with the aboriginal community for the next millennium? I humbly suggest that the universities take a long hard look at themselves, and instead of investing time and energy in such innocuous but useless ‘reconciliation’ activities, that they undertake research and invest on the ground in aboriginal communities addressing the real issues in aboriginal culture instead of the reconciliation trope.

Got a story to share?


Visit our contribute page >>