Yijarni 2nd edition
Yijarni 2nd edition
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On 23 August 1966, approximately 200 Gurindji stockmen and their families walked off Wave Hill Station in the Northern Territory, protesting against poor working conditions and the taking of their land by pastoralists.
Led by Vincent Lingiari, this landmark action in 1966 precipitated the equal wages case in the pastoral industry and the establishment of the Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976.
While it is well known that the Walk Off was driven by the poor treatment of Aboriginal workers, what is less well known is the previous decades of massacres and killings, stolen children and other abuses by early colonists.
Told in both English and Gurindji, in the first edition of Yijarni compelling and detailed oral accounts of the events that Gurindji elders witnessed or heard from their parents and grandparents ignited the interest of audiences nationally and internationally, and challenged revisionist historians who questioned the extent of frontier battles and the legitimacy of the Stolen Generations.
This new edition commemorates the anniversary, with a foreword by Brenda L Croft.
'It is widely acknowledged that the1966 Wave Hill Walk-Off - with Vincent Lingiari leading the Gurnidji people - was a seminal moment in the history of Aboriginal society’s tragic encounters with the European occupiers of Australia. Still, up to now, few Gurindji voices have been heard, especially on the period preceding the Walk-Off. The ‘new’ history contained here: oral accounts, maps, paintings, photos and citations, does much to fill the chasm in our understanding of the circumstances preceding that fateful moment when Lingiari and Gurindji stood their ground. I highly commend this intimate, heart wrenching, and informative account of one of the single
most important events in our recent past.'
- Peter Garrett
Production Details
- Paperback
- 275mm x 213mm
- 256pp + Cover
- Released 28 August 2026
- ISBN 9781922752147
Contents
Foreword by Brenda L Croft
Dedication
Contributors
Chapter 1: Introduction
Chapter 2: Before the Arrival of Europeans
Chapter 3: The Killing Times
Chapter 4: Malyalyimalyalyi/Lipanangku: The First Wave Hill Station
Chapter 5: Jinparrak- The Second Site for Wave Hill Station
Chapter 6: The Wave Hill Settlement
Chapter 7: Early Policemen and Trackers
Glossary of Gurindji and Kriol Words
Acknowledgments
Story Sources
Endnotes
References
Index
About The Editors
Felicity Meakins (FASSA, FAHA) is a Professor of Linguistics at the University of Queensland. She is a non-Indigenous field linguist who specialises in the documentation of First Nations languages in northern Australia and the effect of English on these languages. Felicity has written 22 books with different Indigenous communities on their languages, including Bina: First Nations Languages Old and New (Black Inc, 2024). She has worked as a community linguist aswell as an academic over the past 25 years, facilitating language revitalisation programs and conducting research into First Nations languages. She won the 2021 Linguistics Society of America’s Kenneth L. Hale Award by the Linguistic Society of America (LSA) for this work and was made an Australian Research Council (ARC) Kathleen Fitzpatrick Laureate Fellow for the period 2025-2030. Felicity was also the joint winner of the 2021 Australia Museum Eureka Award for Interdisciplinary Research and the 2024 Prime Minister’s Literary Award for Tamarra: A Story of Termites on Gurindji
Country (Hardie Grant)
Erika Charola is a teacher and linguist who started working with Indigenous people in the Victoria River District of the Northern Territory in 1996. Erika worked for Diwurruwurru-jaru Aboriginal Corporation, facilitating a Gurindji language program at Kalkaringi School (1996 to 1999) and documenting Gurindji stories. She later had a similar role working with Ngarinyman and Bilinarra speakers in other Victoria River area communities. She has worked as an interpreter trainer and NAATI (the National Accreditation Authority of Translators and Interpreters) examiner in Kriol. Erika has taught English to adults in Spain, Germany and France, and to international students at Monash University in Melbourne. Erika is a co-compiler nof the Gurindji to English Dictionary (Batchelor Press, 2013) and co-editor of Mayarni-kari Yurrk: More Stories from Gurindji Country (Batchelor Press, 2016). She has been employed at Kalkaringi School since 2016
About The Cover
Front cover image: Ronnie Wavehill at the remains of the yards at the site of the of the first Wave Hill Station. (Brenda L Croft 2015)
Back cover images: (Top) Women and children at the old station in 1925. (Photo: Michael Terry collection, courtesy of NLA); (Middle) Remians of the yards at the site of the original Wave Hill Station. (Photo: Brenda L Croft 2014.); (Bottom) Early encounters: Michael Terry and a man painted up ready to perform Wangka ceremony at the old station in 1925. (Photo: Michael Terry Collection, courtesy of NLA)
