First Knowledges Design: Building on CountryAboriginal design is of a distinctly cultural nature, based in the Dreaming and in ancient practices grounded in Country. It is visible in the aerodynamic boomerang, the ingenious design of fish traps and the precise layouts of community settlements that strengthen social cohesion. Alison Page and Paul Memmott show how these design principles of sophisticated function, sustainability and storytelling, refined over many millennia, are now being applied to contemporary practices. Design: Building on Country issues a challenge for a new Australian design ethos, one that truly responds to the essence of Country and its people. About the series: Each book is a collaboration between Indigenous and non-Indigenous writers and editors; the series is edited by Margo Neale, senior Indigenous curator at the National Museum of Australia. Other titles in the series include: Songlines by Margo Neale & Lynne Kelly (2020); Country by Bill Gammage & Bruce Pascoe (2021); Plants by Zena Cumpston, Michael Fletcher & Lesley Head (2022); Astronomy (2022); Innovation (2023). |
Contents
On Camps Shelter and Country Paul Memmott | |
Engineered Structures Paul Memmott | |
A New Australian Design Alison Page | |
Notes | |
Further Resources | |
Common terms and phrases
Aboriginal architecture Aboriginal Australia Aboriginal design Aboriginal groups Alison Alyawarr ancestral anthropologist architects Architecture of Australia Arnhem Land artefacts artists Australian Aboriginal Australian design Barangaroo bark behaviour boomerang Building on Country built environment camp sites Central Australia centre ceremonial clan clustering colonial connection to Country contemporary created cultural landscape culturally appropriate Darling River Desert design principles dome Dreaming dugong elders environmental example Figure fish traps Georgina Georgina River Goondie grass Gulf of Carpentaria Gununa human humpy identity Indigenous architecture Indigenous design Kaiadilt Kevin kinship Lardil living Margo Neale materials Melbourne Mornington Island Museum objects painting patriclan Paul Memmott placemaking plants relationship ritual River rock-wall sacred histories seasonal settlement shelters skin social Songlines songs South Wales spaces spatial spear spinifex spirit stone stories storytelling Sydney totemic trade traditional knowledge travelled tree University of Queensland urban Wellesley Islands Western windbreak women