traditional knowledge conference 2008 te tatau pounamu

In Australia we have got big problems. Grog is getting out of control. Child sex abuse is rightaround the country. There is a lack of law and order that keeps things in place and Aboriginalcommunities have no resources to be able to take an intervention into these white communities and tryand straighten them out.Figure 1. Preminghana. Land handed back to Tasmanian Aboriginal community via theAboriginal Lands Act 1995.This place is called Preminghana, which is what I have got written on the back of my shirt.Preminghana is the traditional name of this country, here in the very northwest of the state. It washanded back to us in 1995 and we spent a lot of time there with community camps taking up lots ofyoung people. There are big stone petroglyphs that weigh half a ton with very big carvings on theserocks, meanings of which we no longer know. But it is a very important place.In the top right of the map in Figure 2 is Mt Cameron West, which is where Preminghana is. We gothere. Down to the south east is Hobart. That is where John Bowan came in 1803 and put the flag up.He claimed Tasmania for the king. In the 1830s, Robinson rounded our people up and took them upthere to Wybalenna. They were there until 1848 and 47 survivors were then transferred down south toOyster Cove, which is south of Hobart. They died out there. Their graves were grave robbed.Eventually, after a big struggle by our people in 1984, where we reoccupied Oyster Cove as a sovereignplace, the Tasmanian Government was forced to hand back that collection of human remains, which wecremated at Oyster Cove that very same year.95