Ngoonjook 37: The Learning journeys: Land and Language Maurice O'Riordan (ed)

Ngoonjook 37: The Learning journeys: Land and Language Maurice O'Riordan (ed)Ngoonjook means news or listen up in the language of the Kungarakan People. It is the name of the Institutes journal, now known as Ngoonjook, Australian First Nations Journal, which has been in print for almost 40 years. Issue no. 37 went to press in March, and looks back to the Institutes momentous 50th Anniversary Symposium, Learning journeys: Land and Language. The Learning journeys: Land and Language theme is significant for the Institute because

 Ngoonjook means ‘news’ or ‘listen up’ in the language of the Kungarakan People. It is the name of the Institute’s journal, now known as Ngoonjook, Australian First Nations’ Journal, which has been in print for almost 40 years. Issue no. 37 went to press in March, and looks back to the Institute’s momentous 50th Anniversary Symposium, Learning journeys: Land and Language.

The Learning journeys: Land and Language theme is significant for the Institute because ‘Language’ has been an integral part of the Institute’s educational journey. This is reflected in particular VET and Higher Education courses over the years as well as through the establishment of the Institute’s Centre for Australian Languages and Linguistics and Batchelor Institute Press, both dedicated to developing resources for endangered language programs.

Ngoonjook 37 brings together 13 presentations from former and current Institute staff and students along with other institutional and independent representatives. The presentations complement and build on each other. The paper from Sashanna and Shania Armstrong on the Pertame Language Nest, for example, finds a theoretical voice in Haye van der Meer’s comparative study of First Nations and Finnish models of learning, and a global echo through The Lego Project as introduced by Kathryn Gilbey and Marie Ellis. Bilingual education is central to the paper by Yalmay Yunupingu, Leon White and Kathy McMahon, as both-ways learning is to Rob McCormack’s reflections as an Institute lecturer and how students reshaped his own learning journey.

While Ngoonjook 37 is dedicated to the 50th Anniversary Symposium and to Kathryn Gilbey whose decades-long work at the Institute recently came to an end, the symposium was dedicated to pioneering Aboriginal linguist Jeanie Bell (1994-2024). This issue includes a Foreword by Professor Curtis Roman, Dean of Higher Education and Research, Batchelor Institute, accompanied by other contributors including: Clair Andersen, Stephanie Barber, Helen Bishop, Joyce Bonner, N’arweet Carolyn Briggs, Robyn Heckenberg, Sadie Heckenberg, Michelle Hogue, Robyn Ober, Maurice O’Riordan and Patricia Mamanyjun Torres.