Over the past few weeks I have been working to put together a new page on our website that provides people with access to some of the great work that is underway with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities across Australia. Our understanding about rivers is being enriched by taking the time to listen, observe and understand the incredible spiritual, cultural, economic and environmental knowledge that our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island communities have, both past and present. We are hopeful investment will continue in this vital work and we aim to have more stories, images and knowledge featured on our site. If you know of some work that we have not covered, please get in touch and we will add it to our resources list.
Siwan
Given that we are going to be in Melbourne as part of the Sustainable Living Festival we are delighted to be holding our event at Ether, 265 Little Bourke Street. One of the reasons we chose Ether is because the organisation strives to be carbon neutral and supports the Living Trees Initiative an international program that supports land restoration through biodiverse plantings of trees and vegetation. We would love to see you at our Connecting through Conversation workshop on Monday or at the Sustainable Living Festival on Sunday afternoon where I will be sharing the stage with Frank Fitzgerald-Ryan from Vox Bandicoot, an organisation that specialises in environmental education through theatre, story and working with local communities. Please think about coming along to the festival or the workshop, and let anyone else know about these events who might be interested.
Siwan
Recently I have been discovering some of the most amazing story sites in Australia. In particular, I have been impressed by the number of stories being collected in the rural sector.
I heard about this one on Radio National (I spend a lot of time travelling in and out of Canberra by car). HEYWIRE is a space and a competition for young people from regional Australia. This is where young people can share their stories and opinions, and find the news that affects them. Some of the winning stories are very powerful and really leave you struck by the impact of living in rural communities.
The other one is Place Stories. I joined this community a while ago as it gets used quite a bit by the Natural Resource Management sector. Place Stories has two main parts:
- PlaceStories Software – a Windows program for managing digital media (images, text, audio) creating digital stories and publishing (locally or to the web). The PlaceStories software is provided free for registered members to download and install on a standard PC (XP or Vista). (Such a pity you can’t use it on a Mac without installing Parallels).
- PlaceStories Communities - customised websites – sub-domains of the main PlaceStories portal. Each PlaceStories community has tools to support private and public communication of members including digital storytelling, messaging, chat, forums, blogs, news pages, events calendar, group email.
Another one is the Northern Territory Library Service Community Stories project. The funding for this project was a result of the Northern Territory Library winning the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation 2007 Access to Learning Award. Funds from the award are being used to enhance the delivery of library services and programs to remote Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory.
Also, the Australian Centre for the Moving Image community stories about people which is a selection of autobiographical short films made in the Digital Storytelling workshop program at ACMI.
There are a multitude of these sites in Australia and it would be wonderful to have a single access point to find them. In the meantime just enjoy the stories – some of these are incredibly memorable.
Nerida
Does the culture in your workplace encourage conversation and knowledge sharing, or is it only considered work when you are at your desk facing a computer screen?
We will be at the Sustainable Living Festival in Melbourne on the 20th and 21st of February 2011. On Monday the 21st we will be presenting our ever popular Connecting Through Conversation workshop – a one day workshop on the power of conversation and narrative.
Come along and build your skills on effective use of conversation and narrative. We have delivered this workshop in Canberra and Longreach over the last few months and it has been extremely popular. Feedback can be found on our website under Testimonials on the ARRC site.
More information on this workshop can be found in our Resources section.
If you would like to attend this workshop a registration form and flyer is available on our site.
Nerida and Siwan
Flood at Goondiwindi just before peak
Like most of Australia (and sometimes the rest of the world), we have been watching the Queensland floods with our hearts in our mouths waiting for what will happen next. Some of the video clips (particularly this one in Toowoomba), are more spellbinding than a Hollywood movie, and you are left with an overwhelming sense of the power of water and rivers. Here at the ARRC we realise that rivers are our lifeblood, but when they are angry they are incredibly dangerous as well.
I have been following the regular BoM updates, as well as the #qldfloods twitter feed. What has amazed and impressed me is the great use of social media to keep people connected and up to date with what is happening. Another demonstration of the fact that it is people who make a difference. I am particularly impressed by a Queensland Floods summary site web site put together in 4 hours by a group of volunteer Drupal programmers – Justin Freeman from Agileware and James Dellow from Headshift are just two of the people I know who are involved in this, (and I realise there are many more who I am unable to name – great thanks to all of you). It is amazing what they have created, and it shows what is possible when there is a critical need.
The other small site I heard about was from a friend in Goondiwindi, where their local council has set up a Facebook site to keep the community informed. The Goondiwindi Regional Council site is being followed closely by members of the Goondinwindi/Boggabilla comunity and they are sharing some fantastic photos as well. Our thoughts are with all those who are suffering losses as a result of the floods…Dorothea Mackellar’s poem about Australia…”of droughts and flooding rains” is certainly ringing true at the moment.
Nerida
Resources | Siwan Lovett | 
31 January 2011 6:07 pm | 
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