NAIDOC Week: Always Was, Always Will Be

This week, 8-15 November, is NAIDOC Week. It is an annual occasion (typically in July, but postponed due to COVID-19) that celebrates and honours the history, culture, contribution, and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples.  

The theme of NAIDOC Week this year is ‘Always Was, Always Will Be’, an acknowledgement that our nation did not begin with European contact. In fact, it was here long before that, for at least 60,000 years, though according to the stories and law of some Indigenous Peoples, even longer: since creation itself. 

NAIDOC Week was born out of the Day of Mourning on January 26, 1938, when Aboriginal Peoples gathered in protest of the callous treatment of Indigenous Australians over the 150 years since British Colonisation. 

Following the Day of Mourning, William Cooper, an Aboriginal leader and political activist, wrote to the National Missionary Council of Australia to seek their support in the creation of an annual event. Subsequently, from 1940 until 1955, the Day of Mourning was held annually on the Sunday before Australia Day, and came to be known as Aborigines Day. Then, in 1975, the National Aborigines Day Observance Committee (NADOC) decided that the event should cover an entire week in July. Notably, in 1991, NADOC was expanded to include Torres Strait Islander Peoples and thus became the National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee (NAIDOC). 

Today, the political and cultural aspirations which first drove protestors to march the streets of Sydney in 1938 remain prescient. According to Luke Pearson, a Gamilaroi man and founder of IndigenousX, while many view NAIDOC Week as “little more than a cultural showcase,” he asserts that, with each year, “the themes for NAIDOC hint at so much more.” NAIDOC Week affords the Australian public an opportunity to raise awareness of issues affecting Aboriginal Peoples, and perhaps more importantly, presents Aboriginal Peoples with a moment to reflect and rejoice, “to have safe spaces to celebrate our cultures, communities, and our identities.” 

With this in mind, Pearson reminds us of the importance of taking advantage of the limited NAIDOC Week window to advocate for more permanent change: “What can you do to bring people together?” He asks. “To educate, connect, collaborate, agitate, and inspire?” 

As a non-Indigenous person and an ally, I am aware that merely acknowledging the history of NAIDOC Week does not in itself effect permanent change. To do that, we must familiarise ourselves with the goals of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples, many of which are enshrined in the Uluru Statement from the Heart, which advocates for serious structural and constitutional reform as part of an ongoing effort to close the gap. Furthermore, we must continually educate ourselves; through the books, films, documentaries, social media campaigns, and all manner of things which reflect both the issues and the achievements of Indigenous Australians as told by Indigenous Australians. 

NAIDOC Week may only live in the mainstream conscience for a brief period each year, but the principles and ambitions which underpin it live on, just as the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples responsible for its inception live on. Indeed, in her book, Aboriginal Peoples, Colonialism and International Law: Raw Law (also available online via the University of Adelaide library) Professor Irene Watson, a Tanganekald and Meintangk woman, explains that, unlike the dominant western subject of being which is characterised by a "straight line of thought" (i.e. a beginning, a middle, and an end), for Nunga People, "time and space are encompassed within a circle of becoming." According to Watson, for Nunga People, the beginning, present, and future encircle the place of Kaldowinyeri, which translates to 'a long time ago, the beginning of time itself.' In that place is a process that allows a person to begin again: "[w]e are always returning to the beginning," says Watson, "and are walking into both the future and the past." 

Ultimately, then, this year's NAIDOC Week theme is a reflection of the emergence, the existence, and the perseverance of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples, the relationship of a peoplehood to the law, the land, and the natural world; from antiquity into modernity.