Combining Indigenous and maritime archaeological approaches: experiences and insights from the '(Re)locating Narrunga Project', Yorke Peninsula, South Australia

Roberts, Amy, McKinnon, Jennifer, O'Loughlin, Clem, Wanganeen, Klynton, Rigney, Lester-Irabinna and Fowler, Madeline (2013) Combining Indigenous and maritime archaeological approaches: experiences and insights from the '(Re)locating Narrunga Project', Yorke Peninsula, South Australia. Journal of Maritime Archaeology, 8 (1), 77-99. (doi:10.1007/s11457-013-9108-2).

Abstract

This paper details the unique pairing of Indigenous and maritime archaeological approaches in the ‘(Re)locating Narrunga Project’. Narrunga was a ketch built by the Narungga Aboriginal community at Point Pearce Mission (Yorke Peninsula, South Australia) at the turn of the twentieth century and later sunk in the 1940s. It is argued that convergences between the scholarly interests of Indigenous and maritime archaeological approaches have been slow to develop and that maritime archaeology as a sub-discipline has not capitalized on the insights that can be gained from collaborative approaches between communities and practitioners. Similarly, Indigenous communities in Australia have had few opportunities to work with researchers to record their maritime heritage. As is evident in the Narrunga story told in this research, non-Indigenous records have been complicit in underplaying the maritime achievements and skills of Narungga people and collaborative research can work towards decolonizing this past.

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