Holding Yawulyu: White Culture and Black Women's Law by Zohl dé Ishtar ebook (EPUB)
Mapping inter-cultural relationships as they are played out in a remote Aboriginal settlement in Western Australia's Great Sandy Desert, this book challenges White Australians to reconsider their relationship with Indigenous peoples. Unpacking White cultural practices, it explores the extraordinary difficulties which Indigenous women face when they attempt to maintain and pass their cultural knowledge, customs and skills on to their children and youth. From 1999 to 2001, Zohl dé Ishtar lived and worked intimately with a group of thirteen women elders to establish a vibrant intergenerational cultural knowledge transmission program: the Kapululangu Women's Law and Culture Centre. Through this profound experience Zohl identified 'Living Culture', the cultural energy which is created when individuals live their culture to its fullest expression enabling them to transform their worlds even when to do so seems impossible. Her profound radical feminist analysis of the socio-cultural context surrounding this Indigenous women's initiative challenges White attitudes and behaviours and offers a deeper comprehension to those who aspire to be involved in collaborative projects with Indigenous peoples. A lyrical and passionate book.