Wabi bandarra muli: Documenting Maric song

This project aims to record undocumented Maric songs that are known by community members.

We became aware of undocumented Maric songs in Woorabinda community during fieldwork in December 2023. Uncle Milton Lawton is a senior Bidjara and Gangulu Knowledge holder and will be a consultant and intermediary. We will also record oral history associated with these songs and with artistic practice of the region, as well as metadata that includes information about whether these are public or secret-sacred songs.

Maric songs are not widely documented and, with the lines of transmission now disrupted due to the Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act and subsequent legislation (1897–1970), it is important to record this knowledge. These songs will form a corpus that will tie into existing language and cultural revitalisation work and will contribute to future research.

While there is ongoing study of song traditions in the Central and Western Deserts and Arnhem Land, documentation of Aboriginal songs has been sporadic across most of the continent. Music for Aboriginal people fulfils several societal functions, including creative expression, ceremony, navigation, and capturing history. In an entirely oral society, aural modes are especially important holders of and vehicles for specialised knowledge, such as astronomy, ecology, ceremony and historical events.

While we no longer have any first language speakers in this region, songs are a source of language, even where the performer does not understand the lyrics with fluency. Our current elders in Central Queensland were raised by the last First Language speakers and, as such, hold significant cultural knowledge. It is imperative that we document and learn as much of their knowledge as possible while we still can.