Cover not available
Part of
Land and Language in Cape York Peninsula and the Gulf Country
Edited by Jean-Christophe Verstraete and Diane Hafner
[Culture and Language Use 18] 2016
► pp. 139–158

Groups, country and personhood on the upper Wenlock River, Cape York Peninsula

Donald Thomson’s Kaanju genealogies

| Independent Scholar, London, UK
This chapter presents an analysis of group and personal identities among the Kaanju of central Cape York Peninsula, drawing on unpublished material collected by the anthropologist Donald Thomson in the 1930s as well as my own more recent work. My analysis builds on Bruce Rigsby’s engagement with Thomson’s work, an important aspect of his academic and applied research; it also reconfirms the importance of Thomson’s Cape York Peninsula fieldwork for the ethnographic record. Building on the detailed genealogical material and appended field notes Thomson recorded on the upper Wenlock River in 1932, I develop an analysis of Kaanju social organization and personhood, highlighting important but underappreciated distinctions in the forms of connection between people and country apparent in this material. Attending to these distinctions allows for a better understanding of ‘classical’ Aboriginal connectedness to kin and to country, as well as providing an important baseline for analysis of the changes and continuities that have followed colonization.
Published online: 18 February 2016
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/clu.18.07smi
References (25)
References
Chase, Athol. 1980. Which Way Now? Tradition, Continuity and Change in a North Queensland Aboriginal Community. PhD Dissertation, University Of Queensland.Google Scholar
Chase, Athol, Bruce Rigsby, David Martin, Ben Smith, Mark Winter & Peter Blackwood. 1998. Mungkan, Ayapathu and Kaanju peoples’ Land Claim to Mungkan Kaanju National Park and Lochinvar USL. Unpublished claim book, Cape York Land Council, Cairns.Google Scholar
Chase, Athol & Peter Sutton. 1998/1981. Hunter-gatherers in a rich environment: Aboriginal coastal exploitation in Cape York Peninsula. In W.H. Edwards, ed. Traditional Aboriginal Society (second edition). South Yarra: Macmillan. 62–89.Google Scholar
Crowley, Terry. 1983. Uradhi. In R.M.W. Dixon & Barry Blake, eds. Handbook of Australian Languages. Volume 3. Canberra: Australian National University Press. 306–428.Google Scholar
Fisher, Joe. 1998. Battlers in the Bush: The Batavia Goldfield of Cape York. Darwin: WJ & EE Fisher.Google Scholar
Hill, Clair. 2011. Named and unnamed spaces: Color, kin, and the environment in Umpila. Senses & Society 6: 57–67. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Keen, Ian. 1995. Metaphor and the metalanguage: “Groups” in northeast Arnhem Land. American Ethnologist 22: 502–527. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kidd, Ros. 1996. Occupation history: Kaanju and Umpila, Cape York. Unpublished manuscript.Google Scholar
Levi-Strauss, Claude. 1972/1962. The Savage Mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Meston, Archibald. 1896. Report on the Aboriginals of Queensland. Brisbane: Queensland Government.Google Scholar
Rigsby, Bruce. 1980. Land, language and people in the Princess Charlotte Bay area. In Neville Stevens & Alan Bailey, eds. Contemporary Cape York Peninsula. Brisbane: Royal Society of Queensland. 89–94.Google Scholar
. 1999. Genealogies, kinship and local group organisation: Old Yintjingga (Port Stewart) in the late 1920s. In Julie Finlayson, Bruce Rigsby & Hilary Bek, eds. Connections in Native Title: Genealogies, Kinship and Groups. Canberra: Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research, Australian National University. 107–123.Google Scholar
. 2005. The languages of eastern Cape York Peninsula and linguistic anthropology. In Bruce Rigsby & Nicolas Peterson, eds. Donald Thomson: The Man and Scholar. Canberra: Academy of Social Sciences. 129–142.Google Scholar
Rigsby, Bruce & Nicolas Peterson. 2005. Introduction. In Bruce Rigsby & Nicolas Peterson, eds. Donald Thomson: The Man and Scholar. Canberra: Academy of Social Sciences. 1–16.Google Scholar
Sharp, Laurison. 1934. Ritual life and economics of the Yir-Yiront of Cape York Peninsula. Oceania 5: 19–42. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Smith, Benjamin. 2008. Regenerating governance on Kaanju homelands. In Janet Hunt, Diane Smith, Stephanie Garling & Will Sanders, eds. Contested Governance: Culture, Power and Institutions in Indigenous Australia. Canberra: ANU e-Press. 153–173.Google Scholar
Strathern, Marilyn. 1988. The Gender of the Gift. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Sutton, Peter. 1999. The system as it was straining to become: Fluidity, stability, and Aboriginal country groups. In Julie Finlayson, Bruce Rigsby & Hilary Bek, eds. Connections in Native Title: Genealogies, Kinship and Groups. Canberra: Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research, Australian National University. 13–57.Google Scholar
. 2003. Native Title in Australia: An Ethnographic Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Thomson, Donald. 1932. Cape York Peninsula Genealogies – Wenlock River. Unpublished manuscript held in the Thomson Collection, Museum Victoria, Melbourne.
. 1933. The hero cult, initiation and totemism on Cape York. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 63: 453–537.Google Scholar
. 1935. The joking relationship and organised obscenity in North Queensland. American Anthropologist 37: 460–90. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Thompson, David. 1988. Lockhart River ‘Sandbeach’ Language: An Outline of Kuuku Ya’u and Umpila. Darwin: SIL.Google Scholar
Verstraete, Jean-Christophe & Bruce Rigsby. 2015. A Grammar and Lexicon of Yintyingka. Berlin: de Gruyter Mouton. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Wolmby, Isobel, Noel Peemuggina & Peter Sutton. 1990. Donald Thomson at Cape Keerweer. In Peter Austin, R.M.W. Dixon, Tom Dutton & Isobel White, eds. Language and History: Essays in Honour of Luise A. Hercus. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. 271–282.Google Scholar
Cited by (2)

Cited by two other publications

Tutchener, David, David Claudie & Michael Morrison
2019. Results of archaeological surveys of the Pianamu cultural landscape, central Cape York Peninsula, 2014-2016. Queensland Archaeological Research 22 ► pp. 39 ff. DOI logo
Rusho, Dima
2018. Cultural conceptualisations of language and country in Australian Indigenous languages. International Journal of Language and Culture 5:1 ► pp. 94 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 5 september 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.