Reviewed by Rama Gaind.
Edited by Julianne Schultz and Sandra Phillips, Text Publishing, $27.99
Sometimes making peace, especially after a dispute, can be the hardest thing to do.
First Things First is a crucial, staged and forceful call to listen, hear and respond to questions of constitutional recognition for Indigenous Australians.
It’s said to be a “matter of national urgency”.
“More than two centuries after European settlers arrived, the need to find an honourable way to recognise and celebrate the unique history of this country as home to the oldest living civilisation is long overdue. A Makaratta Commission is the preferred way to do this, to make agreements and enable truth-telling about our history.”
Edited by Shultz and Phillips, Griffith Review unearths history and envisages the future, while not forgetting the urgencies of the present.
Inspired by the 2017 Uluru Statement from the Heart, Griffith Review 60 focuses solely on Indigenous issues and is written predominantly by Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander people.
It delivers strong contemporary insights from leading First Nations people, complemented by powerful Indigenous writers. It provides a unique opportunity to share ‘transformative information, structural challenges and personal stories, and aims to be an urgent, nuanced chorus for genuine consideration of Makarrata beyond the symbolic’.
Contributors include Stan Grant, Melissa Lucashenko, Marcia Langton, Tony Birch, Alexis Wright, Bruce Pascoe, Megan Davis and Kathy Marks.
Is the time really right and are we ready to make peace and devise firmer ground for laws, policies and outcomes that improve Indigenous and non-Indigenous life in Australia?
Here’s a compilation that’s diverse, stimulating and consistently finely written.
This edition asks how we can ‘honourably acknowledge our dark past, and best recognise out country’s status as home of the world’s oldest living civilisation’.
