First Nations

Learn about First Nations cultures and experiences. This website may contain voices, images or names of people who have died.

Updated

03/05/23

mahn (fisherwoman) by Aunty Phyllis Stewart and Uncle Steve Russell.

The First Nations peoples have lived and practised their cultures since time immemorial. These rich and diverse cultures are maintained through song, dance, storytelling, ceremony and language. The Australian Museum has one of the world’s most-significant First Nations collections representing these cultures, with artworks, technologies and cultural material representing First Nations communities from across Australia.

Increased collaboration with First Nations peoples and communities is ensuring the objects held in the Australian Museum Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Collection are interpreted appropriately. The rich knowledge embodied in the collections is activated through programs and exhibitions that provide connections to living practices and deepen public knowledge of First Nations cultures and lived experiences.

The Australian Museum website is also a platform for First Nations voices. The articles here-in are a collection of First Nations writers sharing their expertise and opinions on issues important to First Nations people, helping uncover Australia's hidden histories.

Explore our collections, learn from knowledge shared by First Nations writers and discover our new learning space Burra and permanent exhibitions Garrigarrang (Sea Country) and Bayala Nura (Yarning Country) when you visit the Australian Museum.

Exhibitions

Barka: The Forgotten River

The health of Barka affects us all. Learn how you can support the river by listening to those that have cared for it since time immemorial.

Themes
References

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The Australian Museum's Burra learning space

Discover more about the journey of the burra (eel) from the Pacific Ocean down the East Australian Current to Sydney Harbour, as told in Burra learning and play space.

Themes
References

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Unsettled

Unsettled is a First Nations-led and informed exhibition. Based on rigorous research, Unsettled gives visitors an insight into the lived experience of First Nations peoples over the last 250 years.

Virtual experience
Exhibition themes
References

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Bayala Nura: Yarning Country

Explore and celebrate Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures through a rich diversity of objects and stories of living culture. See more than 250 fascinating objects from Indigenous communities around Australia.

Permanent exhibition
Open daily

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Ngalu Warrawi Marri - We Stand Strong 2021

Garrigarrang: Sea Country

From the Sydney Basin to Torres Strait, discover and celebrate the rich cultures of Australia’s Salt Water People, who for tens of thousands of years have lived and flourished on Garrigarang nura – sea country.

Permanent exhibition
Open daily

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GADI

Built in partnership with local Aboriginal Elders and communities, GADI showcased the rich culture and history of the Country now known as Sydney City. It featured rare objects, new cultural material made by Gadigal Elders, stories, film, songs and 8,000 archaeological pieces.

Award winning exhibition

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Knowledge

Storyboat Installation from Unsettled exhibition

Unsettled: Uncovering our nation's hidden history

An exploration of one of the Australian Museum’s most significant shows in its almost 200-year history.

By Laura McBride and Dr Mariko Smith

Always Was, Always Will Be, Aboriginal Land

The history of an iconic declaration of resilience.

By Laura McBride

Fire management on Country

You do not need to be a scientist to know that the environment is sick. That how we are managing Country is not working and things need to dramatically change.

By Rachael Cavanagh

E078218 canoe, bark, Hunter Valley, New South Wales, Australia.

First Nations watercraft culture

Dr Mariko Smith is a Yuin woman with Japanese heritage, First Nations Collections & Engagement Manager at the Australian Museum, and Honorary Associate at the University of Sydney.

By Dr Mariko Smith

Debunking the myth that Aboriginal stories are just myths: the Yamuti and the megafauna Diprotodon

As a young Adnyamathanha kid, I was told the story about the Yamuti. The Yamuti was a very large and scary animal that specifically looked to steal little kids.

By Jacinta Koolmatrie

Land Rights

Land Rights refers to the struggle for legal and moral recognition of the ownership of the land and waterways that were home to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples of this country prior to the colonisation that occurred from 1788.

By Natalie Cromb

Native Title

Native Title is the Australian Government response to the land rights movement of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, which progressed to legal agitation in the Australian Courts.

By Natalie Cromb

Deaths in custody: What can museums do to effect change?

Museums have the power to set the agenda.

By Dr Sandy O’Sullivan

Sorry

The painting titled Sorry was created in 2006, six years after Nyree participated in the Reconciliation Bridge Walk on 28th May 2000. Sorry means that you don’t do it again.

By Dr Mariko Smith

Whose history: the role of statues and monuments in Australia

The removal of statues of racists, such as Cecil Rhodes or statues that celebrate racist history in the United States, England and Africa has created discussions in Australia around what should be done its statues and monuments of invaders and colonists.

8 May 2020

The differences between hazard reduction burning and Cultural Fire practices

There is a lot of misunderstandings around the different techniques used for burning. The language used to label these may be different but they all have the same purpose and used with the same intent.

By Rachael Cavanagh

Possum skin cloaks then and now – same same but different

Revitalisation of Possum Cloak knowledges and practices as a living legacy in community, is a notable historically significant cultural regeneration phenomenon of our times.

Dr Vicki Couzens

Our Activists: Sunrise Protest (Image 1)”

The Stolen Generation

The phrase Stolen Generation refers to the countless number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children who were forcibly removed from their families under government policy and direction.

By Michael O’Loughlin

Learning from Aunty Fay Moseley about the Stolen Generations

Learn directly from the experiences of Stolen Generations survivors, such as Wiradjuri woman Aunty Fay Moseley who was taken to Cootamundra as a young girl.

By Sara Judge

Who is Country?

So often we are asked “what is Country?”, but for First Nations people the real question has always been “who is Country?”

By Sara Kianga Judge

Tasmanian Aboriginal shell necklaces: A significant cultural practice

Shell necklace-making is a tradition that has continued uninterrupted by European colonisation.

By Aunty Lola Greeno

Kooriculum: Beyond Terra Nullius

Aboriginal Stories of Country welcome all visitors, ask people to listen and learn from them, to respect their country and in particular respect their sacred sites.

By Dr Chris Matthews

Stolen Generations — 21st anniversary of launch of Inquiry, 17 years since report

It has been 21 years since the launch of the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families. Incredibly, the forced removal of Aboriginal children from their families continues to this day.

By Jack Latimore

James Cook – man, mariner, myth or monster

2020 marks the two-hundred-and-fifty-year anniversary of James Cook’s epic voyage along the east coast of Australia in 1770. The Australian nation will be torn between Anglo celebrations and Aboriginal mourning over James Cook’s so-called discovery of Australia.

By Professor John Maynard

Indigenous science goes far beyond boomerangs and spears

Indigenous science was critical for Indigenous people in solving any number of problems they faced and to capitalise on beneficial and sustainable opportunities presented by their environments and circumstances.

By Joe Sambono

Michael Watson in Redfern on the Long March of Freedom, Justice and Hope, Invasion Day, 26 January 1988

The First Lie - the ongoing tragic legacy of Cook’s lie

The artwork I have chosen to respond to is Brenda L Croft’s gelatin silver photograph, Michael Watson in Redfern on the Long March of Freedom, Justice and Hope, Invasion Day, 26 January 1988.

By Tess Allas

Tear It Down

How do we deal with false, constructed histories? 2020 is being used to commemorate the “discovery” of Australia by Lieutenant (best known as Captain) James Cook. Aboriginal people engage with what this means for our history.

By Dr Mariko Smith

The Australian Aboriginal Progressive Association (A.A.P.A.)

The first united all Aboriginal political organisation to form in Australia was the Australian Aboriginal Progressive Association (A.A.P.A.).

By Professor John Maynard

Genocide in Australia

The term genocide has been previously controversial when being applied to Australian History, so why use the term genocide? We need to use the term genocide so we do not minimise the legacy of the colonisation and how the effects contemporarily manifest themselves.

By Nathan Sentance

Dismantling the Australian pygmy people myth

You may have heard this myth before that there was a race of pygmy people who had been on the land that is now called Australia, who were here for several millennia before Aboriginal people, only to have their land stolen and be completely wiped out by Aboriginal people.

By Nathan Sentance

A First Nations lens on glass in Australia

As a Waanyi descendant, I am proud to be a part of the longest living cultures in Australia and have had the opportunity to highlight a small part of First Nations knowledges and their place in National Science Week 2022.

By Jesse King

Australian Museum Archival images 200 Treasures

The Australian Museum’s statement of reflection

Cultural institutions have a responsibility to critically reflect on history and how it influences the present.

By Nathan mudyi Sentance

Aunty Barb McGrady photographs

A proud Gomeroi/Gamilaraay Murri yinah (woman), Aunty Barbara has documented important social, political, and cultural events over thirty years.

Photography

View the collection

Dark Days: A photo essay by Brendan Beirne

Photographs by Brendan Beirne capture the scenes of horrific atrocities committed by white settlers against Indigenous people in the 18th and 19th centuries.

By Brendan Beirne

View the collection

Ghost net art

Fishing nets post a threat to marine life and birds. Learn how First Nation communities and artists are using ghost net sculptures as a way to tell traditional stories.

Pormpuraaw Art & Culture Centre
Darnley Island Arts Centre

Learn more

Weaving Woman, 2019, Genevieve Stewart, Kuku Yalanji. Ink on paper. Australian Museum Collection.

Weaving Woman by Genevieve Stewart

A newly acquired illustration by Kuku Yalanji artist Genevieve Stewart is a powerful statement on memory, resilience and strength of First Nations peoples.

by Jodie Dowd

Unfinished Business

Stories from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with disability.

Unfinished Business project
3D photography
B&W photography

Learn more

Scarred (Ancestral Vase), 2020, Uncle Kevin “Sooty” Welsh, Wailwan. Stoneware No. 7. Australian Museum Collection.

Scarred (Ancestral Vase) by Uncle Kevin “Sooty” Welsh

Years after being removed from his family, Uncle Sooty returned to his birthplace in north-western NSW where he reconnected with his relatives and culture, becoming involved in painting, woodwork, photography and ceramics.

by Dr Mariko Smith

Piracy by Tony Albert

A newly acquired work by Girramay, Kuku Yalanji artist Tony Albert shifts our perspective on what we choose to commemorate.

by Nathan mudyi Sentance

Unsettled exhibition documentation 27 May 2021

Carved emu eggs featured in Winhangadurinya

Winhangadurinya is an experiential space, a complex arrangement of three dimensional objects with deep meanings, including these carved emu eggs.

Discover more

Australian Museum collections

The Australian Museum has spent more than 190 years building a vast collection of over 21.9 million objects and specimens alongside an enviable reputation for world-leading science.

Natural Sciences
Cultural collections
Museum Archives

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Unsettled exhibition themes

Unsettled introduction

Learn about the untold history of Australia's foundation story from the voices of First Nations peoples.

Australia's foundation narratives

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Signal fires

From signal fires in 1770 to bush fires in 2020, discover the importance of knowing our past and acting now for future generations.

Cultural objects and immersive experiences

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Recognising Invasions

Learn from the perspectives and experiences of First Nations peoples and the historical records that point to lack of recognition of dispossession that goes to the very heart of a wound in the nation.

Contested possession
Sovereignty
Plans for a colony

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Fighting wars

Learn how Australia was not peacefully settled but taken by force through the decades of armed, violent conflicts between sovereign First Nations and the colonists.

The Sydney wars
The Appin Massacre
Breastplates

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Remembering massacres

Learn how colonial massacres became a defining strategy to eradicate active resistance from First Nations peoples defending their homelands, families, and resources.

Map of Colonial frontier massacres
No justice, no peace

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Surviving genocide

Massacres, dispossession, dispersals, sterilisation of Aboriginal women, forced child removals and assimilation policies - all acts of genocide, have been committed against First Nations peoples.

Missions, reserves and stations
Stolen Generations

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Always Was, Always Will be ABoriginal Land

Continued resistance

Explore the historical and continued resistance of First Nations peoples.

Art as resistance
Generations of resistance
Blood Money

Find out more

Healing nations

It is important for First Nations peoples to be fully engaged in the process of structural reform to overcome the legacies of colonisation, and together we can work towards a new shared future.

Self-determination
Winhangadurinya

Find out more

The Australian Museum's Unsettled exhibition

Unsettled is a First Nations-led and informed exhibition. Based on rigorous research, Unsettled gives visitors an insight into the lived experience of First Nations peoples over the last 250 years.

Virtual experience
Exhibition themes
References

Find out more

Barka: The Forgotten River

Exhibitions

Barka: The Forgotten River

The Australian Museum's Burra learning space

Unsettled

Bayala Nura: Yarning Country

Garrigarrang: Sea Country

GADI

Unsettled

Knowledge

Unsettled: Uncovering our nation's hidden history

Always Was, Always Will Be, Aboriginal Land

Fire management on Country

First Nations watercraft culture

Debunking the myth that Aboriginal stories are just myths: the Yamuti and the megafauna Diprotodon

Land Rights

Native Title

Deaths in custody: What can museums do to effect change?

Sorry

Whose history: the role of statues and monuments in Australia

The differences between hazard reduction burning and Cultural Fire practices

Possum skin cloaks then and now – same same but different

The Stolen Generation

Learning from Aunty Fay Moseley about the Stolen Generations

Who is Country?

Tasmanian Aboriginal shell necklaces: A significant cultural practice

Kooriculum: Beyond Terra Nullius

Stolen Generations — 21st anniversary of launch of Inquiry, 17 years since report

James Cook – man, mariner, myth or monster

Indigenous science goes far beyond boomerangs and spears

The First Lie - the ongoing tragic legacy of Cook’s lie

Tear It Down

The Australian Aboriginal Progressive Association (A.A.P.A.)

Genocide in Australia

Dismantling the Australian pygmy people myth

A First Nations lens on glass in Australia

The Australian Museum’s statement of reflection

First Nations lecture series

Collections

Aunty Barb McGrady photographs

Dark Days: A photo essay by Brendan Beirne

Ghost net art

Weaving Woman by Genevieve Stewart

Unfinished Business

Scarred (Ancestral Vase) by Uncle Kevin “Sooty” Welsh

Piracy by Tony Albert

Carved emu eggs featured in Winhangadurinya

Australian Museum collections

Unsettled exhibition themes

Unsettled introduction

Signal fires

Recognising Invasions

Fighting wars

Remembering massacres

Surviving genocide

Continued resistance

Healing nations

The Australian Museum's Unsettled exhibition

First Nations team

Laura McBride

Dr Mariko Smith

Courtney Marsh

Haylee Rivers

Remi Ferguson

Tim Bishop

Kiah Patterson

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