For us ‘good governance’ means looking after country according to our custodial responsibilities and customary law, and having a strong land and sea management organisation that can operate in a modern world.
Looking after and respecting our cultural knowledge means being on country, speaking language, doing ceremony, sharing skills, and learning from our elders.
There are many places that are especially important to us. There are sacred sites as well as places where we collect and hunt bush foods and medicines, camp and spend time. We have custodial responsibilities to look after all our cultural places, particularly our sacred sites.
We are saltwater people. Sea country sustains us spiritually, socially and physically. The sea is critical to our cultural identity and to our everyday lives. We are connected to it through our ancestors, our Yijan.
Fire is an important management tool in looking after Marra Country. It also has cultural importance to us. Right-way burning is about the right people, including Minirringki, Jungkayi and Darlyin, making decisions and burning the right country at the right time.
Mangroves and tidal flats are important for all marine life, particularly for growing, breeding and supporting other species.
Buffalo, pigs, horses, donkeys and cows occur on our country. These feral animals trample plants, pollute waterways, disturb nesting sites, damage sacred sites, spread weeds, alter fire regimes and spread disease. It is ok to have some cattle for us for meat, but not big numbers – it is a balance we have to get right.
For Marra many freshwater places are culturally important. Marra Yijans are connected to freshwater places, such as the Hill Kangaroo Yijan, Girrimbu. Animals, such as freshwater turtles and billabong birds, which we love to hunt and eat, rely on freshwater places.
Marra People, Marranbala, identify as saltwater people as the sea and the rivers that flow into it provide a point of interactive connection that results in a true spirit of place and profound sense of being.
In functional terms this is a social environmental connection and may be read as a metaphor for a rich practical ecological knowledge, but for Marra it means much more as it is a conceptual anchor point for Marra social organisation a unique cultural identity.
Non Marra people may separate Country to names like geography, landscape, sea scape or a spirit scape, to Marra they’re all related and people, Country and ancestral beings including plants and animals are all emotionally connected.
All these places and Country aren’t separate but rather they are points on Country that the dreaming and ancestral beings are known to still reside and it is to these places that Mara social memory can be anchored.
The place names and dreaming paths and song lines that can be seen as forms of dissent lines that are part of a system that seeks to include all people and nonhuman entities within a kin centric order that creates the political understanding of the traditional ownership of Minirringi, Jungkayi and Darlyin.
The land parts of our country stretch from the Gulf of Carpentaria between the Roper River in the north to Rosie Creek in the south, and inland to the headwaters of the Cox and Towns rivers.
Our sea country includes Kurrulinya (Maria Island) and Yumunguni (Beatrice Island) and their reefs, and extends offshore with our songlines. Our neighbours are the Warndarrang, Yanyuwa, Alawa and Gudanji peoples. We share responsibility for old Ngalakan Country and Wilangarra Country with our neighbours.
The land parts include rivers, tidal flats, creeks and other freshwater places, plateaus, rocky areas and gorges, and low hills and plains. The vegetation includes forests on the banks of the freshwater places and in the gorges, savanna woodlands on the low hills and plateaus, and mangroves in the tidal areas.
The sea includes the open sea, currents, islands and reefs. While our country covers both land and sea, we identify as ‘saltwater people’.
We are intrinsically connected to the sea and our cultural identity is shaped by this relationship.
Under Marra culture, all country, people, animals and plants belong to one of three main semi-moieties, or clans:
Each clan area also has Minirringki (owners of country) and Jungkayi (guardians or custodians of country).
Darlyin have certain ceremonial responsibilities including checking Jungkayi are doing the right thing, as well as helping protect country including sacred sites.
Darlyin can be Gagu, who has primary say in these matters or Abuji, who has the next say.
It is important that Minirringki, Jungkayi and Darlyin are involved in decisions about country. They speak for country
Under Marra culture, all country, people, animals and plants belong to one of three main semi-moieties, or clans:
Each clan area also has Minirringki (owners of country) and Jungkayi (guardians or custodians of country).
Darlyin have certain ceremonial responsibilities including checking Jungkayi are doing the right thing, as well as helping protect country including sacred sites.
Darlyin can be Gagu, who has primary say in these matters or Abuji, who has the next say.
It is important that Minirringki, Jungkayi and Darlyin are involved in decisions about country. They speak for country
Marra People, Marranbala, identify as saltwater people as the sea and the rivers that flow into it provide a point of interactive connection that results in a true spirit of place and profound sense of being.
In functional terms this is a social environmental connection and may be read as a metaphor for a rich practical ecological knowledge, but for Marra it means much more as it is a conceptual anchor point for Marra social organisation a unique cultural identity.
Non Marra people may separate Country to names like geography, landscape, sea scape or a spirit scape, to Marra they’re all related and people, Country and ancestral beings including plants and animals are all emotionally connected.
All these places and Country aren’t separate but rather they are points on Country that the dreaming and ancestral beings are known to still reside and it is to these places that Mara social memory can be anchored.
The place names and dreaming paths and song lines that can be seen as forms of dissent lines that are part of a system that seeks to include all people and nonhuman entities within a kin centric order that creates the political understanding of the traditional ownership of Minirringi, Jungkayi and Darlyin.
The land parts of our country stretch from the Gulf of Carpentaria between the Roper River in the north to Rosie Creek in the south, and inland to the headwaters of the Cox and Towns rivers.
Our sea country includes Kurrulinya (Maria Island) and Yumunguni (Beatrice Island) and their reefs, and extends offshore with our songlines. Our neighbours are the Warndarrang, Yanyuwa, Alawa and Gudanji peoples. We share responsibility for old Ngalakan Country and Wilangarra Country with our neighbours.
The land parts include rivers, tidal flats, creeks and other freshwater places, plateaus, rocky areas and gorges, and low hills and plains. The vegetation includes forests on the banks of the freshwater places and in the gorges, savanna woodlands on the low hills and plateaus, and mangroves in the tidal areas.
The sea includes the open sea, currents, islands and reefs. While our country covers both land and sea, we identify as ‘saltwater people’.
We are intrinsically connected to the sea and our cultural identity is shaped by this relationship.
The land parts of our country stretch from the Gulf of Carpentaria between the Roper River in the north to Rosie Creek in the south, and inland to the headwaters of the Cox and Towns rivers.
Our sea country includes Kurrulinya (Maria Island) and Yumunguni (Beatrice Island) and their reefs, and extends offshore with our songlines. Our neighbours are the Warndarrang, Yanyuwa, Alawa and Gudanji peoples. We share responsibility for old Ngalakan Country and Wilangarra Country with our neighbours.
The land parts include rivers, tidal flats, creeks and other freshwater places, plateaus, rocky areas and gorges, and low hills and plains. The vegetation includes forests on the banks of the freshwater places and in the gorges, savanna woodlands on the low hills and plateaus, and mangroves in the tidal areas.
The sea includes the open sea, currents, islands and reefs. While our country covers both land and sea, we identify as ‘saltwater people’.
We are intrinsically connected to the sea and our cultural identity is shaped by this relationship.
Under Marra culture, all country, people, animals and plants belong to one of three main semi-moieties, or clans:
Each clan area also has Minirringki (owners of country) and Jungkayi (guardians or custodians of country).
Darlyin have certain ceremonial responsibilities including checking Jungkayi are doing the right thing, as well as helping protect country including sacred sites.
Darlyin can be Gagu, who has primary say in these matters or Abuji, who has the next say.
It is important that Minirringki, Jungkayi and Darlyin are involved in decisions about country. They speak for country
Marra People, Marranbala, identify as saltwater people as the sea and the rivers that flow into it provide a point of interactive connection that results in a true spirit of place and profound sense of being.
In functional terms this is a social environmental connection and may be read as a metaphor for a rich practical ecological knowledge, but for Marra it means much more as it is a conceptual anchor point for Marra social organisation a unique cultural identity.
Non Marra people may separate Country to names like geography, landscape, sea scape or a spirit scape, to Marra they’re all related and people, Country and ancestral beings including plants and animals are all emotionally connected.
All these places and Country aren’t separate but rather they are points on Country that the dreaming and ancestral beings are known to still reside and it is to these places that Mara social memory can be anchored.
The place names and dreaming paths and song lines that can be seen as forms of dissent lines that are part of a system that seeks to include all people and nonhuman entities within a kin centric order that creates the political understanding of the traditional ownership of Minirringi, Jungkayi and Darlyin.