The Community

It been a loooong time since we blogged and its high time we started again. So much has changed too! We are living in a totally different world now having moved from an Island at one end of the country to an island at the other. I have just finished reading a report: Indigenous Health and Education: Exploring the Connections, a research project into Health and Education that was undertaken here in Galiwin'ku and published in 2003 and it has a great little introduction to the community so here it is:

The Community

The remote community of Galiwin’ku, is on an island off the coast of North-East Arnhem Land 500 kilometers east of Darwin. There is a population of approximately two thousand Aboriginal people who refer to themselves as Yolngu and around 100 non-Aboriginal people (referred to as Balanda). A mission was first established there in the 1940s and subsequently large numbers of people from different clans in the region were drawn to that location for various reasons. As a result most of the residents are not living on their own traditional estates although many live for varying periods of time on their homelands.

The past fifty years have therefore been a period of dramatic cultural, social and economic change although many of the features of traditional lifestyle have been maintained to some extent. All children continue to learn a Yolgnu language as their first language and English has little relevance to everyday life. Although Christianity has had a pervasive effect, traditional Yolngu belief systems and ceremonial practices remain central to the lives of most people. Hunting and gathering are still highly valued activities although most people rely on the community store and take-away shops for most of their food, particularly during the week, and many of the often overcrowded households do not have refrigerators or functioning stoves.

Galiwin’ku, like most remote Aboriginal communities, is economically disadvantaged: few salaried jobs are available in the community and many of these are filled by non-Aboriginal people. The majority of Yolngu in the community receive either social security payments of participate in the Community Development employment Program (CDEP) programs (i.e. work for the dole) with little opportunity to move into paid employment. The community school has preschool , primary and post-primary sections but secondary level education is available only by correspondence. There is also a community health center staffed by Yolngu health workers, Balanda nurses and doctors.Serious illness and premature death are impacting increasingly on everyone in the community. The little available systematic data that has been systematically collected suggest that chronic diseases such as diabetes, renal failure and respiratory illnesses are rapidly increasing. For example, the number of people identified with End-Stage Renal Disease (ESRD) in the region is growing markedly. Dialysis treatment for Yolngu with ESRD is only available in Darwin, which results in the person with ESRD – and often many of their extended family – relocating 500 kilometers from their home. This relocation is often highly stressful with many distressing consequences for both the patient and other family members.

Misuse of substances, particularly petrol, kava and increasingly marijuana, is of continuing concern to many Yolngu. As the community is ‘dry’, that is, alcohol is banned, alcohol abuse is not common but Yolngu do go to other centers, including Darwin, to drink, some for short periods and others for many years. In this community, the average age of death (excluding perinatal deaths) in the period between 1992 and 2000 was forty-six (Knight, 2000).

Indigenous Health and Education: Exploring the Connections. A Cooperative Research Centre for Aboriginal and Tropical Health Research Project Report.Anne Lowell, Elaine Maypilama and Dianne Biritjalawuy, 2003