Clip description
Arrernte Mat-utjarra Elder Rupert Max Stuart’s voice runs over the image of the unfolding night in a riverbed outside of Alice Springs. Max tells us he’s come home. He’s 77 years old and has returned to his father’s country. It’s a place called Lila Creek in whitefellas’ language, but in Max’s language it is called Ananta. Max talks about the significance of Indigenous culture and the Dreaming, and how each area has its own Dreaming. It is important to be able to speak Indigenous language as well as English.
Curator’s notes
Arrernte Mat-utjarra Elder Rupert Max Stuart shares the wisdom of his experience, and speaks of the necessity of being able to speak Indigenous language as well as Western language. But he says, unequivocally that Indigenous culture, religion and land has not disappeared – it is still here. Max Stuart is a voice that needs to be heard by Indigenous people and non-Indigenous peoples alike, for there are few Indigenous people who are able to communicate or translate Indigenous religion in relation to the land in a way that it is understood, and the centrality of land to Indigenous beliefs is one that is fundamentally expressed through continuing culture and language.