Australian
Screen

Teacher’s notes

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The clip shows Indigenous women in Puyurra country in central Australia teaching the younger women how to collect bush potatoes. The women, including one with a child on her shoulders, walk through the bush as one of the older women identifies a vine and digging begins. In real time and showing the physical effort involved the women dig holes and bucket out the sand. The older woman holds up a bush potato at the end, and says it is a ‘baby one’. Traditional language is spoken and subtitles are used.

Educational value points

• This clip shows older women passing on Indigenous knowledge by teaching younger women how to gather bush potatoes using traditional teaching methods of watching and doing. The small group of women, one with a child on her shoulders, is shown walking together through the bush with the younger woman watching the older and copying her actions. The emphasis of the clip is their interaction. The older woman’s instructions are part of the commentary.

• The steps involved in the process of gathering bush potatoes are documented in this clip, providing a teaching tool for the future. First, the women identify the vine and then they dig. Using crowbars as digging sticks and billycans as containers they dig around the roots of the vine and create large holes. They cut the roots and the older woman pulls out a bush potato. Commentary and subtitles combine with images of the process so the teaching can continue.

• The traditional role of Indigenous women to provide food for their families and look after the children is documented in this clip. In many traditional Indigenous communities women’s food gathering was separate from men’s work and women provided most of the food. Food gathering is often combined with other roles such as childcare and teaching as seen in this clip. It can also be an opportunity for enjoyable social interaction.

• The clip shows Indigenous women from Yuendumu harvesting bush potatoes in their country – Puyurra in central Australia. The landscape shown is dry and the soil red. The bush potato, which resembles a sweet potato, is a staple food crop in this region. Traditionally, women are careful to take some but not all of the potatoes so that they would be able to return to the same areas in subsequent seasons to harvest future crops.

• Indigenous language is spoken throughout this clip, which comes from the documentary Warlpiri (1993), one of the Nganampa Anwernekenhe series of television films. The guiding principle of the series was to give voice to Indigenous peoples and to maintain and promote their languages and cultures. Indigenous language is used by the women in their interaction and also in the voice-over. Some dialogue and the instructional commentary have English subtitles.

• This clip asserts the adaptability of Indigenous culture by depicting women combining traditional knowledge and techniques with the use of crowbars as digging sticks and billycans to bucket out the sand. Such adaptation is typical of much modern hunting and gathering activities, which can include motor vehicles and rifles. The use of this film to record and teach also reflects the living culture of contemporary Indigenous peoples.