The RegenNarration 109. Cultural Economies at the Greatest Rock Art Gallery in the World, with Clinton Walker
Clinton Walker is a Traditional Custodian of the incredible Murujuga (or Burrup Peninsula), on the north-west coast of Australia. You might recall my conversations with archaeologist Peter Veth and the co-authors of Songlines, Lynne Kelly and Margo Neale, last year. They all related back to this place – where the Songlines start, as Clinton puts it. So at the end of last year, as my family and I headed south from the Kimberley, Clinton and I met up to record a yarn for the Clean State podcast, the spin-off series from The RegenNarration specific to my home state of Western Australia.
That podcast is a shorter snappier format. But with so much at stake here right now, and so much to appreciate about what he’s up to, Clinton and I settled in for an extended chat. So here’s the rest of what we recorded together.
Murujuga houses the largest rock art collection in the world – around one million petroglyphs, some dating back about 40,000 years. The World Heritage nomination for this place is a shoe-in, unless it’s jeopardised by current industry expansion plans – most notoriously, the Scarborough Gas Field proposal, currently being challenged in court and elsewhere, with the stakes running far beyond this incredible ancient place.
But there are better ways to go about things here. And Traditional Custodian Clinton Walker is uniquely placed to say. He was a highly paid technician with one of the mining companies here, but he ultimately couldn't bear the harm it was causing his Country. He now runs an extremely successful tour operation called Ngurrangga Tours, and is living the message that sustainable industries such as Indigenous cultural tourism are enormously beneficial - economically, for Country, and for bringing our cultures together.
Clinton sat us down on a very special part of his Country for this yarn on 13 December 2021.
Update: The Cultural Heritage Reform Bill has since passed the WA State Parliament, without alteration.
Title slide: Clinton Walker (supplied). You can see more photos on the episode website.
Music:
Stones & Bones, by Owls of the Swamp.
Regeneration, composed by Amelia Barden, from the soundtrack of the new film Regenerating Australia.
Find more:
To hear the rest of my conversation with Clinton, tune in to episode 9 of the Clean State podcast.
Ngurrangga Tours.
Hear my conversations with the co-authors of Songlines for episodes 92 &
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