Jason De Santolo | University of Technology Sydney (original) (raw)
Papers by Jason De Santolo
Zed Books, May 15, 2019
Decolonizing Research brings together indigenous researchers and activists from Canada, Australia... more Decolonizing Research brings together indigenous researchers and activists from Canada, Australia, and New Zealand to assert the unique value of indigenous storywork as a focus of research, and to develop methodologies that rectify the ..
Routledge eBooks, Nov 1, 2020
Routledge eBooks, Sep 4, 2018
These notes reflect on the unreserved collaborative essence of Kanymarda Yuwa/Two Laws (Cavadini ... more These notes reflect on the unreserved collaborative essence of Kanymarda Yuwa/Two Laws (Cavadini and Strachlan, 1981). Its re-release draws us once again back to the core of the story’s existence – ‘the people of Borroloola’. It fundamentally re-asserts some of the messages of Borroloola Elders and community and highlights the continuing impacts of a more sophisticated colonial agenda.
Management for professionals, 2019
A poetic statement on wise action and the urgency of compassionate reorientation in the just tran... more A poetic statement on wise action and the urgency of compassionate reorientation in the just transition.
The Australian journal of Indigenous education, Jul 1, 2008
The term “research” means different things to different people. In terms of outcomes, it is often... more The term “research” means different things to different people. In terms of outcomes, it is often associated with purely academic formats – the journal article, the chapter, the lecture. However, things are rapidly changing, especially in the way knowledges are generated and shared. So, what happens when we grab some Indigenous legal and policy analysis and mix it up with Web 2.0 design/development expertise? What we get is an exciting pilot project that aims to enhance research dissemination through digital video and online interfaces. This paper shares insights into the collaborative process of creating a pilot research portal.
Transdisciplinary Theory, Practice and Education, 2018
“Jungku Ngambala Ngarrur Ngarrumba Yarkijina Yurrngumba” ‘We sit peacefully in our lands forever’... more “Jungku Ngambala Ngarrur Ngarrumba Yarkijina Yurrngumba” ‘We sit peacefully in our lands forever’ Garrwa Elder Nancy McDinny
This Doctorate of Creative Arts focuses on understanding the transformative power of ancient song... more This Doctorate of Creative Arts focuses on understanding the transformative power of ancient song renewal through an Indigenous story research video project. In reflecting upon the profound jurisprudential nature of ancient song traditions, this exegesis maps Indigenous story research and video processes through the decolonising lens of Garrwa Yarnbar Jarngkurr or Garrwa talk~story. The first music video renews the ancient Ngabaya songline with deep relational reverence and the second evokes a re-emergence of the Darrbarrwarra as good warriors fighting for the land. The Ngabaya and Darrbarrwarra videos strategically engage with intent, orientation and relationality in the renew process and present cultural powers as aspirational enactments of self determination and homeland . The scope of this study is inspired and informed by four foundational bodies of work within the Indigenous Research Paradigm (Wilson 2008): Indigenous Storywork (Archibald 2008), Decolonising Methodologies (Smi...
Studies in Documentary Film, 2008
... 185 SDF 2 (2) pp. 185189 © Intellect Ltd 2008 Keywords Collaborative filmmaking Aboriginal c... more ... 185 SDF 2 (2) pp. 185189 © Intellect Ltd 2008 Keywords Collaborative filmmaking Aboriginal community resistance Colonial injustice Borroloola story Aboriginal storytelling Page 2. This re-release is particularly timely for the Borroloola community. ...
Architecture_MPS , 2022
Much of design teaching, learning and research in Australia is determined by Eurocentric traditio... more Much of design teaching, learning and research in Australia is determined by Eurocentric traditions and the ongoing colonial project. In this context Indigenous Peoples continue to experience erasure, silencing and appropriation of practices and knowledges. The Visual Communication Design Program, situated in the School of Design at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS), is committed to disrupting this trajectory. In this article we describe an immersive model that seeks to challenge the role of the design educator, creative practitioner and researcher on unceded Gadigal Lands in the city of Sydney, Australia. We reflect on the challenges of facilitating Visual Communication Design and Emergent Practices, for a third iteration as an online studio experience, during COVID-19 in the context of the climate crisis, bushfires and Black Lives Matter. This iteration is the result of four years of deep collaboration with local First Nation Elders, Indigenous scholars and practitioners. The research-focused studio for 180 final-year visual communication design students is led by Local Elders, cultural and research advisers with the support of studio leaders. The consideration of design-led research methods through a process that infuses Indigenous research principles builds on the longitudinal research into the role of the emplaced designer in Indigenous-led projects on Country. Our studio, titled ‘In Our Own Backyard’, provides students with strength-based design capabilities and understandings of the principles of the United Nations Declaration of Indigenous Peoples Rights (UNDRIP), Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property Rights (ICIP) and the Australian Indigenous Design Charter. As a studio experience, the aim is to create conditions which spark possibilities for re-orientation towards relational and respectful negotiation of difference, and the capacity to action Indigenous self-determination in complex practitioner scenarios.
Architecture_MPS
Much of design teaching, learning and research in Australia is determined by Eurocentric traditio... more Much of design teaching, learning and research in Australia is determined by Eurocentric traditions and the ongoing colonial project. In this context Indigenous Peoples continue to experience erasure, silencing and appropriation of practices and knowledges. The Visual Communication Design Program, situated in the School of Design at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS), is committed to disrupting this trajectory. In this article we describe an immersive model that seeks to challenge the role of the design educator, creative practitioner and researcher on unceded Gadigal Lands in the city of Sydney, Australia. We reflect on the challenges of facilitating Visual Communication Design and Emergent Practices, for a third iteration as an online studio experience, during COVID-19 in the context of the climate crisis, bushfires and Black Lives Matter. This iteration is the result of four years of deep collaboration with local First Nation Elders, Indigenous scholars and practitioners. ...
Anger and Indigenous Men Understanding and Responding to Violent Behaviour, 2008
Public Space the Journal of Law and Social Justice, Jun 3, 2008
This is a collaborative new media piece exploring Indigenous rights in Australia by Jason De Sant... more This is a collaborative new media piece exploring Indigenous rights in Australia by Jason De Santolo.
Anger and Indigenous Men Understanding and Responding to Violent Behaviour, 2008
International Journal of Critical Indigenous Studies
Masculindians, Conversations on Indigenous Manhood has travelled with me over the last few months... more Masculindians, Conversations on Indigenous Manhood has travelled with me over the last few months—I guess together we would have flown, driven and walked over 25,000km. Travelling across the continent, here in Australia, often leaves you with lots of thinking space, and it was perplexing to reflect on our angles on manhood here, as Aboriginal men. As in other parts of the world, the continuing violence of invasion (stolen lands, murders, forced relocations, stolen generations, etc.) impacts on our way of life and those localised nuances of what it is to be a man.
Sunshowers and White Ochre, 2019
In all the unintentional privilege of reflection, I fall into a deeper emotional meditation on wa... more In all the unintentional privilege of reflection, I fall into a deeper emotional meditation on water, as a living memory of my late mother and the ancestral ties that her waters gifted me. This wandering essay searches for a deeper understanding of the Indigenous sensorium, as manifest in the resonating power of water in a time dominated by narratives of environmental chaos. How do we map and situate this textual journey? I could say as a baseline, I was once a stolen baby when nothing used to make sense. To know water as memory is potential enough to dance, to declare war on the colonial narrative of defeat. For there is meaning making to be had amid the crisis of contamination and loss.
This paper shares insights into formulating a Doctorate of Creative Arts study within an emergent... more This paper shares insights into formulating a Doctorate of Creative Arts study within an emergent Indigenous communication paradigm. I assert that long-term consultation processes are a necessary precursor to accurately framing context for communication of Indigenous knowledge within an academic construct. By embedding sustainable communication practices within the consultation process I believe we manifest a more meaningful conceptualisation of research meaning. This resonates with our youth and a new generation of activism and scholarship. It speaks to the importance of seeking to harmonise knowledge pathways with localised lores, protocols and big-picture principles for research media.
These notes reflect on the unreserved collaborative essence of Kanymarda Yuwa/Two Laws (Cavadini ... more These notes reflect on the unreserved collaborative essence of Kanymarda Yuwa/Two Laws (Cavadini and Strachlan, 1981). Its re-release draws us once again back to the core of the story’s existence – ‘the people of Borroloola’. It fundamentally re-asserts some of the messages of Borroloola Elders and community and highlights the continuing impacts of a more sophisticated
colonial agenda.
Is the new media agenda essentially colonising, or has it simply reflected a lack of participatio... more Is the new media agenda essentially colonising, or has it simply reflected a lack of participation to date from indigenous perspectives? Jason De Santolo sees a unique strategic opportunity to develop creative research interventions that enhance indigenous self-determination, and believes this can be achieved by giving attention to the indigenous cultural rights agenda. De Santolo’s evaluation of cultural rights emphasises the importance of context in the production and dissemination of cultural material. He shows how new media interfaces con provide an effective and inspirational dimension to the conditions for Friere's "revolutionary leadership!' For non-indigenous peoples, such interfaces offer the potential to gain a closer understanding of the integrated sense of land, community, and politics that are characteristic of indigenous struggles-the "rhythm of rights! Against an environment which is often thought of as terra nullius or empty, De Santolo shows that new media forms can provide a platform for an undeniable cultural presence.
The term “research” means different things to different people. In terms of outcomes, it is often... more The term “research” means different things to different
people. In terms of outcomes, it is often associated
with purely academic formats – the journal article,
the chapter, the lecture. However, things are rapidly
changing, especially in the way knowledges are
generated and shared. So, what happens when we
grab some Indigenous legal and policy analysis and
mix it up with Web 2.0 design/development expertise?
What we get is an exciting pilot project that aims to
enhance research dissemination through digital video
and online interfaces. This paper shares insights
into the collaborative process of creating a pilot
research portal.
Like Australia, Aotearoa/New Zealand is still grappling with a history of dispossession and blood... more Like Australia, Aotearoa/New Zealand is still grappling with a history of dispossession and bloodshed. The Sealord Deal came about at a time of intense political movements within Maoridom and in mainstream politics. Government pushes for settlement increased the pressures to get positioning in the line up for Tribunal recommendations on specific tribal grievances. The Sealord Deal involved a pan tribal settlement over what are essentially hapu (tribal) resources. This fuelled an already volatile treaty settlement environment that will no doubt have direct impact on the workability and legitimacy of the treaty settlement process as a whole. This has proven to be the case with the response to the NZ government’s foreshore and seabed policy. We do not have a Treaty based framework in Australia, but it is suggested that comparative insights (in this case relating to pan tribal settlements) can inform Indigenous negotiating strategies.
Zed Books, May 15, 2019
Decolonizing Research brings together indigenous researchers and activists from Canada, Australia... more Decolonizing Research brings together indigenous researchers and activists from Canada, Australia, and New Zealand to assert the unique value of indigenous storywork as a focus of research, and to develop methodologies that rectify the ..
Routledge eBooks, Nov 1, 2020
Routledge eBooks, Sep 4, 2018
These notes reflect on the unreserved collaborative essence of Kanymarda Yuwa/Two Laws (Cavadini ... more These notes reflect on the unreserved collaborative essence of Kanymarda Yuwa/Two Laws (Cavadini and Strachlan, 1981). Its re-release draws us once again back to the core of the story’s existence – ‘the people of Borroloola’. It fundamentally re-asserts some of the messages of Borroloola Elders and community and highlights the continuing impacts of a more sophisticated colonial agenda.
Management for professionals, 2019
A poetic statement on wise action and the urgency of compassionate reorientation in the just tran... more A poetic statement on wise action and the urgency of compassionate reorientation in the just transition.
The Australian journal of Indigenous education, Jul 1, 2008
The term “research” means different things to different people. In terms of outcomes, it is often... more The term “research” means different things to different people. In terms of outcomes, it is often associated with purely academic formats – the journal article, the chapter, the lecture. However, things are rapidly changing, especially in the way knowledges are generated and shared. So, what happens when we grab some Indigenous legal and policy analysis and mix it up with Web 2.0 design/development expertise? What we get is an exciting pilot project that aims to enhance research dissemination through digital video and online interfaces. This paper shares insights into the collaborative process of creating a pilot research portal.
Transdisciplinary Theory, Practice and Education, 2018
“Jungku Ngambala Ngarrur Ngarrumba Yarkijina Yurrngumba” ‘We sit peacefully in our lands forever’... more “Jungku Ngambala Ngarrur Ngarrumba Yarkijina Yurrngumba” ‘We sit peacefully in our lands forever’ Garrwa Elder Nancy McDinny
This Doctorate of Creative Arts focuses on understanding the transformative power of ancient song... more This Doctorate of Creative Arts focuses on understanding the transformative power of ancient song renewal through an Indigenous story research video project. In reflecting upon the profound jurisprudential nature of ancient song traditions, this exegesis maps Indigenous story research and video processes through the decolonising lens of Garrwa Yarnbar Jarngkurr or Garrwa talk~story. The first music video renews the ancient Ngabaya songline with deep relational reverence and the second evokes a re-emergence of the Darrbarrwarra as good warriors fighting for the land. The Ngabaya and Darrbarrwarra videos strategically engage with intent, orientation and relationality in the renew process and present cultural powers as aspirational enactments of self determination and homeland . The scope of this study is inspired and informed by four foundational bodies of work within the Indigenous Research Paradigm (Wilson 2008): Indigenous Storywork (Archibald 2008), Decolonising Methodologies (Smi...
Studies in Documentary Film, 2008
... 185 SDF 2 (2) pp. 185189 © Intellect Ltd 2008 Keywords Collaborative filmmaking Aboriginal c... more ... 185 SDF 2 (2) pp. 185189 © Intellect Ltd 2008 Keywords Collaborative filmmaking Aboriginal community resistance Colonial injustice Borroloola story Aboriginal storytelling Page 2. This re-release is particularly timely for the Borroloola community. ...
Architecture_MPS , 2022
Much of design teaching, learning and research in Australia is determined by Eurocentric traditio... more Much of design teaching, learning and research in Australia is determined by Eurocentric traditions and the ongoing colonial project. In this context Indigenous Peoples continue to experience erasure, silencing and appropriation of practices and knowledges. The Visual Communication Design Program, situated in the School of Design at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS), is committed to disrupting this trajectory. In this article we describe an immersive model that seeks to challenge the role of the design educator, creative practitioner and researcher on unceded Gadigal Lands in the city of Sydney, Australia. We reflect on the challenges of facilitating Visual Communication Design and Emergent Practices, for a third iteration as an online studio experience, during COVID-19 in the context of the climate crisis, bushfires and Black Lives Matter. This iteration is the result of four years of deep collaboration with local First Nation Elders, Indigenous scholars and practitioners. The research-focused studio for 180 final-year visual communication design students is led by Local Elders, cultural and research advisers with the support of studio leaders. The consideration of design-led research methods through a process that infuses Indigenous research principles builds on the longitudinal research into the role of the emplaced designer in Indigenous-led projects on Country. Our studio, titled ‘In Our Own Backyard’, provides students with strength-based design capabilities and understandings of the principles of the United Nations Declaration of Indigenous Peoples Rights (UNDRIP), Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property Rights (ICIP) and the Australian Indigenous Design Charter. As a studio experience, the aim is to create conditions which spark possibilities for re-orientation towards relational and respectful negotiation of difference, and the capacity to action Indigenous self-determination in complex practitioner scenarios.
Architecture_MPS
Much of design teaching, learning and research in Australia is determined by Eurocentric traditio... more Much of design teaching, learning and research in Australia is determined by Eurocentric traditions and the ongoing colonial project. In this context Indigenous Peoples continue to experience erasure, silencing and appropriation of practices and knowledges. The Visual Communication Design Program, situated in the School of Design at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS), is committed to disrupting this trajectory. In this article we describe an immersive model that seeks to challenge the role of the design educator, creative practitioner and researcher on unceded Gadigal Lands in the city of Sydney, Australia. We reflect on the challenges of facilitating Visual Communication Design and Emergent Practices, for a third iteration as an online studio experience, during COVID-19 in the context of the climate crisis, bushfires and Black Lives Matter. This iteration is the result of four years of deep collaboration with local First Nation Elders, Indigenous scholars and practitioners. ...
Anger and Indigenous Men Understanding and Responding to Violent Behaviour, 2008
Public Space the Journal of Law and Social Justice, Jun 3, 2008
This is a collaborative new media piece exploring Indigenous rights in Australia by Jason De Sant... more This is a collaborative new media piece exploring Indigenous rights in Australia by Jason De Santolo.
Anger and Indigenous Men Understanding and Responding to Violent Behaviour, 2008
International Journal of Critical Indigenous Studies
Masculindians, Conversations on Indigenous Manhood has travelled with me over the last few months... more Masculindians, Conversations on Indigenous Manhood has travelled with me over the last few months—I guess together we would have flown, driven and walked over 25,000km. Travelling across the continent, here in Australia, often leaves you with lots of thinking space, and it was perplexing to reflect on our angles on manhood here, as Aboriginal men. As in other parts of the world, the continuing violence of invasion (stolen lands, murders, forced relocations, stolen generations, etc.) impacts on our way of life and those localised nuances of what it is to be a man.
Sunshowers and White Ochre, 2019
In all the unintentional privilege of reflection, I fall into a deeper emotional meditation on wa... more In all the unintentional privilege of reflection, I fall into a deeper emotional meditation on water, as a living memory of my late mother and the ancestral ties that her waters gifted me. This wandering essay searches for a deeper understanding of the Indigenous sensorium, as manifest in the resonating power of water in a time dominated by narratives of environmental chaos. How do we map and situate this textual journey? I could say as a baseline, I was once a stolen baby when nothing used to make sense. To know water as memory is potential enough to dance, to declare war on the colonial narrative of defeat. For there is meaning making to be had amid the crisis of contamination and loss.
This paper shares insights into formulating a Doctorate of Creative Arts study within an emergent... more This paper shares insights into formulating a Doctorate of Creative Arts study within an emergent Indigenous communication paradigm. I assert that long-term consultation processes are a necessary precursor to accurately framing context for communication of Indigenous knowledge within an academic construct. By embedding sustainable communication practices within the consultation process I believe we manifest a more meaningful conceptualisation of research meaning. This resonates with our youth and a new generation of activism and scholarship. It speaks to the importance of seeking to harmonise knowledge pathways with localised lores, protocols and big-picture principles for research media.
These notes reflect on the unreserved collaborative essence of Kanymarda Yuwa/Two Laws (Cavadini ... more These notes reflect on the unreserved collaborative essence of Kanymarda Yuwa/Two Laws (Cavadini and Strachlan, 1981). Its re-release draws us once again back to the core of the story’s existence – ‘the people of Borroloola’. It fundamentally re-asserts some of the messages of Borroloola Elders and community and highlights the continuing impacts of a more sophisticated
colonial agenda.
Is the new media agenda essentially colonising, or has it simply reflected a lack of participatio... more Is the new media agenda essentially colonising, or has it simply reflected a lack of participation to date from indigenous perspectives? Jason De Santolo sees a unique strategic opportunity to develop creative research interventions that enhance indigenous self-determination, and believes this can be achieved by giving attention to the indigenous cultural rights agenda. De Santolo’s evaluation of cultural rights emphasises the importance of context in the production and dissemination of cultural material. He shows how new media interfaces con provide an effective and inspirational dimension to the conditions for Friere's "revolutionary leadership!' For non-indigenous peoples, such interfaces offer the potential to gain a closer understanding of the integrated sense of land, community, and politics that are characteristic of indigenous struggles-the "rhythm of rights! Against an environment which is often thought of as terra nullius or empty, De Santolo shows that new media forms can provide a platform for an undeniable cultural presence.
The term “research” means different things to different people. In terms of outcomes, it is often... more The term “research” means different things to different
people. In terms of outcomes, it is often associated
with purely academic formats – the journal article,
the chapter, the lecture. However, things are rapidly
changing, especially in the way knowledges are
generated and shared. So, what happens when we
grab some Indigenous legal and policy analysis and
mix it up with Web 2.0 design/development expertise?
What we get is an exciting pilot project that aims to
enhance research dissemination through digital video
and online interfaces. This paper shares insights
into the collaborative process of creating a pilot
research portal.
Like Australia, Aotearoa/New Zealand is still grappling with a history of dispossession and blood... more Like Australia, Aotearoa/New Zealand is still grappling with a history of dispossession and bloodshed. The Sealord Deal came about at a time of intense political movements within Maoridom and in mainstream politics. Government pushes for settlement increased the pressures to get positioning in the line up for Tribunal recommendations on specific tribal grievances. The Sealord Deal involved a pan tribal settlement over what are essentially hapu (tribal) resources. This fuelled an already volatile treaty settlement environment that will no doubt have direct impact on the workability and legitimacy of the treaty settlement process as a whole. This has proven to be the case with the response to the NZ government’s foreshore and seabed policy. We do not have a Treaty based framework in Australia, but it is suggested that comparative insights (in this case relating to pan tribal settlements) can inform Indigenous negotiating strategies.
Doctorate of Creative Arts (UTS), 2018
Indigenous knowledge journeys involve talk, story, song, dance, dream, being on country. But rese... more Indigenous knowledge journeys involve talk, story, song, dance, dream, being on country. But research carries a legacy of exploitation for oppressed peoples. Indigenous theories and methodologies open up decolonising ways to transform shared meaning making experiences (Smith 1999) (Sherwood 2010). This study explores cultural powers of Garrwa resurgence through story research renewal of Ngabaya and Darrbarrwarra traditions as music videos. Garrwa are under threat from mining in South West Gulf country, Northern Territory. This exegesis focuses on three spheres, sharing how vibrant cultural powers are intergenerational and interrelational, sourced in the Yigan (dreaming creation) and passed down through ancestors, Elders, family, clan (Hoosan 2018). It re-orientates Garrwa video practice into greater resonance with visual/aural sovereignty (Raheja 2010) (Behrendt 2016) and Indigenous storywork where interrelatedness is a “synergistic interaction between storyteller, listener, and story” (Archibald 2008:32). Yarnbar Jarngkurr is described by Elders as voices and stories that shape renewal of the relational world through song, dance, ceremony and ancient land practices (McDinny 2017). In transforming perceptions and understandings we must seek unity in meaning making (Van Leeuwen 2017). Yarnbar Jarngkurr is an Indigenous Theory of Transformation (Pihama 2018) and creative Indigenous methodology for visioning and enacting Garrwa self determination.
The effects of the Howard Government’s disastrous 2007 Intervention continue to reverberate throu... more The effects of the Howard Government’s disastrous 2007 Intervention continue to reverberate throughout the Northern Territory. It was a ‘solution’ imposed by a faltering government for its own political purposes on the Aboriginal people without their involvement and without consultation. As part of it the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 (Cth) was suspended, in so far as it related to the Intervention and associated measures. The whole process was deeply insulting to the Aboriginal people and effectively marginalised them as second class citizens.
The consultations described here were superficially an improvement on the previous ones in that there were more interpreters and more apparent effort to make them fit the description of true consultations. We are still left with no real evidence of what Aboriginal opinion is on issues such as school attendance and the proposal to remove welfare payments where there is unsatisfactory school attendance. No doubt there is some support for this as there would be for any other measure, but we are left in the dark as to whether it has majority support overall, or among particular groups or in particular geographical areas. This was effectively this Government’s last chance to achieve real reform in relation to Aboriginal issues. Should it fail and should the Government not be returned at the next election, the future picture may become even darker for Aboriginal people.
New Zealand Fire Service Commission Research Report Number 14 Through Article 1 of the Treaty of ... more New Zealand Fire Service Commission Research Report Number 14 Through Article 1 of the Treaty of Waitangi, under 'kawanatanga', the Fire Service as a Crown agency is in a position to develop an organisational partnership with Maori through the development of a specific Fire Service Treaty policy that will assist in the identification, prioritising and delivery of effective services and fire intervention strategies to the Maori community. It is further suggested that Treaty policy implementation strategies involve cost benefit analysis and regional audits of performance for each of the fire regions. This would contribute to the monitoring and ongoing evaluation of the effectiveness of specific fire intervention strategies for Maori. Following the development of a robust Fire Service Treaty Policy it is recommended that a National Maori Advisory body be created and made responsible for the development of Regional Multi Agency Maori Fire Safety Taskforces. The monitoring and review of these Taskforces can be facilitated at a national level through the National Maori Advisory Body and at local levels through regional review mechanisms.
This report indicates that an Interagency Taskforce focusing on the development of a series of joint venture Fire Awareness campaigns (involving the Fire Service, other Government agencies and existing Maori Social Service Providers) will be effective in delivering fire awareness programmes and environmental interventions to Mäori.