Journey Maps of Victim Survivors A Slow Procession Of Possibility

A S L O W P R O C E S S I O N O F P O S S I B I L I T Y

Without relationships, without memorial experiences, there is no knowledge.

Knowledge as a system is a complex entity. The fragmentation of experiences and learnings told through oral histories, stories, songs and art are generational and built upon relationships formed throughout time, locally and globally. The layering of these knowledge fragments about sky, land and water and their interconnectedness, not only create conversations of cultural identity, but ensure knowledge is shared, valued and retained. Knowledge becomes fused deeply in memories of place; the songlines134 of Aboriginal culture.

This significance to enduring relationships with sky,land and water is foregrounded in First Knowledges, Songlines, “Indigenous cultures are dependent on their memories for everything they know….Without this knowledge, the people simply would not have survived, physically or culturally.”135 Furthermore, “All knowledge, no matter where you store it, is based on a memory……. Every time you learn something, new physical neural pathways are established in your brain- the memory is actually physically laid down. If you don’t reinforce it fairly quickly, then you will lose that memory.”136

The correlation to Place-Making to retain knowledge through spatial mapping developed in the brain, is grounded in neuroscience research.137 For Aboriginal people landscape is centric to knowledge building and knowledge sharing. Procession through spaces creates multi-sensory engagement, where ‘treading lightly,’ is established through intimate relationships and layered relational experiences of knowledge building and nourishment, that grows and evolves from now to next.