Excursion: Queensland Museum and State Library

As part of the Elder Stories project, St Margaret’s Torres Strait Islander students were invited to become part of the Queensland Museum’s Island Futures exhibition, exploring and celebrating contemporary Torres Strait Islander identity in 2021 and 2022. The exhibition was curated by Rhianna Patrick, freelance journalist and broadcaster, and Imelda Miller from the Queensland Museum. St Margaret’s students were invited to respond to the question, ‘How are you fulfilling the hopes and dreams of your Akas and Athes?’ (grandmothers and grandfathers). The Torres Strait Islander students met with Rhianna and Imelda one afternoon after school to write their responses, and then on an excursion on 19 July, they saw their words built into the exhibit in the Queensland Museum. The reaction of the group at seeing their names and words as part of the exhibition was electric and was described by Sofia Nona as ‘a huge privilege. I felt incredibly proud to be included in a project that represented the culture and history of the Torres Strait Islands so beautifully.’ In the afternoon session, we moved to the State Library and were given a tour or kuril dhagun, the Aboriginal Education Centre within the library and shown how to use the library database to access the library’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander collections when researching stories on their Elders.