GABAN: ngarranga-birdyulang dhadharra ngawal murrungamirra

Thesis

How can the power of objects in museum collections, their meaning and life, be worked with and revealed in a manner which is sensitive to the trauma of colonialism and its collecting practices for Indigenous peoples? How might experimental theatre and storytelling work to bring new insight to understanding the complexity and trauma of museums and their collections? How can museums reimagine their function, role and processes to care for and empower their collections?

This thesis embodies these questions by presenting a new theatre script GABAN and position paper along with associated writing, curated exhibitions and artworks. GABAN means strange in the language of Wiradjuri, the author’s matrilineal kinship group, and describes the experience of being in the museum today and realising the sheer mass of collections from Indigenous homelands. The facts of these collections, the conditions of their making and maintenance, speak to the injustice of colonialism and the continuing struggle for self-identity by Indigenous peoples. GABAN is an experimental story, ngarranga-birdyulang dhadharraa or post-traumatic theatre, driven by Indigenous methodologies to honour the agency of objects in museum collections and the lived experiences of Indigenous peoples navigating these institutions. It is told through characters which are embodiments of ngawal murrungamirra or Powerful Objects. The aim of writing GABAN was to create a fictional space in which to unpack the affects of the museum and reimagine how objects and human identities trapped within this system can speak their own narratives. Skirting the nirin or edge of the museum through new methods of storytelling, this thesis is a call for systemic change in cultural institutions, grounded in Indigenous ways of seeing and comprehending the world.

Authors: Andrew, B

• Alternative title: STRANGE: Post-traumatic theatre and Powerful Objects)
• Type of award: DPhil
• Level of award: Doctoral
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford
• Language: English and Wiradjuri
• Keywords: post-traumatic theatre; Aboriginal; healing; Powerful Objects; experimental theatre; self determination; reimagine museum; systemic change; repatriation; theatre; Australia; anthropology; museum collection; First Nation; Indigenous; gaban; Wiradjuri; collection object
• Subjects: Healing; Indigenous peoples in art; Archaeological museums and collections; reimagining museum display; Experimental theater; Justice