Indigenous perspectives on the importance of engagement with archives

Join us at the Music Café in the Sydney Conservatorium of Music for a panel discussion on First Nation perspectives on archival practices, focusing on the importance of creating ways to connect and reconnect with heritage materials.

The speakers will:

• Discuss issues surrounding access to Indigenous cultural and intellectual property held in archives

• Share experiences of engagement with archival collections and reveal stories behind some of the recordings held in PARADISEC

• Ask how opening access to archives can empower Indigenous voices and support the transmission of intergenerational knowledge

This event is free with registration and open to everyone! Please feel welcome to bring along your friends, family and peers.

Light catering will be provided from 4.45pm and after the event, where you can mingle and view the associated exhibition outside the Conservatorium library.

Please note that this event will be recorded and photographed. If you have any concerns, please speak with staff at the event.

This event is brought to you by the University of Sydney Library in collaboration with the Sydney Conservatorium of Music.

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About the exhibition and PARADISEC

This panel is curated by Dr. Jodie Kell and Steven Gagau as part of their exhibition “Opening the Archive: Access, Engagement and Innovation". The exhibition is on display at the Conservatorium library until the end of November.

It showcases the work of PARADISEC (the Pacific And Regional Archive for Digital Sources in Endangered Cultures), a digital archive of records of some of the many small cultures and languages of the world. PARADISEC has a digitisation laboratory at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music.

About the speakers

Steven Gagau is an Indigenous Tolai (Gunantuna) man from Papua New Guinea who is a cultural consultant and archivist at PARADISEC. He focuses on archival and curatorial metadata enrichments for Melanesian Pacific collections through connections and collaborations with community outreach projects such as co-producing the Toksave: Culture Talks podcast and was cultural researcher on the True Echoes project, a collaboration with the British Library reconnecting Indigenous communities with historic audio records from across Oceania.

Dr Lauren Booker (Garigal) is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Indigenous Archives and Data Stewardship Hub at Jumbunna Institute for Indigenous Education & Research, University of Technology Sydney and a member of the Indigenous Archives Collective. Lauren has worked across the Australian Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums sector (GLAM) on projects supporting First Nations communities and organisations to access Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property held in collecting institutions.

Johnny Obed is a former ni-Vanuatu educator and church leader now based in Sydney from Paama Island in Vanuatu. He is an active member of the Wantok Association of Sydney, a representative body for Melanesian people in the diaspora. Johnny has featured in two Toksave: Culture Talks podcast episodes, sharing his knowledge of the culture of Paama and Vanuatu, as well as his perspective on the value of connecting with archival collections.

Evelyn Quispe is an Indigenous doctoral candidate at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. She is from the Quechua people, located in the Andes Mountains of Bolivia. Her research focuses on exploring and revitalising Warlpiri women’s songs, known as Yawulyu, as part of the broader project Rethinking the dynamics of place in Warlpiri performance, an ARC DECRA project led by Dr Georgia Curran.  

Dr. Jodie Kell is a non-Indigenous woman of Irish Australian background who is a senior research officer at the Sydney office of PARADISEC. She is an audio engineer with a PhD on Indigenous female musicians of the Ripple Effect Band, West Arnhem Land, NT. Jodie is interested in projects that promote accessibility and findability for communities with cultural connections to heritage recordings, such as co-producing the Toksave: Culture Talks podcast.