The Nomadic Alternative – Page 167

VII

Australian sheep-farmers were often annoyed when their native sheep-hands, suddenly and without warning, disappeared. The Abos had "gone Walkabout" - one more proof of their unreliability. A call along the bush telegraph line had announced a corroboree or gathering of, this occasion for communal dances and songs, initiation ceremonies, marriage alliances, trade and general merrymaking, was the signal to drop work and be off.

But some Australian tribes were more prone to "go Walkabout" than others. In his Aranda Traditions T.G.H. Strehlow juxtaposes contrasting attitudes to wandering far by two tribes, both of which are equally contemptuous of improving or changing their lot, but set about it in different ways.

The Aranda of Central Australia are a jealous people, conservative of their traditions, whose social structure shows the germs of a hierarchy. They rarely, if ever, stray from their own hunting territory. To congeal their institutions, their oral tradition states a paradigm of events and actions of their tribal ancestors in the an-historical 'dreamtime' of long ago, and as the present is seen as an exact replica of this ideal past, this precludes all motive for change. The following passage from Strehlow illustrates the function of myth in maintaining the desired stasis.

The gurra ancestor hunts, kills and eats bandicoots; and his sons are always engaged upon the same quest. The witchetty grub men of Lukara spend every day of their lives in digging up witchetty grubs from the roots of witchetty trees ... The ragla (wild plum) tree ancestor lives on ragla berries which he is continually collecting into a large wooden vessel. The crayfish ancestor is always building fishweirs across the moving flood of water in which he is pursuing, and he is forever engaged in spearing fish ... If the myths gathered in the Northern Aranda area are found, collectively, a full and very detailed account will be of all the occupations which are practised in Central Australia. In his myths we see the native at his daily task of hunting, fishing, gathering vegetable food, cooking and fashioning his implements. All occupations originated with the totemic ancestors; and here too the native follows traditions he clings to the primitive weapons used by his ancestors, and no thought of improving them ever enters his mind.

Strehlow, Aranda Traditions, p. [illegible]

the close, at a place perhaps several hundred miles away, "the announcement of