Sand Talk

by Tyson Yunkaporta

This remarkable book is about everything from echidnas to evolution, cosmology to cooking, sex and science and spirits to Schrödinger’s cat.

Tyson Yunkaporta looks at global systems from an Indigenous perspective. He asks how contemporary life diverges from the pattern of creation. How does this affect us? How can we do things differently?

Sand Talk provides a template for living. It’s about how lines and symbols and shapes can help us make sense of the world. It’s about how we learn and how we remember. It’s about talking to everybody and listening carefully. It’s about finding different ways to look at things.

Most of all it’s about Indigenous thinking, and how it can save the world.

Genres: Nonfiction, Philosophy, Indigenous, Australia, History, Anthropology, Audiobook

280 pages, Paperback

First published September 19, 2019

About the author

Tyson Yunkaporta is an academic, an arts critic, and a researcher who is a member of the Apalech Clan in far north Queensland. He carves traditional tools and weapons and also works as a senior lecturer in Indigenous Knowledges at Deakin University in Melbourne. He lives in Melbourne.

Reviews

[Jim Rimmer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading Tyson's book is like dropping a mentos into a bottle of coke. That coke is never going to be the same again.

I'd recommend taking this book as slow as you need to really get a handle on the many concepts covered.

Also, pass it forward. Once you've finished give this as a gift to a friend or loved one or local politician. Help get this genie out of the bottle.

[Marchpane · Rating 4 out of 5]

Drawing upon deep understanding of indigenous traditions, Sand Talk contains the author’s personal reflections on techniques for living and learning. When other (typically white) writers offer up this kind of content, it’s usually packaged as self-help, memoir, or a blend of the two. Yunkaporta’s approach is different, based on ‘yarning’ and, for me at least, this makes the material so much more accessible than those other genres. Sand Talk includes plenty of personal anecdotes, but as a whole it doesn’t make Yunkaporta the central focus the way a memoir would.

Much of Sand Talk is fascinating, mind-expanding stuff, but it can also be frustrating at times. Yunkaporta often makes sweeping generalisations to illustrate his points, while at the same time decrying the modern tendency towards overly simplistic modes of thought. The tagline, ‘How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World’ is rather overblown as a description of the book’s contents—it offers no such grand solutions but is nevertheless full of valuable wisdom with wide potential application. The ‘sand talk’ of the title—a style of visual mnemonic, the kind easily scratched out in the sand with a stick—alone is so strikingly simple and useful as to make this a worthwhile read, but there’s lots more here to chew on as well.

[Pat · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tyson Yunkaporta examines ways of using Indigenous Australian knowledge to gain wisdom and a better understanding of how the world works. He provides ides for different thinking about the inter-connectedness of everything and suggests how contemporary living endangers the natural order of things.

It is a very philosophical book written with a lot of heart but if you don’t come at it from a position of respect for this ancient culture it will not be an easy read. There is some wonderful knowledge here that I am still coming to grips with. This is an important book that I will no doubt be reading again.

[Adam Rice · Rating 1 out of 5]

The first issue I take with this book is that it doesn't actually ever discuss "how Indigenous thinking can save the world". There are certainly times where the author states that Indigenous practices are better for the world but either we are told that we are not allowed to know the details of those or there is no practical path to implementation. For example, there is a lot of discussion about the destructive nature of cities and how living off the land is better for the earth but it's hardly like we are going to convince the >25 million people in Australia to move to the bush and, even if we did, I'm not sure the outcome would align with the book's expectations.

There are also many attempts to discredit Western science but it commonly seems like the author has a very poor understanding of scientific concepts and makes truly bizarre leaps. For example, there is a discussion of how the Schrödinger's cat thought experiment is used to explain the uncertainty principle of quantum physics. In a confusing leap, he explains that this is an example of the failure of science because he can't see any way for Schrödinger's cat to inspire sustainability. "I can’t see any sustainability solutions in thought experiments about felines in boxes, but I do see possibilities in the pattern created by those three generations of women I mentioned earlier."

[Michael Livingston · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an awful lot to take in. It's accessible written, but Yunkaporta challenges the fundamental ways in which most of us see the world. I bristled against parts of this, especially the sections on gender, but found so much of it hugely compelling. Everyone should read it.

[Keira Scuro · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is extraordinary.

I've never read a book that actually challenged the internal workings of my brain. I just kept turning the pages and new ideas jumped into my mind one after the other. I need to read it again slowly, with a highlighter pen, and take proper notes.

Every chapter covers a different topic, and each topic is presented from a perspective I've never thought of, or heard anyone else talk about. It makes me feel like we are missing out on so much by not having this profound, but simple way of thinking and being part of our everyday lives. The parts about community and connection made me cry with yearning for what we are missing out on in our human lives and the loneliness we have created in society.

The book is funny and humble and feels very intimate, particularly because it is not first-person or third, or even second-person but 'us-two' are on a journey of learning together.

The weirdest thing is that when I first bought the book, I put it aside because I thought it was difficult to read. Then, a year later, I picked it up again. In the meantime, I had gone through the most difficult time of my life, which probably changed the way I was able to receive it. When I picked it up again a few weeks ago, that was it, I couldn't put it down.

I would love to see the carvings Dr Yunkaporta talks about in the book. I will keep my eyes peeled in case he ever decides to show them in a gallery.

[alice belle · Rating 3 out of 5]

closer to a 3.5

there’s a whole web of interconnected thoughts & feelings i have as i reflect on this book. all of which enrich or diminish depending which train of thought is followed.

i also am aware of certain problems politically.

firstly, disregard the hideous and embarrassing subtitle. it’s such a brazen sensationalist gesture that reeks of publisher interference lol.

anyway, this made a lot of sense to me. it’s commendable for yunkaporta to turn his back on an academic mode to write a book on Indigenous knowledges (non-singular). following one path down the rabbit’s warren connecting back up with where he started.

you have to remember tho: this is one (highly) subjective take on a web of ideas, knowledges & it’s a mistake to ask for more than has been given. there is now the next step to take & it is up to you. this doesn’t stop until you die. you are now complicit in a life long journey of unraveling yourself.

if you closed this book with more questions than answers, i think you have read it in the right way. now that you’re unsettled, swan dive into the next. be engulfed once more but never let what just happened be usurped. let knowledge bind like molecules.

[Katey Flowers]

Where do I even start with a review? Firstly, I guess I should acknowledge that I won’t be giving this one a star rating. It doesn’t feel right to do so and, even if it did, I honestly have no idea what I’d give it.

This book challenged me, my biases, my understanding of the world, and my learned limited thinking. It raised ten times as many questions as it answered, and for those reasons, this was a highly engaging read.

I loved the structure and the inclusion of yarns and sand talk sections to help expand and direct the conversation. And I appreciate that the author tackled some really big and sticky subjects like violence.

I didn’t follow all of his logic, and some things I disagreed with. But I don’t think the point of this was to walk away nodding your head, rather to scratch it. And almost a week after finishing, this book is still asking me questions from the back of my mind.

[Text Publishing]

The following book reviews have been shared by Text Publishing – publisher of Sand Talk

'It was certainty that drove a bulldozer through the oldest and deepest philosophic statement on earth at Burrup Peninsula. Sand Talk offers no certainties and Tyson Yunkaporta is not a bulldozer driver. This is a book of cultural and philosophic intrigue. Read it.’
Bruce Pascoe

‘An extraordinary invitation into the world of the Dreaming… Unheralded.’
Melissa Lucashenko

‘A familiar Indigenous sense of humour and generosity of sharing knowledge makes this book enjoyable to read…Like Dark Emu, Yunkaporta’s book will have people talking.’
Books+Publishing

'An exhilarating meditation on different ways of knowing and being. Sand Talk is playful, profound and fiercely original.’
Billy Griffiths

'Radical ideas, bursting with reason.’
Tara June Winch

‘After two hundred years, Indigenous thinkers are claiming the right to interpret Aboriginal Australia. It is a revolutionary change: here, in this compelling book, are its first fruits.’
Nicolas Rothwell

‘Asks the reader to emotionally connect to with not only the text, but connect to the author through the text.’
Geelong Advertiser

'Perhaps the most unusual science book of the year...It’s a dramatically new (to some) and absorbing way of engaging with the world, and stops just short of exasperation with self-important “western science”.’
Guardian

‘A bold voice among a growing field of Australian Indigenous writing that challenged a lot of my assumptions.’
Dr Larry Marshall

[Rhonda · Rating 3 out of 5]

A book on this topic needed to be written and I'm really glad it has been, but I'm not sure this will resonate quite the same way that say Bruce Pascoe's Dark Emu has. With my white western education, I found it hard work to make sense of the author's message due to his writing style, but then again that is part of the reason for writing and needing the book. It's one that requires a few re-reads and much thinking.

[Zarathustra Goertzel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tyson Yunkaporta seems to have grown up at the chaotic edge of Settler's Australia and Indigenous Australia, which perhaps places him in a position to comment on inter-perspectival understanding.

Note: according to his culture he can speak 'of' aboriginal life and history but he cannot speak 'for' it.

He appears to make some effort to consult elders, primitivists, feminists, and other compatriots when their wisdom is needed.

--

How does he think Indigenous folk will view the current global civilization?

For starters, we seem to tolerate a high degree of rampant narcissism: people who believe they are better or deserve more than others are running around trying to make it so and perhaps even being encouraged for it!

They see knowledge as highly interactive, grounded in social relations to people, places, or living 'objects'. As English teachers say, one must know one's audience. Thus symbolic writing in fixed terms seems quaint and limited: "What? I have to say it the same way for a hundred thousand unique individuals in different life circumstances?! We're not robots yet, yo!"

Moreover, learning is best done in a hands-on manner rather than done via "rote memorization" as in many of our Western schools. Probably true.

As a society passing down stories via trusted knowledge keepers for tens of thousands of years, our civilization looks quite young, like in the Tower of Babel. They know that people need to be ready to move and adapt to changing climates and seasons, just as many animals in nature do. They see that we funnel resources from ecosystems into garbage dumps, which must crumble eventually given the circular nature of the world and her finite resources.

When time is thought of as non-linear or circular, the need to, in my own words, "leave the environment better than we find her," becomes obvious.

They purportedly respect and value the contribution of every perspective: the ground's, the ants, or even Flat Earthers'.

There are plenty more goodies I'll save for Yunkaporta's mouth.

I highly recommend the audiobook version if you have easy access ;-)

[Craig Werner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Overcame my resistance to Yunkaporta's tendency to generalize--not always accurately--about the nature of "Western" thinking in part because he's got a good sense of humor about it and owns some of his simplifications as simplifications.

As long as you can get past that, this is a great, important book, which flips the usual treatment of indigenous (in this case aboriginal) thought to focus on what that tradition can tell the outside world about itself rather than serving up touristy tidbits.

The core is the notion of "yarning"--talking through issues in a collective setting, something like the African American practice of call and response. In each chapter Yunkaporta yarns with other thinkers--most but not all aboriginal--and the natural world via making objects with cultural significance from local materials. He describes the dynamics of yarning in ways that resemble the theories of teaching I developed over forty years or so; I wish I'd had Sand Talks in the mix to help me clarify what I was working towards. He's also compelling when he talks about the nature of different "minds"--ancestral, kin, dreaming, etc.

You could generalize the message into a set of fairly familiar concepts shared with Native American traditions: sustainability, relationship, respect, but the angle isn't quite like anything I've read before.

One of the best books I've encountered in quite a while.

[Ross Nelson · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a terrible book. Not because it doesn't have anything to offer, it has a few good suggestions, though I wouldn't say it was conceptually that original. Systems thinking, holistic viewpoints, tolerance -- all good things.

What I really hated was how sloppy it was. Multiple times the author cited the urban legend that we only use a few percent of our brain (not true), he conflated city-dwelling with capitalism, his attempts to reference quantum physics were mostly wrong, and he had similar issues with chaos theory and cosmology.

The book is full of non-sequiturs and assertions made without any evidence. Many of them sounded like things he'd heard somewhere and just assumed they were true. He writes an "alternative history" of the educational system, acknowledging that it's basically not true, but then what's the point? As I said, it's really sloppy writing. He might be a good speaker. The 20-30% of what's useful in the book might make a good TED Talk, but if you value clarity and logic, avoid this book.

[Remi · Rating 1 out of 5]

An incredible collection of nonsense. The author casually drops and conflates all kinds of scientific terms and theories, applies them to the wrong fields, puts up straw man arguments which are then taken down in an even bigger mess of confusion.

[vašík · Rating 1 out of 5]

Before anyone takes this book too seriously because of Yunkaporta's ability to balance snippets of history with accessible and interesting writing, let me link this thread debunking of just one of many out-of-context "facts" that he puts forward:

Did Mussolini kill off a Paleolithic culture that was living in Italy?
I am reading Sand Talk by Tyson Yunkaporta. In it, he writes:

In Italy, for example, it used to be common knowledge but is now all but forgotten that Hitler’s fascist partner in crime, Mussolini, exterminated the Cavernicoli, a cave-dwelling people who were still maintaining a Palaeolithic culture.

(p. 154 in ebook, near the end of the chapter "Advanced and Fair")

I was very surprised by this, and a little searching didn't turn up any obvious confirmation. Does anyone know more about what Yunkaporta might be referencing here?

The short answer is... no, not at all. Tyson Yunkaporta is taking something extremely out of context, and it mostly happened after Mussolini's death.

Matera is a city in Italy with a cave system that had been used as housing since (likely) the Palaeolithic period. In the early 20th century, the caves were more or less a slum within the city, housing the poorest residents in abysmal conditions. In the immediate post-war period, however, the residents were relocated to new urban housing projects in order to "clean up" the city's image. There is an interesting writeup from the Smithsonian here.

Though the Matera caves had been used as dwellings since the Palaeolithic period, this was not a "Palaeolithic culture": residents did live amongst what could be considered ancient archaeological sites (murals, artefacts, etc.) but these were simply poor Italians. They really weren't living the kind of "caveman" image Yunkaporta is evoking. I should also note that "Cavernicoli" just means "cavemen"; it's not the name of a culture, a people, or anything similar. It was used pejoratively against the residents of Matera into the post-war period (see pgs. 120-121 here). I think Yunkaporta is taking one specific quote completely out of context: from the previous document, the Minister of Health Mario Cottellessa said at the time that residents were living in "primitive conditions of stone age cavemen".

In terms of what Mussolini had to do with this, there were some efforts to connect the caves to urban infrastructure and then to eventually relocate residents, but as Mussolini was ousted and hanged, he didn't live to see this. It wasn't until the 1950s that the "renovation" and relocation of residents occurred (put forward by the Christian Democrats). The last document linked talks about this entire renovation in great detail, mostly from a cultural perspective (the first couple of chapters should paint a good picture of the situation).

I've linked a couple of sources already, the first from the Smithsonian and the second a very hefty thesis from University College London, but if you're looking for lighter reading I'll throw in this New Yorker article about Matera's caves as well. Patrick McGauley has also written an academic history of the caves beginning in the immediate post-war period.

TL;DR There were people living in Palaeolithic caves in Italy, but they certainly didn't maintain a "Palaeolithic culture". Mussolini died before they were relocated from the caves. "Cavernicoli" just means cavemen in Italian, it isn't the name of a culture, and Yunkaporta is completely rewriting an actual historical event here.

I want to warn against this kind of popular historical-cultural-sociological writing. It's definitely engaging and by putting forward a never-ending cascade of trivia and "fun facts", writers like Yunkaporta can generally avoid scrutiny. But if this one sentence can be so ahistorical, and take something so out of context, I find it hard to take the rest of the book seriously.

[Benjamin Stahl · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was actually unlike anything I have read before, and for a while there it was on a secure path to getting four stars. Yunkaporta takes a refreshingly critical perspective on the issues surrounding Indigenous voices, First Nation politics and social movements, and the efforts of non-Indigenous community to meaningfully engage with their perspectives, instead of merely offering tokenistic gestures of acknowledgement and respect. He actually gave multiple examples for how Indigenous customs, practices, beliefs and values can be put to practical effect in modern Australian society, in our ongoing challenge to mitigate global warming, societal disintegration and a range of other issues. Yunkaporta delves right down into specifics with clear, well-formulate suggestions for how we can improve our world, from plastic packaging techniques to parliamentary debates, to criminal justice. Much of this was really neat.

All that brought it down a little for me in the end was a host of smaller, niggling annoyances. Yunkaporta's wilful rejection of linear, "Western" communication styles and formats kind of gets a little old after a while. Some of the longer, more poetic diatribes too often lost me. Sometimes, he also forgets to practice what he so often preaches, in never denigrating other cultures and their beliefs.

None of this ruined the book at all. It is a very unique and admirable work. Sometimes it is beautiful. Sometimes it is appropriately scathing and uncomfortable. But I don't know, man ... sometimes it's just a kind of annoying as well.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.75. There is much I appreciated about Sand Talk, and I am so glad that a book club I am a part of chose to read it together. Yunkaporta's ways of discussing Indigenous knowledges -- how they are frequently treated (not in good ways), and some of the ways that they function, their processes, oral culture context -- is absolutely captivating. His epistemological insights - including critiques of notions of 'objectivity' that demand scientists "remove all traces of themselves from experiments, otherwise their data is considered to be contaminated" and his reflections on land-based knowledges - are incredible. His reflections on sustainability, and so many of his yarns, have left me with much to think about. I appreciate his calling out the ways that racist settler narratives have painted Indigenous men as inherently or more violent, and the ways that gender roles in Indigenous cultures have been horribly misrepresented. All this said, I would be remiss if I did not mention that there are some real issues with gender binary thinking here. Yunkaporta cites Germaine Greer approvingly (which may explain some of the problems I have with how he speaks of sex and gender), and makes some unjustifiable sweeping generalizations about men and women.

[Lydia · Rating 4 out of 5]

‘Sand Talk’ is a unique book, a collection of philosophical musing by Indigenous author Tyson Yunkaporta, that both delights and intrigues.
Using the Aboriginal custom of drawing images on the ground to bring clarity of thought, the author uses patterns, symbols and shapes to make sense of the world.
An extraordinary glimpse into the profound wisdom and gift of Indigenous culture and perspective, an essential read to broaden the mind.
‘Sand Talk' explores global systems from an Indigenous perspective, questioning how it could challenge our worldview and provide a real and tangible wisdom to the way we live and interact with one another and our landscape.
A fascinating book, quite unlike anything else.

[Aidan Meyer · Rating 5 out of 5]

In terms of influence over my imagination and trajectory of thought, this is one of the best books I’ve ever read. I’ve read a lot of great books, but there are a select few that have shaken and restructured my sense of belonging in the world in such a foundational way that I will never really be the same reader, student, or person. This isn’t just a book on the topic of indigenous culture or wisdom; it’s a work that in itself pulls its readers into new pathways of comprehending and imagining wisdom, knowledge, and being while simultaneously delivering its content. It’s one of the most unique reads I’ve encountered, and I will likely be recommending it to most people in my circles for many years to come.

[Gill Hutchison · Rating 3 out of 5]

So jam packed with ideas that my brain exploded on page 50 and I had to put it down. I just couldn't find the rhythm of his voice.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a difficult book to rate and perhaps it's one I need to reread. Many of the concepts just don't come naturally to the way my brain thinks.
In indigenous culture people were only entrusted with deeper learning once they were assessed to be ready for it and that could take some time. I suspect in my case, it certainly will take some time.
Some of the authors more radical ideas, he admits himself, are a bit playful and tongue-in-cheek.
But an interesting read nonetheless.
Will borrow from the library again some time in the future.

[Bernie Gourley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book does a good job of showing that there are fundamental differences in philosophy, worldview, and perspective between indigenous / aboriginal peoples and the rest of the world. It’s fair to say that differences exist between any two different cultures, but the argument is that these are deeper and more profound. Said differences run from how one visualizes abstractions to how one views and interacts with nature to one’s go-to pronouns.

What the book does not do, not by any means, is honor its sub-titular promise to show how changing to aboriginal modes of thinking would save the world. It doesn’t even strongly demonstrate that the world needs saving. Instead, it relies heavily on the looming sentiment among many in the modern world (myself included) that the world is FUBAR [if needed, please look it up.] That sentiment is what draws people to the book in the first place. (And to others, e.g. Daniel Quinn’s “Ishmael” books, that argue for overturning modernity in favor indigenous ways.) While I, too, feel the imminent fall of modernity on a visceral level, I also recognize that this inevitable collapse is a combination of fact and fiction, and that its bases are as well. So, in some sense, Yunkaporta’s book is an exercise in preaching to the choir. Because of this, it only tweaks and clarifies the reader’s philosophy and mode of thinking (sometimes in clever and fascinating ways,) but it doesn’t vastly overturn a reader’s thinking. But even if it did completely change modes of thought and philosophies, those things don’t automatically change behavior. And saving the world (if the world needs saving) requires changes in behavior. Ultimately, one needs to know whether, how, and to what degree incentives change. (FYI – the importance of incentives is not lost on Yunkaporta, as he discusses them himself in another context.)

That said, there were many ideas that resonated with me, and in which I found deep truths. I’ll go straight to what may be the most controversial idea in the book and that is that modernity’s discomfort with – and desire to do away with -- every form of [non-state sanctioned] violence has not been without cost. Yunkaporta is not justifying domestic violence (although the perception – justified or not – that such acts are out-of-control in aboriginal populations is likely an impetus for bringing up the subject.) What he seems to be arguing is that what seems like a disproportionate problem of violence in aboriginal populations derives from looking at what is happening in tribal communities through the lens of modernity, and the resultant tinge blows things out of proportion while missing part of the truth of the matter.

I’ll elaborate how I came to have a similar view through the study of martial arts. For example, when I’ve traveled to Thailand, I’ve always had mixed feelings about child Thai-boxing. On the one hand, I recognize a reason for concern about concussions in a brain that’s not fully developed. On the other hand, those children display a combination of emotional control, politeness, and self-confidence that seems in decay in much of the world. On a related note, I think that the lack of coming-of-age ritual might be failing the kids in the modern world because they skip a step that puts a bedrock of self-confidence under their feet. As a result, it’s not that they all end up milquetoast, some end up murderous because they can’t process challenging emotions effectively, they have a feeling of powerlessness gnawing at them, and they have no grasp of how to moderate their response under challenging conditions.

As far as ancillary matter is concerned, it’s mostly line-drawn diagrams that are used to show how aboriginal people depict various concepts under discussion.

I enjoyed the book and found many new ideas to consider. I’d recommend it for individuals interested in approaches to thinking and problem solving – and for those who want to learn more about indigenous populations. Just don’t think you’ll have a map to fix the world at the end.

[Daniel Pelkowitz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really enjoyed reading this. Flowed as if you were talking to the author, easily accessible and fresh perspectives. Would recommend to anyone interested in looking at the world a bit differently !

[Teo · Rating 3 out of 5]

2020.10.02–2020.10.03

Jim Rutt urged his podcast listeners to read this or he’d kick our ass, so I guess I’m safe now.

This book is meant to be an indigenous thinking perspective on global issues, especially sustainability.

It definitely contains a lot of food for thought for anyone who’s only ever experienced the world with e.g. Western(ized) eyes.

I didn’t gain much new tools from the spirit stuff, but I appreciated the emphasis on haptic cognition, stories, metaphors, analogies, mnemonic devices, and high-context (field dependent) processing.

It’s important to consider what we ‘domesticated humans’ may have lost along the way and whether some of this could form a much-needed or even necessary antidote to problems like alienation and atomization.

When the book talks about relations and complex systems I don’t feel like comparing it to other books on my ‘complex-systems’ shelf, so I didn’t give it that tag. This feels less systematic and technical and more grounded in the realm of perceiving patterns and how it all works in a living, field dependent tradition. But it was dense in a way, and there may be a lot of synergy I’m missing.

Overall, it has a lot of generalizations and stuff I don’t necessarily endorse, but also a lot of important perspectives on cognition, learning, relating, etc., and especially on power relations. It’s fascinating that indigenous cultures have long traditions of keeping individual narcissism in check, while more atomized modern cultures lead to not only increased narcissism but also to situations where people have to confront it one-on-one, which rarely works.

The audiobook narration by the author was fun and one of the best self-narrations I’ve heard.

Contents

Yunkaporta T (2019) (07:49) Sand Talk - How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World

01. The Porcupine, the Paleo-mind and the Grand Design
02. Albino Boy
03. First Law
04. Forever Limited
05. Lines in the Sand
06. Of Spirit and Spirits
07. Advanced and Fair
08. Romancing the Stone Age
09. Displaced Apostrophes
10. Lemonade for Headaches
11. Duck Hunting is Everybody’s Business
12. Immovable Meets Irresistible
13. Be Like Your Place
14. Which Way

Acknowledgments
About the Author

[Neve · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tyson is only skimming the surface of Indigenous knowledges but I gained a much deeper understanding and appreciation of the complexities in Aboriginal culture and ways of being, doing and knowing after reading this book.

Aboriginal peoples have a completely different way of thinking than non-Indigenous peoples. While this may seem obvious I was surprised at how much I struggled to grasp some of the concepts. However I think this could be the point. Like the metaphor Tyson uses, westerns look at Aboriginal culture through a glass window - we only see snippets and snapshots of Aboriginal culture of what they want us to see but we are unable to see the full extent/full room of what Aboriginal people see and understand.

The book did not offer many direct solutions rather Tyson is having a conversation with the reader about Indigenous knowledges. My intention to come out with concrete solutions is a reflection of my western and linear ways of thinking compared to more circular and abstract ways of thinking, being and doing. This is a book I will definitely be rereading.

[Juno Babić · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am so sad to say that I didn’t like this book! Perhaps my expectations were too high, but I found it extremely dense and boring (I’m sorry 😭😭😭😭)

The author is a researcher, which is fabulous, but I felt like I was reading a peer reviewed scholarly resource for a Uni assignment. I wanted a-ha moments felt in my soul but I got long chapters that were so wordy I could honestly not absorb any of it. I wish the book dumbed it down a lot more; because I’m sure there are great messages that me and other dumb white people would get a lot out of, I just missed all of them!

[Carl Safina · Rating 4 out of 5]

A contemporary look at Indigenous views through the eyes of someone who identifies deeply as Indigenous (from the continent we now call Australia) yet who also operates in the Western, industrialized context.

He has deep insights and a very engaging, open writing style. I've read a lot about Indigenous world views recently and this book stands out as relevant, deliciously irreverent, profound, and refreshing.

[Kiran Bhat · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book of great knowledge

I learnt a lot about Aboriginal culture reading this book. It’s a must read for anyone who wants to understand Aboriginal psychology. I just wish it went a little deeper into its claims. The tone was too colloquial and not erudite enough for me.

More soon.

[Andy Fleskens · Rating 5 out of 5]

Feels shallow reducing this one to a few words.
Was inclined to not leave a review. Yet I think that's the type of book that deserves a 5 star.
It stretches your thinking and your individual presuppositions, all with deep respect.
I havnt been someone that usually checks on my morals/life ethos - this book provides story from the deep time perspective on what it means to be a human. Refreshing

[Hugh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deeply powerful and re-orientating. One of the most important books I've read.