"Welcome to Country"

Today I attended a conference at another university, and once again some middle aged white guy took it upon himself to "welcome" us to "Country".

This annoys the hell out of me.

Why? Because nine times out of ten they tick every box necessary for turning it into something trite and irrelevant instead of something meaningful:

Did some guy who definitely has no claim to "Country" welcome us to it as if he new what "Country" really meant? Yes.

Did he neglect to even mention the name of the people whose Country he was so magnanimously welcoming us to? Yes.

Did he point out how good his organisation was for making a point of mentioning "Country" and the "original owners"? Yes.

Did he use the standard cliche of "acknowledging the original owners of this land" without giving the impression he even knew who they were? Yes.

Sure, its the "in thing" these days to show how culturally aware you are by stating explicitly that this piece of land used to belong to someone else and they still have ties to it. But, honestly people, if you aren't going to make the effort to find out who those original owners were and acknowledge them by name - what's the point?

Country isn't a buzzword that you get to bandy around because it's in vogue amongst political circles these days. Either think about what it means and sound like you care, or skip it.

For those of you who aren't familiar with this particular Australianism, "Country" refers to the concept that indigenous people have a bond with their home turf. Left to their traditional ways, they would be intimately familiar with the seasons, flora, fauna and sacred places of the patch of land they call their own. Their ancestors' spirits sink deep into that land and therefore it's not just their home - it's part of their family.

Whatever they would have called it in their own language, these days the convention in English is to call it Country. No articles, adjectives or qualifiers - no "the" or "my" or "your" - just Country.

Except that it does have a name - the name of the people who call it their own. To them, it's just Country. To everyone else it's Such-and-Such Country.

Take the place were I live and work, for example. It was variously home to two Aboriginal Language Groups: Wulgurukaba and Bindal. There are other language groups in the area, but those two are the traditional owners of the place I now call my home.

Not being a member of either language group, I'd feel a right twit trying to welcome you to "Country" as if I had a right to do so. It's not "Country" to me. Well, in a way it is, as I was born and raised here and feel a kind of kinship with my home turf, but if I was going to welcome you to my place I would welcome you to Townsville. It's not in my culture to think of this as "Country", and to use that word in that context when I don't really feel it...

Well, that just seems even more culturally insensitive than not using it at all. I could quite happily welcome you to Wulgurukaba and Bindal Country, just as I could quite happily welcome you to Charters Towers if you were meeting me there and you had never visited that town before.

If I wouldn't use "Country" to welcome you to my home town where I was born and raised, I sure as heck wouldn't dare do it to a place I've only lived in for a couple of years.

As for "acknowledging the original owners of this land"? Well, you do that by actually mentioning whose traditional land it is. You can bandy the political buzzwords around as much as you like and feel special about it, but if you haven't gone to the trouble of finding out the name of the traditional owners, then saying "I acknowledge you" is a pretty shallow gesture indeed.

Get over yourselves, impertinent and supercilious white dudes. You don't sound special. You just sound obnoxious.