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A land acknowledgement (or territorial acknowledgement) is a formal statement that acknowledges the Indigenous peoples of the land. It may be in written form, or be spoken at the beginning of public events. The custom of land acknowledgement is present in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, and more recently in the United States. [1]
The Welcome to Country and Acknowledgement of Country have become core Australian customs. [31] Some jurisdictions, such as New South Wales, make a welcome (or, failing that, acknowledgement) mandatory [dubious – discuss] at all government-run events. [32] The Victorian Government supports Welcome to Country and Acknowledgement of Country. [33]
"Always was, always will be" is sometimes incorporated into the Acknowledgment of Country. [9] [10]Always was, always will be was the name of a temporary installation (2012–2017) by Reko Rennie in Taylor Square, Sydney.
Drawing on this important relationship with Country, many First Nations Australians — including Aboriginal Australians across the continent and Torres Strait Islanders alike [13] [34] — identify a sense of responsibility or obligation to care for Country as a central tenet of traditional custodianship.
The term "on Country", or "on [a specific people] country" is often used. [6] Connection to country, "the most fundamental pillar of Indigenous identity", is a difficult concept for non-Indigenous Australians to understand, and disconnection from country has been shown to have an impact on Indigenous peoples' health and well-being. [7]
Today, Indigenous sovereignty generally relates to "inherent rights deriving from spiritual and historical connections to land". [1] Indigenous studies academic Aileen Moreton-Robinson has written that the first owners of the land were ancestral beings of Aboriginal peoples, and "since spiritual belief is completely integrated into human daily activity, the powers that guide and direct the ...
Keating's speech has been described as "a defining moment in the nation's reconciliation with its Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people", being the first ever public acknowledgement by the Commonwealth Government of the dispossession of the country's First Nations peoples. [2]
The establishment of the council was an acknowledgement of past policies which had done harm to Aboriginal peoples, [7] and its purpose was to guide the process of reconciliation in the nation over the coming decade, which would end with the celebration of centenary since the Federation of Australia. [10]