“As an Aboriginal writer this success is very profound for me. I truly hope this acknowledgement will encourage the growing number of emerging First Nations and Indigenous writers to persevere in their craft, to trust the strength of our cultural stories and our words, and to aim beyond the prejudice of assimilation and the limits of mainstream education.”
-ALI COBBY ECKERMAN, AUSTRALIA COUNCIL LITERARY FELLOW

MEET SOME OF OUR INCREDIBLE SOUTH AUSTRALIAN FIRST NATION WRITERS

Default Image

Ali Baker

Country: Mirning

Platform:

poet, academic, filmmaker, visual and performance artist, curator, archivist

Availability:

Exhibitions, installations, festivals, guest speaker

Publications:

Unbound Collective, TARNANTHI Festival of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Contemporary Art (2015), Nunga Odradek (2013) at the Australian Experimental Art Foundation and Long Way Home (2012) at Flinders City Gallery. artist at the Art Gallery of South Australia exhibition From the Street (2012), curated by Lisa Slade. She has exhibited at Tandanya National Aboriginal Cultural Institute (2011) a show called ALIAN: Bow Down to the Sovereign Goddess.

Contact:

website, (email if you wish)

Default Image

Edoardo Chismani

Country: Wiradjuri

Platform:

writer, poet, filmmaker

Availability:

Speaking engagements, filming

Publications:

2019-2021 Coordinator for the South Australian First Nation Writers group and a Board Member of FNAWN (First Nation Australia Writers Network)

2020 short documentary Lest We Forget Aboriginal Women premiered on SBS and at the United Nations International Women’s Day in Jordan

2019/2018 short drama 440 premiered at the Winda Film Festival, Sydney and internationally at the Austin, Texas Micro Short Film Festival

2017 nominated for Australian Writers Guild Award for the documentary about his grandfather 1931 champion boxer and entertainer Joe Murray, titled The Panther Within.

short doco Crombie Crew on Lillian and Elaine Crombie on ABC IView

short stories and poetry published in journals and anthologies in Australia and overseas.

Contact:

website, (email if you wish)

Default Image

Dylan Coleman

Country: Kokatha

Platform:

writer, academic, filmmaker

Publications:

Novel Mazin Grace; Short film Walking With Us, Secret Pretty Things Kokatha language

shortlisted for the Commonwealth Book Prize
longlisted for the Stella Prize
Blak&Write Indigenous Fellowship

Awards:

Australian David Unaipon Indigenous Literary Award Mazin Grace, based on her mother’s childhood growing up on Koonibba Mission under oppressive colonial government policies including segregation of the 1940’s and 50’s was written in Aboriginal English and

Kokatha language

  • shortlisted for the Commonwealth Book Prize
  • longlisted for the Stella Prize
  • Blak&Write Indigenous Fellowship

Contact:

website (email if you wish)

Default Image

Ali Cobby Eckermann

Country: Yankunytjatjara

Platform:

writer, poet

Availability:

Speaker

Publications:

2009 ‘little bit long time’

Awards:

2018 Australia Council New Literary Fellowship.

  • Australian Poetry Ambassador
  • Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry and Book of the Year award at the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards for Ruby Moonlight, a massacre verse novel.

Inaugural recipient of the Tungkunungka Pintyanthi Fellowship at Adelaide Writers Week for her memoir Too Afraid To Cry, and was the

first Aboriginal Australian writer to attend the International Writing Program at University of Iowa.

Windham Campbell Award for Poetry from Yale University, USA

Deadly Award for outstanding contribution to Indigenous Literature.

Contact:

website/email

Default Image

Dominic Guerrera: He/Him

Country: Ngarrindjeri, Kaura, Italian

Platform:

readings, guest speaker, mentoring

Publications:

‘violence against women is everybody’s business’ IndigenousX 2018, essay; ASH Podcast 2018- 2020, host

‘laundered winds’ Cordite Review 2019, poem

Adelaide Writers’ Week 2019, poetry performance

Aboriginal Standpoint storytelling event 2019, curator

‘questions from an uppity white’ – non compliant arts publication 2020, poem

‘yanurumi’ – fine print 2020, poem

yanurumi’ – fine print 2020, poem

‘circles to us’ – fine print 2020, conversation

‘within us’ – SA Artist Survey Ace Open 2020, essay

Adelaide Writers’ Week 2021, poetry performance

‘strategies for caring for our community during Invasion season’ IndigenousX 2021, essay

‘suffocation’ – fine print 2021, poem

Cedric Varcoe – Tarnanthi Catalogue 2021, essay

http://cordite.org.au/poetry/domestic/laundered-winds/

http://www.fineprintmagazine.com/suffocation

http://www.fineprintmagazine.com/circles-to-us

http://www.fineprintmagazine.com/yanurumi-transcript

https://indigenousx.com.au/strategies-for-caring-for-our-community-during-invasion-season/

https://indigenousx.com.au/violence-against-women-is-everyones-business/

https://vimeo.com/561736318?fbclid=IwAR34KwR_Z4eVU9fQStYkX-ta0I1_lqB94jS5ICj_4aWn81N6Iq6c2nFoUCM

Awards:

Blakandwrite

Contact:

website (email if you wish)

Default Image

Natalie Harkin

Country: Narungga

Platform:

poet, archivist

Availability:

readings, speaking engagements, mentoring, exhibitions, installations

Publications:

‘Apron Sorrow/Sovereign Tea; Dirty Words, by Cordite Books; Archival-Poetics by Vagabond Press; Unbound – Flinders University

Awards:

ARC Discovery Early Career Researcher Awardee; 2020 Cate Challis RAKA Award; 2020 Adelaide Festival’s John Bray Poetry Award;

Default Image

Jared Thomas

Country: Nukunu, Ngadjuri

Availability:

journalist, film script editor, and writer

Publications:

Jared Thomas | AustLit: Discover Australian Stories

His first play ‘Flash Red Ford’ toured Uganda and Kenya in 1999, performed by a Ugandan company. In 2002, his work ‘Love, Land and Money‘ was performed at the Adelaide Fringe Festival. Thomas began to develop his skills ‘as a fiction writer with several short stories and poems being published in anthologies.’ (Heiss and Minter 2009). His first novel Sweet Guy published by IAD Press.With his forthcoming novel Calypso Summer

Contact:

Jared Thomas

Image

Ali Baker

Mirning

Genres/themes: history, popular culture, politics,

Platform: poet, academic, filmmaker, visual and performance artist, curator, archivist

Availability: Exhibitions, installations, festivals, guest speaker

Publications: Unbound Collective, TARNANTHI Festival of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Contemporary Art (2015), Nunga Odradek (2013) at the Australian Experimental Art Foundation and Long Way Home (2012) at Flinders City Gallery. artist at the Art Gallery of South Australia exhibition From the Street (2012), curated by Lisa Slade. She has exhibited at Tandanya National Aboriginal Cultural Institute (2011) a show called ALIAN: Bow Down to the Sovereign Goddess.

Awards:

Contact: website, (email if you wish)

Image

Edoardo Crismani

Wiradjuri

Genres/themes: history,  

Platform: writer, poet, filmmaker

Availability: Speaking engagements, filming

Publications: 2019-2021 Coordinator for the South Australian First Nation Writers group and a Board Member of FNAWN (First Nation Australia Writers Network)

2020 short documentary Lest We Forget Aboriginal Women premiered on SBS and at the United Nations International Women’s Day in Jordan

2019/2018 short drama 440 premiered at the Winda Film Festival, Sydney and internationally at the Austin, Texas Micro Short Film Festival

Image

Dylan Coleman

Kokatha

Genres/themes: Indigenous narrative process, standpoint, literary and critical race and whiteness theories, political activism, health and social justice

Platform: writer, academic, filmmaker

Availability: 

Recent publications: Novel Mazin Grace; Short film Walking With Us, Secret Pretty Things

Awards:Australian David Unaipon Indigenous Literary Award Mazin Grace, based on her mother’s childhood growing up on Koonibba Mission under oppressive colonial government policies including segregation of the 1940’s and 50’s was written in Aboriginal English and

Image

Ali Cobby Eckermann

Yankunytjatjara

Genres: Contemporary, Indigenous, prose fiction, 

Platform: writer, poet, 

Availability: Speaker, 

Publications: 2009 ‘little bit long time’

Awards: 2018 Australia Council New Literary Fellowship.  

  • Australian Poetry Ambassador 
  • Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry and Book of the Year award at the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards for Ruby Moonlight, a massacre verse novel.
Image

Dominic Guerrera, He/Him

Ngarrindjeri, Kaura, Italian

Genres: 

Platform: poet, writer,

Availability: readings, guest speaker, mentoring, 

Publications: ‘violence against women is everybody’s business’ IndigenousX 2018, essay; ASH Podcast 2018- 2020, host

‘laundered winds’ Cordite Review 2019, poem

Adelaide Writers’ Week 2019, poetry performance

Aboriginal Standpoint storytelling event 2019, curator

'questions from an uppity white' - non compliant arts publication 2020, poem

‘yanurumi’ – fine print 2020, poem

Image

Natalie Harkin

Narungga

Genres/themes: activism, history

Platform: poet, archivist, 

Availability: readings, speaking engagements, mentoring, exhibitions, installations, 

Recent publications: ‘Apron Sorrow/Sovereign Tea; Dirty Words, by Cordite Books; Archival-Poetics by Vagabond Press; Unbound - Flinders University

Awards:  ARC Discovery Early Career Researcher Awardee; 2020 Cate Challis RAKA Award; 2020 Adelaide Festival’s John Bray Poetry Award; 

Image

Jared Thomas

Nukunu, Ngadjuri 

Genres: fiction, 

author, playwright, poet, academic

Availability: journalist, film script editor, and writer

Publications: Jared Thomas | AustLit: Discover Australian Stories

His first play 'Flash Red Ford' toured Uganda and Kenya in 1999, performed by a Ugandan company. In 2002, his work 'Love, Land and Money' was performed at the Adelaide Fringe Festival. Thomas began to develop his skills 'as a fiction writer with several short stories and poems being published in anthologies.' (Heiss and Minter 2009). His first novel Sweet Guy published by IAD Press.With his forthcoming novel Calypso Summer

Awards: Kuril Dhagun Indigenous Writing Fellowship in 2013, shorted listed for both the Victorian Premier's Literary Awards and the Festival Awards for Literature.