Walking home one night, I came across what looked like a torn up dictionary outside the McDonalds on Ballarat Rd. I’m into a bit of upcycling and paper craft – it makes sense to use books/paper that are being thrown out anyway and this has little illustrations… No cover, torn in sections, mouldy and weathered, unwanted… except for me who’s picking up rubbish thinking “Cute.” and “Score!”
Looking more closely once I got my prize home, I realise it’s not a dictionary but rather some sort of encyclopaedia and it’s old. Really old. Old enough that it’s quite offensive – mostly for its omissions rather than what it explicitly says, for example in a section called “Australia’s History: Chief events in chronological order…”spanning 1788-1939, I can see only one reference made regarding an aboriginal person or place and that was “1876 Death of Truganini, last of Tasmanian aborigines”. I look her up online to know her story.
A visitor on country myself, I have not (and continue) not to know very much about what right relationship looks like between people and the land. Not having the right words and being afraid of saying the wrong ones, I try and stay silent. To listen and to learn. I have heard people talk about their family members, homes, and culture being lost through colonisation. I have heard them talk about losing language and here am I finding some lying by the side of the road. I find myself wishing I could give it back to who it belongs to.
itellyouarise 
Where is the artwork that this became? I am now curious!
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Thanks for your interest, it was donated to an art fundraiser for indigenous land rights. It’s in one of the photos… silhouette with bark, feathers and gum leaves and it had a page from ‘c’ in the encyclopedia that had a pretty telling definition of colony and the colonial office in Australia.
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