Griffith Review 76: Acts of Reckoning
Truth-telling in a post-truth world.
Four years on from the Uluru Statement from the Heart, there’s a clear divide between the groundswell of popular support to recognise the rightful place of First Nations people in Australia’s democratic life and ongoing political inertia in the same space. Griffith Review 76: Acts of Reckoning is a wide-ranging discussion of the multifaceted issues at play in Australia’s fraught journey towards a full settlement with Indigenous peoples. What might be possible for Australia’s narrative when reconciliation between the world’s oldest continuing culture and one of its newest nation states is achieved? And how can this take place in an era of quick assumptions and divides, alternative facts and cancellations? Examining questions of history, truth-telling and decolonisation and revisiting colonial figures and assumptions and their ongoing legacies – in Australia and beyond –Acts of Reckoning reframes the past in order to form new futures, and celebrates how much work is already underway.
Ashley Hay is an award-winning writer, editor and journalist whose work spans fiction, narrative non-fiction, essays and science writing. She has published eight books as well as a range of essays, articles, reviews and short stories for anthologies and journals including The Monthly, Australian Geographic, Creative Non-Fiction, The Guardian and Griffith Review. In June 2018, Ashley became editor of Griffith Review – the second in its eighteen-year history. Ashley oversees the creation and curation of four editions of the journal annually – as well as exclusive online content — giving voice to up to 150 writers each year.
Teela Reid is a proud Wiradjuri and Wailwan woman and lawyer. She has experience practising in criminal, civil and administrative law. She was born and raised in Gilgandra, Western NSW, and comes from a family of advocates in the NSW Land Rights movement. Teela was involved as a working group leader on s51(xxvi) in the Constitutional dialogue process that culminated in the Uluru Statement from the Heart. Previously, Teela was Australia’s first Female Indigenous Youth Delegate to the United Nations Permanent Forum in New York, which inspired her journey to become a lawyer. Teela completed her postgraduate Juris Doctor from UNSW Law Sydney and was named on the UNSW Law Deans Women of Excellence List. In 2017, Teela was selected to attend Harvard University as a global Emerging Leader. On her return to Australia, she fearlessly took Prime Minister Turnbull to task on Q&A after his dismissal of the Uluru Statement from the Heart.
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