Barngarla people

The Barngarla, (historically also spelled as Parnkalla or Pangkala), are an Indigenous people of South Australia and the traditional owners of much of Eyre Peninsula.^[2][3] Their language, Barngarla is a Yura language and part of a revival effort by the University of Adelaide.^[4]

Their traditional land encompassed much of the upper Eyre peninsula, including Port Lincoln, Whyalla and the lands west of Port Augusta. The Barngarla people traditionally lived by the coast and visited inland seasonally and for ceremonial and special purposes.^[5] The Barngarla native title claim compromises 44,481 square km, or about two-thirds of the Eyre peninsula.^[6] In 2015 this claim was upheld^[7] and in 2023 the barngarla people won a federal court decision to prevent a nuclear waste disposal facility from being built on their land.^[8]

Barngarla people traditionally wore cloaks made from kangaroo skin and mainly hunted for seafood, but also caught kangaroo, emu, snakes and various lizards depending on seasonality. Nondo beans (thought to be Acacia sophorae seeds^[9] ) and pigface (carpobrotus modestus) were especially prized food items.^[5] a book entitled Wardlada Mardinidhi documents the location and names of barngarla medical plants.^[10]

Barngarla Dreaming is heavily centred on a large mythic complex known as the Seven Sisters. The primary male spiritual figure in that narrative is named Yulanya from which the Uley, Yeelanna, Yallunda Flat, along with the smaller localities of Yallunna, Yulina, and Palanna Fountain on the Eyre Peninsula derive their names.^[9]

A practice known as "singing to the sharks" was an important ritual in Barngarla culture. The performance consisted of men lining the cliffs of bays in the Eyre peninsula and singing out, while their chants were accompanied by women dancing on the beach. The aim was to enlist sharks and dolphins in driving shoals of fish towards the shore where fishers in the shallows could make their catch.^[11]

Just prior to invasion by the English 'free settlers', the Barngarla were under pressure from the Kokatha, who were on the move southwards, forcing the Barngarla to retreat from their traditional northern boundaries. One effect was to cut off their access to certain woods used in spear-making, so that they finally had to forage as far as Tumby Bay to get supplies of whipstick mallee ash.^[12]

The barngarla and Nauo people were engaged in more clashes with European settlers then any other people in South Australia following the colonisation of the state. During the decade following the establishment of Port Lincoln in 1839 the barngarla attacked pastoral stations with local settlers conducting vigilante killings and police retaliating indiscriminately.^[13] This undeclared war between white sellers and the barngarla people continued until at least 1862.^[14] Barngarla people are one of the many indigenous groups which contain an oral-history of the Waterloo Bay massacre, where up to 260 Barngarla, Nauo, Kokatha and Wirangu may have been driven off cliffs into the sea.

In 1850 both the Barngarla School, operated by Clamor Wilhelm Schürmann, and the first Anglican mission were set up at Poonindie on the Tod River within barngarla land.^[13] Living conditions at Pooninidie were basic with no running water, over-crowding and a lack of food and medicine. In 1894, the mission had closed and the majority of residents were moved onto Point Pearce and Point McLeay missions, although some stayed on their land.^[15] The barngarla community was deeply affected by the Aborigines Act 1911 which lead to the Stolen Generations and the loss of Barngarla as a first language.

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