Key Knowledge point

Key Knowledge point

• Other understandings of specific
outdoor environments, such as artistic,
Indigenous, and historical.
Artistic Understandings of
Outdoor Environments
 Artistic
This refers to how Outdoor Environments were
depicted by artists through time. Artists can
represent painters, musicians, sculptors etc.
In the past, Artists being white settlers to
Australia have depicted environments different
to what may be true. When white settlers
arrived in Australia from Europe in the late 18th
Century Artists were challenged by scenery
which they had never seen before.
 European
interpretations

European traditional art did not fit within this

new and strange landscape. The earliest Artists
would paint what they saw, but generally would
paint the land scape in a wild and bewildering
manner. They tended to incorporate concepts
that were familiar to them such as green open
plains and animals such as dogs and cattle.
What would do these Artists understand
about the environment due to what they
do?

Your drawing at Arapiles.. What did it

tell you about the environment there?
 Kimberley

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igN
DrXP_hLg
Historical Understandings
of Outdoor Environments
 Historical

Refers to key events or key historians and

how they understood a specific outdoor
environment. For example what was
different in the past compared with white
settlers and indigenous Australians? How
did each population understand the land?
 First Settlers:
Captain James Cook arrived upon the shores of
Botany Bay, Australia in 1770; Followed by the
first fleet Captained by Arthur Phillip followed
their arrival 1788. The Europeans were quite
worried about the Australian land. It was
extremely arid and seemed to be untameable.
Where would they farm? The soil was poor and
not good enough for crops. White setters did not
understand the land, the climate, or how to live
off the land.
 Indigenous First
Encounter with White
settlers:
Aboriginals and White settlers did not
understand each other. Nor did the white
settlers understand or have much care for
sacred land. The Europeans chopped down
trees, and took food without asking. The
Australian Outdoor Environment was purely a
resource for White settlers where they were
able to use it.
 Indigenous
Understandings of Outdoor
Environments
 BELIEFS
(the dreamtime)
• The world was created in the
dreamtime by spirit ancestors.

• Equivalent to the bible.

• Creation stories explain natural
features, animals and plants
• When they died they returned to
the earth or became a natural
feature/plant/animal
 PERCEPTIONS
• They believed that the land owned them,
rather than the other way around.
• They had a responsibility to look after the
land/plants/animals
(custodians/Stewardship)

• The land would provide for them if looked

after
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qok6YM3E1z8
 Custodians
Because the "Stories of the Dreaming" have been
handed down through the generations, they are not
'owned' by individuals. They belong to a group or
nation, and the storytellers of that nation are carrying
out an obligation to pass the stories along.
 The Elders of a nation might appoint a
particularly skilful and knowledgeable storyteller
as 'custodian' of the stories of that people.
 With the discouragement and 'unofficial'
banning of the telling of traditional stories,
which continued well into the twentieth
century, many stories were 'lost'. The
custodians passed away without being able to
hand the stories on. This was particularly so
in the south-east region of Australia.
 Storytelling, while explaining the past, helps young
Indigenous Australians maintain dignity and self-respect in
the present.
Present-day custodians of stories play a vital role in
Indigenous communities.
 Practices/Management
• Semi nomadic lifestyle
• Seasonal movements
• Few permanent settlements
• Hunting and gathering
• Firestick farming
• Story places/sacred sites
• Small populations
 Impacts of Indigenous Cultures
• Possible extinction of mega fauna
• Creation of grasslands/open woodlands
• Introduction of dingo – impact on mainland
• Selection of eucalypts over rainforest plants
• Relatively little impact over 50,000 years
compared to 200 years of European settlement