SENSITIVE CONTENT. Notes on Kunapipi [1 of 5]

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Languages: Alawa; Yanyuwa; Djauan; Rembaranga

Places: Cape Barrow; Elsey Creek; Elsey Station; Woodah Island; Millingimbi

This is a folder of notes, both handwritten and typescript, on Elkin's work on ceremonial life of Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory over several years of his fieldwork from 1946 and 1949 to 1952. There is also a small set of correspondence from 1944. The focus is on the kunapipi (kunabibi) cycle.

A separate bundle (Bundle 1, 14 pages) contains correspondence from a LAC Parkes, with the RAAF in Darwin, who wrote to Elkin during 1944 about the ‘Old Woman' culture hero of the Port Keats people. This is related to (or part of) the Kunapipi cult.

The last bundle (Bundle 2, 19 pages) in this item contains two typescript documents. The first is 16 pages (numbered), and is titled ‘The Karawadi or initiation into the ‘Old Woman' or ‘Mother' cult'. There are then 1 and a half pages titled ‘The Karanjara Wandji', and one page titled ‘The Kudidjingera'.

Elkin, AP (1964) The Australian Aborigines: How to Understand Them, Sydney, Angus & Robertson, esp pages 216-217, 255, 256, 257, 260, 285, 286, 287, 293, 394,