Hearing, voicing and healing: Rivers as culturally located and connected

Abstract

In this article, a collaborative writing group explores how we, two rivers, express ourselves over time, place and space, our energies long interpreted as veins and arteries carrying the Country's life affirming blood. Voiced as River: I, River, this position reflects a worldview in which interrelationship with living river is normal, and River Spirit is ever‐present. It is a position underpinned by Indigenous narratives as riverine expressions of place‐based love. At times, the article is also voiced as a writing group or individuals, with voices being interchanged where required for smooth reading. We see this as part of the decolonising process, which feels liberating and healing among the writers. Each writer is equally valued as co‐creator, contributor, narrator and story teller. The two rivers, being Martuwarra Fitzroy River (Kimberley, Western Australia) and Unamen Shipu Romaine River (North Shore, Québec, Canada), illustrate a common condition of being, through heritage, life, change and possibility. Through stories and voices, the socio‐scientific implications of colonisation and lost connections become clear, considering the interaction, the dialogue and the cultural synthesis of living water systems that have always incorporated all life forms into rivers of life. As a way of navigating towards wholeness, Aboriginal knowledge systems and narratives for healing are used to bring together findings of this intercultural river learning journey.

A tale of two rivers – Baaka and Martuwarra, Australia: Shared voices and art towards water justice

“…Importantly, with the guidance of senior Elders, his art 'captures' the River to allow others to feel and to hear how the River is important. His award-winning paintings provide meaning and connection and show his love for Martuwarra; a happy way to learn about and share his non-human kin (Poelina et al, 2021). To him, 'Coming Down the River' is important, both therapeutic and as a time of learning.…”

The River’s Legal Personhood: A Branch Growing on Canada’s Multi-Juridical Living Tree

“…This approach grows from the authority of the Innu Council of Ekuanitshit, who entered a partnership with the regional municipality of Minganie, which resulted in the collaborative recognition of the legal personhood of Muteshekau Shipu (Magpie River), including the river's right to flow, maintain physical integrity, and litigate (Townsend et al, 2021). A recent article with two rivers as its lead authors, the Martuwarra and Unamen Shipu Romain Rivers, demonstrates the transformative potential of listening to and voicing rivers' interests to nurture such relationships for future generations (Martuwarra RiverOfLife et al, 2022). The following section, therefore, seeks to develop a discussion that leverages the rights of nature to amplify Indigenous law and governance and, thereby, to listen and give voice to water beings.…”

Riverkin: Seizing the moment to remake vital relations in theUnited Kingdomand beyond

“…Understanding that history as processes whereby historically particular and local ways of knowing and doing became globally dominant, suggests other possibilities, including moving away from what we characterize as the derangement of relationship with our ‘riverkin’ 1 , 2 entailed by this history. Kinship with waters has figured centrally in the vital, primarily Indigenous‐led struggles for the recognition of the life, agency, voice and or personhood of rivers in New Zealand, Australia, Canada and elsewhere (Manikuakanishtiku et al, 2021; Martuwarra RiverOfLife et al, 2021; Nixon, 2021; Strang, 2021; Wooltorton, 2021). This marks an important potential inflection point in how humanity relates to the nonhuman world, although its transformative potential will necessarily be curtailed if kinship with waters is associated solely with Indigenous worlds.…”