In his second interview with Tessa Atto from the Aboriginal Centre, Damien Brown investigates the traditional Welcome to Country ceremony.
It’s more than just a scripted welcome, it’s a skill that has been passed on from the old to the young within the Indigenous community.
There is a formula that is attended to when a welcome to Country speech is scripted, it is, Tessa says, “a formal way of bringing someone in, welcoming them into your space.”
Tessa says, “we’ve always done welcome’s to country but probably haven’t used the language before but now we have this wonderful language back and in use, we’re able to do it now… community and I speak for my self, feel an overwhelming sense of pride that my language is being spoken and that my language is being acknowledged and that my people are speaking my language and that I understand that…”
You can listen to the full interview below
- This article originally appears at:
- http://blogs.abc.net.au/tasmania/2013/07/welcome-to-country-.html
- Article taken from the following publication:
- ABC Hobart
- Article submitted by:
- Author:
- Sarah Mashman
