‘Cultural strengthening sits at the forefront of the Gunditjmara Bundya | Gunditjmara Alive project. The project brought together a small but diverse group of Gunditjmara people who, with the assistance of Vicki Couzens and the Victorian Aboriginal Corporation for Languages, translated their songs into language. Songwriters learnt how to sing their songs in language and then through a series of workshops we taught these songs to community, including students at Heywood & District Secondary College. The performance and professional recording of the songs drew on the skills of VCA staff, graduates and students. A key component of the project is a series of short interviews with participants where we ask them to reflect on their experience of writing and singing in language and what this means to them as individuals as well as for their families and communities.

This project is made possible by the Indigenous Languages and Arts Project run by the Department of Communications and the Arts with the support of the Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne and Victorian Corporation for Aboriginal Languages. Our draft Gunditjmara Alive Language Protocols are here.

This project has been supported by the Australian Government’s Indigenous Languages and Arts program with assistance from the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body, the University of Melbourne and the Victorian Aboriginal Corporation for Languages.