First Nations children learn culture at Murray River's Robinvale camp

Australia Broadcast Center

31-05-2025

There's a bend along the Murray River at Robinvale in north-west Victoria that arouses conflicting emotions in multi-clan nation elder Aunty Thelma Chilly.
It's where, as a girl, she ran and played on the riverbank and learnt the traditions of ancestors, passed down through generations.
But it's also where the harsh realities of the White Australia Policy played out.
Aunty Thelma's family was forced to move from their home on the banks of the Murray River, at a site known locally as Punt Bend, to the old Manatunga mission close by.
Decades after her family was relocated, Aunty Thelma is working to reclaim the site through an annual cultural gathering of Aboriginal families from across Australia's east coast.
During the 1956 flood, Aboriginal families relocated from Punt Bend to an industrial area in Robinvale.
"They formed a welfare board, which was connected to the assimilation policies of those days, and they built Manatunga mission."
Families were forced onto the mission, to live in concrete buildings with a door and a pot-belly stove.
Still, Aunty Thelma's family and others kept returning to the banks of the Murray every year, sometimes for months at a time.
"They actually return here to … commemorate the fact that this was where their people come from.
"We have turned this into a place of learning and passing on knowledge of our culture."
Every year, families come from across Australia's east coast to Robinvale on Tati Tati Country to take part in a four-day camp.
"Every year, we try to do something different here at the Easter camp to pass along the culture and knowledge to other people in the community, but particularly our children," Aunty Thelma said.
Robinvale is close to the lands of Latje Latje, Wadi Wadi and Mutti Mutti clans, and their traditional owners can be found among the families who set up a campsite every year.
Over the four days, older generations teach their children, grandchildren and others how to fish, weave, and make cultural art and costumes, and to hold ceremonies such as Welcome Baby to Country.
It's a way for those who didn't grow up with a connection to family and culture to find that connection and sense of belonging.
"Matt [Chilly] does his emu feathers and he's weaving, and he's telling his story with the importance of technique, and art and creativity," Aunty Thelma said.
"He's a creative young man, and it's so important to be able to provide that art.
The stories of assimilation and the threat of the welfare board would never be forgotten by those who lived through that period, Aunty Thelma said.
But by holding the camp, elders hoped to reinforce their pride in their culture and share their customs and skills with their most important asset — their children.
"I'm just so grateful to be able to continue this tradition of being in this place, and it does mean a lot to me," Aunty Thelma said.
National Reconciliation Week runs from May 27 to June 3.
This year's theme is Bridging Now to Next, which reflects the ongoing connection between past, present and future, and how Australia can move forward by learning from past lessons.