Software tools for Indigenous communities 

 
 

Charles Darwin University’s (CDU) School of Education Learning Group was the host of a recent workshop focusing on the development and flow of software tools in and around Indigenous communities.

The half-day meeting which included the Learning Research Group, the Anindilyakwa Land Council and the Northern Territory Library and Information Services was held in early July at Casuarina Campus.

The workshop brought together researchers from Indigenous Knowledge and Resource Management in Northern Australia (an ARC project involving CDU and the University of Melbourne), and programmers and knowledge workers from Batchelor Institute of Indigenous Tertiary Education, Darwin, Wadeye and Groote Eylandt.

Associate Professor Dr Michael Christie, commented on the workshop: “This meeting was another in a series where the land councils, knowledge centres, NT Government and CDU pool their resources, share their projects and develop plans for ongoing work together.”

“Indigenous knowledge centres in the Northern Territory benefit from links with CDU through technical collaborations, particularly programming work, in theoretical and field research work looking at the intergenerational transmission of Aboriginal knowledge traditions, and in the work of postgraduate students supported by the NT Libraries and Information Service,” he said.

Points of discussion included new software solutions for Indigenous knowledge centres, including ‘Our Story’ and ‘Memory Place’ online training packages.

Other proposals for Indigenous knowledge work at the family on-country level included TAMI which as an electronic proof-of-concept can be viewed at http://www.cdu.edu.au/centres/ik/db_TAMI.html

For further information contact michael.christie@cdu.edu.au or go to www.cdu.edu.au/ik.