Children with fish trap, Yirrkala |
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Title : | Children with fish trap, Yirrkala |
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Creator : | Mountford, Charles P., photographer | ||
Source : | PRG 1218/34/2768 | ||
Date of creation : | 1948 | ||
Format : | Photograph | ||
Dimensions : | 60 x 60 mm | ||
Contributor : | State Library of South Australia | ||
Catalogue record | |||
The State Library of South Australia is keen to find out more about SA Memory items. We encourage you to contact the Library if you have additional information about any of these items. |
Copyright : | The Library received cultural clearance from the Buku-Larrnggay Mulka Art Centre, Yirrkala to display this image. Reproduction rights are owned by State Library of South Australia. |
Description : |
Children with fish trap, Yirrkala Fish formed an integral part of the diet for people living in and around the water-sources of Arnhem Land. The children in this photograph are using a trap to gather up fish from the creek. McCarthy describes this technique as "push[ing] a roll of grass or reeds, extending the full width of a pool, from one end to the other so that the fish become stranded." (in Australia'sAborigines: their life and culture). In addition to this method, fishing in Arnhem Land was carried out with spears, conical traps, nets and by simply trawling the shallows with hands and feet. Children's play and children's training for future life skills can be difficult enough to separate, but when water becomes involved there is little doubt about the play aspect. Fish spears were frequently observed by anthropologists and others in the hands of even very young Aboriginal children, the length of the spear adapted to the child's height. |
Subjects | |
Coverage year : | 1948 |
Place : | Yirrkala |
Region : | Northern Territory |
Further reading : | American-Australian Scientific Expedition to Arnhem Land, (1948). Records of the American-Australian scientific expedition to Arnhem Land, Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1956-1964 |
Internet links : |