Audio: First Nations Astronomy

An interview with Duane Hamacher Australian Society of Indigenous Astronomy

Astronomy is one of the oldest sciences and there is evidence that the First Nations people in Australia have been looking to the night sky to learn the 'culture of the stars' for at least 60,000 years. The earliest European records of Indigenous astronomy was in an 1857 essay called 'The Astronomy and Mythology of the Aborigines of Victoria'. It was written by William Stanbridge who had befriended some Boorong people and they in turn showed him how they read the stars. Reading the stars is a very important part of Indigenous culture.

ABC Radio National Counterpoint 2 February 2015 Presented by Amanda Vanstone