Changing lifestyles
Whilst Aboriginal people belong to a particular clan territory, they also travelled through and used other territories. Use of other clan territories was generally arranged through relationships established by marriage, kinship and ceremonial cooperation. In this way groups who observed the appropriate protocols could gain access to the full range of resources available in the region (Press et al.1995).
Aboriginal people were traditionally hunter-gatherers and moved regularly to places where resources were plentiful. There were no permanent settlements, but favoured camping areas were used for many, many generations. Among the temporary dwellings the people used were stringy-bark and paperbark shelters near billabongs, wet-season huts built on stilts on the floodplains, and rock shelters in the stone country.
When non-Aboriginal people arrived in the Kakadu area the Aboriginal population decreased markedly as many people died of disease or moved off their land to towns and settlements. The reduced population and the introduction of vehicles and shops have changed traditional seasonal movements: people are able to base themselves in an outstation or town and use vehicles to shop, to visit different outstations, to attend ceremonies and to move about the country on hunting trips.
It is thought that about 2000 people lived in the Kakadu area before the arrival of non-Aboriginal people; there are now about 500 Aboriginal people living in 18 outstations dotted throughout the Park.
Quick links
See also
Key
Links to another web site
Opens a pop-up window