Study Guide

  • Yugambeh Language Region
  • Choreography, Music, Costumes, Props, Sets & Lighting, Stories, Songs & Language, Highlights, Resources

Study guide for Bangarra's Wudjang, with specific Australian curriculum references for the Learning Areas of English, History, Civics, Citizenship, Health and Physical Education, and the Arts

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In the deep darkness just before dawn, workmen find bones while excavating for a dam. Among them is a Yugambeh man, Bilin (bat), who convinces his colleagues to let him keep the ancestral bones. This ancestor is Wudjang (mother) who longs to be reburied the proper way. With her young companion spirit, Gurai, (wonder) she dances and teaches and sings of the past, of the earth, of songlines. With grace and authentic power, a new generation is taught how to listen, learn, and carry their ancestral energy into the future. Wudjang: Not the Past follows the journey to honour Wudjang with a traditional resting place on Country.

The production of Wudjang: Not the Past is presented as a work of narrative dance theatre and contemporary ceremony. It shares elements of performance art with opera, drama, musical theatre, and contemporary dance, rendering them with innovative design to create a potent from of storytelling that reaches into the heart and demands acknowledgement of the truth.