Naku Dharuk The Bark Petitions: How the people of Yirrkala changed the course of Australian democracy

In this engaging narrative, Wright follows the story of petitions on bark created by the Yirrkala community in Arnhem Land in 1963, protesting bauxite mining on traditional lands.

In 1963-a year of agitation for civil rights worldwide-the Yolŋu of northeast Arnhem Land created the Yirrkala Bark Petitions- Naku Dharuk. 'The land grew a tongue' and the land-rights movement was born.

Naku Dharuk is the story of a founding document in Australian democracy and the trailblazers who made it. It is also a pulsating picture of the ancient and enduring culture of Australia's first peoples.

And it is a masterful, groundbreaking history.

Clare Wright's Democracy Trilogy began with The Forgotten Rebels of Eureka and continued with You Daughters of Freedom. It concludes with this compulsively readable account of a momentous episode in our shared story.