How are stories of death entangled with our connections to Wurundjeri Country?
Shared by CATHERINE HAMM and MIRIAM BROWN
How are stories of death entangled with our connections to Wurundjeri (Indigenous land) Country? Recently, we walked with a group of preschoolers to a local park. On route, we encountered a dead rat (Rattus Rattus) lying in the bark. This is not the first time we have encountered death on our walks, earlier in the year we met a dead bird. This encounter entangled us in many uncertainties about how we (humans) respond to death. Initially we kept our bodies a ‘safe’ distance from the dead bird as we engaged with curiosity. Should we take the bird and dispose of it ? This time as we met dead Rattus Rattus, our deeper connections with Wurundjeri country provoked awareness of the microbes that support the cycles of life and death. This time we did not hold our bodies at a distance or think about intervening, instead we wondered “What are the stories of death that we share with Wurundjeri Country?”
