Learn Aboriginal Traditions Through Dance and Ceremony

Book a traditional Smoking Ceremony, Welcome To Country, or a traditional owner's ancient dreaming stories

Smoking Ceremony, Aboriginal Dreaming and Welcome To Country - Carnarvon Gorge

Learn About Smoking Ceremony, Welcome to Country and Stories of Creation

Storytelling is linked to the Time of Creation

Smoking Ceremonies

Smoking ceremonies have been performed by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people for thousands of years to cleanse people and places of evil spirits and to treat sickness. These ceremonies promote good health and wellbeing by fostering connection to culture and the health benefits of traditional Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander medicine.

They are regarded as an essential part of connecting people to the country and keeping them safe from the dangers posed by the spiritual beings residing in the land and waters.

The practice of smoking to cleanse a house or person is used in many cultures around the world, and often involves burning herbs, special wood and bark, such as white sage, among aboriginal Americans. There is some evidence that the traditional use of burning white sage can significantly reduce the presence of harmful bacteria in the air.

Similarly, in Aboriginal Australian medical practices, emu bush (Eremophila longifolia) is highly valued for its use in smoking, and scientific research has supported its use as an antibacterial, antifungal, and antioxidant substance. The leaves of the emu bush are placed on hot embers to produce wet, steamy smoke, which kills bacterial or fungal pathogens. This can be beneficial for individuals who are sick, to prevent the spread of sickness, and for use during childbirth.

There are many different plants used in smoking ceremonies and for medicine. The type of leaf used for smoking varies by region and availability, but can include peppermint, cauliflower bush, eucalyptus and sandalwood. Smoking ceremonies are used for burial, celebration, healing, and cleansing, and are also a gesture of goodwill, bringing people together. Performing the ceremony for another is a gift and a blessing.

Smoking ceremonies can also be a way of connecting with the country by speaking to and acknowledging the ancestors or ‘Old People’.

Welcome To Country

'Traditional 'country' means something beyond the dictionary definition of the word. For Aboriginal Australians, this might mean their homeland, or tribal or clan territory, and it may mean more than just a place on a map. Country is a word for all the values, places, resources, stories and cultural obligations associated with that territory... It describes the totality of our ancestral domains. While they may no longer all hold title to the land, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians remain connected to their ancestral country, and most consider themselves custodians or stewards of their land.

Welcome to Country is delivered by Traditional Owners, or Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, who have been permitted to welcome visitors to their Country.

Incorporating Welcome to Country into meetings, gatherings, and events shows respect by upholding Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural protocols.

Protocols for welcoming visitors to the country have always been a part of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures. Crossing into another group’s Country required a request for permission to enter.

When permission is granted, the people of that part of the country welcome the visitors, offering them safe passage and protection of their spiritual being while in that part of the country. Visitors must respect the protocols and rules of the landowner group while on their Property.

Today, while these protocols have been adapted to contemporary circumstances, the essential elements remain: welcoming visitors and respecting the country.

First Nations Education advise on organising a Welcome to Country by a Traditional Owner in your area.

Welcome to Country occurs at the beginning of a formal event and can take many forms, including singing, dancing, smoking ceremonies, and/or a speech.

Protocols for welcoming visitors to Country have always been a part of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures. Boundaries were clear, and crossing into another group’s Country required a request for permission to enter.

When permission was granted, the hosting group would welcome the visitors, offering them safe passage and protection of their spiritual being during the journey. Visitors had to respect the protocols and rules of the landowner group while on their Country.

Today, while these protocols have been adapted to contemporary circumstances, the essential elements remain: welcoming visitors and respecting the country.

Welcome to Country occurs at the beginning of a formal event and can take many forms, most commonly with a speech; however, it can also incorporate singing, dancing, and smoking ceremonies.

The Dreaming

Aboriginal Dreaming.... The Dreaming recounts the journey and actions of Ancestral Beings who created the natural world. Ancestral Beings are supernatural and creator beings who travelled across the unshaped world in both human and non-human forms, shaping the landscape, making people, and laying down laws of social and religious behaviour.

The Dreaming is infinite, linking the past to the present and determining the future. If life on Earth is to continue, these rules, almost lost to the world, must be followed.

Dreaming is an English word commonly used by Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people alike to describe Aboriginal cosmology and the genesis of the world. The Dreaming encompasses the ancestral narratives about the supernatural and ancestral beings, as well as their epic deeds of creation.

Each narrative is known as a 'Dreaming'. The entire Australian continent is covered in an intricate web of Dreamings or ancestral tracks.

'In the beginning, ' the land was a flat, featureless, barren plain.

No animals or plants lived on it, and no birds flew over it. However, during The Dreaming, ancestral beings —the forerunners of all living species —began stirring and finally emerged from the land, the sea, and the sky to start a series of odysseys that carried them throughout the length and breadth of Australia.

The Rainbow Serpent is one of the Dreamtime creators. Dreamtime stories can vary between tribes; however, the Rainbow Serpent is one of the few common to all.

The Rainbow Serpent lay sleeping under the ground. When it was time, she pushed herself up, with all the animals in her belly waiting to be born. Calling the animals to come out of their sleep, she threw the land out, creating mountains and hills, and spilled water over the land, forming rivers and lakes. She made the fire, the sun, and all the colours. The creation of the topography of the Australian landscape we see today.

The landscape was also shaped by ceremonies performed by these ancestral beings as they recalled their wanderings and feats in dance and song. The remnants of these ceremonies (decorations, feathers, dried blood, stone chips, etc.) have turned into rocks, trees, and plants that can still be seen. For example, blood from wounds incurred in battles became deposits of red ochre, and parts of bodies hewn off became trees or rock outcrops. The places where these major events left their imprints on the landscape are typically described as 'sacred sites' or 'sites of significance.

Not only does it connect Aboriginal tribes, but it also unites people from diverse cultures and walks of life worldwide.

Book your journey to the Dreaming, smoking ceremony and Welcome To Country any time, any place.