Expanding Recognition for
NAIDOC Week
July 3-10 marks NAIDOC week 2022 and this year, the theme to Celebrate National Aboriginal and Islanders Day Observance Committee is “Get Up! Stand Up! Show Up!”
It’s a brilliant choice for this year’s theme. Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander people have themselves been getting up, standing up and showing up since colonisation.
Finally, there’s a sense of a real and growing mood in this country to recognise the value and richness of Indigenous culture and people. The snowball is gaining momentum. When we first celebrated Aboriginal Models and Designers in NAIDOC Week, we were a lone voice in fashion. We’re thrilled to see, with the explosion of Indigenous talent grasping self-publishing by the horns and promoting themselves and their peers, that mainstream media and business is starting to board the train. Of course non-mainstream NITV have been there since 2007, promoting and sharing Aboriginal culture, values, contemporary views and issues.
And while NAIDOC Week celebrations are hard to miss, its message has never been more important:
“We need to move beyond just acknowledgement, good intentions, empty words and promises, and hollow commitments. enough is enough.
The Relationship between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and non-indigenous Australians needs to be based on justice, equity, and the proper recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander People’s rights.”
–NAIDOC
There’s much we could say about this. Too much, in fact. We choose instead to direct you to the NAIDOC website where you might inform yourself and become familiar with this year’s NAIDOC Week award winners, in case you didn’t already know them. To those who celebrate with us- Happy NAIDOC Week 2022!
Featured Image: @maara.collective with Aboriginal model Charlee Fraser in Maara Collective
To see more Aboriginal Fashion and the designers behind them, go to Aboriginal Fashion Designers. You may also like to see: Aboriginal Models. Or just hit the search button at the top right of our home page for Aboriginal and Indigenous to see the many posts we have covered in fashion.
