[Synapse elist] Aboriginal Songlines and why you can't find them...

[allard at allardvanhoorn.com]

In answer to Esther's quest for Songlines the following. Songlines are not only the 'bringing into existence of the land and all the things in it' but they are also the Title Deeds, the papers and proof of ownership if you want, of the land that is sung. If somebody 'owning' a songline has to travel or is otherwise (temporarily) incapable of taking care of their land they would teach someone else the song that then becomes (temporarily) 'owner' of this land. Any songline you would know Esther, would make you 'own' that land. That is why you can not find a songline. They are with the ones that 'own' the land.

As far as my understanding about the way a songline is constructed it seems to be the case that the songline literally describes the physical landscape and all that is to be found in it and it has a tonal description of the physicality e.g. an open wide area would have tones corresponding to it, and three bumps on a mountain range would have sounds that would make you 'hear' those bumps. According to Chatwin this enables someone on a songline that might stretch over hundreds or thousands of miles and through as many as twenty different languages to understand how the land and everything in it looks like in a part where they have never been. Unable to understand the words of their 'neighbor' singing their songline the other will see the land and everything in it by listening to the tonality of the songline.

I feel that one who wants to learn more about the songlines should not look for the songlines themselves but the way they are constructed and used to represent the land and everything in it. There are specialists to be found I am sure and I am going to Australia myself three months later this year to research more. It seems the only place to get to the core of the understanding.

For cartography it means wonderful ways of understanding our world I think. Songlines are a way of creating the land 'and all the things in it', calling it to life and keeping it alive. Compare it to the creating story ('schepping' in Dutch) in the bible. Aboriginals keep singing the songlines to keep the land and all the things in it alive, they keep singing the songs to keep the land into existence, for as they would not sing the songline the land would simply not exist. This means we are looking at cartography that not only keeps the things on the map into existence, but does that on a very frequent basis as well.

In the west we have taken a distance from our physical environment by de-personalization of our territory. Leases, mortgages, rent of places we live in. Streets owned by municipalities and so on mean we have a less direct relationship to the tangible terrain and all the things in it in which we wander all day every day. Exceptions exist in for example graffiti, where someone puts his name on a wall or building and therefor 'signs' it acting out a form of re-appropriation (and a quite direct one at that!).

Mapping is about naming. What do we call a thing that is in the land, what is the convention, the description to allow all of us to agree and talk about the same things, and therefor enable us to navigate these maps. Songlines make up a map. They are a method of calling into life and keeping into existence the land that provides the circumstances for life. They are a necessary tool for surviving by knowing inside out the place where you wander. Songlines you take with you always and keep you inseparably connected to the land and everything in it.  

So far.

All the best regards,

Allard

www.allardvanhoorn.com