Women's Business

by Chris Kenny

ISBN 1 875989 10 2

$21.95

Published Oct 1996

In 1994 opponents of the Hindmarsh Island bridge were facing defeat. Then an anthropologist told Aborigines who had been enlisted in the campaign 'It would be nice if there was some Women's Business.'

Soon after, the cult of Women's Business was created by a small group of people, including a few members of the local Ngarrindjerri tribe. All of Australia believed them - except for many Ngarrindjerri women. This is the story of those women and their struggle to tell the truth in the face of hostility from the goverment, the churches, the media, and other anthropologists.

It is an important story for anyone interested in the manipulation of Aboriginal culture for political ends, and for anyone who believes that reconciliation, in the words of Ngarrindjerri woman Beryl Kropinyeri, 'starts with the truth'.