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In this paper, we discuss a rapid‐fire study involving Indigenous and non‐Indigenous stakeholders from the urban Indigenous health sector who collaborated to produce an "Urban COVID‐19 Systems Map." The map outlines the behaviours, actions and responses that stakeholders identified as mitigating or exacerbating COVID‐19 risks in urban Indigenous communities. Data were collected and analysed during the height of the pandemic in 2021. We begin by introducing the characteristics of system thinking—the methodology that informed our research—and consider its use in Indigenous health research more broadly. We then outline our utilisation of system thinking and discuss how it was applied to the three workshops. System thinking contributes to collaboration and collective debate amongst stakeholders and aims to produce holistic understandings of complex problems, such as pandemics. This article provides a reflective overview of the benefits and challenges of applying system thinking in Indigenous health research whilst also sharing some of the research findings. We argue that centralising the voices of stakeholders, particularly Indigenous stakeholders, is critical to developing and implementing effective and culturally appropriate responses to pandemics and is equally as important to the preparedness for future pandemics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses a public art installation in Rockhampton, Queensland, which was commissioned by the Queensland Government in 2013 to explore Rockhampton's history of flooding and its relationship to Toonooba (the Fitzroy River). One of the three artworks, Honouring Land Connections, was developed by members of the Capricornia Arts Mob to emphasise Indigenous presence in the region and connection to Country. This paper considers how connections to Country and waterways are symbiotic, acting as the lifeblood that mediates Aboriginal relationships to person and place and informing connections to culture and identity. It highlights how the flood markers, which are memory poles made from ironbark, are manifestations of an enduring and continuing Aboriginal presence on Country. Embracing ethnographic literature on waterscapes and place, this paper explores how water blurs the boundaries between person, place and time. Water flows through Country, our bodies, space and time, connecting the past with the present and connecting lived experiences with memory. This paper proposes new habits of thought about place that transcend dominant Eurocentric perceptions. Like the memory poles in Honouring Land Connections, this paper aims to promote awareness about whose Country we reside on and the life ways of that Country., In the city of Rockhampton in Central Queensland, artworks line the banks of Toonooba (also spelled Tunuba--the Fitzroy River), imposing themselves on the landscape and calling on those who witness [...]

National and state/territory dialogues in Australia have increasingly turned towards implementing mechanisms that will oversee truth-telling processes to facilitate reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples. While truth lies central to decolonising, it is vital to reflect on whose truth(s) are being represented, and in what ways it should be disseminated. In this article I discuss how the cultivation of a ‘decolonising consciousness’ may assist in confronting national and personal truths while also helping citizens of settler-colonial nations acquire the proficiency needed to put decolonial understandings into praxis. I argue that decolonising truths entails a responsive consciousness that is informed by frameworks such as border thinking, agonistic pluralism and kincentric orientations. Decolonising truth enables non-Indigenous settlers and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples alike to live alongside the complexities of mutually informing, competing, and at times incommensurable worldviews; this is the point of departure in the ongoing path towards reconciliation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on countering conspiracies and misinformation within Indigenous Communities in Australia. It mentions vaccination rates in some Indigenous communities, however, remain stubbornly low, with hesitancy coinciding with the spread of misinformation and amplification of conspiracy theories. It also mentions removal and institutionalisation of Aboriginal children, now known as the Stolen Generations, or the disproportionate rates of policing.

The article discusses a meme created by James Blackwell, a Research Fellow at the Centre for Social Impact, to comment on establishing an Indigenous representative Voice within Australia's parliamentary system. Topics covered include Blackwell's intention to encourage an informed discussion about what an Indigenous Voice to Parliament entails and what co-design demands, and the Uluru Statement from the Heart that was devised during First Nations National Constitutional Convention in 2017.