Illustrated Literature of the Strelley Mob

In the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, hundreds of illustrated books were published in Nyangumarta and Manyjilyjarra, Aboriginal languages of the Pilbara region of Western Australia, for the Strelley School community. They told stories from the Dreaming, of hunting, working on stations and of the mining camps that this community worked on after the 1946 Pilbara Strike.

Illustrated Literature of the Strelley Mob traces the stories of the authors and illustrators, who set down their lived experiences and the stories of their ancestors for the generations to come. Their art and literature were made for a tight-knit community who purchased their own pastoral stations and ran their own community-controlled bilingual school, as they set out to be independent of mainstream Australia and its governments.