Difference within Identity: Recognition, Growth and the Circularity of Indigenous Knowledge

Abstract

The concept of circular thinking is readily attributed to patterns of Indigenous knowledge, characterised as distinct from the supposed linearity of Western epistemology; to approach epistemology through this metaphor is to anticipate identity by difference and underscore the autonomy of knowledge within bounded cultural coordinates. In seeking a more nuanced appreciation of the interwoven contours of human knowing, I consider some leading Indigenous Australian thinkers who understand cultural identities to be consolidated through creative repetition and recognised within dynamic relationality. These explorations include Mandawuy Yunupiŋu’s interpretation of Yolŋu thought as a process of mak..