People, Place and Nature in Indigenous-Settler Relations by Melissa Kennedy

People, Place and Nature in Indigenous-Settler Relations by Melissa Kennedy

This edited collection is an essential resource for understanding contemporary Indigenous-settler relations across three major settler colonial contexts, bringing together First Nations and settler scholars, practitioners, artists and community organisations from Australia, Aotearoa New Zealand, and the USA. The book provides students and researchers with critical frameworks for analysing how colonial power relations shape contemporary injustices while exploring Indigenous-led pathways toward transformation.

Organised into three sections – Words of the Land, Unmaking Extraction, and Restoring Country, Restoring Justice – the collection demonstrates how relationships between people, place, and the more-than-human world are articulated through Indigenous water governance, cultural restoration projects, decolonial museum practices, traditional ecological knowledge, and community-controlled care systems. Chapters engage theoretical rigor with practical case studies, offering concrete examples of how Indigenous knowledge systems provide solutions to environmental and social challenges.

Featuring majority Indigenous authorship and innovative cross-cultural collaborations, this collection models meaningful scholarly engagement while centring Indigenous perspectives. Essential for scholarships in Indigenous studies, environmental justice, colonialism, and social justice, this volume contains critical insights in envisioning more just futures grounded in relationality and care.

Melissa Kennedy is a Tati Tati First Nations person belonging to Murray River Country in Australia. She is a PhD candidate at Monash University, and a Senior Atlantic Fellow for Social Equity, a global community collaborating across borders and disciplines to address the root causes of inequity. Melissa sits on the advisory board for the federal Aboriginal Water Entitlements Program, and is the Director and cofounder of Tati Tati Kaiejin, an Indigenous owned and operated conservation organisation. In 2022, Melissa was a co-author of the Victorian Government’s policy Water is Life: Traditional Owner Access to Water Roadmap.

Erin O’Donnell, PhD, is a settler water law and policy expert, recognized internationally for her research into the legal rights for rivers and Indigenous rights to water. Since 2018, Erin has been a member of the Birrarung Council, the voice of the Yarra River in Melbourne. In 2022, Erin was a co-author of the Victorian Government’s policy Water is Life: Traditional Owner Access to Water Roadmap. In 2023, Erin commenced an ARC-funded research fellowship to explore the opportunity of treaty to address aqua nullius, increase Traditional Owner power and resources in water, and create more sustainable and legitimate settler state water laws.