The Finest New Writing in Australia
The Meanjin Papers
‘Meanjin Papers’ was Meanjin’s original title and came to denote the lead essay in each edition over the years. From Winter 2023 to late 2025, The Meanjin Paper was a piece by a First Nations Elder. By opening each edition with a story of place, readers entered Meanjin by listening to Elders.
Reimagining and remaking this commitment is an important focus for the next iteration of Meanjin.
Wanjawurru: Reimagining Australia in 30 years
June Oscar AO
Summer 2025
When I think about the future, I think about peace ...
Older than pyramids
Bradley Hardy
Location: Brewarrina Aboriginal Museum Time: Afternoon, Wednesday 15 September Speakers: Bradley Hardy, Tourists, Man No.1, Woman No.1, Paul Magee, Small Child, Paul Collis, Man No.2, Woman No.2, Man No.3, Woman No.3, Layna Onji, Barry (‘Baz’) Buzzey BRADLEY: Come across, ...
My Country
Marion Kickett
Spring 2025
Growing up and living on Country is something I had always taken for granted ...
‘I am an invisible man’: This is how I became a curator
Djon Mundine OAM FAHA
Winter 2025
To be a curator is to care. To care for Country, to care for history, and to care for living people and their expression ...
Different Plants for Different Meanings
Anyume John Kemarre Cavanagh with Gabriel Curtin
Autumn 2025
On the way to my homeland there’s a riverbed. And above it there’s a big rock face where these stripy lines are, all those lines, that’s intelhentye ...
Sing for the Black: From the Act to Treaty
Uncle Joe Geia
Summer 2024
My story is a story of challenge, success, sadness, joy, ongoing struggle and love. My show From Rations to Wages to Treaty is a curated story of song and images that speak to the experiences of many Indigenous people, focusing ...
Well it’s beautiful Country, really—
Mike Ross
Spring 2024
and not much development on it. Very little. There's still Country that hasn't been touched for a long time ...
Djaara: the essential ingredient
Rodney Carter
Winter 2024
The Dja Dja Wurrung Clans Aboriginal Corporation has a recipe for health and success. It’s a recipe perfected by the Dja Dja Wurrung Ancestors over millennia ...
Ilkakelheme akngakelheme—resisting assimilation
Theresa Penangke Alice
Autumn 2024
Kinship comes out of the Country itself, it comes from the Ancestor beings. Aboriginal people have grown up deep inside this from creation, and they live within it always and forever ...
Yulendj Boonwurrung
N'Arwee't Professor Carolyn Briggs
Summer 2023
The history of the first people of Melbourne—the Yaluk-ut Weelam clan of the Boonwurrung The area we today call Melbourne was part of the estate of the Yaluk-ut Weelam clan. The Yaluk-ut Weelam were a clan of the Boonwurrung—one of ...
From the Archives: Interview with Kath Walker
Oodgeroo Noonuccal
Spring 2023
In considering the Meanjin Paper for this edition, we have dived deep into the archives of Meanjin, seeking to honour the voices of those that have come before. Through our reading of the archives, we understand that many of the ...
Makunschan, Meeanjan, Miganchan, Meanjan, Magandjin
Gaja Kerry Charlton
Winter 2023
Every tribe … has its own dialect, if not language … stamps their locality much, know every acre of land belonging to their ‘home’… each plant, flower, tree, shrub, grass, bird, beast, insect … every mile of a river or ...