Digital tools for local knowledge: The tourism industry of Pine Creek

Located in the ‘Top End’ of the Northern Territory, the small town of Pine Creek in the Katherine region has been utilising digital tools to share Indigenous cultural knowledge with visitors. 

The academic article ‘Indigenous Knowledge Sharing in Northern Australia: Engaging Digital Technology for Cultural Interpretation’ published in January 2020 by authors, Gabrielle McGinnis, Mark Harvey and Tamara Young from the University of Newcastle in Australia covers extensive ethnographic research within the Pine Creek community. 

McGinnis, Harvey and Young worked closely with and provided expertise to both Indigenous  and non-Indigenous community members in their endeavour to bring digital empowerment through cultural knowledge sharing to the Pine Creek community. 

This article has been written with full permission from the authors.

Information sharing through digital technologies

Utilising digital tools in the tourism industry to share knowledge and information has become  common practice. However, sustainable tourism development and the empowerment of Indigenous people through digital knowledge sharing is an area currently lacking research. 

McGinnis, Harvey and Young undertook their study over three periods throughout 2015, 2016 and 2017 and their study contributed to further research in this area. 

While digital technologies have the capacity to conserve Indigenous knowledge, multimedia approaches to tourism also provide a great platform for taking Aboriginal sound and image-based learning techniques and combining them with Western text-based learning systems. This creates a more holistic participation in tourism while empowering Indigenous communities to take control of their heritage and provide authentic education to both tourists and locals.

Indigenous tourism in Australia 

In the past, Aboriginal tourism in Australia has been stereotypically represented and experienced. It has been driven by the commodification of Indigenous culture and has often resulted in a representation that is beyond the recognition of Aboriginal people.

It has lacked a formal recognition of the specific Aboriginal group or identity to a location, and has instead utilised the blanket term ‘Indigenous’ or ‘Aboriginal’. For tourism to empower communities, Indigenous stakeholders must regain control over the development of tourism activities and focus on promoting Indigenous heritage and authenticity. 

“Tourists wish to have genuine encounters and experiences in Aboriginal tourism with Aboriginal communities, it is important to note that such encounters must be reciprocated by the Aboriginal communities themselves. In other words, authenticity does not only apply to the presentation of culture and heritage in the tourism experience, but also for the willingness of communities to participate and engage in tourism development and practice” (p. 102). 

Digital knowledge transmission is a method that can be used to achieve such empowerment and authenticity. Using digital tools provides the added benefit of providing skills to individuals and community members in website design, marketing and mapping of country, while allowing Indigenous Elders to participate in tourism development without needing to be physically present.  

Tourism in Pine Creek 

McGinnis, Harvey and Young’s study worked with the Wagiman Aboriginal community to develop a sustainable tourism product. This product included two websites and an app that were designed to remain within community control. 

Since mining operations ceased in the 1990s, income for the Wagiman community of Pine Creek has mostly been generated through welfare and the Wagiman (Guwardagun) Ranger Program. Pine Creek had also been identified as a transit destination as opposed to a tourist destination, leaving income from tourism minimal and unreliable. When tourists previously stopped in Pine Creek, they mostly engaged with non-Aboriginal heritage sites which are managed by the non-Aboriginal residents of the community. 

The tourism industry was identified as an economic opportunity for Wagiman people to share their knowledge of local language, landscape, and flora and fauna heritage. The Wagiman Elders wanted to utilise visual storytelling to share this knowledge. 

“The Wagiman Elders were central figures in the call for more tourism options in the town and surrounding areas. The Elders are the knowledge-keepers of the Wagiman community and wish to share their country and knowledge with the younger Wagiman people as well as tourists” (p. 103). 

The Pine Creek community and Wagiman residents initially experienced challenges in developing a sustainable tourism product. A lack of resources, funding and mobility among the Elders, paired with the unruly climate and road conditions of the Northern Territory, made frequent visits to country a difficult process. 

Digital developments were difficult to undertake due to the minimal cellular coverage and access to Wi-Fi in the Pine Creek area. Much like many remote regions, Telstra is the only cellular provider, rendering all other services in the area unusable, and there are only two establishments in Pine Creek that have access to Wi-Fi services.

However, relief came from Google Maps which allows visitors to download maps and videos of Wagiman country before they travel. This allowed tourists to access the stories of the Wagiman elders without needing access to cellular coverage at the same time. 

Both Wagiman and non-Aboriginal residents of Pine Creek chose Google Maps as their platform of choice due to its familiarity and user-friendly interface. MapInfo Professional and ArcGIS were two other platforms that were considered for this product. 

The first website, Visit Pine Creek, was developed to publish general tourist information such as accommodation options, Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal heritage stories and maps. This website uses Google Maps and Vimeo to share videos of the Wagiman elders telling their stories. The website is now available to download as an app from the Google Play store. 

Gabrielle McGinnis during her time at Pine Creek.

Image credit: University News

The second website, the Wagiman Community Heritage Archive (WCHA) contains similar materials and hosts an extensive collection of videos and maps made by the Wagiman people and the researchers from this study. Some of the materials are password protected as they contain culturally sensitive information about sacred sites and dreamtime stories. 

McGinnis, Harvey and Young’s research team assisted the Wagiman people in transferring their knowledge into Google Maps. The younger Wagiman people translated this process to the Elders which created a sense of companionship between the generations. 

“This small act of knowledge transfer provided an opportunity to empower the young ones as well as the Elders in skill and knowledge sharing. The younger Wagiman people were able to share technical skills with the Elders, at the same time as learning more from the researchers about technology, and from the Elders about country” (p. 111). 

This process of embracing knowledge sharing through digital tools provided cultural, digital and economic empowerment to the Wagiman community and residents of Pine Creek. 

Digital tools offer potential for further empowerment 

The process of using digital tools to share cultural knowledge is a relatively new practice, and is therefore underutilised and rarely sought after by tourists. For this new practice in Aboriginal tourism to boost digital empowerment in Indigenous communities, increases to marketing and funding are required. 

Sharing knowledge through tourism by combining traditional and modern methods will enable education and economic development for the Wagiman community, an area worthy of further investment. 

“People cannot be empowered if they do not have the necessary technical capacities for empowerment. The Wagiman community has the potential for applying great knowledge and personal, technological skills to the tourism industry, but the lack of sufficient funds, hardware and software resources makes it difficult for them to reach empowerment” (p. 120). 

Digital knowledge sharing not only offers Indigenous communities control over their cultural content, but also paves a way for other communities to follow. 

Is your community looking to make the move to digital? Or do you have a digital project you’re looking to get off the ground? Check out our Mapping Services or get in touch with our team to discuss!

Winyama would like to thank Gabrielle McGinnis, Mark Harvey and Tamara Young for the use of their paper ‘Indigenous Knowledge Sharing in Northern Australia: Engaging Digital Technology for Cultural Interpretation’ on which this article has been based.

Citation: Gabrielle McGinnis, Mark Harvey & Tamara Young (2020) Indigenous Knowledge Sharing in Northern Australia: Engaging Digital Technology for Cultural Interpretation, Tourism Planning & Development, 17:1, 96-125, DOI: 10.1080/21568316.2019.1704855

https://doi.org/10.1080/21568316.2019.1704855