On the Visibility of Indigenous Australian systems of Marine Tenure: TECHNICAL REPORT

Between 1921 and 1977 twelve anthropologists worked in coastal communities of Arnhem Land in Australia's Northern Territory, researching and writing about land tenure, among other things, yet not one of them mentioned the existence of a system of customary marine tenure (for the resulting publications see: Tindale 1925-6; Warner 1937; Worsley 1954; Berndt 1964,1970,1976; Rose 1960; Hiatt 1965; Shapiro 1969; Turner 1974; Meehan 1982; Morphy 1991; Keen 1994;Williams 1986). Some of them such as Ronald Berndt (1976) actually mapped sites in the sea. Today there is a well developed and dynamic system of indigenous marine tenure along the Arnhem Land Coast. This lack of visibility raises a number of questions including how old these systems are and why if they have any antiquity they have not been more visible.