South-East Australian indigenous space and its cosmological origins

Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to investigate Australian Indigenous spatialordering. The central question guiding the research is: how does south-east AustralianIndigenous spatial ordering differ from the European concept of spatial ordering? Thehypothesis is that south-east Australian Indigenous occupation of space can be understoodas interiority; in addition, it is also hypothesised that colonising western Europeans failedto understand this occupation and as a result, sought to impose western European spatialordering in its place. The thesis presents a new narrative that is specifically associatedwith the discipline of interior architecture.Methodology: The overall research framework adopted in the thesis is a ‘spatialapproach.’ An interpretive-historical research methodology is operating in a majority ofthe thesis chapters, bar one (Chapter 8), which diverges from this approach and adopts anethnographic-type research methodology. A number of research methods have beenutilised in order to gather and analyse the empirical material contained in this thesis.Results: Empirical material has been gathered and considered in relation to, but not only,the Sky Dome, palawa buildings, the site of Wybalenna, and Ring Trees. The aforesaidexamples contribute to the thesis by allowing a questioning of the following: howcosmology lays the foundation for physical spatial ordering, how building types play arole in defining spatial ordering, the resistance of the palawa peoples to western Europeanspatial ordering, and how Ring Trees in Wadi Wadi Country illustrate a spatial organisingprinciple.Conclusions: The thesis concludes that western European spatial ordering, concernedwith an inside and outside, finds expression differently in south-east AustralianIndigenous buildings. These buildings are argued to operate as artefacts within spatialdivisions enacted at a much larger scale defined by cosmology and inhabitation of thecultural landscape. The contribution that this thesis makes is to enable the westernEuropean spatial ordering model to transform and accommodate variations of itsexpression, as well as to contribute more broadly to the dialogue regarding AustralianIndigenous buildings and space