Position Doubtful: Mapping Landscape and Memories (Kim Mahood, Scribe)

Artist and writer Kim Mahood grew up on Tanami Downs Station in the Northern Territory. She has always felt the strong pull of the land and its Indigenous people, and has been returning over the years to Tanami Downs to gain inspiration for her art, maintain her relationships with the people and fulfil personal, spiritual ties with the land. Position Doubtful: Mapping Landscape and Memories is a shimmering, evocative memoir covering some 15 years of Mahood’s return visits to country, a patchwork of people, places, projects and memories. Central to Position Doubtful is Mahood’s work in Aboriginal communities and her mapping project. The maps were made in collaboration with local Indigenous people, painted on large canvases, recording dreaming tracks, place names and other culturally significant information. The maps were a way of trying to merge Western and Indigenous concepts of land and identity. Position Doubtful, like Chloe Hooper’s The Tall Man, is required reading for anyone interested in contemporary Aboriginal Australia. Mahood has lived too long among Indigenous people to idealise or peer through theoretical rose-coloured glasses at what should be. She is also honest about her own shortcomings when approaching Aboriginal culture and life. This is a memoir that opens the heart to understanding.

Chris Saliba is co-owner of North Melbourne Books and a freelance reviewer

Category: Reviews Reviews newsletter Book review list