Yarning up: Stories of challenges and success

Abstract

This paper explores the lives of three New South Wales Aboriginal women, mothers, artists and academics. It will identify the women’s success in academia as demonstrated by their pathways to education, employment, job satisfaction, commitment and leadership experiences. In addition, the challenges they have faced, together with balancing family and community commitments and the importance and influence of mentors who assisted them on their pathway to success will be discussed. They employ Aboriginal methodologies that privilege Aboriginal ways of being, knowing and doing utilising a yarning methodology which is a culturally appropriate conversational process of sharing stories to develop knowledge and educate younger generations. In this way, they generate new knowledge on what works and why for Aboriginal women in academia, identifying historical pathways and platforms to success, revealing common significant influences in order to uncover key drivers of success and aspects of cultural and social life, which have enabled them as Aboriginal women to succeed.

Developing culturally relevant and collaborative research approaches: A case study of working with remote and regional Aboriginal students to prepare them for life beyond school

“…As Christensen (2012) indicates, "storytelling and knowledge sharing are often one and the same" in Aboriginal cultures (p. 234). Indigenous knowledge, which mostly exists in oral form, is passed on from generation to generation through storying (Battiste & Henderson, 2003;Mooney et al, 2018). For instance, older members of the community tell stories to children to help them develop their identity and teach how to distinguish between insiders and outsiders, which helps explain and strengthen family and community ties (Lekoko, 2007).…”

Are you really using Yarning research? Mapping Social and Family Yarning to strengthen Yarning research quality

“…Collaborative Yarning has also been used (Adams & Faulkhead, 2012) as well as seeking feedback from participants on Yarning data interpretations (Gibson et al, 2020;Reilly & Rees, 2018). Some studies have been transparent about researcher expertise and experience with Yarning (Bessarab & Ng'andu, 2010;Dean, 2010;Lin et al, 2016;Mooney et al, 2018;Shay, 2019;Walker et al, 2014) showing researcher reflexivity (Kleinsasser, 2000).…”

“…Approaches to application of methodology in Yarning research vary. Some researchers do not identify a methodology (Gibson et al, 2020;Jennings et al, 2014;Lin et al, 2016;Lukaszyk et al, 2017), and some have described Yarning as a methodology (Barlo et al, 2021;Dean, 2010;Geia et al, 2013;Mooney et al, 2018;Shay, 2019;Walker et al, 2014); however, Yarning is most often applied as a method for data collection, collaboration and information sharing. The methodology underpinning Yarning methods includes the research axiology, epistemology, ontology and researcher's socio-cultural position (see Figure 1).…”

Examining Indigenous leadership in the academy: A methodological approach

“…This increase may be attributed to the introduction of a requirement whereby universities must have a senior Indigenous appointment (Trudgett et al., 2020) to be eligible for Indigenous Student Success Program funding (Australian Government, 2017). In addition to a push for more Indigenous appointments in general, scholarly work has also focussed on Indigenous women’s leadership across the higher education sector (Fredericks et al., 2011; Fredericks & White, 2018; Hogarth & Bunda, 2018; Mooney et al., 2018; Wyld, 2010). However, understanding how to best integrate Indigenous leadership in the higher education governance structure at a senior executive level is an area that requires further investigation (Coates et al., 2020).…”