The Western Desert cultural bloc (also capitalised, abbreviated to WDCB, or just Western Desert) is a

cultural region In anthropology and geography, a cultural area, cultural region, cultural sphere, or culture area refers to a geography with one relatively homogeneous human activity or complex of activities (culture). Such activities are often associa ...

central Australia Central Australia, also sometimes referred to as the Red Centre, is an inexactly defined region associated with the geographic centre of Australia. In its narrowest sense it describes a region that is limited to the town of Alice Springs and ...

covering about , used to describe a group of linguistically and culturally similar

Aboriginal Australian Aboriginal Australians are the various indigenous peoples of the Australian mainland and many of its islands, excluding the ethnically distinct people of the Torres Strait Islands. Humans first migrated to Australia 50,000 to 65,000 year ...

nations.

Languages

The term ''Western Desert cultural bloc'' is often used by

anthropologist An anthropologist is a scientist engaged in the practice of anthropology. Anthropologists study aspects of humans within past and present societies. Social anthropology, cultural anthropology and philosophical anthropology study the norms, values ...

s and

linguist Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...

s when discussing the 40 or so Aboriginal groups that live there, who speak dialects of one language, often called the

Western Desert language The Western Desert language, or Wati, is a dialect cluster of Australian Aboriginal languages in the Pama–Nyungan family. The name ''Wati'' tends to be used when considering the various varieties to be distinct languages, ''Western Desert'' w ...

. The term ''cultural bloc'' is used by

s to describe culturally and linguistically similar groups (or nations) of Aboriginal peoples of Australia.

Country

According to anthropologist Robert Tonkinson:

Extending over a million square miles, the Western Desert... covers a vast area of the interior of the continent. It extends across western South Australia into central and central northern Western Australia (south of the Kimberleys) and south-western Northern Territory, and it includes most of the hill country in northern South Australia..The area is marked by an overall similarity in both climatic conditions... and physiographical characteristics. More important, however, is its delineation as a distinct culture area.. its Aboriginal inhabitants share a common language (with dialectal variations), social organization, relationship to the natural environment, religion and mythology and aesthetic expression. The term Western Desert, then refers to both a cultural bloc and a geographical entity.

The WDCB covers around and extends across much of

Western Australia Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...

, parts of

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories by area, which in ...

, and parts of the

Northern Territory The Northern Territory (abbreviated as NT; known formally as the Northern Territory of Australia and informally as the Territory) is an states and territories of Australia, Australian internal territory in the central and central-northern regi ...

. includes the

Gibson Desert The Gibson Desert is a large desert in Western Australia, largely in an almost pristine state. It is about in size, making it the fifth largest desert in Australia, after the Great Victoria, Great Sandy, Tanami and Simpson deserts. The ...

, the

Great Victoria Desert The Great Victoria Desert is a sparsely populated desert ecoregion and Interim Biogeographic Regionalisation for Australia, interim Australian bioregion in Western Australia and South Australia. History In 1875, British-born Australian explore ...

, the Great Sandy and

Little Sandy Desert The Little Sandy Desert (LSD) is a desert region in the state of Western Australia, lying to the east of the Pilbara and north of the Gascoyne regions. It is part of the Western Desert cultural bloc, Western Desert cultural region, and was dec ...

s in the

and

. It stretches from the

Nullarbor The Nullarbor Plain ( ; Latin: feminine of 'no' and 'tree') is part of the area of flat, almost treeless, arid or semi-arid country of southern Australia, located on the Great Australian Bight coast with the Great Victoria Desert to its no ...

in the south to the

Kimberley Kimberly or Kimberley may refer to: Places and historical events Australia Queensland * Kimberley, Queensland, a coastal locality in the Shire of Douglas South Australia * County of Kimberley, a cadastral unit in South Australia Ta ...

in the north, and from the Percival Lakes in the west through to the

Pintupi The Pintupi are an Australian Aboriginal group who are part of the Western Desert cultural group and whose traditional land is in the area west of Lake Macdonald and Lake Mackay in Western Australia. These people moved (or were moved) into th ...

lands in the Northern Territory.

History of contact

Ronald Berndt Ronald Murray Berndt (14 July 1916 – 2 May 1990) was an Australian social anthropologist who, in 1963, became the inaugural professor of anthropology at the University of Western Australia. He and his wife Catherine Berndt maintained a clo ...

estimated that, before the European colonisation of Australia, the Western Desert peoples may have numbered as many as 10,000, but that by the late 1950s, their numbers were down to between 1,371 and 2,200. Apart from the

Canning Stock Route The Canning Stock Route is a track that runs from Halls Creek, Western Australia, Halls Creek in the Kimberley (Western Australia), Kimberley region of Western Australia to Wiluna, Western Australia, Wiluna in the Mid West (Western Australia), ...

and the

rabbit-proof fence The State Barrier Fence of Western Australia, formerly known as the Rabbit-Proof Fence, the State Vermin Fence, and the Emu Fence, is a pest-exclusion fence constructed between 1901 and 1907 to keep rabbits, and other agricultural pests from ...

, white contact with this part of Australia was very rare until the 1960s. Terry Long, a Native Patrol Officer employed by Weapons Research Establishment, observed:

Modern history

A 2007 court case held by the

Federal Court of Australia The Federal Court of Australia is an Australian superior court which has jurisdiction to deal with most civil disputes governed by federal law (with the exception of family law matters), along with some summary (less serious) and indictable (mo ...

to determine "whether there was authorisation to apply for native title determination by all holders of native title claimed" had to determine whether a Western Desert Cultural Bloc society existed before colonisation. The judgment held that such a society existed in 1829, and continues to exist today. A 2018 native title determination determined that the Lappi Lappi and Ngulupi claimants "belong to the Western Desert Cultural Bloc (WDCB) system of laws and customs", and had rights to an area in the western part of the

Tanami Desert The Tanami Desert () is a desert in northern Australia, situated in the Northern Territory and Western Australia. It has a rocky terrain and small hills. The Tanami was the Northern Territory's final frontier and was not fully explored by Austral ...

Dialect groups

* Antekarinja * Kukatja *

Luritja The Luritja or Loritja people, also known as Kukatja or Kukatja-Luritja, are an Aboriginal Australian people of the Northern Territory. Their traditional lands are immediately west of the Derwent River, that forms a frontier with the Arrernte p ...

* Mandjildjara * Martu *

Ngaatjatjarra The Ngaatjatjarra (otherwise spelt Ngadadjara) are an Indigenous Australian people of Western Australia, with communities located in the north eastern part of the Goldfields-Esperance region. Name The ethnonym Ngaatjatjarra essentially translat ...

Ngaanyatjarra The Ngaanyatjarra, also known (along with the Pini) as the Nana, are an Indigenous Australian cultural group of Western Australia. They are located in the Goldfields-Esperance region, as well as Northern Territory. Language Ngaanyatjarra is ...

* Pini (Nana) *

Pitjantjatjara The Pitjantjatjara (; or ) are an Aboriginal people of the Central Australian desert near Uluru. They are closely related to the Yankunytjatjara and Ngaanyatjarra and their languages are, to a large extent, mutually intelligible (all are v ...

Spinifex people The Pila Nguru, often referred to in English as the Spinifex people, are an Aboriginal Australian people of Western Australia, whose lands extend to the border with South Australia and to the north of the Nullarbor Plain. The centre of their h ...

* Wongatha *

Yankunytjatjara The Yankunytjatjara people, also written Yankuntjatjarra, Jangkundjara, and other variants, are an Aboriginal Australian people of the state of South Australia. Language Yankunytjatjara is a Western Desert language belonging to the Wati lan ...

Notes

Citations

Sources

* * * * Dusset, Laurent (2005). ''Assimilating Identities: Social Networks and the Diffusion of Sections''. Sydney: Oceania Publications, Monograph 57. * Morgan, Margaret (1999). ''Mt Margaret: A Drop in a Bucket''. Lawson, NSW: Mission Publications of Australia (out of print). * Harrington-Smith on behalf of the Wongatha People v State of Western Australia (No 9) Page 4 of 112 http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/federal_ct/2007/31.html 5/17/2007 accessed 5 September 2009 {{DEFAULTSORT:Western Desert Cultural Bloc Indigenous Australians in the Northern Territory Canning Stock Route Culture of South Australia Culture of Western Australia Indigenous Australian culture Western Desert cultural bloc