Here’s a special Mother of Invention preview: an essay by Ambelin Kwaymullina.  Ambelin is an Aboriginal writer and illustrator from the Palyku people. The homeland of her people is located in the dry, vivid beauty of the Pilbara region of Western Australia. Ambelin has written and illustrated a number of award-winning picture books as well as writing a dystopian series – The Tribe – for young adults. When not writing or illustrating, Ambelin teaches law and spends time with her family and her dogs. 

I am a Palyku author of Indigenous Futurisms, a term coined by Anishinaabe academic Grace Dillon to describe a form of storytelling whereby Indigenous peoples use the speculative fiction genre to challenge colonialism and imagine Indigenous futures.[1] Indigenous Futurist writers draw from worldviews shaped by our ancient cultures, from our inheritance of the multigenerational trauma of colonialism, and from the sophisticated understandings of systems of oppression that are part of the knowledge base of all oppressed peoples. Because of this, we share similarities that shape our works and provide a fruitful base for cross-textual analysis.[2] But because we are many individuals from many Indigenous nations, each with our own homelands, cultures, and identities, there is also great diversity between us all. As such, my viewpoint is one among many Indigenous viewpoints. Continue reading