Listening to Experts

Abstract

Earth mounds are Late Holocene sites that have received little interpretation in Northern Australia’s archaeological record due to their visible similarity to natural features. This chapter will show how Indigenous traditional knowledge, coupled with new analytical techniques, has expanded the study of these sites in new directions. Indigenous communities’ engagement with their landscape and cultural epistemologies have provided concepts and evidence-based practices that take the interpretation of these sites beyond the biased lens of Western suppositions. The archaeology of listening is paramount in the interpretation of both the past and present meanings of these sites in Indigenous Australian communities.