A First Nations practice
Yarning is a conversational form long used by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples for sharing knowledge, building relationships, and passing on culture across generations. The Queensland Curriculum and Assessment Authority describes it as “a harmonious, creative and collaborative way of communicating” that fosters trust and provides a safe place to be heard and to respond.
Queensland Curriculum and Assessment Authority. Yarning Circles.
The Mitakoodi Elders Council — the authoritative body for the Mitakoodi people of Pimurra/Cloncurry, in northwest Queensland, where Uncle Bill’s family has its connections — describes the yarning circle as a means to encourage responsible and honest interaction, build trusting relationships, foster accountability, and provide a safe place to be heard and to respond. They note its use not only for cultural learning but for community consultation, research, and gathering baseline understandings in workplaces.
Mitakoodi Elders Council. About.
Yeddung Mura, an Aboriginal Corporation in Canberra whose work is built around yarning circles, articulates the same idea from inside the practice: yarning circles are “deeply rooted in Indigenous Australian culture” and the format itself — sitting in a circle — symbolises equality and promotes open, honest, and respectful communication, with everyone considered equal and no hierarchy.
Yeddung Mura Aboriginal Corporation. Why Yarning Circles?
The practice has also been examined and articulated in scholarly work, most influentially by Professor Dawn Bessarab — a Bardi-Indjarbandi woman and Aboriginal researcher — and Bridget Ng’andu, whose 2010 paper set out yarning’s credibility and rigour as a knowledge-sharing form. Their work, and the work that has built on it, has helped establish yarning as a recognised practice in research, education, health, and community settings well beyond its origins.
Bessarab, D. & Ng’andu, B. (2010). Yarning About Yarning as a Legitimate Method in Indigenous Research. International Journal of Critical Indigenous Studies, 3(1), 37–50.
Although yarning circles are most often found in Indigenous contexts, they are now also held in the wider community — in schools, universities, hospitals, workplaces, and community centres — where they are recognised as a serious communication form, not a casual chat.
Australian National University, Australian National Dictionary Centre. yarning circle.
What sits under all of it is older than the literature: a way of being in conversation that puts everyone in the circle on equal footing, asks people to listen as carefully as they speak, and treats stories as the natural carriers of knowledge.
