Yarning with Boe Spearim & ‘Myall Creek & the Law’ Symposium
Friday 7 June 2024 from 10.00 - 3.00pm
venue: Oorala Aboriginal Centre or ZOOM
This year’s Myall Creek Memorial commemorations at Oorala will see an expanded program, featuring Boe Spearim – a Gamilaraay and Kooma man and driving force behind the groundbreaking podcast series ‘Frontier War Stories’. Boe has recorded more than thirty episodes, speaking with Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people on the first century and a half of conflict and resistance in Australia. Episodes 21 was dedicated to the Myall Creek Massacre Memorial. In the afternoon session at Oorala, Boe will be yarning with us on ‘The Frontier Wars and Blak Resistance: Then and Now’ and will help us keep the conversation going on truth-telling in history.
In the morning, UNE legal scholars will present a symposium called Myall Creek & the Law. The trial and execution of perpetrators of the Myall Creek Massacre in 1838 were some of the most momentous events in NSW colonial legal history. UNE’s Law School is the closest Australian law school to the site of the massacre at Myall Creek Station near Bingara and for several years has proudly co-sponsored the annual Myall Creek Memorial commemorative events. This year, legal scholars from UNE will discuss the ongoing relevance of Myall Creek to legal scholarship that continues to reverberate in modern Australia.
The Oorala event sets the scene for the Memorial Day ceremonies at the Myall Creek site near Bingara on Sunday, 9 June. Boe will be delivering the oration on-site at the ceremony. Are you looking for a ride to the Memorial Day ceremony at Myall Creek on Sunday, 9 June? Contact Andrew Lawson on andrew.lawson@une.edu.au or (02) 6773 3551, who will put you in touch with other travellers.
This commemorative event at Oorala is proudly co-sponsored by UNE’s Oorala Aboriginal Centre, UNE’s Law School, and the Armidale Friends of Myall Creek Memorial.
Presentations (20 min + 10min Q&A)
The day will chaired by Ms Julia Day, Senior Lecturer, School of Law.
10:15 Welcome
10:30 The Myall Creek Massacre and Indigenous Laws of War
- Adjunct Associate Professor Sam White, School of Law
11:00 The Myall Creek Massacre – Why Was There No Declaration of Martial Law for the Fighting at the Time?
- Mr Ben Hingley, HDR Candidate, School of Law
11:30 The Myall Creek Massacre – A Comparative Perspective with New Zealand and North America
- Associate Professor Guy Charlton, School of Law
12:00 The Myall Creek Massacre – Where to From Here?
- Professor Cameron Moore, School of Law
12:30 Lunch break
1:30 Yarning with Boe Spearim
The Frontier Wars and Blak Resistance: Then and Now
This Yarning is part of the weekend of memorial activities commemorating the Wirrayaraaypeople who were murdered in the Myall Creek Massacre of 1838. The weekend culminates in a memorial ceremony at the Myall Creek Memorial site near Bingara, NSW on Sunday 9 June 2024. More on the memorial can be found at this link: https://myallcreek.org/the-massacre-story/
About Boe Spearim
Boe Spearim is a Kooma, Murawarii and Gamilaraay, podcaster and activist born in western Sydney and raised on the Southside of Brisbane.
Boe has been involved in community radio since 2012 volunteering at 4zzz on the Indigi Briz program then later studying a cert 3 in media broadcasting at 98.9fm where Boe found employment after leaving the station and then coming back in 2017 Boe began hosting Let’s Talk a talkback program that discusses issues that affect First Nations people, as well as hosting a podcast called Frontier War Stories that has over sixty thousand downloads the podcast is dedicated to truth-telling about a side of Australia that has been left out of the history books.
Before finding his passion in radio Boe got involved in activism at the Brisbane Aboriginal Sovereign Embassy which was established in March 2012 in Musgrave Park and is a current member of (WAR) Warriors of the Aboriginal Resistance.
