Read The Play

• What do we want? When do we want it?

  In this episode, Chelsea & David share a special panel recording from the 2025 National Symposium Unifying Anti-Racist Theory and Practice, bringing together Prof Gracelyn Smallwood, Dale Ruska, Uncle Coco Wharton and Senator Lidia Thorpe to share their responses to the question: “what do we want? And when do we want it?” This rich and far-ranging discussion also offers vital context for our next few episodes, which begin to look at Indigenous critical race theory in practice, and the importance of intellectual work that can confront the scale, urgency, and expansiveness of the war on race in the colony. Reading list Let’s Talk Black Knowing with Uncle Coco Wharton. With Chelsea Watego, David Singh, and Coco Wharton. Triple A Murri Country, October 25, 2024. https://triplea.org.au/lt-black-knowing-with-coco-wharton/. Gregoire, Paul. “The Burning Question of Sovereignty: Interview with IAPA Candidate Uncle Wayne Wharton.” Sydney Criminal Lawyers, April 16, 2025. https://www.sydneycriminallawyers.com.au/blog/the-burning-question-of-sovereignty-interview-with-iapa-candidate-uncle-wayne-wharton/. Smallwood, Gracelyn. Indigenist Critical Realism: Human Rights and First Australians’ Wellbeing. Routledge, 2015 Ruska, Dale, Donna Ruska, Ann Ferguson, et al. Stradbroke Island: Facilitating Change. Edited by Regina Ganter. Queensland Studies Centre, 1997. https://www.lidiathorpe.com/ Credits Recordings and Production: Some of the podcast materials are drawn from Triple A Murri Country’s Let’s Talk Black Politics and Black Knowing, recorded in the studio between 2023-2024, hosted by Professor Chelsea Watego and Dr David Singh in addition to excerpts from QUT Carumba Institute’s National Symposium Unifying Anti-racism Research and Practice, all of which were produced by Anna Carlson. Music: We wish to sincerely thank Matt Hsu’s Obscure Orchestra for granting permission for free use of ‘Live, Laugh, Decolonise’ and ‘Eat the World’ Production & Sound Design: BlakCast Productions Artwork: graphic by Rachel Apelt, Artbalm. This podcast was supported (partially) by the Australian Government through the Australian Research Council's Discovery Indigenous Projects funding scheme (project IN210100008). The views expressed herein are those of the presenters and are not necessarily those of the Australian Government or Australian Research Council. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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• Insisting on Indigenous Humanity

  This week on Read the Play, Chelsea and David reflect on what it means to insist on Indigenous humanity: a humanity that is not defined by proximity to whiteness or power, but rather grounded in sovereignty, spirit, and struggle. First up, you’ll hear an interview with Darumbal and South Sea Islander scholar and writer, Dr. Amy McQuire, who reflects on the insights she has learned from working alongside the families of disappeared Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women. We then listen back to some beautiful presentations from the 2025 National Symposium Unifying Anti-Racist Theory and Practice, including a powerful address from diaspora Palestinian scholar and activist Dr. Jamal Nabulsi, a beautiful dialogue between Amy and Palestinian poet, writer and lawyer Sara Saleh, and a powerful call to arms from Waitaha, Kāti Mamoe and Kai Tahu Professor Donna McCormack. Reading list McQuire, Amy. “Disappearing Aboriginal Women: Speaking Back to Silences.” University of Queensland, School of Political Science, 2023. McQuire, Amy. “The Act of Disappearing.” Meanjin, October 2022. https://meanjin.com.au/essays/the-act-of-disappearing/. McQuire, Amy. Black Witness. University of Queensland Press, 2024. Nabulsi, Jamal. “Affective Resistance: Feeling through Everyday Palestinian Struggle.” 2023. Nabulsi, Jamal. “Reclaiming Palestinian Indigenous Sovereignty.” Journal of Palestine Studies 52, no. 2 (2023): 24–42. King (Te Aūpouri, Te Rarawa, and Kāti Māmoe) Cormack (Kāi Tahu. “Indigenous Peoples, Whiteness, and the Coloniality of Co-Design.” In Handbook of Critical Whiteness. Springer, Singapore, 2023. Credits Recordings and Production: Some of the podcast materials are drawn from Triple A Murri Country’s Let’s Talk Black Politics and Black Knowing, recorded in the studio between 2023-2024, hosted by Professor Chelsea Watego and Dr David Singh in addition to excerpts from QUT Carumba Institute’s National Symposium Unifying Anti-racism Research and Practice, all of which were produced by Anna Carlson. Music: We wish to sincerely thank Matt Hsu’s Obscure Orchestra for granting permission for free use of ‘Live, Laugh, Decolonise’ and ‘Eat the World’ Production & Sound Design: BlakCast Productions Artwork: graphic by Rachel Apelt, Artbalm. This podcast was supported (partially) by the Australian Government through the Australian Research Council's Discovery Indigenous Projects funding scheme (project IN210100008). The views expressed herein are those of the presenters and are not necessarily those of the Australian Government or Australian Research Council. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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• Building Critical Black Consciousness

  This week, Chelsea and David bring together two key thinkers in the war on race: Uncle Graham Brady and Uncle Philip Mills. First up, we hear Uncle Graham’s generous and thoughtful opening keynote from the 2025 National Symposium Unifying Anti-Racist Theory and Practice in which he reflects on the long history of Black struggle in so-called queensland. In the second part of the episode, we turn to an older interview that Chelsea and David recorded as part of Let’s Talk Black Knowing in 2024 with Uncle Phillip Mills, who reflects on his own work developing and implementing the Torres Model of Care, and explains why care needs to be at the heart of all of our movements for justice. Across this episode, Chelsea and David reflect on the work of rebuilding a unified and critical Black consciousness grounded in sovereignty, spirit, and care. Reading list Brady, Graham (et al). Yalanya That’s the Way It Is: The Life and Story of Pastor and Activist Don Kawanji Brady. Jawiyaba Warra, 2024. Watego, Chelsea, David Singh, and Graham Brady. Let’s Talk Black Knowing with Uncle Graham Brady. Triple A Murri Country, February 24, 2024. https://triplea.org.au/lt-black-knowing-with-uncle-graham-brady/. Mills, Phillip. “We Don’t Want ‘Equity’, Acknowledge Our Sovereignty – IndigenousX.” IndigenousX, n.d. https://indigenousx.com.au/we-dont-want-equity-acknowledge-our-sovereignty/ 2024 QUT Meanjin Oration feat. Uncle Graham Brady, Aunty Cheryl Buchanan, Uncle Phillip Mills and Uncle Joe Geia. QUT Gardens Point, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eVZtDO2haE. Credits Recordings and Production: Some of the podcast materials are drawn from Triple A Murri Country’s Let’s Talk Black Politics and Black Knowing, recorded in the studio between 2023-2024, hosted by Professor Chelsea Watego and Dr David Singh in addition to excerpts from QUT Carumba Institute’s National Symposium Unifying Anti-racism Research and Practice, all of which were produced by Anna Carlson. Music: We wish to sincerely thank Matt Hsu’s Obscure Orchestra for granting permission for free use of ‘Live, Laugh, Decolonise’ and ‘Eat the World’ Production & Sound Design: BlakCast Productions Artwork: graphic by Rachel Apelt, Artbalm. This podcast was supported (partially) by the Australian Government through the Australian Research Council's Discovery Indigenous Projects funding scheme (project IN210100008). The views expressed herein are those of the presenters and are not necessarily those of the Australian Government or Australian Research Council.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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• Coming this Friday!

  Join your favourite “nerds on the frontline,” Professor Chelsea Watego & Dr. David Singh, for Read the Play — a fearless new podcast unpacking Indigenous critical race theory with sharp analysis, deadly interviews, and a whole lotta heart.Across 13 episodes, Chelsea & David break down the ethics of anti-racist research, yarn on working from Aboriginal terms of reference, and uplift the joy of Indigenous Intellectual Sovereignty.💥 Big ideas. Gut-punch truths. The occasional belly laugh.This is one for the thinkers, the disrupters, and the ones sick of playing the coloniser’s game.🖤 Launching Friday 8 August on the BlakCast Network. Follow now so you don’t miss the drop!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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• Indigenous Intellectual Sovereignty & Aboriginal Terms of Reference

  In this first episode, Chelsea & David catch up with three powerhouses of critical Indigenous studies in this colony: Professor Lester Rigney, Dr. Aunty Lilla Watson, and Dr. Aunty Mary Graham. Together, they ask: what does it mean to work from Aboriginal terms of reference? What does Indigenous intellectual sovereignty mean in practice? And what tools do Indigenous knowledges offer for the fight ahead? Through these wide-ranging conversations, Chelsea & David work to build the intellectual foundations of Indigenous critical race theory and the toolkit for Reading the Play Reading list Rigney, Lester-Irabinna. Global Perspectives and New Challenges in Culturally Responsive Pedagogies: Super-Diversity and Teaching Practice. Routledge, 2023. Rigney, Lester-Irabinna. Indigenist Research and Aboriginal Australia. Routledge, 2017. Mary Graham. “Some Thoughts about the Philosophical Underpinnings of Aboriginal Worldviews: [Paper in: The Ecological Humanities].” Australian Humanities Review, no. 45 (2008): 181–94. Phillips, Gregory. “Patterns, Power and Place—On Whose Terms?” Meanjin Spring 2023 (forthcoming). https://meanjin.com.au/essays/patterns-power-and-place-on-whose-terms/. Lilla Watson. “The Commonwealth Games in Brisbane 1982 - Analysis of Aboriginal Protests.” Social Alternatives 7, no. 1 (1988): 37–43. Watego, Chelsea, Lisa J. Whop, David Singh, et al. “Black to the Future: Making the Case for Indigenist Health Humanities.” International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 18 (16), (2021): 8704 Credits Recordings and Production: Some of the podcast materials are drawn from Triple A Murri Country’s Let’s Talk Black Politics and Black Knowing, recorded in the studio between 2023-2024, hosted by Professor Chelsea Watego and Dr David Singh in addition to excerpts from QUT Carumba Institute’s National Symposium Unifying Anti-racism Research and Practice, all of which were produced by Anna Carlson. Music: We wish to sincerely thank Matt Hsu’s Obscure Orchestra for granting permission for free use of ‘Live, Laugh, Decolonise’ and ‘Eat the World’ Production & Sound Design: BlakCast Productions Artwork: graphic by Rachel Apelt, Artbalm. This podcast was supported (partially) by the Australian Government through the Australian Research Council's Discovery Indigenous Projects funding scheme (project IN210100008). The views expressed herein are those of the presenters and are not necessarily those of the Australian Government or Australian Research Council.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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