Person

Strehlow, Theodor George Henry (1908 - 1978)

Born
6 June 1908
Hermannsburg, Northern Territory, Australia
Died
3 October 1978
Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
Occupation
Linguist and Ethnologist

Summary

Theodor Strehlow, who was born at Hermannsburg in Central Australia, was a Reader in Australian Linguistics, University of Adelaide from 1954. His primary interest was in linguistics, ceremony and traditions of Australian Aborigines, particularly the Arrente people. He was expert in the Arrente language, which he spoke from a child. Strehlow was often as odds with some of his colleagues because of his disinclination to follow the expected path of physical anthropology. He spent much time in Central Australia immersing himself in Aboriginal culture. Among his landmark publications were Aranda phonetics and grammar (1942-4); Aranda traditions (1947), the publication of which was delayed until none of his informants were still alive; and Songs of Central Australia (1971) which was instrumental in establishing the Dreaming and the Aboriginal world-view as key to an emerging Australian cultural identity. Strehlow amassed a large collection of Aboriginal song verses, myths (written in indigenous dialects and languages), film of ceremonial acts, photographs, genealogies and sacred artefacts. His later years were years overshadowed by the question of ownership of the collection.

Details

Chronology

1931
Education - BA (hons), University of Adelaide
1932
Life event - Returned to Central Australia
1932
Award - Australian National Research Council grant
1932
Career event - Member, Board of Anthropological Research expedition
August 1932
Career event - Member, Board of Anthropological Research expedition to Mt Liebig, Northern Territory
1935
Award - Australian National Research Council grant
1936 - 1941
Career position - Patrol Officer, later Deputy Director of Native Affairs, Central Australia
1938
Education - Master of Arts (MA), University of Adelaide
1942 - 1946
Career position - Served with the Australian Army
1946 - 1949
Career position - Research Fellow in Linguistics and Lecturer in English Literature, University of Adelaide
1947
Career position - President, Anthropological Section, Australian and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science
1949 - 1950
Career position - Postgraduate Fellowship, Australian National University
1950 - 1952
Life event - Studied anthropology at London School of Economics
1954 - 1970
Career position - Reader in Australian Linguistics, University of Adelaide
1964 - 1973
Career position - Founding Member, Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies
1970 - 1974
Career position - Professor of Australian Linguistics (Personal Chair), University of Adelaide
1975
Education - DLitt, University of Adelaide
1978
Award - Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), honoris causa, University of Uppsala, Sweden

Related Corporate Bodies

Archival resources

National Library of Australia Oral History Collection

  • Theodor George Henry Strehlow - Records, 1910 - 1978, DeB 76; National Library of Australia Oral History Collection. Details

Published resources

Books

  • Cox, James L., Restoring the chain of memory: T. G. H. Strehlow and the repatriation of australian indigenous knowledge (Sheffield, U.K.: Equinox Publishing House, 2018), 224 pp. Details
  • Gibson, Jason M., Ceremony men: making ethnography and the return of the Strehlow Collection (Albany, N.Y.: SUNY Press, 2020), 300 pp. Details
  • McKenna, Mark, Return to Uluru: a killing; a hidden history: a story that goes to the heart of the nation (Carlton, Vic.: Black Inc., 2021), 256 pp. Member, Commonwealth Board of Enquiry 1935 into the death of Yokununna at Uluru; pages 84, 89, 92-97, 99, 104-7, 127-9, 207. Details
  • Strehlow, T. G. H., Comments on the Journals of John McDouall Stuart (Adelaide: 1967). Details
  • Strehlow, T. G. H., Journal to Horseshoe Bend (Artarmon, N.S.W.: Giramondo Publishing, 2015), 220 pp. Details

Book Sections

  • Austin-Broos, Diane, 'Of kinships and other things: T. G. H. Strehlow in Central Australia' in German ethnography in Australia, Peterson, Nicolas and Kenny, Anna, eds (Canberra: Australian National University Press, 2017), pp. 223-41. Details
  • Gibson, Jason, '"Only the best is good for eternity": revisiting the ethnography of T. G. H. Strehlow' in German ethnography in Australia, Peterson, Nicolas and Kenny, Anna, eds (Canberra: Australian National University Press, 2017), pp. 243-71. Details
  • Jones, Philip, 'Strehlow, Theodor George Henry (1908-1978), Linguist' in Australian dictionary of biography, volume 16: 1940 - 1980 Pik-Z, John Ritchie and Diane Langmore, eds (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2002), pp. 333-336. http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A160399b.htm. Details

Edited Books

  • Berndt, Ronald M. ed., Australian Aboriginal art (Sydney: Ure Smith, 1964), 117 pp. Details

Journal Articles

  • Berndt, Ronald M., 'T. G. H. Strehlow, 1908 - 1878', Oceania, 49 (3) (1979), 230-3. Details
  • Berndt, Ronald M., 'T. G. H. Strehlow 1908 - 1978', Aboriginal history, 3 (1) (1979), 84-8. Details

Resources

See also

  • Carment, David et al ed., Northern Territory dictionary of biography (Darwin: Charles Darwin University Press, 2008), 655 pp. pp. 559-62. Details

Gavan McCarthy [P004098] and Helen Cohn

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"... the rengitj, as a visible mark or imprint on the land, is characterised as a place of origin, the repository of all names, as well as a kind of mapped visual expression of the connection between people and places which is to be carried out in the temporal sequence of the journey." Fanca Tamisari (1998) 'Body, Vision and Movement: In the footprints of the ancestors'. Oceania 68(4) p260