NGIKALIKARRA
Listening is the foundation and key
principle for authentic engagement.
The centrality of listening in conversation is considered by Clifford Coulthard, Senior Elder of the Aboriginal Adnyamathanha people in the northern Flinders Ranges, South Australia as the key principle for empathic engagement.
Likewise, Jeannie Warbie, Senior Elder, and Traditional Custodian of the Aboriginal Nyikina people of the Kimberley Region, Western Australia reinforces that careful and sustained listening is central to all of our personal and business-related conversations. We honour and respect those who have shared these sustainable and life-affirming ways of living, and we share these understandings as a cultural obligation in action within all of our engagements.
SOCIO-ETHICAL IMPLICATIONS
Dr. Alexander Hayes, in collaboration with global leaders, differentiates ’location’ from ‘place’ in his Ph.D. thesis, revealing through semi-structured interviews, conversations, and events an insight into the importance of empathetic understanding in the information communication and emergent technologies context.
Complementing the Kalara ‘Reveal: Make seen’ methodological approach to business and personal engagements, the Ngikalikarra framework is an example of engagement grounded in ‘being in listening’ on Country - Ngikalikarra.
“A review of findings instantiates the spiritual importance of Country as central to listening, the beginning of true sensing and awareness engaging through a place-centred socioethical framework”. (Hayes, 2020, p. 473)
Through turn-taking in the conversation, we demonstrate our capacity to acknowledge the philosophical perspectives, theoretical modeling, and cultural understandings of our contacts. This results in respectful, meaningful, contextual, and authentic Stakeholder, Partner, and Client engagement.
“A place-based and place-centered Ngikalikarra approach to engaging in technological development is central to conversations on Country and vital for the future of humanity”. (Hayes, 2020, p. 473)
Access & download Alexander Hayes Ph.D. thesis - PDF ( 15.6 MB)
“Ngikalikarra ... you have to listen, that's the name. That is the name to use when you work with people - Ngikalikarra. Protect Martuwarra and protect Country ... you tell them all, they have got to listen”.
Jeannie Warbie
Nyikina Senior Elder & Traditional Custodian
Broome, Western Australia
August 2016