Yolŋu Country, North East Arnhem Land, Northern Territory. 31 July 2024
Have you ever thought about research as storytelling?
For our team research is all about story: collecting, sharing, understanding and making new stories. We appreciate the value of both words and numbers to tell insightful stories about perinatal health and wellbeing.
Recently our team was granted access to the Miwatj Health Aboriginal Corporation data for women having a Yolŋu baby in Galiwin’ku over the years 2015-2021. The strengthening of our partnership with Miwatj and access to this data is a crucial step in understanding what we refer to as the Number Dhäwu (story).
Reaching shared understanding about the Number Dhäwu requires complex intercultural communication and co-construction of meaning.
Reaching shared understanding about the Number Dhäwu requires complex intercultural communication and co-construction of meaning for Yolŋu women, djäkamirr, stakeholders and health services. To meet this unique communication challenge, we welcome Dr Emily Armstrong and Jessica Davis to our team. Under Professor Elaine Ḻäwurrpa Maypilama’s leadership, Emily and Jessica are working in collaboration with our Yolŋu research team and Gumurr' dhangiyunamirr Governance Board to develop shared understanding of the Number Dhäwu and related concepts such risk and perinatal healthcare decision making.

Photo credit: Sue Kildea. Professor Ḻäwurrpa Maypilama accepting a gift of fresh fish from family.
Emily Armstrong is a speech pathologist and collaborative researcher in the field of intercultural communication. Her research explores and facilitates intercultural communication in ways that honour participants’ voices, resonate with diverse audiences and challenge inaccessible systems to transform ways of working together – djäma rrambaŋi. Emily undertook her doctoral research in Galiwin’ku and has established community connections and relationships.
Jessica Davis is registered midwife and the recipient of the competitively awarded Charles Darwin University Domestic Scholars Doctorate Scholarship. Jessica joins us a PhD student with previous international maternal health research experience and a passion for working with community to address health inequities.
Ḻäwurrupa, Emily and Jessica have been spending time together at Dhäyirri homeland this week

Photo credit: Unknown resident of Dhäyirri. (L-R). Dr Emily Armstrong, Professor Elaine Ḻäwurrpa Maypilama and doctoral student Jessica Davis at Dhäyirri homeland.
Ḻäwurrupa, Emily and Jessica have been spending time together at Dhäyirri homeland this week and share insights from their fieldwork:
Professor Elaine Ḻäwurrpa Maypilama
' When we work together out at Dhayirri, we can feel free to work and we can concentrate where there are no disturbances. This is where we sit and share our knowledge and we feel manymak (good) and light.
I share my knowledge where there's no distractions.
We can concentrate on what we are sharing with each other - you share some of your story and ask questions and I share my knowledge where there's no distractions. The wind brings freshness to our story and helps us think clearly'.
Dr Emily Armstrong
' We are in the early stages of new collaborative projects - we are focussed on building connections and listening to Yolŋu directions for our research. I am so excited to be back in Galiwin’ku, seeing familiar faces and enjoying the latju wata (beautiful wind) of this season. In this picture, we are spending unhurried time together, working together in Yolŋu ways, and listening to Ḻäwurrpa's guidance about research project design.
As we sat at Dhäyirri to talk, wata stirred the campfire, settled us and brought us focus.
As we sat at Dhäyirri to talk, wata stirred the campfire, settled us and brought us focus. A group of young miyalk (women) and their djamarrkuḻi' (children) sat with us and Ḻäwurrpa wove a multigenerational, intercultural discussion about the research dhäwu (story) and djäkamirr djäma (Yolŋu doula work). As we discuss the challenges of intercultural communication, directions for our research emerge: words for which we don't yet have shared understanding, concepts that underpin our knowledges, questions we hadn't thought of before, worries to work through, and hopes for what we can achieve together. These stories will shape our projects and are all connected through gurruṯu (kinship) and this place.'

Photo credit: Pat Josse. Professor Elaine Ḻäwurrpa Maypilama starting a food cooking fire at Dhäyirri homeland.
Jessica Davis
'It is a beautiful day in Dhayirri, in northeast Arnhem Land. I’m sitting on a large mat under a shady tree with Ḻäwurrpa, my Yolŋu supervisor, and Emily, one of my Balanda (non-Indigenous) supervisors. We have met to talk about the research project Emily is working on and the PhD research I am about to start. We collect firewood, make tea, eat nyoka’ (crab), ŋarirri’ (fish) and fresh damper made on the fire. In between doing these things, we talk about Yolŋu maternal and infant health data: the data that has been sourced from health centres and hospitals, and the number stories we might be able to find in this data.
Using all my concentration to hold onto the threads of conversations that swing back and forth between English and Yolŋu Matha.
I’m learning many new Yolŋu Matha (Yolŋu languages) words, and using all my concentration to hold onto the threads of conversations that swing back and forth between English and Yolŋu Matha. I’m far from my comfort zone, and feeling very lucky to be sitting in this beautiful place, learning from these clever women about such important topics'.
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What a workplace!