Oodgeroo Noonuccal and the fight for rights
Sisters in Arms is a work of creative non-fiction about the friendship between Oodgeroo Noonuccal and Kathie Cochrane, and their part in the pivotal campaign that led to the 1967 referendum.
A new historical narrative is highlighting an often overlooked perspective of the untold contribution of women behind a pivotal moment in Australian history that reshaped the nation – the 1967 referendum.
On May 27, 1967, Australians voted to change the constitution so that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples would be counted as part of the population, with more than a decade of campaigning leading up to that moment.
Sarah Cochrane Ridout’s book Sisters In Arms: Oodgeroo Noonuccal, Kathie Cochrane and the battle for the 1967 Referendum has been years in the making. It is meticulously researched, and an important continuation of the work of her grandmother Kathie Cochrane – who was a lifelong friend and political ally of Oodgeroo Noonuccal (Kath Walker) – a pivotal voice in the decade-long campaign that led to the referendum.
Oodgeroo entrusted Kathie Cochrane to write her biography after the untimely death of Oodgeroo’s son Vivan Walker, who had begun documenting his mother’s remarkable political and creative life.
Sarah Cochrane Ridout has integrated some of Vivian’s draft biography material into Sisters in Arms, becoming the first book to include it.
“It has been a long process and I wouldn’t have undertaken it without permission from both families,” Cochrane Ridout says. “I think there’s been a lot of books about the referendum, but I don’t think there’s been anything personal about it. I wanted to do something personal and to show the importance of allies and how people can help each other and build something really wonderful and also make lifelong friends along the way.
“That’s why I wanted to show that aspect of it, the two women working together across their very different worlds they came from and yet finding all the things they had in common and fighting for things that they thought they should have in common and working together over the years.
“And so I was very cautious and wanted to make sure that that was okay with everyone and everyone was okay, including Denis Walker, who is Oodgeroo’s last remaining child at that point. He is a legend among activists and I thought, well, if Denis is totally fine with it and he’s really fully supportive, then who’s anyone else to say no.”
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Cochrane Ridout cleverly integrates important background details of the time that were often disregarded, such as the backdrop of the Cold War, racial inequality and state surveillance, and the emotional toll that political and social activism took on both families.
Passages written in Oodgeroo’s voice are drawn directly from recorded interviews, speeches and other primary sources, while archival records, interviews and redacted ASIO files inform the narrative.
“It’s a real story that affected all of us,” she says. “I thought that the new generation needs to understand what people went through then and just the weird things about Australia during the Cold War, how there was the special branch and ASIO. They were everywhere and spying on these people who were trying to do a good thing,” says Cochrane Ridout. “Every young person who’s heard about my book is just absolutely shocked about that. They just had no idea it was like the Stasi.
“I’ve been writing (the book) for 10 years and all the different things that happened in those 10 years, like the 50th anniversary that was in 2017, all these different times it has been relevant and I’ve been writing it and trying to get it published. The Voice referendum people have a kind of rose-coloured kind of view of what the ’67 referendum was like and I think everyone thinks it was really easy, but it wasn’t.
“That’s why I just kept going because I thought, it happened a long time ago but it’s still relevant today and there are still lessons for people to learn.”
The book also brings together some of Oodgeroo Noonucal’s most intimate family poems into a single volume, including previously unpublished work, Son of Son of Mine written for her first grandchild, Raymond (Nunka) Walker.
Sisters in Arms is a meticulously crafted labour of love that started from Cochrane Ridout’s childhood memories of Oodgeroo and her grandmother.
“It’s a story I’ve been interested in all my life since I first met Oodgeroo in my grandparents’ living room when I was about seven,” she says. “My grandmother was also a very big personality like Oodgeroo, and very commanding. That was the first time I ever saw Grandma deferring to someone else and that really intrigued me because I sort of hero worshipped my Grandma. I thought, well, this woman must be really special.
“That just always stayed with me, just the interest, the intrigue as to their friendship and how obviously important it was to both of them and how it had lasted all these years.”
Sisters In Arms: Oodgeroo Noonuccal, Kathie Cochrane and the battle for the 1967 Referendum by Sarah Cochrane Ridout, AndAlso Books, $35.
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