Takeaways from Indigenous Cultural Immersion

In July 2022, GPRA, in conjunction with GPSN, organised an Indigenous Cultural Immersion trip to Yarrawarra in Gumbaynggirr country.

The aim of this immersion was to provide a unique experience for medical students to understand and appreciate Indigenous culture. In most traditional medical school education systems, there is a lack of face-to-face contact with Indigenous people who possess a rich knowledge and culture. The trip was designed to overcome this.

During the weekend, we were led through a series of workshops and talks with the local Elders in order to grow our understanding and skill set of working with First Nations peoples. The workshops included bushtucker tasting and damper baking, a guided bushwalk while learning Gumbaynggirr language, dancing as the oldest form of storytelling, painting and making clay art with local Aboriginal artists. We were welcomed to country, heard dreamtime stories and learned about the history of the area, which included a massacre. We also saw artefacts at the local art gallery. Overall, we were totally immersed in a cultural environment that invited our questions and served as an eye-opening experience for the students.

There are a few key takeaways from the Indigenous cultural immersion that are significant for each medical student to take with them into practice.

First Nations people are not some distant entity
Indigenous culture is a rich and deep resource which, the more you learn about it, the sooner you begin to understand the nuances that must be taken into practice to be a culturally competent practitioner
Australia is an absolutely huge place – be mindful that different countries and mobs may have different cultural customs. Therefore, what you learn in one region may or may not be the same for the next region
Elders are a rich resource for everyone. If you seek knowledge and understanding in a culturally sensitive manner, they are more likely to share their cultural understanding with you
As a medical student, learning does not stop once we leave campus. To be a good doctor there are opportunities and skills you must seek outside of medical school education
Sometimes there are cultural barriers or taboos that you may not know or understand. It is important to actively seek this understanding when practising in a new location.

In traditional medical school teachings, I found that First Nations people were treated as some distant, isolated concept that you may someday encounter in clinical practice. In reality, however, this is far from the truth. Aboriginal people are people with a rich and lively culture with a deep history full of stories, customs and laws that a practitioner must be mindful of to appropriately and sensitively treat a First Nations person. Without coming face-to-face with First Nations peoples and their teachings, often the excitement and vastness of the culture is lost.

Are you keen to do a trip like this?

By Lucy Schulz

GPSN Club Vice Chair – Western Sydney University