First Voices Indigenous Radio
May 23, 2023
Munya Andrews is an Indigenous woman from the Kimberley region of Western Australia. Born to an Aboriginal woman and Scottish father, she is proud of her Aboriginal and Celtic heritage. Her Bardi ‘saltwater’ people come from the Dampier Peninsula and the offshore islands north of Broome. Regarded by Melbourne University as a “leading Australian thinker,” Munya is an accomplished author and barrister with degrees in anthropology and law. Educated in Australia and the United States, she is fascinated by comparative religions, languages, mythology and science, and is intrigued by the way in which they interact and inform each other. Munya’s book, “Journey into Dreamtime,” is an easy guide to Aboriginal spirituality that explains Dreamtime concepts in a simple way. Munya’s life purpose is to create better understanding and appreciation of Aboriginal people, leaving behind a legacy of Dreamtime wisdom for generations to come. Munya’s long term vision is to create a fairer, more inclusive Australian society, which recognizes and pays respect to its First Nations people. Following Tiokasin’s talk with Munya, he and Malcolm Burn, FVR’s show engineer and host of “The Long Way Around” on Radio Kingston, discuss greed, while contemplating the title of the closing song, “Everybody Wants to Rule the World.” Tiokasin asks, How does one get to rule the world? Answer: “By turning your back on Mother Nature/Mother Earth.” Following this train of thought, Tiokasin talks about greed, which he says is a being, a value that many people in the U.S. and Western Hemisphere don’t understand. What if greed had a cost; what if one had to pay something for greed? Malcolm says that we live in a culture where greed is kind of celebrated and is expected on a certain level “turn on the television and everyone wants more of everything, bigger this, bigger that, more; our culture is consumer based.” Both agree that greed is a characteristic of the wasicu and the windigo (the one who is never satisfied). Tiokasin says there is no ceremony to accept greed intelligently. Greed is a being. How is it treating you and how are you treating it?