I wanna change this but idk what to

Illustration commission for @cottagetwilight for their partner as an anniversary present! A redraw of the original Mulan poster, focusing on Ping a bit more than Mulan. I had so much fun with this, a joy to work on!

More below the cut

Alucard 🩸🦇

don’t climb uluru (it’s sacred and incredibly disrespectful)

do NOT play the didgeridoo/yirdaki if you’re white/not aboriginal (ESPECIALLY if you’re a woman - women aren’t allowed to play the yirdaki in our culture due to the belief they will become sick/pregnant/infertile (it varies depending on nation)) the ONLY exception to this is if you’re invited in by the community

if you’re going to buy a boomerang, get one from the community and also know that not all boomerangs come back! and not all nations use them either! same goes for art/other cultural stuff

there are AT LEAST 250 nations with ~300 languages and ~700 dialects. don’t be ignorant and ask someone if they “speak aboriginal”

usually when we speak about our language/country, however, we just call them “language”/”country” (e.g. “i speak language”/”out on country”)

DON’T EVER ask “how much” or “what percentage” indigenous someone is - it’s incredibly offensive considering the australian government’s policy of kidnapping lightskinned indigenous kids from their families to “bring them up white” and “better the bloodline”. due to this + centuries of colonisation we can look like anything and we’re all STILL aboriginal. obviously there are still things such as white passing privilege but in an aboriginal context, there is a lot more nuance due to the stolen generations and extra sensitivity must be taken when discussing these topics

additionally aboriginal people are NOT the only indigenous australians, there are also the torres strait islanders who live in the torres strait islands in queensland. i’m not torres strait islander so i don’t have much to say here (feel free to add on if you are though)

in a lot of our cultures, we are not allowed to say the names of the dead or view photos/listen to recordings of them, as we believe it disturbs their spirit. if you come across content featuring a deceased aboriginal person, it is very appreciated if you warn us that they are deceased. people who are not indigenous don’t have to follow this tradition but it’s appreciated if you do

certain terms are seen as offensive by some, such as “aborigine”, so it’s best not to use them. we also have a series of regional terms such as koori/goori/murri/palawa/nyoongar etc.

contrary to popular belief, we weren’t all nomadic peoples - there’s fishtraps + evidence of agricultural and villages of thousands of people all over australia, as well as possibly the OLDEST astronomical observatory in the WORLD (wurdi youang)

don’t fucking appropriate the dreamtime (looking @ you white hippies/alternate lifestyles) - while we share some of these stories, a lot of these are exclusive and only for us and y’all are more than likely to bastardise the shit out of them. just don’t touch them.

anyway there’s a lot more i could add to this but this post is already really long so just send me questions/stuff if you want more thanks

and this always was, and always will be, aboriginal land