Lionel Fogarty

{{Short description|Indigenous Australian poet and political activist}}

Lionel Fogarty (born 1958), also published as Lionel Lacey, is an Indigenous Australian poet and political activist.

Early life

Fogarty was born in 1958 on an Aboriginal reserve at Barambah (now called Cherbourg) in Queensland, where he grew up.{{citation|url=http://www.poetrylibrary.edu.au/poets/fogarty-lionel|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20150310072026/http://www.poetrylibrary.edu.au/poets/fogarty-lionel|archivedate=10 March 2015|title=Lionel Fogarty (1958 – ) |work=Australian Poetry Library}} He is of the Yoogum (Yugambeh) and Kudjela (?) peoples.{{cite web | title=Lionel Fogarty | website=AustLit | date=13 November 2019 | url=https://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/A21618 | access-date=24 February 2021}}

Activism

Fogarty was involved in Aboriginal activism from his teenage years, including involvement with such organisations as Aboriginal Legal Service, Aboriginal Housing Service, Black Resource Centre, Black Community School and Murrie Coo-ee. He worked mainly in southern Queensland on issues such as land rights, Aboriginal health and deaths in custody. His brother, Daniel Yock, died in the back of a police van shortly after being arrested, in 1993.{{cite news|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article127525002|title=Marchers pay a silent tribute to Daniel Yock. A peaceful 4000|newspaper=The Canberra Times|page=17|date=18 November 1993}}

Fogarty met activist Cheryl Buchanan (born 1955), later the mother of his six children, in Melbourne, who was working with the National Union of Australian University Students (NUAUS). He assisted in publishing the newspaper Black News Service{{cite book | title=From Sit-Ins to #revolutions: Media and the Changing Nature of Protests |isbn= 9781501336959 | via=dokumen.pub | date=28 June 1969 | url=https://dokumen.pub/from-sit-ins-to-revolutions-media-and-the-changing-nature-of-protests-1501336959-9781501336959.html | editor1-last=Guntarik | editor1-first=Olivia | editor-last2=Grieve-Williams | editor-first2=Victoria|chapter=2: 'We have survived the white man’s world': A critical review of Aboriginal Australian activism in media and social media| first=Victoria |last=Grieve-Williams| access-date=1 October 2022}}{{cite book | editor1-last=Guntarik | editor1-first=Olivia | editor-last2=Grieve-Williams | editor-first2=Victoria | title=From Sit-Ins to #revolutions: Media and the Changing Nature of Protests | publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing | year=2020 | isbn=978-1-5013-3696-6 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=07vADwAAQBAJ | access-date=1 October 2022 | via=Google Books}} (1975–1977), originally out of the Black Resource Centre (BRC) in Melbourne (supported by the NUAUS) and later from Brisbane.{{cite thesis| type=PhD | last=Burrows | first=Elizabeth Anne | title=Writing to be heard: the Indigenous print media's role in establishing and developing an Indigenous public sphere | year=2010 | publisher=Griffith University | doi=10.25904/1912/3292 | url=https://research-repository.griffith.edu.au/handle/10072/365622 | access-date=1 October 2022 }} [https://research-repository.griffith.edu.au/bitstream/handle/10072/365622/Burrows_2010_02Thesis.pdf?sequence=1 PDF] Buchanan had been involved in the setup of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in 1972,{{cite web | title=Australia Day under a beach umbrella | website= Collaborating for Indigenous Rights | date=22 July 2008 | url=http://indigenousrights.net.au/subsection.asp?ssID=45 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120317141354/http://indigenousrights.net.au/subsection.asp?ssID=45| publisher= National Museum Australia | archive-date=17 March 2012 | url-status=dead }} and became inaugural director of the BRC. The centre later moved to Brisbane. Buchanan also took him up to Aurukun festival and to meet Mapoon people whose land near Weipa had been taken from them in the 1930s and 1940s.

The BRC was involved in the defence and acquittal of the "Brisbane Three" in 1975. Fogarty was one of the three: he faced charges of conspiracy against the state in Brisbane, along with Denis Walker and Chilean national John Garcia.{{cite web | title=Buchanan, Cheryl (1955– ) | website=The Australian Women's Register| first1=Leonarda |last1= Kovacic |first2= Barbara |last2=Lemon | date=12 Feb 2019|others= First created 27 July 2005 | url=https://www.womenaustralia.info/biogs/AWE1255b.htm | access-date=1 October 2022}}{{cite web | title=Committee for the Defence of the Brisbane Three: Ephemera | website=Fryer Library Manuscripts| publisher=University of Queensland | url=https://manuscripts.library.uq.edu.au/index.php/fvf61 | access-date=1 October 2022}} The charges, which had been laid by then premier of Queensland Joh Bjelke-Petersen's Special Branch{{cite web | last=McIlroy | first=Jim | title=Vale Denis Walker, Aboriginal freedom fighter | website=Green Left | date=18 January 2018 | url=https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/vale-denis-walker-aboriginal-freedom-fighter | access-date=1 October 2022}} in 1974, were on various offences relating to an alleged plot to "kidnap" Jim Varghese, students' union president at the University of Queensland.

After this, Fogarty started writing on political issues.{{cite interview | title=‘The Rally Is Calling’: Dashiell Moore Interviews Lionel Fogarty|first=Lionel |last=Fogarty|interviewer-first=Dashiell|interviewer-last= Moore | website=Cordite Poetry Review | date=31 January 2019 | url=http://cordite.org.au/interviews/rally-moore-fogarty/ |page=1| access-date=1 October 2022}}

As well as travelling around Australia promoting Murri culture and Aboriginal causes, in 1976 he travelled to the Second International Indian Treaty Council in South Dakota, United States, part of the American Indian Movement. In the International Year for the World's Indigenous People in 1993, Fogarty went on an extensive tour in Europe, reading his work.

Poetry

His poetry can be seen as an extension of this activism; common themes include the maintenance of traditional Aboriginal culture and the effects of European occupation. His work has been described as "experimental", and sometimes "surrealist". He uses Aboriginal language in his poetry, partly as an attempt to extend the dialogue between Australian cultures.{{Cite journal |last=Hall |first=Matthew |date=2018 |title=Forced Poetics in Lionel G. Fogarty's "Disguised, not attitude" and "Bam Gayandi" |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.13110/antipodes.32.1-2.0209 |journal=Antipodes |volume=32 |issue=1–2 |pages=209–223 |doi=10.13110/antipodes.32.1-2.0209 |jstor=10.13110/antipodes.32.1-2.0209 |issn=0893-5580|url-access=subscription }}

Fogarty has been involved with not-for-profit poetry organisation, The Red Room Company, participating in Unlocked, a program for inmates in New South Wales correctional centres, as well its creative projects including Clubs and Societies and The Poet's Life Works.{{cite web|title=Lionel Fogarty biography|url=http://redroomcompany.org/poet/lionel-fogarty/|publisher=The Red Room Company|accessdate=20 September 2012}}

Recognition and awards

2023: Shortlisted, Prime Minister's Literary Awards, Poetry Award for Harvest Lingo{{Cite web |date=2023-10-26 |title=Prime Minister's Literary Awards 2023 shortlists announced |url=https://www.booksandpublishing.com.au/articles/2023/10/26/239949/prime-ministers-literary-awards-2023-shortlists-announced/ |access-date=2023-10-26 |publisher=Books+Publishing}}
2023: Winner, Queensland Literary Awards, Judith Wright Calanthe Award for a Poetry Collection for Harvest Lingo{{Cite web |date=2023-09-05 |title=Winners of the 2023 Queensland Literary Awards announced |url=https://statements.qld.gov.au/statements/98623 |access-date=2023-09-06 |website=Media statements |publisher=Queensland Government}}
2023: Shortlisted, New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards, Indigenous Writers' Prize{{Cite web |date=2023-02-01 |title=Harvest Lingo |url=https://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/awards/indigenous-writers-prize/2023-shortlisted-harvest-lingo |access-date=2023-03-01 |website=State Library of NSW}}
2023: Shortlisted, Victorian Premier's Literary Award for Indigenous Writing for Harvest Lingo{{Cite web |last= |date=2023-01-09 |title=VPLAs 2023 shortlists announced |url=https://www.booksandpublishing.com.au/articles/2023/01/09/224783/vplas-2023-shortlists-announced/ |access-date=2023-02-02 |website=Books+Publishing |language=en-AU}}
2016: Shortlisted, New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards, Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry
2015: Kate Challis RAKA Award for Mogwie-Idan: Stories of the Land (2012)
2014: Shortlisted, Victorian Premier's Literary Awards, Prize for Indigenous writing
2012: Scanlon Prize for Indigenous Poetry, for Connection Requital.{{cite web | title=Lionel Fogarty | website=Monash Indigenous Studies Centre | url=https://www.monash.edu/arts/monash-indigenous-studies/literary-commons/literary-commons-participants/lionel-fogarty | access-date=24 February 2021}}{{cite web | title=CRISIS! | website=1856 | url=https://1856.com.au/artists/crisis | access-date=24 February 2021}}
2006: Australian Council for the Arts – Promotional And Presentation Grant Award Literature Board
2996: Nominated, NBC Banjo Awards, Poetry Prize, for New and Selected poems: Munaldjali, Mutuerjararera
1995: Australian Council for the Arts – Travel Grant Award, toward promotional activities in UK, Italy and Spain
1994: Queensland OPAL Award – Murri Achievement (Writers) Award
1988: FAW Patricia Weickhardt Award to an Aboriginal Writer{{cite book | last=Heiss | first=Anita| author-link=Anita Heiss | title=Dhuuluu-Yala: To Talk Straight - Publishing Indigenous Literature | publisher=Aboriginal Studies Press | year=2003 | isbn=978-0-85575-444-0 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6RuEAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA150 | access-date=7 November 2023 | page=150}}{{cite web | title=FAW Patricia Weickhardt Award to an Aboriginal Writer | website=AustLit| url=https://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/v707 | access-date=13 February 2020}}

Selected works

Fogarty's works include:

Harvest Lingo (Giramondo, 2022){{Cite web |last=Kinsella |first=John |date=2022-07-23 |title=Harvest Lingo |url=https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/culture/books/2022/07/31/harvest-lingo |access-date=2023-02-02 |website=The Saturday Paper |language=en}}
Selected Works 1980-2016 (re.press, 2017){{Cite web |title=Lionel Fogarty Selected Poems 1980-2017 |url=http://re-press.org/books/lionel-fogarty-selected-poems-1980-2017/ |access-date=2022-06-01 |website=re-press.org}}
Eelahroo (Long Ago) Nyah (Looking) Möbö-Möbö (Future) (Vagabond Press, 2014)
Mogwie-Idan: Stories of the Land (Vagabond Press, 2012)
Connection Requital (Vagabond Press, 2010)
Yerrabilela Jimbelung: Poems About Friends and Family, with Yvette Walker{{Cite web |last=Austlit |title=Yvette Walker {{!}} AustLit: Discover Australian Stories |url=https://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/A118841 |access-date=2022-06-01 |website=www.austlit.edu.au |language=en}} and Kargun Fogarty{{Cite web |last=Austlit |title=Kargun Fogarty {{!}} AustLit: Discover Australian Stories |url=https://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/A117572 |access-date=2022-06-01 |website=www.austlit.edu.au |language=en}} (Keeaira Press, 2008)
Minyung Woolah Binnung: What Saying Says (Keeaira Press, 2004)
New and Selected Poems: Munaldjali, Mutuerjaraera (Hyland House, 1995)
Booyooburra: A Tale of the Wakka Murri with illustrations by Sharon Hodgson (Hyland House, 1993)
Jagera (Murri Coo-ee, 1990)
Ngutji (Murri Coo-ee, 1984)
Kudjela (Murri Coo-ee, 1983)
Yoogum Yoogum (Penguin, 1982)
Kargun (Murri Coo-ee, 1980)