Due to the COVID-19 restrictions we have regretfully decided to postpone this event and our other large events in April. We hope to reschedule later in the year.

Those who have already booked will receive a full refund.

Twenty years ago I wrote a book that documented a journey I had been on for over a decade. The book was A Little Bird Told: Family Secrets, Necessary Lives. This book represented a journey of discovery where I located my Aboriginal ancestors and answered a number of questions that had dogged my family for generations. Along the way, I discovered a story of secrets and lies, of madness, and refuge.  In this talk, I will reflect on this book nearly 20 years later with a focus on the importance of women as the keepers and tellers of family stories. In so doing I will consider the reasons why I wrote the book, what impact it had at the time and its ongoing influence. I hope that these reflections might have something to say to other family historians. I want to question whether there are there some family secrets and necessary lies that should never be told?

Professor Lynette Russell AM is an award-winning historian and Indigenous studies scholar. In 2020 she is taking up an Australian Research Council’s Laureate Fellowship to examine Global Encounters and First Nations People: 1000 Years of Australian History.