Details of a change to the Constitution would have to be agreed by parliament and then presented for a vote in a referendum, which would need to be passed by a majority of voters in a majority of states. Thomas Mayor’s book is part of a strategy directed at convincing Australians to vote for the Statement’s proposals. He presents notes, quotations, and opinions from seventeen Aboriginal people and three Torres Strait Islanders that are interwoven with his own extensive commentary. All views are in agreement with Mayor that the Uluru Statement is compelling and should be embraced in light of the legacies of colonialism.

The author is an engaging writer and his first-person account includes his own deeply felt sense of injustices evident from the experiences of Indigenous people. The information about this history emerges either from the personal convictions of the author or from the stories he chose to present in his book. Readers sympathetic to the cause of Indigenous rights will likely find this approach unproblematic; those who are undecided may well prefer supportive references particularly for confronting assertions. Two examples. A deceased Yolŋu man in Arnhem Land is said to have been ‘hunted by a white man, with a lawful direction to kill him’, yet there is no information that might assist the reader to understand how or why this could have occurred. It ‘has been estimated’ that 50,000 Aboriginal children were historically excluded from attending schools in New South Wales, but the reader has no help to know the basis for such an estimate or its reliability.

Thomas Mayor (photograph via IndigenousX)

Mayor explains his work history as a wharfie and then a full-time official with the Maritime Union of Australia and his long commitment to workers’ rights. The MUA supported his travels around the country carrying and showing the Uluru Statement canvas to Indigenous communities and others. The author’s political convictions are given full expression as he recounts powerful stories from interviewees who explain their own activism as often inherited from parents, grandparents, and other family members who have inspiringly fought for Indigenous rights. One of the admirable aspects of the book is its explication of the centrality of family relationships to Indigenous life and the strong sense of collective spiritual connections to Country.

Also impressive is the author’s refusal to mask disputation among Indigenous people regarding the issues addressed in the Uluru Statement. As was noted in the media at the time, some delegates from New South Wales and Victoria left the convention, as they opposed its aspirations to work with government and suspected a conspiracy. While this was a small minority of attendees, they had loud voices, and seemingly were not impressed with the convention’s assemblage of a group described by the author as having ‘unprecedented cultural authority’. The implications of such disagreement for a future functioning voice to parliament might have been more thoroughly addressed, as might have been the extent of a conservative political position among some Indigenous individuals that may not favour the vision of the Uluru Statement. The author does not, however, shirk the responsibility of reporting intergenerational tensions and allegations arising from different histories among Indigenous groups and individuals.

Finding the Heart of the Nation gives expression to Mayor’s own strong voice and life experiences. Of Torres Strait Islander ancestry through his father, he grew up distant from his traditional Country in what he is careful to acknowledge as Larrakia tribal land in Darwin. Through his mother, he has Polish Jewish and English ancestry, as well as Philippine and Borneo Dayak forebears through paternal great-grandfathers. The author’s primary identity does not focus on his non-Indigenous forebears. It is the Torres Strait side of his family that infuses his commitment to the Uluru Statement. He describes the convention welcome ceremony at Mutitjulu as ‘the spiritual highlight of my life’. Those interviewed throughout the book similarly may mention their non-Indigenous ancestry – English, Irish, Scottish, Afghan, Chinese, and so on – but it is their inherited Indigenous language affiliations that feature in their stated identities. This is not incommensurate with interviewees’ positive embrace of aspects of non-Indigenous society, including ‘values’ from ‘a Christian foundation’ in north Queensland, efforts in running a mining company in Arnhem Land, and Mayor’s own fundamental commitment to the trade union movement.

The author’s conversational style gives readers a feeling for the informality and intimacies of his working relationships with interviewees, many of whom were already known to him, either because they had attended the Uluru convention or were fellow activists. Mundane details of Mayor’s travels engagingly supplement the big topics discussed. He sits with an interlocutor on plastic chairs in the shade of a tree, leans against a vehicle talking while watching a football game, and enjoys a ferry ride to Bruny Island being ‘blown by a stiff salty breeze’. The author’s impressions, at times speculative, lend literary licence to the prose: ‘I sensed that what she was about to say was rarely shared, often hidden in her heart’; an interviewee’s eyes were ‘like windows to a place full of sun, river sand and beautiful Arrernte flora and fauna’; ‘I’m sure he knew what I was feeling – an overwhelming pride and connection with my island home that I had yearned for my entire life’. Such poetic commentary facilitates a lively story, even if it is not always clear where the interviewee’s voice becomes transposed with the author’s rich interpretations.

The book’s motif, with its spectacular cover image, is finding ‘the heart of the nation’, symbolised by Uluru as the geographic ‘heart’ of the continent. Those without Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander ancestry are not included among the interviewees, but the journey towards ‘voice, treaty and truth’ is presented as an urgent goal for all. Surely the invitation ‘to join us’, ‘to walk with us’, will be persuasive for many, whether those whose forebears have been in Australia for generations or more recently arrived migrants. The message, however, is not without complication. Describing federal parliament as occupying ‘a hill that was stolen from the Ngunnawal people’ will stoke discomfort and uncertainty for some, and risk resentment among Australians who remain proud of the history of European settlement.

The message of inclusiveness which is present in parts of Mayor’s book is important: ‘we can only find the heart of the nation together’. Unavoidably this invitation also sits alongside repeated renditions of negative and at times brutal experiences suffered among Indigenous forebears. On the one hand, a senior Yolngu man is quoted as saying that ‘our ancestors’ we sing to ‘are your ancestors too’, but we also encounter the categorical distinction between those with Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander ancestry and others who are envisaged as remaining always ‘non-Indigenous’. Indeed, a sharp difference is implied between ‘modern times’ and ‘the old ways’, the latter presented as ‘the most peaceful culture with unsurpassed longevity’ and ‘a model of harmonious coexistence’, these propositions risking romanticisation that ignores the flaws and discontinuities exhibited by all societies over time.

Finding the Heart of the Nation deserves to be read widely and the issues it raises addressed across the diverse sectors of Australian society. The energy with which the author has propounded his commitment to Indigenous rights and advancement is impressive. Further details as to how improved life outcomes for Indigenous people will arise from the Uluru Statement proposals will doubtless remain a key issue for ongoing debate. The book is indeed, as the author posits, ‘a live political document’ and a ‘call to action’ for those who share a commitment to the resolution of colonialism’s legacies across Australia.