Book chat, Kim Scott

Kim Scott named a State Cultural Treasure

kimbofo

Congratulations to Australian writer Kim Scott who has received a prestigious 2022 State Cultural Treasures Award.

These awards celebrate and honour senior Western Australian artists and organisations who have made outstanding lifelong contributions to their art form and community.

Only 38 people have ever received one of these awards, which were established in 1998 (and known as State Living Treasures Awards) and subsequently awarded in 2004 and 2015.

Scott is a descendant of the Wirlomin Noongar people and wrote his first novel, ‘True Country‘ while he was teaching in Kalumburu, the northernmost settlement in Western Australia, with his wife.

His second novel, ‘Benang: From the Heart’, won the Western Australian Premier’s Literary Award and the Miles Franklin Literary Award, making him the first Aboriginal author to win it.

He won a second Miles Franklin Literary Award with ‘That Deadman Dance’. This novel also earned him the prestigious South-East Asia and Pacific Commonwealth Writers’ Prize.

He has dedicated himself to reclaiming Noongar culture and language.

He was named the inaugural Western Australian of the Year in 2012 and was inducted into the Western Australian Writers Hall of Fame in 2020. He is currently a senior academic at Curtin University of Technology

You can find out more about the awards, and the other recipients, on the official website.

Published by kimbofo

I am a book obsessive who has been charting my reading life online since the early 2000s. I review modern and contemporary literature, mainly from Australia and Ireland, but with a nod to other regions of the world, too.

21 thoughts on “Kim Scott named a State Cultural Treasure”

    1. Agreed! Did I tell you I bumped into him at the Orient Hotel in Freo when I was leaving David Whish-Wilson’s book launch back in April? I had a fan girl moment and told him how much I loved Benang and he said I must be a very thoughtful reader because not many other people liked it! He was a very gracious man because I kind of accosted him and was rather excitable because I couldn’t believe it was him. Also: he is tiny.

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    1. Kim Scott is one of Australia’s most important writers. His novels have taught me so much about Aboriginal culture and dispossession, so much so that when I went on a full day’s Cultural Awareness training earlier this week I felt like I knew considerably more than my colleagues when it came to all the horrible things Australia had done to First Nations people because I had learned so much from Kim Scott’s novels. These things are not taught in schools.

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      1. I’ll follow this up. It sounds as if Australia is having the same kind of split between those who believe our history needs to be re-evaluated and contextualised, and those who believe it’s both unpatriotic and ‘woke’ (a term of abuse, apparently) to do so.

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    1. There were other recipients too, including Ernie Dingo. The full list is:

      Kim Scott | Writing
      Helen Matthews | Music
      Helicopter Tjungurrayi | Visual Arts
      Nannup Music Festival | Community Impact — Organisation
      Chris Hill | Design
      Terri Charlesworth OAM | Dance
      Ernie Dingo AM | Theatre and Film
      Wayne Jowandi Barker | Community Impact — Individual

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