ABSTRACT
Figure 14.3 shows that 50 per cent of fibre arts come from the outstation community of Weemol, even though the art from this community comprises less than 9 per cent of the database of Smith’s study. A dialectical relationship between structure and social action can be perceived here in the fact that people who are interested in distinctly Aboriginal ways of living are attracted to the structures that exist in outstation communities. The social actions of these people, including their decisions relating to art production, tend in turn to reinforce the customarily oriented aspects of those structures. The emphasis on fibre arts at Weemol is the practical manifestation of this process. Further, the production of these art forms tends to strengthen the indigenous values of the communities in which they are produced, not least because they are the visual manifestation of these values.
