ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses some parallel across and some sites of indigenous intervention with the aim of documenting how they represent decisive shifting emphasis on 'culture'. Such mappings constitute a deliberate 'storying' or 're-storying' of indigenous sovereignty. Carpentaria is the land of the untouched: an Indigenous sovereignty of the imagination. In working to 're-story sovereignty', both Wright and Thornton differently revisit the resourcefulness and continuing mobility of indigenous cultural strategies precisely in order, as Wright has it, to help 'grow the land', to mobilize further investment in the health and well-being of its people. For Jeff Corntassel, 'sustainable self-determination' must become a 'benchmark for the restoration of indigenous livelihoods and territories' and for future political agitation. 'Indigenous self-determination', as Corntassel argues, 'is more than a political/legal struggle; at its core are spiritual and relational responsibilities that are continuously renewed'. Alexis Wright's Carpentaria and Thornton's Samson and Delilah interrogate questions of responsibility.
