Elfie Shiosaki

Dr Elfie Shiosaki is Noongar and Yawuru academic and storyteller from the southwest region of Australia, leading community education about human rights through her award-winning Indigenous storytelling practices. She is the author of two poetry collections, Homecoming (Magabala Books 2021) and Refugia (Magabala Books 2024), and co-editor of maar bidi: next generation black writing (Magabala Books 2020). She was the Editor of Indigenous Writing at Westerly from 2017 to 2021.

Since completing a PhD in nation-building in 2015, she has consolidated her research into three key areas: histories of advocacy by Indigenous people for rights and self-determination; Indigenous understandings of rights; and the significance of Indigenous storytelling for rights discourses. Engaging with critical Indigenous research methodologies, her contributions to the field have generated new knowledge and decolonial theories about the agencies of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to transform discourses of humanity through cultural diplomacy. Her research has social impact for First Nations people by revitalising Indigenous storytelling practices and supporting health and wellbeing through cultural resilience.