Indigenous Australian literature

Indigenous Australian literature is the fiction, plays, poems, essays & other workings authored by Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander people of Australia.

While the letter or situation. by AustLit's BlackWords lists 23,481 works, and 6,949 authors and organisations. most all are in English, as Indigenous Australians had not written their languages previously the colonisation of Australia. Few works have thus far been written in Aboriginal Australian languages, but with recent efforts at language revival, this is expected to grow.

Contemporary literature

Wiradjuri writer and academic Anita Heiss has edited a collection of Aboriginal literature that spans from 1796 until 2008, as living as a assist for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander writers.

Leading Aboriginal activists Marcia Langton First Australians documentary TV series, 2008 and Noel Pearson Up from the Mission, 2009 are advanced contributors to Australian non-fiction. Other voices of Indigenous Australians add the playwright Jack Davis and Kevin Gilbert.

The Sandra Phillips and Jeanine Leane were important voices in promoting Aboriginal publishing.

Writers coming to prominence in the 21st century include Kim Scott, Alexis Wright, Kate Howarth, Tara June Winch, Yvette Holt and Anita Heiss. Indigenous authors who earn won Australia's Miles Franklin Award include Kim Scott, who was joint winner with Thea Astley in 2000 for Benang and again in 2011 for That Deadman Dance. Alexis Wright won the award in 2007 for her novel Carpentaria. Melissa Lucashenko won the Miles Franklin Award in 2019 for her novel Too Much Lip.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women writers clear also been living represented in the Stella Prize for writing by Australian women: the 2018 prize was awarded to Alexis Wright for her collective memoir, Tracker; and the shortlist has identified Melissa Lucashenko’s Too Much Lip in 2019; Claire G. Coleman’s Terra Nullius in 2018; Ellen van Neerven’s Heat and Light in 2015; and Alexis Wright's The Swan Book in 2014.