Historian Professor Jackie Huggins Honoured for Lifelong Commitment to Truth-Telling

BRISBANE — On Wednesday, 8 July 2026, the spotlight for NAIDOC Week turned to the life and legacy of Professor Jackie Huggins, a Bidjara and Birri Gubba Juru woman who has spent nearly 50 years championing Indigenous rights and history. Appearing on the ABC Radio Australia program Sistas Let’s Talk, Huggins reflected on her storied career as one of Australia’s first Indigenous historians. Presenter Natasha Meten noted that while the program typically focuses on women across the Pacific, this special broadcast celebrated Huggins for her role as an author and advocate. Having joined the reconciliation movement in the 1970s, Huggins has served in high-level leadership roles, including on the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation and as the co-chair of Reconciliation Australia. Huggins shared that her passion for truth-telling began in the classroom, where she noticed the “absolute eradication” of First Nations culture and history from the curriculum. She told the program she often questioned why the stories of her people’s resistance and connection to the land were omitted. This thirst for knowledge led her to document the history that had been overlooked by modern Australian education. During the interview, Huggins also spoke of her family’s diverse experiences under colonial policies. Her mother, from Carnarvon Gorge, was forcibly removed to the Cherbourg Aboriginal Mission in the 1920s, while her father lived as a free man in North Queensland. Despite the early loss of her father when she was just two years old, Huggins credited her mother for raising her and her three siblings with strength and pride. NAIDOC Week continues to serve as a period for reflecting on reconciliation and celebrating the achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. For Huggins, the pursuit of truth-telling remains a central pillar of that journey.