What’s the weather story? Both-ways learning in Indigenous-led climate communication workshops in northern Australia

Remote Indigenous communities in northern Australia are experiencing increasingly severe weather hazards due to climate change. Indigenous knowledge practices for weather and climate risk reduction exist alongside Western meteorological and emergency management processes, however cultural and linguistic differences present perennial challenges for communication and understanding between Indigenous communities and the government institutions responsible for keeping people safe. In this paper, we report on our work to create spaces for intercultural engagement on weather, climate, and emergencies, grounded in Indigenous governance and both-ways learning practices. We describe the design and facilitation of two workshops which brought together Indigenous community leaders and government stakeholders to share knowledge and experiences about severe weather, and to discuss better ways of working together to keep people safe. We present these as case studies in the practice of ‘connecting before participation’, and reflect on elements of engagement between Indigenous and non-Indigenous collaborators.