Pormpuraaw
- Location:
- Western Cape York, 680 km from Cairns. Roads are always closed during the wet season.
- Area:
- 4,455.8 square km (includes 13 homeland outstations occupied on a part-time basis).
- Population:
- 653 - the Thaayorre and Mungkan peoples.
- Language:
- Pormpuraaw people are rightly proud of the strength of their language and culture. Many Pormpuraaw children speak a local Aboriginal language as their first language. The Thaayorre people mainly speak Kuuk Thaayorre and related dialects, the Mungkan people speak a variety of Kugu or Wik languages.
History of settlement
Superintendent J.W. Chapman established Pormpuraaw as an Anglican Mission in 1938. Many of the previously dispersed peoples from the surrounding lands came to live in the new mission settlement. It remained Edward River Mission until 1967 when the Anglican Church handed the administration of the community to the Queensland Government. In 1986 the community council assumed local government responsibilities and acquired Title of the Trust area by way of Deed of Grant in Trust. In 1987 the community changed its name to Pormpuraaw taken from the local dreamtime story about a burnt hut or Pormpur in Kuuk Thaayorre language of the traditional owners.
Pormpuraaw’s community services include primary health care centre, child care centre, women’s shelter, home and community care service, arts centre and primary school. A justice centre, built in 2002, provides the venue for monthly magistrate courts. A local Justice of the Peace presides monthly over council by-law offences. The Pormpuraaw Police Station has two full-time Queensland Police Officers, with another two to be appointed, and six community police officers. Pormpuraaw State School has an ‘Adopt-a-Cop’ program with one police officer regularly visiting the school and talking to the kids about safety and the law. State Government funding also supports the provision of drug and alcohol programs, youth leadership development, family support, child care, a women’s shelter and healing centre.
Many traditional arts and crafts are practiced, such as weaving of baskets and dilly bags from cabbage palm leaves, painting, spear and boomerang carving. Visitors can purchase these art works at the Pormpuraaw Arts and Cultural Centre.
Last updated: 15 July 2008.