Comprehensive and Rich Material

You will be pleased to hear that we now have the drafts from our five research/authors and the material is  comprehensive and rich. It has been a privilege to read it all and it is wonderful raw material for the next stages of the project.

I would like to say a big thank you to the writers and the reference groups from each area for their feedback.

Over the last few months I have been asked by many people what this particular part of the project is about and simply put - imagine it like this:

Imagine you visit a“place” either made by humans or by nature. You can appreciate it for itself and your appreciation is based on your own knowledge. Your own  knowledge is gained for example through experience, education, training, level of initiation, level of imagination or belief.  Every individual has their own lens through which they see things and the depth of seeing or understanding determines their interpretation reflected in the stories they tell about it.

Your stories are what informs us about what you are seeing or have seen.

Now imagine that you are visiting a place with someone else who has a different way of seeing. They know the landscape with a completely different set of “knowings” and as a result guide and enrich your knowledge and experience by the stories they tell. It could be a geologist, an experienced bush walker, an artist, a marine biologist, a conservations or a developer, dreamer, magician or a con man.

The material we have researched and developed in this part of the project can be seen as different layers of knowledge or ways of seeing aspects of the Sapphire Coast as part of Australia’s Coastal Wilderness. That is the layers of stories that weave their way through and underpin the landscape of our key heritage stories - The Meeting of the Waters, In the Shadow of the Mountains, The Killers of Eden, The Bundian Way and Naturally Inspired 

The next step in this process is to develop and identify the tools and techniques to make this information accessible to our visitors and stimulate them to explore more

Editorial Position

The Sapphire Coast Cultural Heritage project is calling for expressions of interest for an experienced editor to edit our iconic stories that are currently being written by experts in each field. This contract position requires a creative and audience focussed approach to suit the tourism market. See below for the target market brief and outline of each story.

Brand Australia experience seeker target market.

These people:

> are experienced international travellers.

> seek out and enjoy authentic personal experiences they can talk about.

> involve themselves in holiday activities, are sociable and enjoy engaging with the locals.

> are active in their pursuits and come away having learnt something.

> are somewhat adventurous and enjoy a variety of experiences on any single trip.

> place high importance on value and hence critically balance benefits with costs.

> place high value on contrasting experiences (i.e. different from their day-to-day lives).

These people typically:

> come from households that have higher than average household income.

> are tertiary educated.

> are open-minded and have an interest in world affairs.

> are selective about their media consumption.

> are opinion leaders within their peer and social groups.

> are not characterised by nationality, preferred holiday style/mode or age.

Our Stories:

Marine Heritage

Cetaceans of the Coastal Wilderness.

Marine Richness – mixing the currents

Historic Heritage

Old Tom and the History of Whaling

Life in the 19^th Century

Geoheritage

The Geology and Landscapes of the Three Mountains

Gondwana Splits – the Geomorphology of the south east coast

Indigenous Heritage

Bundian Way – the ancient highway

Balawan, Mumbula and Gulaga, the Sacred Mountains

Cultural Heritage

Nature, Inspiration and Art

Music and the Coastal Wilderness

Please send your expression of interest and a current CV by April 16th to: stories@sapphirecoast.com.au

Meet Our Authors!

March has been a busy time behind the scenes and we have now contracted our writing team for our iconic stories!

This is an exciting phase of the project that will see all the hard work and research become our first "product" that is now developing from the intangible to the tangible. A big thank you to everyone who has made time to form our working briefs for each story.

We had a great response to the call for writers and are pleased to introduce the following fantastic people assigned to each story:

John Blay - Bundian Way

John has conducted 15 years of research and has written a book about the Bundian Way which is pegged to be published

this year. John also writes material for the Land Council, State Heritage Office, and the Management Committee. John brings extensive knowledge of this subject and we are thrilled that he is onboard to write for our project.

Toni Houston - Meeting of the Waters and Cetaceans of the Coastal Wilderness Heritage of the Sapphire Coast Region.

A professional writer across a broad spectrum of genres for over 20 years. This includes multiple credits in documentary and television, as well as publications and awards. Bringing a strong background in marine research and experience to our project Toni has specialised in marine and natural history subjects for many years. Toni also wrote and directed the film "AQUA".

Angela George - Life in the 19th Century and The Killers of Eden

In addition to a Bachelor of Arts (History/English), a Graduate Diploma of Applied Science (Museum Studies) and a Certificate in Non-Fiction Writing and Publishing, Angela has been involved in the heritage management and interpretation field locally for 20 years, including researching, writing and publishing on various topics.

Dr Anne Marshall - Naturally Inspired (Visual and Performing Arts)

Anne has had an extensive career as a practitioner, educator, facilitator, writer and researcher in theatre and music; visual arts and crafts; arts administration. Specialising in visual and performing arts: history, theory and practice, and comparative cultural studies. Anne was Chair of the South East Arts Region Board (SEAR) until 2008; Chair of the Far South Coast Community College until 2009 (remained on Board); and is on the Indigenous Arts Advisory Board at Bundanon, and a member of AIATSIS (Canberra) and the Indigenous Community Volunteers.

Dr Anne Felton, Geologist - In the Shadow of the Mountains (Gulaga/Dromedary, Mumbulla and Imlay)

The first female Honours Graduate from the ANU Department of Geology, Anne has researched and written a multitude of works for the ANU Geoscience Department, which is the highest rated discipline group in Australia and in the top ten of it's class in the world.

An active board member of the Sapphire Coast Marine Discovery Centre, Anne leads large groups on her Beach Geology Tour on the shores of Twofold Bay. Anne is working with Bruce Leaver on our Geo-story.

Each 6000 word story will be due towards the end of May and then an overall editor will be assigned to the task of maintaining the continuity of tone across all stories. Watch this space....

Author Contracts

After much community consultation, our author briefs are ready to be assigned to contracted writers. We are now in the process of contracting the authors for each of our identified stories and aim to have them assigned to the identified stories within the next two weeks.

If you're a writer and would like to apply, read on...

Below is a reference to each of the identified stories:

The information will be pitched to align with the expectations of an educated, environmentally aware target market, matching the profile of the Brand Australia ‘experience seeker‘

This project will produce succinct (5000 word maximum), high quality and authentic information packages suitable for ready adaption for unlimited usage across signage, printed material, international/national media releases and downloadable packages on the Australia‘s Coastal Wilderness and Sapphire Coast Tourism websites.

The project is lumped into 5 themes, each of which will addressed by an author under the oversight of a community reference group convened by the Heritage Committee:

Marine Heritage

Cetaceans of the Coastal Wilderness.

Marine Richness – mixing the currents

Historic Heritage

Old Tom and the History of Whaling

Life in the 19^th Century

Geoheritage

The Geology and Landscapes of the Three Mountains

Gondwana Splits – the Geomorphology of the south east coast

Indigenous Heritage

Bundian Way – the ancient highway

Balawan, Mumbula and Gulaga, the Sacred Mountains

Cultural Heritage

Nature, Inspiration and Art

Music and the Coastal Wilderness

The authors will undertake research based on the available literature and, where relevant, through consultation with experts and the community holders of information related to the iconic stories in the Heritage Strategy.

If you are interested in writing for this exciting project please email your expression of interest with an outline of your experience and list of published work to: stories@sapphirecoast.com.au
Also, mention which particular story you are most interested in and why.

You can also download our strategy document that is available on this blog.

* We will also be engaging the services of an editor to oversee each story to present the whole project package with clarity and continuity to the target audience.

Arts Group Story Telling Time

Our Cultural Heritage Arts brief is now in circulation amongst the community!

We invite local arts people, visual, performance, film-makers, authors and poets to participate in building this brief that will be given to a contracted author.

Your stories could obviously be history based as outlined but in particular the story you have as an artist living in the region is vital in illustrating the regional arts.

Just a few questions that can shape the type of stories we are looking for:

Why/when did you come to live in the region?

What creative inspiration from the surrounding wilderness influences your work?

How much of the natural environment is reflected in your work?

Where do you exhibit/perform?

Have other local artists inspired your work?

How has living in the region changed you as an artist?

What emotion does the natural surroundings evoke in you?

Are you part of an arts organisation and how long has it been operating?

What sets this region apart from other places that you have worked?

We appreciate you are all busy, but if you could send us your stories/comments over the next week, we can then start the busy task of collating the information to finalise our authors brief. You can email to Andrew Gray: agray@sear.org.au.

We look forward to hearing your stories - the more the merrier!

Festivals and Events: Naturally Inspired

At the first SCT Board meeting for 2012 this week the importance of Local Festivals and Events throughout the Shire was discussed including:  The Bermagui Seaside Fair,  The Cobargo Folk Festival, Sculpture on the Edge, Four Winds Music  Festival, the Merimbula Jazz Festival,  Candelo Village Festival, The Eden Whale Festival were mentioned as well as a number of sporting/ extreme events including the George Bass Surfboat Marathon, The Merimbula Classic, The Tathra Wharf to Waves Swim as well as discussion of a number of other potential  significant events.

It was recognized that all these festivals and events already attract visitors as participants and audiences, most of them are run by dedicated volunteers and nearly all of the festivals and events have the potential for growth.  If you are involved with the organization of a festival or event in the region here are ten questions we would like your input on:

1.     What is the name of your festival or event?

2.     What distinguishes your festival and event from any other festival or event on the eastern sea board ?  

3.     Why do people come ?

4.     Where do they come from and how do they get here ?

5.     How would you like to see your festival grow or developed?

6.     What resources are you aware of in the shire that are available to help you ?

7.     What resources would you like to see developed in the shire to help you?

8.     How can you help ?

9.     What is the economic impact of your festival or event on the local community ?

10. What role do you see for Sapphire Coast Tourism?

Story Briefs taking shape

This week our working group has been moving full steam ahead with the foundation "Story Brief" taking shape for most of our identified stories. Meeting of the Waters and Shadow of the Mountains are well underway with input from the marine, historical and geology members of the group who have actively sought like minded people to contribute to the story.

Well done everyone who has made time for this project over the Christmas break - what a great start to 2012!