Roberta "Bobbi" Sykes (16 August 1943 – 14 November 2010) was an Australian poet and author. She was a lifelong campaigner forIndigenous land rights, as well as human rights and women's rights.

Bobbi Sykes
Born	Roberta Sykes (1943-08-16)16 August 1943 Townsville,Australia
Died	14 November 2010(2010-11-14) (aged 67) Sydney, Australia
Occupation	Poet
Nationality	Australian
Alma mater	Harvard Graduate School of Education
Genre	Poetry

Born Roberta Barkley Patterson inTownsville,Queensland, sometime in the 1940s, Sykes was raised by her white mother, Rachel Patterson, and never knew her father. Sykes says in her autobiography that his identity is unknown, and her mother told her a number of different accounts about him; variously that he was Fijian, Papuan, African American, and Native American. The most consistent and plausible version was that he was an African American soldier stationed in Australia during World War II.^[1]

Although she fought hard forAustralian Aboriginal rights, she herself was not of Australian Aboriginal descent. She was sometimes criticised for not correcting the record when others assumed she was Aboriginal.^[1]

Sykes was expelled fromSt Patricks College at age 14 and, after a succession of jobs, including a nurse's assistant at the Townsville General Hospital from 1959 to 1960, she moved toBrisbane and then toSydney in the early to mid-1960s, where she worked as astriptease dancer at the notorious Pink Pussycat Club inKings Cross under thestage name of "Opal Stone".^[2]

She became afreelance journalist and got involved in several national Indigenous activist organisations. She was one of the many protestors arrested at theAboriginal Tent Embassy in July 1972.^[2]

During the 1970s Sykes, along withSue Chilly (also spelt Chilli),^[a]Marcia Langton, andNaomi Mayers, formed the Black Women's Action (BWA) group, which later evolved into theRoberta Sykes Foundation.^[3]

She was involved in the creation and early development of theRedfern Aboriginal Medical Service, theNational Black Theatre inRedfern, and in the setting up ofAboriginal Islander Dance Theatre inGlebe, which later becameNAISDA, which nurturedBangarra Dance Theatre.^{[citation needed]}

Sykes's early poetry was published in 1979 in the bookLove Poems and Other Revolutionary Actions. The first edition was limited to a thousand copies (with the first 300 numbered and signed). A mass-market edition was published in 1988. Her second volume of poetry was published in 1996. In 1981 sheghosted the autobiography ofMum (Shirl) Smith, an Aboriginal Australiansocial worker inNew South Wales.^[4]

She won thePatricia Weickert Black Writers Award in 1981.^[5]

Sykes received a PhD in education fromHarvard University in 1983^[4] or 1984, after Black Women's Action raised funds to cover her expenses to study there in 1979.^[3] She was the first black Australian to graduate from a United States university.^[4][6]

She returned to Australia, where she took over running the BWA.^[3]

She was appointed to theNation Review, as Australia's first (presumed) Indigenous columnist.^{[citation needed]}

In 1994 her role was recognised when awarded theAustralian Human Rights Medal.^[7]

Sykes's three-volume autobiographySnake Dreaming was published between 1997 and 2000.^[1] The first volume wonThe Age Book of the Year 1997 and the 1998Nita Kibble Literary Award for women writers.^[5]

Sykes died in Sydney in November 2010.^[7]

During the 1970s Sykes, along withSue Chilly^[a] (often spelt Chilli; fromBrisbane^[9]),Marcia Langton, andNaomi Mayers, formed theBlack Women's Action (BWA) group, which later evolved into theRoberta Sykes Foundation.^[3]BWA started publishing a monthly community newspaper for Aboriginal people,Koori Bina, also speltKoori-Bina (meaning "black ears";^[10] also translated as "listen up"^[11]).^[3][12][13] Aboriginal journalistJohn Newfong, already established in mainstream media and inaugural editor and principal writer of quarterly magazineIdentity (1971–1982)^[14][15] was also involved.^[16] The paper raised awareness of biased coverage of Indigenous issues in mainstream Australian media, and covered Aboriginal unemployment, health issues, andland rights, but struggled on minimal funding,^[17] relying on donations to keep going. It was later described as a "hard-hitting, staunchly political newspaper". It criticised cuts to funding that affected Aboriginal organisations and theFraser government's plans to dismantleMedibank. Along with other Indigenous publications, it covered stories in detail that were not found, or only superficially covered, in mainstream media, such as Aboriginal housing.^[18]

Students atAboriginal Islander Dance Theatre were taught publishing and writing skills to produce the newspaper, which eventually led to their assuming responsibility for its publication.^[3] The cast ofHere Comes the Nigger byGerry Bostock, which played atBlack Theatre in Redfern in December 1976, were involved in the publication and group.^[19] The journal ran from June 1976 to June 1979,^[12] before running out of funds. A new magazine,AIM (Aboriginal and Islander Message orAboriginal-Islander-Message),^[3][12] took up its format and ran until 1982.^[17] It was more moderate in tone than its predecessor, but did publish political stories challenging government policy, such as the powers given toASIO over Aboriginal campaigners. It also encouraged Indigenous participation and activism.AIM was produced by a group of Aboriginal students, overseen by two mainstream journalists

Langton later wrote that the founders of the paper had been inspired byAbo Call, published in 1938 in Sydney,^[20][21] byJack Patten (co-founder of theAborigines Progressive Association) andPercy Reginald Stephensen.^[22] She also wrote: "the experience of producing those newspapers within a hostile white environment... because it has the power and resources, has historically defined us".^[18][23]

BWA expanded its scope over time, and started funding small enterprises established by Aboriginal women. In 1979 it raised funds to pay for Sykes to study at Harvard University, where she became the first Aboriginal woman to graduate from an American university. It contributed to several other Black women's educational goals, includingNorma Ingram andMaryAnn Bin-Sallik, who both attended Harvard too. BWA played a crucial part in raising public awareness and funds to enableMum Shirl to pay off the mortgage on her house she was in danger of losing, after giving so much to others throughout her life.^[3]

In 1990, Black Women's Action became registered as a tax-deductible entity, changing its name toBlack Women's Action in Education Foundation (BWAEF) to reflect the change. Langton, Rob Bryant (later co-founder ofBangarra),Jackie Huggins, Jilpia Jones,Brian Syron and Lili Tuwai becametrustees of the foundation. Funds to assist Aboriginal students to achieve goals were raised mainly through small individual donations and community fundraising events.^[3]

In 2003 Sykes became ill and participated less in BWAEF activities, but the foundation continued its work until around 2006, when there was an hiatus for a few years.^[3]

In late 2008, Sykes asked Danny Gilbert to revive the foundation, and Gilbert suggested a change of name to the Roberta Sykes Indigenous Education Foundation (RSIEF). In 2010, Peter Waters (chair), Jilpia Jones, Shireen Malamoo, Mark McMillan, Richard Potok and Nicole Watson were appointed as trustees, with Potok also taking the role of executive director. RSIEF has continues Sykes' work, supporting a number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students to undertaking postgraduate study overseas. It also runs a program ofbursaries to support short course overseas study.^[3]

• 1981:Patricia Weickert Black Writers Award^[5]
• 1994:Australian Human Rights Medal^[5]
• 1997:Age Book of the Year forSnake Cradle^[5]
• 1998:National Biography Award forSnake Cradle^[5]
• 1998:Nita B. Kibble Literary Award forSnake Cradle^[5]

• Love Poems and other Revolutionary Actions (Cammeray: The Saturday Centre, 1979)
• Mum Shirl: An Autobiography (with Colleen Shirley Perry) (Melbourne, 1981)
• Love Poems and other Revolutionary Actions (St. Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1989)ISBN 0-7022-2173-2
• Eclipse (Queensland, Australia: Univ of Queensland Press, 1996)ISBN 0-7022-2848-6
• Incentive, Achievement and Community (Sydney: Sydney University Press, 1986)
• Black Majority (Hawthorn, Australia: Hudson, 1989)ISBN 0-949873-25-X
• Murawina: Australian Women of High Achievement (Sydney: Doubleday, 1993)ISBN 0-86824-436-8
• Snake Cradle (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1997)ISBN 1-86448-513-2
• Snake Dancing (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1998)ISBN 1-86448-513-2
• Snake Circle (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2000)ISBN 1-86508-335-6

• China, Corey."Allegations, Secrets, and Silence: Perspectives on the controversy of Roberta Sykes and the Snake Dreaming Series"(PDF). Archived fromthe original(PDF) on 30 September 2011.