Our Story

Borderlands  is a literary journal showcasing storytelling by Northern Territory and First Nations storytellers. It was founded in 2018 by Dr Glenn Morrison, Dr Raelke Grimmer and Dr Adelle Sefton-Rowston, eighteen years after the journal’s predecessor, Northern Perspectives, ceased publishing in 2000.  

The people and places of Australia’s Centre and North are of great interest to many Australians, and often shape the way we are represented and perceived globally.

They also hold a cherished and historically significant place in Australian literature, for example, ideas of sprawling space, isolation, and that Australia has a ‘spiritual heart’, are all given voice in the Northern Territory.

And the Territory is culturally diverse: One quarter of its population is Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander and an equal portion are born overseas.

Such diversity combined with the Territory’s isolation from the rest of the nation, and its close proximity to Asia, contributes to a unique lifestyle and an unparalleled set of challenges.

The stories of the Territory, it is often said, are among the most important Australia has to tell.

Yet so often they are not widely heard.

Borderlands is  a vibrant storytelling portal where the Territory’s diverse ‘ideas and identities’ may readily meet and be heard.