A groundbreaking new collection of essays which transforms the narrative of what First Nations writing can look like has been released.

Edited by Jeanine Leane and Ellen van Neerven, Shapeshifting is a collection of lyric nonfiction essays by a series of leading Indigenous writers that seeks to challenge Western expectations of First Nations narratives as well as elevate First Nations cultural styles of storytelling.

"The essays in this anthology challenge, change, rework, reinterpret and rearrange colonial structures and institutions," the two said in the introduction.

"The essays challenge stereotypes and misperceptions of First Nations identities and cultures and debunk long-held assimilationist narratives that First Nations people in the twenty-first century have lost connections to, and are out of touch with, the intergenerational histories and stories of our ancestors and Elders, in pre- and continuing colonial structures.

"Shapeshifting presents a new genre of writing that is taking shape and being shaped by First Nations Australian writers: a body of writing that is formed, informed and re-formed by us."

The collection brings to the fore a new and groundbreaking genre of writing that is waiting to take shape and be formed, informed, and re-formed by Indigenous writers.

Contributors to Shapeshifting include Jennifer Kemarre Martiniello, Natalie Harkin, Timmah Ball, Daniel Browning, Alison Whittaker, Charmaine Papertalk Green, Melanie Saward, Rhianna Patrick, Hugo Comisari, Mykaela Saunders, Evelyn Araluen, Neika Lehman and Jim Everett/puralia meenamatta.

Both Leane and van Neerven have a history of writing excellence and pushing the boundaries of literary expertise.

Leane, a Wiradjuri poet and academic from southwest NSW, has been published widely in Aboriginal literature, writing otherness and creative nonfiction.

Her first volume of poetry, Dark Secrets After Dreaming: A.D. 1887–1961, took home the Scanlon Prize for Indigenous Poetry, whilst her first novel, Purple Threads, won the David Unaipon Award.

In 2023, she won the David Harold Tribe Award for Poetry, Australia's richest poetry prize, and is the poetry editor for Meanjin.

van Neerven, an award-winning writer of Mununjali Yugambeh and Dutch heritage, saw their first book, Heat and Light, win the David Unaipon Award, the Dobbie Literary Award, and the NSW Premier's Literary Awards Indigenous Writers' Prize.

Their poetry collection Throat won the Kenneth Slessor Prize, the Multicultural NSW Award and Book of the Year in the NSW Premier's Literary Awards, whilst their latest book, Personal Score: Sport, Culture, Identity, won the Victorian Premier's Literary Award for Non-fiction in 2024.

The two say Shapeshifting will shift the paradigm and shape of the Australian literary landscape as well as "the ways in which the whole genre of nonfiction and its craft and construction is considered and expanded into the future".

"To date, we have been largely framed in the national-settler consciousness through what is referred to and revered as western research," they said.

"A frame is a restricting space to be in. The very shape of a frame means rigid boundaries and a designated limited space to move within its borders."

The editors argue the voices in Shapeshifting "reject and resist the narrowness of shape and space".

"The voices within defy the narrow definition of nonfiction and in doing so defy much of the western research that has 'informed' the settler public of First Nations peoples to date."

Shapeshifting is out now through UQP.

The launch will be held at Readings Carlton in Naarm on Thursday October 10, featuring Jennifer Kemarre Martiniello, Evelyn Araluen, and Neika Lehman in conversation with Jeanine Leane.

Bookings are free, but registration is essential.