Darumbal and South Sea Islander activist and journalist Dr Amy McQuire has taken out the $30,000 Queensland Premier's Award for a Work of State Significance for her book 'Black Witness' at the 2025 Queensland Literary Awards.

Dr McQuire told National Indigenous Times she was honoured to see the book recognised in Queensland, given its themes.

"I was really humbled and honoured that Black Witness has been recognised, particularly in the state of Queensland," she said.

"Particularly because a lot of the book critiques the violence of Queensland and specifically the violence of mainstream and imperial media.

"So I think it's really interesting it's been recognised and I just hope that this sort of recognition leads to more journalists in mainstream media potentially reading it."

Dr McQuire noted the work is about how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people should be believed when telling their stories and how mainstream media often falls short with truth-telling.

"It's about acknowledging the fact that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people can and should be believed, particularly when telling their own experiences," she said.

"What we see in the mainstream media is that only a certain narrative is promoted and it's always the story that supports the state.

"Despite its pretences of speaking truth to power, the media actually does the opposite when it comes to black fellas."

The book also aims to encourage younger Indigenous journalists to see pathways beyond mainstream institutions.

"For younger black journalists, it's about showing you don't have to aspire to the imperial media as the end goal," Dr McQuire said.

"There are other ways you can be a journalist... media is totally changing and we've had a huge black media landscape in the past to build upon.

"It's really good to continue working within that space because you aren't compromising within violent institutions."

Other Indigenous writers were also recognised at the awards.

Wiradjuri writer and filmmaker E.M. Crismani won the David Unaipon Award for an Emerging Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander Writer for 'Finding Billy Brown', while Goori and Lebanese writer Mykaela Saunders received a Queensland Writers Fellowship for her project 'Dear Uncle'.

Clare Wright's 'Näku Dhäruk The Bark Petitions: How the People of Yirrkala Changed the Course of Australian Democracy' won the University of Queensland Non-Fiction Book Award.

This year's Queensland Literary Awards presented a total of $261,000 across 11 categories, including fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and published and unpublished work.