Jasmin Stewart details the family pride behind Port’s AFLW Indigenous guernsey
The jumper which Port Adelaide will wear during Indigenous Round over the next fortnight is steeped in family pride and meaning for Jasmin Stewart. And a hint of some club glory.
Jasmin Stewart expects to get a little choked up when she runs out in the AFLW First Nations guernsey she has designed.
The jumper, which Port Adelaide (Yartapuulti) will wear during Indigenous Round over the next fortnight, is steeped in family pride and meaning.
Stewart took inspiration from the artwork of her late grandfather, recreating it with his totem, the snake, central to the story.
“I really wanted to acknowledge him in it,” Stewart said of the guernsey, which had a layout based on the club’s 2004 AFL premiership jumper.
“This has brought his art back to life in a way.
“It’s really sentimental.
“I think I’ll be a bit teary wearing it.”
Stewart, a Jaru woman, has prided herself on her culture from a young age.
But having been born in Perth and spent much of her childhood between rural West Australian towns due to her mum’s work as a teacher, it took until the midfielder was a teenager to really delve into her Aboriginality and connect with her extended family in the Kimberleys.
Her great-grandmother Daisy was a member of the Stolen Generation, forcibly removed from her mum at the age of two.
Daisy, who grew up in Halls Creek in northern WA and was now in her 80s living in Broome, continued to inspire the 25-year-old.
“I really look up to her and her strength,” Stewart said of her great-grandmother, who had 11 children.
“It’s scary to think of what she went through … but her outlook on life is amazing.
“It’s been really empowering for me to learn more about my family history, where I’ve come from and what my family’s been through.”
Stewart’s visits over the past decade to Halls Creek are special – “it sort of feels like you’re home”.
Her guernsey depicts the area through ripples representing her great-grandmother’s birthplace, Caroline Pool, and the Kimberley ranges, which are incorporated in many of her grandfather’s paintings.
In the bottom corner is a meeting place and his signature, also taken from his artwork.
“The snake represents him but in Indigenous culture the snake has a lot of meaning behind it, a lot of Dreamtime stories,” said Stewart, whose grandfather died when she was young.
“The snake also kind of means rebirth, so I like the idea of it being on there representing our women’s program and how it’s given the club new life.”
Symbols of 11 people – her nan’s children – are on the snake, in a nod to how her grandfather’s brothers and sisters are always with him.
Inside the guernsey’s collar are the words Ngadlu Yartapuulti, meaning We are Port Adelaide in Kaurna language.
Kaurna country is acknowledged by Adelaide’s hills being on the black background.
Stewart and her mob are very proud of the design.
“It’s a huge privilege to be able to represent my family and my culture,” she said.
Port Adelaide will be known as Yartapuulti during Indigenous Round in matches against Gold Coast (away) and GWS (home).
Stewart’s side sits eighth on the ladder and will play finals for the first time if it wins its remaining games.
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