Editing Didgeridoo (section)

==Cultural significance==
[[File:Australia Aboriginal Culture 009.jpg|thumb|upright|An Indigenous Australian man playing a didgeridoo]]
[[File:Reticulated Didjeridoo 2015.jpg|thumb|upright|Musician playing a travel or reticulated didgeridoo]]
Traditionally, the didgeridoo was played as an accompaniment to ceremonial dancing and singing and for solo or recreational purposes. For Aboriginal peoples of northern Australia, the yidaki is still used to accompany singers and dancers in [[Aboriginal Australian ceremony|cultural ceremonies]]. For the Yolngu people, the yidaki is part of their whole physical and cultural landscape and environment, comprising the people and spirit beings which belong to their country, [[Aboriginal kinship|kinship system]] and the [[Yolngu Matha language]]. It is connected to Yolngu Law and underpinned by ceremony, in song, dance, visual art and stories.<ref name=nicholls/>

Pair sticks, sometimes called [[clapstick]]s (''bilma'' or ''bimla'' by some traditional groups),<ref name="UniMelbourne">{{cite web |title=Clapsticks: Teaching with Unique Objects |url=https://library.unimelb.edu.au/teachingobjects/objects/clapsticks |website=University of Melbourne: Teaching with Unique Collections |date=21 June 2017 |access-date=24 July 2019 |ref=UniMelbourne}}</ref> establish the beat for the songs during ceremonies. The rhythm of the didgeridoo and the beat of the clapsticks are precise, and these patterns have been handed down for many generations. In the [[Wangga]] genre, the song-man starts with vocals and then introduces ''bilma'' to the accompaniment of didgeridoo.<ref name="Elkin">{{Cite book
| author-link= A. P. Elkin
| first = A. P. | last= Elkin
| orig-year= 1938 | year = 1979
| title=The Australian Aborigines
| publisher=Angus & Robertson
| place= Sydney | page =290
|isbn=0-207-13863-X
|url=http://www.manikay.com/didjeridu/styles.shtml}}</ref>

===Sex-based traditional prohibition debate===
Traditionally, only men play the didgeridoo and sing during ceremonial occasions; playing by women is sometimes discouraged by Aboriginal communities and elders. In 2008, publisher [[HarperCollins]] apologised for its book ''The Daring Book for Girls'', which openly encouraged girls to play the instrument, after Aboriginal academic Mark Rose described such encouragement as "extreme cultural insensitivity" and "an extreme faux pas{{nbsp}}... part of a general ignorance that mainstream Australia has about Aboriginal culture."<ref name="PBP">{{cite book|title =The Didjeridu: From Arnhemland to Internet|publisher =Perfect Beat Publishers|pages =[https://archive.org/details/didjeridufromarn0000unse/page/89 89–98]|isbn =1-86462-003-X|editor-first =Karl|editor-last =Neuenfeldt|date =1997|url =https://archive.org/details/didjeridufromarn0000unse/page/89}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7595515.stm|title=Didgeridoo book upsets Aborigines|date=3 September 2008|access-date=21 April 2021|website=News.bbc.co.uk}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/daring-book-for-girls-breaks-didgeridoo-taboo-in-australia-917751.html|title='Daring Book for Girls' breaks didgeridoo taboo in Australia|date=23 October 2011|newspaper=[[The Independent]]|access-date=21 April 2021}}</ref> However, [[Linda Barwick]], an [[Ethnomusicology|ethnomusicologist]], said that though traditionally women have not played the didgeridoo in ceremony, in informal situations there is no prohibition in the [[the Dreaming|Dreaming Law]].<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.bushcrafts.com.au/Info_pages/Can_women_play_didgeridoo.html |title=Women can play didgeridoo – taboo incites sales |access-date=25 May 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070604181534/http://www.bushcrafts.com.au/Info_pages/Can_women_play_didgeridoo.html |archive-date=4 June 2007 |url-status=dead}}</ref> For example, in 1966, ethnomusicologist [[Alice Marshall Moyle]] made a recording in Borroloola of Jemima Wimalu, a Mara woman from the Roper River, proficiently playing the didgeridoo.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Moyle |first1=Alice M. |date=|title=Aboriginal Sound Instruments |publisher=Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies |pages=18–19 |citeseerx=10.1.1.370.505 }}</ref>  In 1995, musicologist Steve Knopoff observed Yirrkala women performing ''djatpangarri'' songs that are traditionally performed by men and in 1996, ethnomusicologist Elizabeth MacKinley reported women of the Yanyuwa group giving public performances.

Although there is no prohibition in the area of the didgeridoo's origin, such restrictions have been applied by other Indigenous communities. The didgeridoo was introduced to the [[Kimberley (Western Australia)|Kimberleys]] in the early 20th century but it was only much later, such as in Rose's 2008 criticism of ''The Daring Book for Girls'', that Aboriginal men showed adverse reactions to women playing the instrument and prohibitions are especially evident in the South East of Australia. The belief that women are prohibited from playing is widespread among non-Aboriginal people and is also common among Aboriginal communities in Southern Australia; some ethnomusicologists believe that the dissemination of the [[taboo]] belief and other misconceptions is a result of commercial agendas and marketing. The majority of commercial didgeridoo recordings available are distributed by multinational recording companies and feature non-Aboriginal people playing a [[New Age]] style of music with [[liner notes]] promoting the instrument's spirituality which misleads consumers about the didgeridoo's secular role in traditional Aboriginal culture.<ref name="PBP"/>

The taboo is particularly strong among many Aboriginal groups in the South East of Australia, where it is forbidden and considered "cultural theft" for non-Aboriginal women, and especially performers of New Age music regardless of sex, to play or even touch a didgeridoo.<ref name="PBP"/>