Musgrave Ranges is a

mountain range A mountain range or hill range is a series of mountains or hills arranged in a line and connected by high ground. A mountain system or mountain belt is a group of mountain ranges with similarity in form, structure, and alignment that have aris ...

Central Australia Central Australia, also sometimes referred to as the Red Centre, is an inexactly defined region associated with the geographic centre of Australia. In its narrowest sense it describes a region that is limited to the town of Alice Springs and ...

, straddling the boundary of

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories by area, which in ...

( Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara) and the

Northern Territory The Northern Territory (abbreviated as NT; known formally as the Northern Territory of Australia and informally as the Territory) is an states and territories of Australia, Australian internal territory in the central and central-northern regi ...

( MacDonnell Shire), extending into

Western Australia Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...

. It is between the Great Victoria Desert to the south and the Gibson Desert to the north. They have a length of and many peaks that have a height of more than , the highest being Ngarutjaranya at .

Inhabitants

They were originally inhabited by the indigenous Yankunytjatjara people. The English explorer William Gosse and his team were the first Europeans to visit the region in the 1870s. Gosse named the mountains after Anthony Musgrave, then

Governor of South Australia The governor of South Australia is the representative in South Australia of the monarch, currently King Charles III. The governor performs the same constitutional and ceremonial functions at the state level as does the governor-general of Aust ...

. At the start of the 20th century, Yankunytjatjara people began migrating east, and groups of Pitjantjatjara moved into the Musgrave region from the west. Today, the majority of the families in the communities of Amata and Kaltjiti identify as Pitjantjatjara. In a historic decision freehold title to the South Australian portion of the Musgrave Ranges was granted to the Pitjantjatjara people by virtue of the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Land Rights Act 1981.

Mineral exploration

In order to combat unemployment, the Pitjantjatjara Elders seek to develop employment and opportunity within the Pitjantjatjara Lands.

Mineral In geology and mineralogy, a mineral or mineral species is, broadly speaking, a solid substance with a fairly well-defined chemical composition and a specific crystal structure that occurs naturally in pure form.John P. Rafferty, ed. (2011): Mi ...

exploration Exploration is the process of exploring, an activity which has some Expectation (epistemic), expectation of Discovery (observation), discovery. Organised exploration is largely a human activity, but exploratory activity is common to most organis ...

companies in particular have been keen to discuss possible business alliances with the Pitjantjatjara people because in addition to being a highly prospective region ( platinum group elements,

gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

uranium Uranium is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Ura ...

copper Copper is a chemical element; it has symbol Cu (from Latin ) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orang ...

silver Silver is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Ag () and atomic number 47. A soft, whitish-gray, lustrous transition metal, it exhibits the highest electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, and reflectivity of any metal. ...

, possibly oil), the region represents the largest freehold Aboriginal province in Australia and has had no modern mineral exploration techniques applied since the Land Rights Act of 1981.

References

{{reflist Mountain ranges of South Australia Mountain ranges of Western Australia Mountain ranges of the Northern Territory Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Pitjantjatjara

Inhabitants

Mineral exploration

See also

References