Jeremy Donovan
Indigenous Storyteller & Inspirational Keynote
Jeremy Donovan is a celebrated Aboriginal keynote speaker, performer, and cultural ambassador. A master of the didgeridoo, storyteller, and artist, he inspires audiences on Indigenous identity, youth empowerment, and cultural heritage.
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Jeremy Donovan descends from the Kuku-Yalanji people of far North Queensland and is one of Australia’s most celebrated keynote speakers, performers, and cultural ambassadors. Renowned for his mastery of the didgeridoo and his deep knowledge of Aboriginal culture, Jeremy is recognised as a master storyteller whose performances and presentations inspire, educate, and entertain.
Drawing on his personal experiences and expertise, Jeremy speaks powerfully on Indigenous disparity, identity, and self-empowerment. He is passionate about elevating the lives of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, often stating: “The culture and the wisdom of this country does not belong to us as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island people, it belongs to us as Australians.”
Jeremy has held prominent leadership roles, including National Development Director and spokesperson for Generation One, and served as Chief Executive Officer to advance campaigns addressing Indigenous employment disparity. In 2015, he founded Walking with Wisdom, a consultancy that works with government, corporates, and communities to create meaningful engagement and change.
A gifted artist and musician, Jeremy has exhibited his artwork in solo exhibitions and private collections across the USA, and performed internationally at festivals, corporate events, and cultural ceremonies. He has collaborated with world-class musicians, including System of a Down, King Errisson (Neil Diamond’s percussionist), and orchestras such as the Berlin Philharmonic and Chicago Philharmonic. His performances have taken him to venues including Australia’s Parliament House, the Staples Center in Los Angeles, and major international festivals across the USA, Canada, Europe, Asia, and the UK.
Jeremy is deeply committed to youth development, working in both urban and remote communities to build self-esteem, identity, and resilience. He also shares his expertise in traditional healing, sacred ceremony, and cultural storytelling, ensuring the richness of Aboriginal heritage is celebrated and passed on. For Jeremy, his music, art, and teaching are all forms of connection—to his ancestors, his culture, and the wider world.
Topics
One of Australia’s most celebrated Aboriginal Keynote speakers, Jeremy speaks on a wide range of topics, drawing from personal life experiences to some of the current battles people of today can often face from both sides of his heritage. Full of energy, his words are eloquent, bold and relevant to an audience.
Overcoming Adversity
Having Jeremy share this story with your clients and staff will allow them the opportunity to see the potential in all the many challenges that present themselves through life. This will empower your clients and staff to see how they can meet the challenges of work life on a day to day basis. This is an insight into the personal life of Jeremy Donovan. Jeremy speaks candidly about the struggles with understanding identity, overcoming drugs and alcohol, and his drive to forge a positive path in life. Jeremy’s stories are moving and inspiring as he reveals the steps to ‘Walking Free’.
Eyes Of Judgement
This moving keynote is filled with energy and laughs. Using personal stories of judgement, Jeremy allows audiences to realise how the ‘eyes of judgement, are more often eyes of betrayal’. Jeremy reflects on how our society has become so dependent on how we see people opposed to judging individuals on their truths. This topic is an important insight for all your conference attendees in teaching and sharing acceptance of our constantly changing world.
Traditional Healing and Its Importance in Modern Australia
This keynote will give your attendees something to consider and think about. Through this keynote Jeremy Donovan will speak to audiences about the traditional understanding of healing, and how people misinterpret the word healing for ‘Cure’. Jeremy will allow insights into traditional understanding of how the physical body and the spiritual exist together. Through Jeremy’s majestic weaving of words he brings the realisation of the need to experience these traditions to gain a greater understanding to the land we live.
Healing your Ancestral Wounds
Jeremy Donovan has gained great recognition speaking nationally and internationally on this topic. He reveals how often we only look at pain as a physical form e.g., inflicted from our upbringing, negative relationships. Traditionally The Kuku Yalanji believed that you could inherit pain from genetics that create patterns of behavior that are not taught. These Ancestral wounds are stored memories on a cellular level. Using traditional healing methods of vibration with the Yigi Yigi (Didgeridoo) this vibration can allow us access to the healing of these negative stored wounds.
Understanding Aboriginal Culture Today
This is a topic Jeremy Donovan speaks powerfully on as he brings to life stories of his own experiences living as an Urban Aboriginal still deeply connected to cultural ways. As you listen to Jeremy speak you can feel the pride that Jeremy has in the ancestral history of Australia.
Walk With Wisdom
Jeremy shares something that all Australians share, patriotism and an appreciation of how lucky and beautiful Australia is. Jeremy Speaks of the importance of breaking down the walls of separation that exist between non-Indigenous and Indigenous. “Only when we sit together or walk together will be able to re write the wrongs. Constantly reliving the painful past is walking backwards, we should never forget but we should walk free and forward. While listening to Jeremy speak, you will be taken on a journey that will connect you with the true vibration of Australia. Giving all Australians and people alike a true sense of Australian pride.”
