The Serpent (or Rainbow Serpent) is a significant and powerful creator being across many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and countries. The Serpent is a creator of geography (hills, gorges, creeks, rivers, and lakes), People, plants and animals and is intricately linked to waterways. The Serpent may even control the local elements, creating wind, rain and storms when needed for the land and Peoples to thrive or to protect them from malicious forces.

Serpent Dreaming is shared through song lines, stories, art, and dance and offers valuable moral and ethical lessons across Australia.
 
The Serpent has many different names and appearances across the numerous Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander groups of Australia, and the sites where the Serpent rests are highly respected and sacred sites. In Western Australia ‘Wagyl’ (Waugal/Waagal) created the waterways of the Noongar People surrounding Perth. In central Australia ‘Wanampi’ is a fierce protector of the waterholes for the Anangu People of the Pitjantjatjara/Yankunytjatjara language groups, and ‘Goorialla’ is the great creator of the land, waterways, People, plants and animals of the Lardil People of Northern Queensland.
 
On the lands and waterways where Serpent Dreaming is strong, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples pay respect to the great creator by acknowledging its presence and letting it know when they are approaching the spaces it inhabits, what their intentions are for their visit, and to ask permission to proceed. Some of these sacred sites are forbidden for people to enter due to their cultural and spiritual significance. Singing to waterways, sharing sweat or rubbing soil on the body are some of the practices used to notify the Serpent of one’s approach.
 
In many traditional stories the Rainbow Serpent is heralded for its ability to shed its skin, renew the land, and create new lifeforms. Sometimes by swallowing humans who may have behaved unethically (or for its own mischievous purposes), then using its blood to transform them into other creatures and plants to sustain and enhance the environment.
 
The Serpent and Serpent Dreaming has been chosen to help illustrate this Framework as it demonstrates the beginning of all things, the creation, transformation, reflections, rebirth, renewal, and nurturing of what is important and sacred, essentially what is ‘core’. The Serpent can change its shape, colours, and dimensions to mould the land, create and recreate spaces for living things to thrive. The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultural and Health Training Framework is designed to ensure the RACGP has embedded the guiding principles within training and education for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples to thrive. This Framework heralds new approaches and will evolve and mature with space and time.