Tingari refers to the Dreaming and its Laws for the Pintupi language group of the Central Western Desert. The Tingari is the Creation era when the Dreamtime Ancestors moved across the lands, creating the features of the landscape and all aspects of the natural world.
The Tingari Ancestors stopped at specific sites on their journey, and the events that occurred at each site as they camped there, gave rise to all the features of the surrounding environment and the animals and plants that are found there. These Creation events have been embodied in the song cycles learned by initiated Pintupi elders, and these long narrative songs provide the Laws and social structures that traditional Pintupi people have lived under. As younger people are initiated into the Law, they are taken through gradual stages of knowledge of traditional matters, which becomes a life-long process.
