In short:

The remote Aboriginal community of Djarindjin has celebrated official recognition as a community through the West Australian government.

The community has been advocating for the change since it was founded in 1985.

What's next?

Community leaders hope the recognition will lead to the creation of by-laws and eventual ownership over their land.

After decades of advocacy, residents in Djarindjin are celebrating official recognition as a community from the West Australian government. 

The former Catholic mission, about 2,200 kilometres north of Perth, has been in its modern incarnation since 1985 when it split from the church.

But formal recognition has taken an additional 40 years.

Celebrations drew dozens of families and children to the town's basketball court on Tuesday, with state government representatives on hand to mark the milestone.

Community chairman Brian Lee said the community had existed "in name only" for too long.

"We've been seen as a community but legally we never existed as a community until this proclamation has come through for us," he said.

"Today is something that we can be proud of as a community and as a board of directors ... we've achieved something."

Health Minister Amber-Jade Sanderson said the change was much more than a political ruling.

"The proclamation of this community is so much more than a legal document," she said.

"It's the realisation of the community's own decisions and determination and the direction that the community wants to go in and to take itself."

Ms Sanderson acknowledged the community's years of "heartache, heartbreak and challenges" in order to reach the point of recognition.

She said the government remained committed to self-determination and reconciliation despite the failure of the Voice to Parliament referendum.

Major step forward

Djarindjin Aboriginal Corporation chief executive Nathan McIvor said the recognition was deeply symbolic but still carried huge weight.

"If you're not a recognised people and you don't have an identity under the system that controls you as a people, then you really don't have any way forward," he said.

"Just a piece of paper that's been signed by the government stating they've now been recognised as a community, I think, is a massive thing."

Mr McIvor said the lack of recognition had previously made it challenging for the community to work toward taking their land back or creating their own by-laws.

Community land has been held under the Aboriginal Lands Trust (ALT), which involved the state government holding, using and managing that land for the benefit of persons of Aboriginal descent.

The state government committed two years ago to divesting ALT land back to communities.

But the process has been slow and complex.

"When you don't have [land] tenure, you don't have control over your destiny," Mr McIvor said.

"We can now move into the next area that we can work towards, which is getting the [Indigenous Land Use Agreement] and then the by-laws, and then we can start looking at land tenure."

'For the younger generation'

Bardi Jawi elder Bernadette Angus, the community's oldest resident at 73, said recognition had been driven with the younger generation in mind.

"Been waiting a long time for this, we supported it all the way from '85," Ms Angus said.

"Now we can hope everything turns out well because today will be different for the younger generation, and I hope they'll be taking notice."

Ms Angus said she hoped the recognition would bring years of advocacy for the community to introduce by-laws into reality.

"We've got a lovely community and we all should be thankful when the by-laws come in and I hope they'll have some little bit of things in place, some little bit of restrictions," she said.

"I hope the young generations see what's happening in their community and what the by laws mean to them."