This paper uses Klisala Harrison’s concept of an epistemic community as a methodology, in order to understand applied ethnomusicological research on Australian Aboriginal song. It will investigate the ways in which the goals and methods of applied research are informed by institutional recommendations that emanate from an Indigenous rights agenda and Australia’s colonialist past and present, and will consider how applied ethnomusicology has been supported by recent regulatory and funding environments. Framing repatriation and intercultural collaboration as sites of critical discourse, an epistemic community of applied ethnomusicology in Australia is theorized as a site of convergent, pluralistic practices that respond to: social and political determinants of music endangerment; and, aims and principles prescribed by institutional documents that set out priorities for and govern the ethical conduct and design of academic research.