As a member of the Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL), Eirlys Richards worked in Fitzroy Crossing in the Kimberley region of Western Australia for sixteen years, studying Walmajarri, compiling a dictionary and teaching speakers of the language to read their own language. In 1983, she transferred to SIL headquarters in Darwin, moving back to the Kimberley in 1991 to continue her involvement with the Walmajarri people through Karayili Adult Education Centre as a freelance teacher and linguist. Eirlys is a non-Indigenous contributor to the books Two Sisters and Out of the Desert: Stories from the Walmajjarri Exodus.