Marrie was born and raised in Yarrabah, Queensland (an Aboriginal community approx 7 km south-east of Cairns), the eldest daughter of Henry Fourmile (aka Queballum – cyclone), grandson to the Yidinji warrior Ye-i-nie (Aboriginal Peace Maker and "King" of Cairns).

She went to school in Yarrabah, and later studied teaching at the South Australian College of Advanced Education, where she first obtained a Diploma in Teaching.
Later, after the College had been transformed into the University of South Australia, she obtained a Graduate Diploma of Arts (Indigenous Studies).

By 1988 Marrie was lecturing at Griffith University, Brisbane, and in 1991 had managed to return to Cairns (Gimuy) region, where she first assisted co-ordinate the Cairns College of Technical and Further Education's Aboriginal ranger training program, then by 1994, had become the Cairns Coordinator of a new Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Participation, Research and Development Centre in James Cook University.

From Cairns, Marrie undertook a Masters in Environmental and Local Government Law (through Macquarie University).
Her interests and concerns moved to biocultural diversity, indigenous intellectual property, and traditional ecological knowledge, and as such, by 1997, she had moved on and taken up a position with the United Nations Secretariat for the Convention on Biological Diversity, where she was the first Aboriginal Australian to be appointed to a full-time professional position in a United Nations agency.

Since 2003, Marrie moved her focus back towards Cairns, first working as the Christensenfund's North Australian Program Officer assisting that philanthropic organisation distribute grants and funds to help promote, sustain, and encourage indigenous biocultural diversity across Australia's north (including the Cairns region), and now working as an Associate Professor at the Central Queensland University's Cairns campus.
Marrie was born and raised in Yarrabah, Queensland (an Aboriginal community approx 7 km south-east of Cairns), the eldest daughter of Henry Fourmile (aka Queballum – cyclone), grandson to the Yidinji warrior Ye-i-nie (Aboriginal Peace Maker and "King" of Cairns).
She went to school in Yarrabah, and later studied teaching at the South Australian College of Advanced Education, where she first obtained a Diploma in Teaching. Later, after the College had been transformed into the University of South Australia, she obtained a Graduate Diploma of Arts (Indigenous Studies).
By 1988 Marrie was lecturing at Griffith University, Brisbane, and in 1991 had managed to return to Cairns (Gimuy) region, where she first assisted co-ordinate the Cairns College of Technical and Further Education's Aboriginal ranger training program, then by 1994, had become the Cairns Coordinator of a new Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Participation, Research and Development Centre in James Cook University.
From Cairns, Marrie undertook a Masters in Environmental and Local Government Law (through Macquarie University). Her interests and concerns moved to biocultural diversity, indigenous intellectual property, and traditional ecological knowledge, and as such, by 1997, she had moved on and taken up a position with the United Nations Secretariat for the Convention on Biological Diversity, where she was the first Aboriginal Australian to be appointed to a full-time professional position in a United Nations agency.
Since 2003, Marrie moved her focus back towards Cairns, first working as the Christensenfund's North Australian Program Officer assisting that philanthropic organisation distribute grants and funds to help promote, sustain, and encourage indigenous biocultural diversity across Australia's north (including the Cairns region), and now working as an Associate Professor at the Central Queensland University's Cairns campus.
Henrietta Marrie