Australian Studies: Identities - Essay Example

Australian Studies: Identities The final years of the 20th century Australia saw a shift in the in the trend in the policies of the government to wards Indigenous people, who till then were almost non-citizens. It was because of this shift that in 1991 The Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation was set up as a unanimous act of Parliament. This seemed to be almost an acknowledgement that the Aboriginal people of Australia had been dispossessed of land that was rightfully theirs by tradition as they were the first people of Australia. However this notion of ‘justice’ became a point of debate, which, therefore, did not lead to the fulfillment of aspirations of the Indigenous people. Policies that do not lead to a marked change in practical terms cannot really be termed favourable and hence do not lead to removable of reconciliation. Moreover Bob Hawke saw it as a way out, as a sop for the land rights reforms that did not take place in 1986 as he had announced in the Barunga Cultural Festival in the Northern Territory “there shall be a treaty between the Aboriginal people and the Government of Australia (Brennan S, 2004 p 150). So unless the land issue is taken into consideration everything else pales in significance and the word reconciliation becomes a non starter. The creation of new land titles for the Indigenous people is seen as a privilege by some Australians within the legality of a nation. Most Australians lived with “terra nullius” as that served everyone well. However the Mabo judgment and the passing of the Native Title Act in 1993 which instead of being seen as a threat to land tenure was seen as a positive opportunity (David Carter p 417). Also it led to the government trying to make it possible for the Indigenous people to claim their traditional land without the present landowners being jeopardised. This move was however, not popular and was seen as one leading to a clash of interests between pastoralists, miners and conservative politicians with the result that this policy was soon overturned. The blow to any kind of reconciliation on land issues came when the Native Titles Amendment Act was passed in 1998 and this led to further divisions between the government and the Indigenous leaders (David Carter p 418) The claims to traditional land numbered more that 700 but only about 20 claims have so far seen actual fruition. Though land has been claimed back by the Indigenous people it is land that is unproductive and in the desert. It was land that belonged to the government but had no title by any other Australian. According to, ‘Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation’ (ANTaR) unlike other colonies Australia is the only former British colony that has been taken over without a Treaty. “This disregard of the Indigenous people continued at the time of the Federation (1901) – the only mention of the Indigenous Australians in the Constitution was to exclude them from the population count” (Treaty, 2011). Not acknowledging the political, social and economic rights of the Indigenous people of Australia cannot lead to equality and that is one of the first obstacles by way of reconciliation. Reconciliation cannot be separated from affects endured by the ‘stolen generations’ even though it was a policy that was more popular in 1930 Australia and not in contemporary Australia. However, the repercussions of that policy are “really a discussion about the shape of contemporary Australia” (Read P, 2002). What answer Australians are really seeking is that what should be the place of Indigenous people in today’s Australia when they are really the ones who are now clearly the wronged people whose lands and traditional ways got taken away by the settlers. Policies were made for them by people who did not understand their ways and it was agreed by the settlers that they needed to be assimilated. “under a government policy that ran from 1910 to, unbelievably, 1971, as many as 1 in 10 of all Aboriginal children were removed from their families in an effort to “civilize” them...” (McCarthy T 2000). This is Australia’s shame and something that both the Indigenous people and the white settlers need to come to terms with before reconciliation can really bear fruit. The Bringing Them Home Report (HREOC 1997) found that no Aboriginal family was and is untouched by policies and practices of child removal” (Nicoll F, 2004 p 28). The report also recommended that there should be an apology and compensation. The report brought out feelings of sympathy for the Indigenous people and led to the culmination of numerous ‘Sorry Day” parades in most Australian cities. The Australian people were ready for a reconciliation process but the government was not. The parades were like hollow promises that brought no change in the stance of the Indigenous people. The government sponsored reconciliation walk over Sydney Harbour Bridge in 2001 in which about half a million Australians took part are some measures that could have made a difference to reconciliation but according to Fiona Nicoll, she asked Aunty Nance who’s exhibition Nicoll had helped to curate and who was a stolen generations victim if “she saw the walk as a bridge between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians” and the reply she got from the victimized Nancy was ‘No way”. The hurt runs deep and reconciliation therefore remains a challenge. Also most middle class Australians could not understand why stolen children might have wanted to live in conditions that are impoverished (Nicoll F, 2004 p 26). So far just one stolen generation person has been compensated. Bruce Trevorrow “has become the first of Australia’s Stolen Generations to win compensation” (Bryant N 2007).. Prime Minister Howard’s negative view about the Indigenous people set them back and reconciliation became a dream. When even basic rights of the Indigenous people were not considered how could they ever become part of the mainstream? Besides “Howards rejection of the treaty, his opposition to the establishment of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) in 1988 and hostility to the native title and all this really led to a fall in the in the social and economical condition of the Indigenous people while Howard remained prime minister“ (Dodson P, p 26) The fact that John Howard former Australian Prime Minister refused to apologise for a black past, for fear of the Indigenous people demanding compensation, and how many Australians supported him, goes to show how little they understood the suffering, abuse and sense of loss among the stolen generations. It was only the apology by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd that brought a semblance of respect to the long suffering Indigenous people. He addressed the parliament and his sorry words to mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters (Andy McSmith and Christopher Finn, 2008) are the words that finally brought in the acknowledgement of what the Indigenous people had suffered. It was seen by many as a small step taken in the right direction of setting some of the wrong right. Kevin Rudd himself called it a “significant and symbolic.” Indigenous people were considered strong before Europeans came in, and there was no evidence on any disease that they suffered or any disease endemic in the Aboriginal people today (Jackson Lisa R and Ward Jeannette E 1999). Once the Europeans arrived, the diseases decimated the population of the Indigenous populations and the confiscation of their lands forced them to change their healthy lifestyle with the result that they are now less healthy than other Australians. The First peoples of Australia are presently facing many developmental challenges. The Centre for the Aboriginal Economic Policy Research (CAERP) indicates that these people have the highest poverty rates, unemployment, and early mortality besides the lowest educational levels in Australia. Since the population of these people is growing faster it is likely that the socioeconomic difficulties will remain high. This remains a challenge for all governments. It is imperative that to reconstruct the Indigenous society sort of social cohesion is needed (Dobson and Smith p 10-11). According to the Australian government website reconciliation began “with the 1967 referendum when 90% Australians voted to remove the clauses in the Australian Constitution that discriminated against the Indigenous people.” (Australia.gov. au) This led to them being counted in the census as Australians and so they got citizenship status. Voting rights had been established in 1962 already by the commonwealth. According to a study of the results of a Newspoll survey Prof A.J Brown and Dr. Ron Levy say that 75% of the respondents felt a referendum to bring about “Indigenous recognition is important.” Two sets of surveys involving 1201 and 1100 people were carried out in 2008 and 2010 respectively. (www.couriermail.com.au, 2010) In today’s Australia groups like the RAP Reconciliation Action Plan are going a long way in trying to close the gap in a number of action oriented schemes to help the Indigenous people and the other Australian people from RAP groups which will together help in the development of the Indigenous people through meaningful programmes that are action based. Anybody, any government, any university and any departments can start a RAP as long as it a trust is built between Indigenous and other Austrlians, where they solve problems by complementing each other and not being against one another (Reconciliation Australia) Professor Marcia Langton speaking at the Charles Darwin University on the occasion of the Annual Vincent Lingiari Memorial lecture, which marks the 1966 Walk off on Wave Hill Station in 1966 which was a protest by the Indigenous people for rights, balmed current government not giving heed to their issues, particularly health-related ones like fetal alcohol disorders and malnutrition (Glenday J, 2011). However Vincent Lingiari boycotted the lecture as he did not like the professor supporting the “federal intervention in the Northern Territories.” Just this little example is enough to show that reconciliation is still a far dream and the ways of the Indigenous people have been too changed by what the white settlers thought was the right thing to do by the Indigenous people and it will require close to a miracle for reconciliation to really take shape. Works cited: ANTaR (2011) Treaty [Online ] (24th February 2011) available from http://www.antar.org.au/issues_and_campaigns/treaty [accessed 18th August 2011] Australian government (n.d) Reconciliation (n.d) Available from http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/reconciliation [Accessed on 18th August 2011] Brennan S (2004) Reconciliation in Australia: The Relationship Between Indigenous peoples and the Wider Community. Brown Journal of World Affairs Volume XI, Issue 1 (Summer/ Fall 2004) ( p149- 161) available from http://www.watsoninstitute.org/bjwa/archive/11.1/Politics%20of%20Reconciliation/Brenan.pdf [accessed 18th August 2011] Bryant N (2007) The Agony of Australia’s Stolen Generation, BBC News, 9th August 2007,[Online] available from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/6937222.stm, [Accessed on 18th August 2011] Carter D, (n.d) Dispossession dreams & diversity issues in Australian Studies. Pearson and Longman Courier mail 2010 More Australians want referendum on recognizing aborigines in the constitution than on becoming a Republic [online ] 4th October 2010, available from more Australians want referendum on recognising aborigines-in the constitution than one on becoming a republic/story-e6freooo-1225933850691 [accessed on 18th August 2011] Dodson M and Smith E (2003) Governance for sustainable development: Strategic issues and principles fro Indigenous Australian communities. Center For Aboriginal Economic Policy, ANU [Online] No 250/2003 Available from https://digitalcollections.anu.edu.au/bitstream/1885/41862/3/2003_DP250.pdf, [Accessed on 18th August 2011] Glenday J (2011) Thinking outside The box an Indigenous disadvantage. ABC News Indigenous, 19th August 2011[Online] available from http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-08-19/20110819lingiari-memorial-lecture/2847060/?site=Indigenous&topic=latest [accessed 19th August 2011] Jackson, LR and Ward JE (1999) Aboriginal Heath-why is reconciliation necessary? MJA 170: 437-440 [Online] 1999 available from http://mja.com.au/public/issues/may3/jackson/jackson.html [accessed 18th August 2011] Mccarthy T (2000) The Stolen Generation, Time Magazine [Online] 2nd October 2000 available from http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,998067,00.html, [Accessed 18th August 2011] McSmith A and Finn C (2008) Australia’s stolen generation: ‘To the mothers and the fathers, the brothers and the sisters, we are sorry’ The Independent, 13th February 2008 [Online] available from http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/australias-stolen-generation-to-the-mothers-and-the-fathers-the-brothers-and-the-sisters-we-say-sorry-781543.html [accessed 18th August 2011] Nicoll, F. (2004) Reconciliation in and out of Perspective: while knowing, seeing, curating and being at home in and against Indigenous sovereignity. Robinson A.M (Ed) Whitening Race, 2004. Canberra: Aboriginal Studies Press. Reconciliation Australia (n.d) Reconciliation Resources (n.d) [Online](n.d) available from http://www.reconciliation.org.au/home/reconciliation-action-plans/what-is-a-rap- [accessed 18th August 2011] Read More