Exploration of the Mabo Case, Stolen Generation and Reconciliation Both Keating’s and Rudd’s speeches are firmly based on the ideas of recognition and reconciliation for the wrongs that European settlers, and their decedents, have inflicted on Indigenous Australians. To explore this idea I believe that it is necessary to take a closer look at both the plight of Eddie Mabo and the stories of the Stolen Generation. The Mabo Case Eddie Mabo is widely known for his plight to regain land rights for both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. In 1982, along with four other Meriam people from Murray Island, he initiated legal proceedings in the Queensland Supreme Court claiming customary ownership of their lands on Murray Island. This original claim was rejected by the Supreme Court, but rather than backing down Mabo chose to present his case to the High Court of Australia. The basis of his case explores how “’Australia’ is morally illegitimate to the extent that it is founded on European denial of the continent’s prior ownership by indigenous people…” (Rowse, 1994) His claim presented that a portion of the Murray Island belonged to his family, as it had been passed down through the generations. These areas had been removed from Indigenous control during the annexation of the Torres Strait in 1879 and Mabo believed that his customary ownership had not been lawfully extinguished (Rowse, 1994). The ownership of land by the indigenous people of Australia was simply washed over with the label of Terra Nullius. The term Terra Nullius causes a lot of pain for Indigenous people as it can be translated to “A land that belongs to no-one” (“Terra Nullius defined,” 2013). This simply means that the British settlers completely disregard... ... middle of paper ... ...http;//search.proquest.com/docview/223162550?accountid=10675 Manne, R. (2001). In Denial: The stolen generations and the right. The Australian Quarterly Essay, 2001(1), p25. National Sorry Day Committee Inc. (2014). The Apology to Australia’s Indigenous Peoples. Retrieved from: https://www.nsdc.org.au/events-info/the-apology-to-australias-indigenous-peoples Rowse, T. (1994). After Mabo. Interpreting indigenous traditions. Carlton, Victoria: Melbourne University Press. Terra Nullius defined (2013). Retrieved from http://www.nfsa.gov.au/digitallearning/mabo/tn_01.shtml The Mabo case and the native title act (1995). Retrieved from http://www.abs.gov.au/Ausstats/abs@.nsf/Previousproducts/1301.0Feature%20Article21995?opendocument The Mabo decision in the High Court (2014). Retrieved from http://www.abc.net.au/archives/80days/stories/2012/01/19/3412061.htm
How can we not own it?’ as a clarification for Mabo when he was deal with the case. After he died the government finally said Merry island is belong to aboriginal people. This is a powerful clue show racialism was a momentous aspect for Mabo fighting for aboriginal people’s rights let everyone turn be
Eddie Mabo was an Aboriginal rights activist who fought for rights of indigenous peoples to land (Land Rights) and for the government to recognise Aboriginals spiritual ties to pieces of land (Native title) . for aboriginal people throughout the 1980’s and early 1990’s. He campaigned for the right for aboriginal groups to own certain pieces of land of water due to the spiritual connection they have to that land or water. Mabo was born and lived on the Murray Island and wanted for his Native title and Land Rights to be recognised by the government. Mabo fought against High Court of Australia in 1988. However he did not see the outcome of the case, due to his death in 1992 by cancer.
Since the first fleet arrived on the rugged, yet beautiful shores of Australia, Indigenous australians have been treated appallingly and have even be recognised as ‘flora and fauna’ by the invading Europeans. They have been discriminated against by unequal pay and citizenship rights, no recognition of land rights and racial prejudice. However, after the 1930’s certain people have achieved change through fighting for aboriginal rights which has had a huge impact on Australia. One of these people was a woman, Faith Bandler a South Sea Islander Australian.
1. It has been 200 years since the first white settlers took ownership of Aboriginal and Tore Strait Islander land, took ownership of land that has been woven into Indigenous Australian culture and tradition for centuries, took ownership of land that was not Terra Nullius. We, as white Australians, have still not given this land back.
Indigenous Australian land rights have sparked controversy between Non Indigenous and Indigenous Australians throughout history. The struggle to determine who the rightful owners of the land are is still largely controversial throughout Australia today. Indigenous Australian land rights however, go deeper than simply owning the land as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders have established an innate spiritual connection making them one with the land. The emphasis of this essay is to determine how Indigenous Australian land rights have impacted Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, highlighting land rights regarding the Mabo v. the State of Queensland case and the importance behind today’s teachers understanding and including Indigenous
The Stolen Generation has had a profound impact on every aspect of the lives of Indigenous communities. It has jeopardised their very survival. It has impoverished their capacity to control and direct their future development. The Stolen Generation has corrupted, devastated and destroyed the souls, hopes and beliefs of many Australian lives through damaging assimilation policies established in an attempt to make a ‘White Australia’ possible. Discrimination, racism and prejudice are some of the many permanent scars upon Indigenous life that will never be repaired. However, recently Rudd and the Australian public have sincerely apologised for the detrimental effects the Stolen Generation had caused. The Stolen Generation has dramatically shaped Australian history and culture.
“Today we honour the Indigenous peoples of this land, the oldest continuing cultures in human History. We reflect on their past mistreatment. We reflect in particular on the mistreatment of those who were Stolen Generations—this blemished chapter in our nation’s history. The time has now come for the nation to turn a new page in Australia’s history by righting the wrongs of the past and so moving forward with confidence to the future. We apologise for the laws and policies of successive Parliaments and governments that have inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians” (apology by Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, 16th November 2009, Parliament House, Canberra.)
In the late eighteenth century prior to the arrival of the first European settlers, Australia was once believed to be a terra nullius, an uninhabited “nothing land.” The European colonizers of Australia sought to make something of this land they believed they had discovered. Operating under this false notion, colonizers systematically invaded and conquered Australia, imposing their own ways onto the land and its original custodians, the Aboriginal people. The introduction of western settlements disrupted much of Aboriginal life. In a publication titled, Is it in the Blood? Australian Aboriginal Identity, author Myrna Ewart Tonkinson discusses Western imperialism and its implications on Aboriginal identity.
Summary of Text: ‘The Redfern Address’ is a speech that was given to a crowd made up of mainly indigenous Australians at the official opening of the United Nations International Year of the World’s Indigenous Peoples in Redfern Park, New South Wales. This text deals with many of the challenges that have been faced by Indigenous Australians over time, while prompting the audience to ask themselves, ‘How would I feel?’ Throughout the text, Keating challenges the views of history over time, outlines some of the outrageous crimes committed against the Indigenous community, and praises the indigenous people on their contribution to our nation, despite the way they have been treated.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders were hunters and gatherers back to the time of the Dreaming. The concept of land ownership as it was not a part of their world view. The reason why, is because the land is the Aboriginal peoples ‘Mother’, who has supported and protected the people for many tens of thousands of years. To the indigenous peoples, arguing over who owns the land, was like two fleas arguing over who owns the kangaroo they were living on. The ‘Mother’ or land, was something that cannot be owned. If anything the ‘Mother’ owns the people, and the Aboriginal people are obligated to maintain the lands natural balance.
Aboriginal people originally inhabited mainland Australia and the continent's offshore islands. Torres Strait Islanders are named after their original inhabitant, the islands of the Torres Strait, between the tip of Cape York in Queensland and Papua New Guinea. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island people are referred to as Indigenous.
The core epistemology of Indigenous culture is based in the notion of country. Contrasting this, is the axiology of the colonial framework in representing itself the land. In its purest form, non-Indigenous conceptions of land were imposed through invasion. “Invasion requires the invader to justify his actions not to the invaded, but to himself” (Pascoe 178). Justification of invasion within the colonial framework has been represented in the landscape through numerous declarations, namely through the assertion of terra nullius over the land and its inhabitants. This motion perpetuates and underlies the fact that “land has always been at the centre of conflict between black and white Australians” (Reynolds 133-167). Furthermore, the doctrine
...mination in the workplace focusing on Indigenous people and so on. In the late 1970’s the Queensland government claimed the Murray Islands of Torres Strait as a part of Queensland, and prohibited Islanders the use of their land and from practicing traditional law. In 1982, Eddi Koiki right of the Queensland government to do this. Eventually he took this case to high court. He argued that his people had occupied the Murray Islands for a long time and had become too known as the ‘Mabo decision’; the high court overruled the terra nullius notion. The idea of terra nullius was a declaration in the 19th century by the British Parliament that Australia was not inhabited by anybody who could claim to have ownership of the land. The ‘Mabo Decision’ meant that Aborigines could claim to crown land where it could be proven that continued occupation and use had occurred.
For a long time in Australian history, there was constant concealment of the reality of the nature of the relationships between the settlers, government, and aboriginal peoples. Aboriginal people were supposed to be British subjects, but were not aware of the fact. They would commit crimes of British law, and settlers would harm them under that justification. Jno. B Hughes wrote, in a letter to The Register, regarding the att...
Colonisation (1788) ended traditional life for Aborigines and started a period of white degradation, leading to their severely oppressed situation in 1900. Control over all Australian land, besides the very remote areas, had been lost. Aborigines were not given the chance to determine their own future and even their language was dying out. “Few whites took the trouble to learn anything about Aboriginal life; many whites regarded Aborigines as oddities or nuisances.”