Annotated Bibliography
Colbung, K., ‘On being an Aboriginal: a personal statement’, Aborigines of the West: edited by In Berndt, R. & Berndt, C.; Perth UWA Press, 1980, p. 100-105.
Colbung explains the many legislative conditions and restrictions the Aboriginal people faced throughout history and in his own life. In spite of the acts set to protect the rights and heritage of Aboriginal people, much was easily twisted when economic demands were needed (i.e. the Western Australian Mining Act). Being confined to settlements, children of Aboriginal decent were separated from parents, and many other prohibitions discussed seem to directly contradict the traditional heritage and moort values Aboriginals hold dearly.
Collard, L.,
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Focusing on moort (family/relations), Nyungars’ cherish their traditions, obligations, and responsibilities to one another. Nyungar moort can especially be affiliated with geographical location. When traveling it is common regardless of where you go, to have a family connection. However, all Nyungar koorlangkar (children) take their mothers’ heritage and affiliation. This matrilineal culture means the heritage is always ‘true’ as a maaman (father) may have many yok/koorlangkar.
Collard, L., Harben, S., Berg, R., ‘Nidja Beeliar Boodjar Noonookurt Nyininy: A Nyungar Interpetive History of The Use of Boodjar in The Vicinity of Murdoch University’, Murdoch University, 2004, p. 1-96
Nyungar moort (families) are large, but each individual has an important role. When looking at Nyungar Yok/Yorga (women) throughout history, many European observers distorted the truth and made their own models of Aboriginal women. This may be due to the tradition that Nyungar men dealt with the male wam (strangers/colonists). However, it’s important to recognize the major importance of Nyungar Yok. Nyungar women harvested many foods, hunted small animals, constructed the mia mia (shelter), made cloaks and bags, raised kurrlonggur (children), led ceremonies, and were boodier
Thomas King uses an oral story-telling style of writing mingled with western narrative in his article “You’re Not the Indian I Had in Mind” to explain that Indians are not on the brink of extinction. Through this article in the Racism, Colonialism, and Indigeneity in Canada textbook, King also brings some focus to the topic of what it means to be “Indian” through the eyes of an actual Aboriginal versus how Aboriginals are viewed by other races of people. With his unique style of writing, King is able to bring the reader into the situations he describes because he writes about it like a story he is telling.
Samuel Wagan Watson presents an Aboriginal perspective on Australian identity, exploring the marginalization of Aboriginal culture. Watson associates
Firstly, gender disparity plays a significant role in aboriginal health, especially in the administration of health care. In Aboriginal culture, there are certain health practices that can only be done by either men or women, but not all (Bonvillain, 2001). In most cases, women are treated by their female counterparts whereas male doctors handle male patients. This means that a male doctor cannot undertake a vaginal inspection and a female nurse cannot teach an aboriginal man about self-catheterization. As a result, a breach of this traditional gender division, for instance a male doctor helping a woman in emergencies, is likely to cause shame, distress, depression, and fear of breaking a particular taboo (Freud, 2000).
The goal of this paper is to provide an examination of the book “The History of the Ojibway People” by William W. Warren as well as express some of what I learned about the book, the author and the Ojibway people. William W. Warren, born of a white father and Ojibway mother, used his fluent familiarity with the Ojibway language and his tremendous popularity with both whites and Indians to document the traditions and oral statements of the Ojibway people at a time when the future of their existence was in jeopardy.
As European domination began, the way in which the European’s chose to deal with the Aborigines was through the policy of segregation. This policy included the establishment of a reserve system. The government reserves were set up to take aboriginals out of their known habitat and culture, while in turn, encouraging them to adapt the European way of life. The Aboriginal Protection Act of 1909 established strict controls for aborigines living on the reserves . In exchange for food, shelter and a little education, aborigines were subjected to the discipline of police and reserve managers. They had to follow the rules of the reserve and tolerate searchers of their homes and themselves. Their children could be taken away at any time and ‘apprenticed” out as cheap labour for Europeans. “The old ways of the Aborigines were attacked by regimented efforts to make them European” . Their identities were threatened by giving them European names and clothes, and by removing them from their tra...
Reynolds, H. (1990). With The White People: The crucial role of Aborigines in the exploration and development of Australia. Australia: Penguin Books
How can you write about a culture whose history is passed on by oral traditions? Better yet, how can you comprehend a culture’s past which a dominant society desired to assimilate? These two questions outline the difficulty in understanding the historiography of Canada’s Aboriginal peoples. In 2003, Paige Raibmon published her article, “Living on Display: Colonial Visions of Aboriginal Domestic Spaces.” Her work, although focused on Canada’s colonial “notions of domesticity,” presents the role of Aboriginals as performers to European notions of indigenous culture and identity. Early social historians believe that Aboriginals’ place in history is in their interactions with European Jesuits. A decade later, historians argue Aboriginals exemplify a subordinate culture fighting against assimilating and hegemonic forces. More recently, social historical perspective shows Aboriginals as performers of the white-man’s constructed “authentic-Indian.” Obviously, there is disparity between historians’ viewpoints but each decade’s published histories concur with James Opp and John Walsh’s concept of local resistance. Using Raibmon’s paper as a starting point, a chronological examination of select histories reveals an evolving social historiography surrounding historians’ perceptions of Aboriginals’ local resistance attempts.
Australian indigenous culture is the world’s oldest surviving culture, dating back sixty-thousand years. Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders have been represented in a myriad of ways through various channels such as poetry, articles, and images, in both fiction and non-fiction. Over the years, they have been portrayed as inferior, oppressed, isolated, principled and admirable. Three such texts that portray them in these ways are poems Circles and Squares and Grade One Primary by Ali Cobby Eckermann, James Packer slams booing; joins three cheers for footballer and the accompanying visual text and Heywire article Family is the most important thing to an islander by Richard Barba. Even though the texts are different as ….. is/are …., while
The education of Aboriginal people is a challenge that has been a concern for many years and is still an issue. However, it remains the best way young people can climb out of poverty. With the colonialization and the oppression of Aboriginals, there have been many lasting side effects that continue to be affecting the Aboriginal youth today. “While retention and graduation rates have improved among urban Aboriginal population, an educational gap still remains between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal youth in urban settings” (Donovan, 127). Many suffer from a diminished self-worth, as they do not feel valued and feel inferior to their classmates. In this essay I am going to outline the reasons Aboriginals are struggling, discuss what is being done
Parker, H. T. "The Australian Aborigine." The Journal of Negro Education 3.1 (1934): 57-65. Web.
Within Australia, beginning from approximately the time of European settlement to late 1969, the Aboriginal population of Australia experienced the detrimental effects of the stolen generation. A majority of the abducted children were ’half-castes’, in which they had one white parent and the other of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander descent. Following the government policies, the European police and government continued the assimilation of Aboriginal children into ‘white’ society. Oblivious to the destruction and devastation they were causing, the British had believed that they were doing this for “their [Aborigines] own good”, that they were “protecting” them as their families and culture were deemed unfit to raise them. These beliefs caused ...
Lawlor, Robert. Voices of the First Day: Awakening in the Aboriginal Dreamtime. Rochester, Vermont: Inner Trad. Ltd., 1991.
Jones, F.L., 1993, `Unlucky Australians: Labour market outcomes among Aboriginal Australians', Ethnic and Racial Studies, vol. 16, no. 3.
The essay “Self-Reliance” has really helped me decide “Am I or am I not?” It has helped me see my “inner light” and now I strive to do better, and to reach that unattainable goal of finding my aboriginal self.
European ships chiefly began sailing into southern Australian waters in the 18th century. These left human cargoes behind and, unlike earlier visitors, had an immediate impact on the Aborigines, who suffered interference with their economy and lifestyle as the colonists sought and secured for themselves good sources of water, sheltered positions, and access to fish—all of which were also vital to Aboriginal people.