Australia has created a multicultural society today since the 1788, where people from different races, religions and cultures have come to an equal treatment. Although Australia today still faces less unequal treatment between some cultures and beliefs when compared to the 17th century and today.
During 1788, people in Australia were finding it hard to create a stable multicultural society, where ‘settler society’ took places. The ‘settler society’ required the dispossession of indigenous people in order for society to follow the political economy, which required society to do a lot of labour jobs. Therefore, during1788 there were other arrivals from different minority groups that had come to Australia, which some groups were welcome and some
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In references to Moran (2011), he mentions that during the time where there was an economic drop which had led to a resulted in Australia. Australia during this period need migrants for labour to help with rebuilding of Australia, where people from overseas were needed and wanted to remain in Australia, although the government selected official people which they were after “typically white, young and healthy” (Moran, 2011.pg. 2158). Therefore, this demonstrates that Australia back then in the 1901 was not a multicultural society, where migrants that were entering Australian were expected to follow certain values. Furthermore, the migrants that entered to Australia were told to integrate to the Australian ‘white’ culture, which was that migrants were asked to forget their own identity. During this process Australia was not an efficient multicultural society, due to having migrants to forget their own identity, religion and belief.
Therefore, during these period time in Australia was that, multiculturalism was not a successful between other societies, some minorities were accepted and some were not accepted, which this caused all people from different races, religions and cultures to treat each other unequally in Australia. The white Australia policy died out as an official policy in the 1960s, where Australia was accepting other minorities which the government celebrated the diversity of Australia for becoming a multicultural society and accepting other
There is a reference to our multiculturalism in the lines ‘All cultures together as one. Yet, individual until the game is won’. These lines acknowledge the fact that even though Australia is an increasingly Multicultural society, all Australians, regardless of their ethnic backgrounds, share the same values, principles and national identity.
Maestro by Peter Goldsworthy provides an insight into 1960s/70s Australia and helps reinforce common conceptions about Australian culture. One common conception Goldsworthy reinforces in this text is Australia’s increasing acceptance of multiculturalism. Maestro, set in the 1960s to 1970s, shows Australians growing more accepting and tolerant of other cultures. This shift in perspective was occurring near the end of the White Australia/Assimilation Policy, which was phased out in the late 1970s/early 1980s. An example of this shifted perspective in Maestro is Paul’s father’s opinion about living in Darwin:
Over the years Australia has had many different problems with racism and racism affecting peoples’ lives. Many racial groups have been affected, most significantly the Aboriginals. The end of world war two in 1945 marked a huge change in types of racism. Australia went from the ‘superior’ white Australians dominating over immigrants and aboriginals. To a relatively multicultural and accepting society that is present today.
The Assimilation was a policy set by the government in 1937 and went to till 1964. This policy of Assimilation was set not just for Aborigines in Australia but for all foreign immigrants that were not European and white in colour. Having this policy set in place meant that Aborigines were forced to give up their heritage and adopt the culture of the British/Anglo Saxons. This law sent children away from their families to learn how to become and live like a white Australian, leaving all memories, beliefs, and traditions behind. Another major impact this had toward the Aborigines was they had no rights or freedoms and finally all culture, heritage, beliefs were left behind and made to start a new life living as a 'white fella’.
Throughout the world, in history and in present day, injustice has affected all of us. Whether it is racial, sexist, discriminatory, being left disadvantaged or worse, injustice surrounds us. Australia is a country that has been plagued by injustice since the day our British ancestors first set foot on Australian soil and claimed the land as theirs. We’ve killed off many of the Indigenous Aboriginal people, and also took Aboriginal children away from their families; this is known as the stolen generation. On the day Australia became a federation in 1901, the first Prime Minister of Australia, Edmund Barton, created the White Australia Policy. This only let people of white skin colour migrate to the country. Even though Australia was the first country to let women vote, women didn’t stand in Parliament until 1943 as many of us didn’t support female candidates, this was 40 years after they passed the law in Australian Parliament for women to stand in elections. After the events of World War Two, we have made an effort to make a stop to these issues here in Australia.
In the article, “Multiculturalism: Battleground or Meeting Ground,” Takaki starts out addressing the difference in philosophy between him and Woodward when it comes to cultural diversity. Woodward strongly disagrees with Takaki when it comes to the topic of cultural diversity. They both are seeing issue threw two difference lens. Woodward attacked Takaki on the issue when Woodward reviewed Takaki’s “Iron Cages: Rave and Culture in Nineteeth-Century America” book in the “New York Review of Books,” saying it was too narrow in focus (Takaki, n.d). Woodward rebuttal was that the book did not contain any balance, and should have touched on “national issues” to have that balance and not just the American south. Woodward even said that Takaki was
Reynolds, H. (2005). Nowhere People: How international race thinking shaped Australia’s identity. Australia: Penguin Group
The assimilation policy was a policy that existed between the 1940’s and the 1970’s, and replaced that of protectionism. Its purpose was to have all persons of aboriginal blood and mixed blood living like ‘white’ Australians, this established practice of removing Aboriginal children (generally half-bloods) from their homes was to bring them up without their culture, and they were encouraged to forget their aboriginal heritage. Children were placed in institutions where they could be 'trained' to take their place in white society. During the time of assimilation Aboriginal people were to be educated for full citizenship, and have access to public education, housing and services. However, most commonly aboriginal people did not receive equal rights and opportunities, for example, their wages were usually less than that paid to the white workers and they often did not receive recognition for the roles they played in the defence of Australia and their contribution to the cattle industry. It wasn’t until the early 1960’s that expendi...
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 ...
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.
Key events in Aboriginal Australian history stem from the time Australia was first discovered in 1788. For instance, when Federation came into existence in 1901, there was a prevailing belief held by non Aboriginal Australians that the Aborigines were a dying race (Nichol, 2005:259) which resulted in the Indigenous people being excluded from the constitution except for two mentions – Section 127 excluded Aborigines from the census and Section 51, part 26, which gave power over Aborigines to the States rather than to the Federal Government. Aboriginal people were officially excluded from the vote, public service, the Armed Forces and pensions. The White Australia mentality/policy Australia as “White” and unfortunately this policy was not abolished until 1972. REFERENCE
Ever since the 1970s, Australia has become a multicultural nation. Australia’s multiculturalism is a way to explain the variety of ethnic backgrounds within the Australian people. “It implies that there are many ways of being Australian, not just one ‘Australian way of life’” (Carter 333). Multiculturalism has majorly changed the way that people view Australian history and identity.
The immigration Restriction Act 1901or more commonly known as the White Australia Policy was made 'to place certain restrictions on immigration and to provide for the removal from the Commonwealth of prohibited immigrants' (Australian Government Department of Immigration and Boarder Protection, 2013) or in other words to have an all-white British colony. This act was unfair for all those who were not British and those who were of colour. In this essay, I will discuss the experiences of the non-Anglo-Celtic groups in Australia before the White Australia policy was introduced, the political and social arguments for the White Australia Policy and the consequences of the White Australia Policy for individuals and groups, up until 1918. There were mixed experiences for the non-Anglo-Celtic groups in Australia before the White Australia Policy was introduced. For example, majority of the Chinese Gold Miners were treated differently to other countries and groups that mined for gold in Australia.
‘Approximately 1 in 5 people and 7 in 10 teens are victim to racism.’ This is truly alarming and worrying for Australia. Racism has been in Australia from the very first settlement in 1788. Britain claimed Australia as ‘terra nullius’ (empty land) even though they knew that aboriginals existed. The indigenous people of our land were treated more like flora and fauna than citizens of Australia and only were counted in
Good morning and welcome to this esteemed leadership forum, “Australian Identities: Past, Present and Future”. I am honoured to speak with you about the complex affiliation between Australia’s indigenous and non-indigenous people. In the late 1700s, British settlers invaded Australia and formed the Eurocentric view that the original inhabitants of the land were an inferior and primitive race. This clear depiction of cultural superiority can be seen in two early colonial texts: a lithograph titled “Natives of N.S. Wales, as seen in the streets of Sydney” by travel artist Augustus Earle; and a 1793 letter by convict artist Thomas Watling to his aunt.