Essay On Namatjira's Influence On Aboriginal Society

How Have Indigenous Australians been Treated In the past 200 years in regards to Australia’s Constitution as well as Government Legislation surrounding the treatment of Aborigines

Agriculture was not a choice made by our society, after humans had hunted many staple food species to extinction the need a new source of food, this source came in the form of easy to manipulate crops such as, like wheat, rice and corn as well easy to tame animals such as sheep, chicken, camels, horses, cows, etc. The advent of Agriculture gave birth to modern civilisations through a butterfly effect, Agriculture gave birth to townships surrounding food, increased demand for food gave birth to surplus as food supply began to outgrow demand, surplus gave birth

to the ‘master’, (a person who owns the food/surplus or the land where the cop is grown), the sudden need for a System of documentation surrounding surplus gave rise to literacy which in turn gave rise to innovation thus Building the society we know today, but the aboriginal population never ran out of their natural food sources, meaning that the Aboriginal culture had no need for agriculture, and without agriculture the aboriginal society never advanced past a hunter gatherer mindset. When British colonizers came to Australia, they recognised the aboriginal culture as an inferior culture due to its similarity to primitive cultures around Europe thousands of years ago. “Australian Society, like many other parts of the world, had been colonised/had a dominant culture that assumed white races were superior to black races, and so were natural leaders”. This false sense of superiority caused hundreds of years of oppression and segregation directed towards the aboriginal population. Causing the removal of their land from their possession and a slew of other discriminatory occurrences, all caused by the belief that ‘white’ culture was above ‘black’ culture. I do not accept this Assumption and nor should history, history should recognise the role certain factors had on the societal developments of different nations instead of focussing on the superiority of one race over another.

The Australian Constitution came into effect in 1901 after a series of constitutional conventions in the 1880s and 1890s, by this time in history the Aboriginal population was struggling, living on the outskirts of mainstream society and ‘cut off’ from white society, Aboriginals were considered inferior to their white counterparts due to their ‘Primitive’ culture, Aboriginals weren’t even considered people until the 1967 referendum in which they became recognised as people of Australia, rather than Fauna. Australian politicians were worried that the inclusion of aboriginals in Australia’s population could affect the quota that decided the number of seats a state could hold in parliament. The FCAA (Federal Council for the Advancement of Aborigines) and the FCAATSI (Federal Council for the Advancement of Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders), fought to change the constitution to grant federal government the power to formulate laws surrounding Australia’s native population, Certain laws imposed by separate Australian states made it difficult for aboriginal populations to own property, vote and work. Some of these disparities include, Indigenous people could vote in state elections in all states except Western Australia and Queensland, they could own property in NSW and South Australia but in no other state) and they could receive and distribute wages in NSW but nowhere else. Opposition from the prime minister at the time, Robert Menzies made it difficult to sway
the public towards changing the constitution due to uncertainty regarding how the inclusion would affect Australian parliament. It’s 2018, 230 years after the British invaded Australia, 117 years since the advent of Australia’s constitution, 51 years since Aboriginals were counted in the census (Not part of the flora and fauna), 33 years since Uluru was handed back to the original custodians and 26 years since the Native title (Mabo) judgment. It took British colonizers less than a decade to strip The Aborigines of their land, rights and Humanity, and it’s taken over 200 years to get to where we are today. But equality and reconciliation cannot truly occur while Aboriginals aren’t part of their own country’s Constitution.

Aboriginals are believed to have been living in Australia for an estimated 60,000 years before British arrival, through harsh and unforgiving conditions the aboriginal culture flourished into one of Deep spiritual connection and rich sense of family/community. When the British came in 1788 the aboriginal population was decimated both intentionally (Physical violence) and unintentionally (Introduced disease’s) at the hands of the British invaders. In 1816 Martial law was Proclaimed in New South Wales against Aboriginal people, who could be shot if they were armed or within a certain distance of colonial settlements, 1824: Tasmanian colonists were authorised to shoot Aboriginal people at will
The Australian people felt they were doing the Aborigines a favour “Many People assumed that the indigenous people would die out and that the kindest thing that could be done for them was to place them in areas like reserves where they could live out their days with some dignity”
Up until recently, The Aboriginal people were considered to be part of Australia’s Flora and Fauna, aboriginals weren’t (According to law) considered to be people until the 1967 referendum, this referendum came about due to significant push from Civil rights groups such as the FCAA and the FCAATSI and stated that the Aboriginal people were to now be included in the census and removed from the list of Australia’s flora and fauna. The Referendum question was structured as shown : “Do you approve the proposed law for the alteration of the constitution entitled ‘An Act to alter the Constitution as to omit certain words relating to the people of the Aboriginal race in any state so that Aboriginals are to be counted in reckoning the population” The aboriginal population were Prohibited from voting in federal elections until 1962, and even then, social pressures and dissimilatory behaviour prevented many aboriginals from voting for many years after the bill was passed.

Albert Namatjira was and still is one of Australia’s most influential aboriginal artists, he paved the way for a large array Indigenous artist through his detailed and well-received water colour paintings, famously depicting a white Snowy Gumtree, a symbol that would forever be attributed to his name, Namatjira (2 years prior to his death) sold his the rights to his artworks to an art dealer by the name of John Brackenreg and his publishing company Legend Press, with 12.5% royalty’s going to Namatjira and his family, after Namatjira’s passing on the 8th of August 1959 (only 11 days after his 57th birthday) the agreement stood between Brackenreg and Namatjira’s for 23 years.

Until Mr Brackenreg purchased the full copyright to Namatjira’s work in 1982 from a Northern Territory Trustee, (meaning he would hold the copyright until 2029), Namatjira’s family no longer received royalty’s from their ancestors artworks, it was later found that Namatjira had written a final will and testimony “in which he passed his assets — including the copyright — to his wife and children.”, once this fact was uncovered Namatjira’s family fought for the regaining of the artistic copyright, this battle went on for decades, only coming to an end in late 2017 with the copyright transfer back to the Namatjira family, with the assistance of Dick Smith (an Australian millionaire) who struck a deal with

the
proprietors in exchange for the rights transfer. The entire process took far too long, all the while the Rightful owners of the artistic Copyright lived in poverty while a wealthy Family in the north shore benefitted from their ancestor’s hard work. The fact that the Northern Territory state government allowed for the sale of an Artist’s copyright without the artist or the artists family’s consent is beyond me, and I cannot help but feel that if the artist was of British descent the NT government would have thought twice about the sale of the copyright

Conclusion
Aborigines had inhabited Australia for thousands of years, living relatively peacefully, until Australia was discovered by Britain, The British began to colonise Australia and 60,000 years of settlement and inhabitancy was thrown away by the imposing Colonizers, They took away the aboriginals rights, defiled their customs, stripped them of their land and referred to them as animals/Part of Australia’s flora and fauna, Laws were put in place allowing colonizers to kill aboriginals in cold blood, causing a genocidal drop in aboriginal population. Jump forward a hundred year and Aboriginals are still oppressed, Their children are being forcefully taken away, Their sacred sites being defiled by ignorance and they are still considered to be Flora and fauna, 50 years on, Aboriginal Children are still being taken away even though as of 1967 Aboriginals are considered to be part of Australia’s Population, 20 years on, the NT Government has just Sold the rights to Namatjira’s art without the consent of his family, who are now impoverished, 10 Years on Torres strait islander populations have just been given their and back via the Mabo judgement. Skip to today, Aboriginal culture is better understood, sacred sites are being looked after, Aboriginals are no longer Fauna. But, according to Australia’s Constitution, they don’t exist, Aboriginals are still not recognised as part of Australia, this needs to change because equality and reconciliation cannot truly occur while Aboriginals aren’t part of their own country’s Constitution.