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Land rights indigenous australia essay
Land rights indigenous australia essay
Land rights indigenous australia essay
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Directed by Phillip Noyce in 2002 Rabbit-Proof Fence depicts the story of three young girls who escape from a settlement and set out to make the 1,200-mile journey back home on foot. The events are based on a true story sounding the experiences of Ms. Garimara's mother Molly (Everlyn Sampi) who was 14 at the time of the movie, her 8-year-old sister Daisy (Tianna Sansbury), and their 10-year-old cousin Gracie (Laura Monaghan). All three are mixed-race children fathered by itinerant white fence workers commonly referred to as “Half Casts” throughout the film.
The film discusses themes surrounding the stolen generation highlighting the anguish experienced by mothers whose children were taken in an attempt to breed out the indigenous culture,
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particularly targeting “Half Casts”. The film furthermore reflects the fear and confusion of these children forced to adapt to European ways. Also explored are themes such as Aboriginal spirituality, their connection to the land and family relationships. This can be connected by the images of the land and Maud (Molly's mother) teaching her about their spirituality in their native language. Their spirituality is signified by the spirit bird seen flying free in the Skye. We feel is if though Molly is guided back by the spirit bird as we hear the calls of an eagle throughout the movie. The story is set during the 1930's in Jigalog in north-western Australia on the edge of the Gibson Desert. Passing through this Aboriginal community is a rabbit-proof fence which molly follows to navigate home. Mixed race children such as Molly were taken from their “country” and families under ministerial warrants the three girls were forcibly taken and placed into the reduction camp at the Moore River Settlement. The movie implicates that the idea that these camps are set up to train the children as domestic workers to be then servants for white Australian settlers. This is evident throughout the film with the white people consistently seeking to control the aboriginal children and insisting that obey orders or else suffer harsh punishment. This idea was future portrayed through the character of Mavis (Deborah Mailman) who the three girls met on their journey. Mavis was previously from that camp but was too scared to run away and now serves as a servant for a white household. The movie implements the sexual abuse when a white frontiersman enters the cabin where the girls are sleeping, intending to rape the half-caste woman who has lent them her bed. Chief Protector of Aboriginals A.
O. Neville is commonly referred to as “Devil” by the aboriginal children as a way of insinuating the negative feelings they have towards him for being taken away from their families. At times the movie depicts he feels he is truly doing a good thing for the children, “If only they would understand what we are trying to do for them“ (A. O. Neville). These caring feelings are conflicted with the reality that he is removing children from there families forcing them to adapt to the European ways trying to breed out an entire race. While talking about the “half cast” girls he quotes “the youngest is of particular concern, she is promised to a full blood” which related to breeding out the race through not allowing aboriginals to marry and have children. Neville’s statement in Rabbit-Proof Fence that ¨In spite of himself, the native must be helped” His contention that the native must be helped regardless of his/her opinion on the matter voices a moral responsibility to save the native from his/her barbarism. It implies both racism and, more explicitly, paternalism. Neville’s words sound like those one might use in discussing a misbehaving child rather than a ancient society that has survived off the land for over 40,00 years. Ironically Kidnapping and rape are decidedly “uncivilized” in Neville’s world, and yet those are the tools he uses to “civilize” the native. Neville acknowledges the contradiction of his racial policy when he admits that, …show more content…
“Just because people use Neolithic tools does not mean they have Neolithic minds.” Molly is, of course, the film’s exception. Most Aboriginal characters seem to acknowledge their powerlessness in the face of white violence, offering only token resistance. Thus intercultural communication in Rabbit-Proof Fence seems to centre on the dominance of whites over Aborigines There is indication to suggest the film depicts intercultural relationships in Australia in a negative light. Most of the film’s white characters appear to consider the Aborigines a “un wanted third race”( A. O. Neville), justifying kidnapping, rape, and violence against the aboriginal people. Aborigines are portrayed as family-oriented, spiritual, and dynamic were as the majority of white characters are bureaucratic, shallow, greedy, and mechanistic. Evidence supporting this concept includes Molly, Gracie, and Daisy are violently kidnapped from their mothers, a runaway girl is beaten and her hair cut off, when a girl speaks in her native language she is scolded by a white nun shouting “We don’t use that jabber here”. An example of one of the few exceptions to this concept is a white woman who shares clothes and food with Molly, Gracie, and Daisy after they have run away, providing an example of token white resistance to intercultural domination. The Tracker acknowledges his powerlessness to leave Moore River because his daughter is there. He has no choice but to continue working for his white masters. One of the girls at Moore River explains Neville’s inspection of Molly’s whiteness and thus potential to be taken to a special school implying that white race is more intelligent then the aboriginals, “they more cleaver then us, they get to go to proper school”. Some people find the film to be a powerful and moving, and accept what it has to say as fair and accurate.
Other people have challenged this, and say it is not fully accurate, and not fully honest. They say it actually distorts and misrepresents the truth, and causes us to see ourselves in an inaccurate way. The film was criticized over accounts that it did not accurately depict the policies on removal of Aboriginal children nor did it reflect Molly's situation and circumstance as retold in the book Follow the Rabbit—Proof Fence (Byrnes, P. n.d.). According to Andrew Bolt (Herald Sun 14 Feb), the girls were taken after Neville received a letter informing him of their situation and that they were in danger (Bolt, A n.d). Speaking before the Moseley Royal Commission in 1934, A.O. Neville himself claimed that the children had not been removed indiscriminately. Molly’s story has indeed been extremely well documented by Mr Neville, The Chief Protector of Aborigines in Western Australia at the time. Andrew Bolt’s main argument is that Molly, Daisy and Gracie were not removed from Jigalong because of Mr Neville’s plan to ‘breed out the Aborigine’ but to remove them from squalid aboriginal camps for their own
good. Under Molly’s leadership, the girls escape the re-education camp evading the skilled tracker Moodoo and the state police as they walk the long distance back home. The girls are faced with many challenges as they travel the harsh outback for 9 weeks, 1500 miles (2400Km) by foot along the rabbit-proof fence. The epicjourney ranks as one ofthe most remarkable feats of endurance and courage in Australian history (Stephens, T. 2004). The story could easily have been treated as a brutally suspenseful manhunt in which the girls survive any number of narrow escapes from their pursuers (Stephen Holden, 2002). Instead Mr. Noyce's reflects on the beauty of the Australian countryside and the decency of most of the common people who aid the fugitives. Molly, Daisy and Gracie were the first girls who managed to run away from the Moore River Settlement and were not captured; thus, they stood as an example of young women who decided to control their own fate. An uplifting drama that has a happy ending with the reuniting of Molly and Daisy with their mother and grandmother leaves you with an emotional connection to the story and history of Australia. The story continues for her struggles have not ended a and it follows on through to her adult life as she was recaptured with her own daughters escaping a second time only being able to carry Annabelle, her 18—month—old daughter leaving behind Doris who was 4 at the time. Annabelle was then removed aging 3 years later and Molly never saw her daughter Annabeyé‘ again.
Drugs and gang affiliation influence the youth in the communities with resources to escape for better things being so limited. This film shows issues that coincide with the class as well, we have pushed the indigenous people off of their lands and limited them so much that this is the life that they are forced to live. Environmental issues with these problems include drugs going into the water streams and waste, old furniture being disposed of by burning it. The conditions of life for the people living on this reservation is very bleak and the director does an astonishing job at showing
Nan Dear, the matriarch of the family, is challenged and is subsequently forced to reflect on her past experience with white Australians. In the past, Nan Dear experience the Stolen generation, ‘they forced us to leave. Forced us to leave Cummeragunja. Our home.’ The inclusive pronoun ‘us’ places herself amongst other children who were taken away from their home.
What is known as `The Stolen Generation' in my opinion, is an enormous feature in the film. References from the scene of Cressy and Nona in a heated moment, when Cressy illustrates to Nona, as children their mother easily handed Mae and herself to `officials' when they came to take them. Nona defends their mother and says that they once went to see the girls when they were at the school with nuns. On their first attempt to scatter ashes, which in my opinion is not of aboriginal custom, Mae breaks down and wails in tongue. It appears to be an aboriginal lyrical sorrow, which the whole reason for her doing this was initially because of her unfortunate childhood.
The fact that this film is based on a true story makes it more powerful and real. The film puts a human face to the stolen generation, and the young actress who plays the main character Molly does not disillusion the viewer of the real emotions and disgusting actions taken upon the young half caste children taken from their families. She makes the journey real and her cleverness is created by the need to survive, not as an entertainment construction to make the film more exciting, but to give the viewer an emotional impact. The racial activist, A.O. Neville constantly shows strong discrimination against both Aboriginal culture and half-caste children. He is determined to `breed the black out of them'. "Are we to allow the creation of a third unwanted race?" resembling the cause of World War Two where Adoff Hitler proposed the creation of the `perfect race' therefore killing off over half the Jewish people.
The stolen generation is a scenario carry out by the Australian government to separate most aboriginal people’s families. The government was enforced take the light skinned aboriginal kids away from their guardians to learn the white people’s culture in the campus around the country and then send them back to their hometown and prohibit them join the white people’s society after they turn be an adult. The
This movie is based on changing the lives of Mexican Americans by making a stand and challenging the authority. Even when the cops were against them the whole time and even with the brutal beatings they received within one of the walk out, they held on. They stuck to their guns and they proved their point. The main character was threatened by the school administrators, she was told if she went through with the walkout she would be expelled. While they wanted everyone who was going to graduate to simply look the other way, the students risked it all and gave it their all to make their voices
Specific elements of the storyline that display the theme racism include: the display of animalistic treatment, enforced religious practices, and historical comparisons. The film reveals the overarching government belief that the white race is smarter and purer, to the inferior, uncivilized and misguided, darker-skinned, Aboriginals. This belief is demonstrated throughout the film and signifies the government’s attitudes toward the half-caste race as: uncivilized animals that need a trainer to discipline them. For example, the film shows the girls being transported like livestock to th...
In Alice Munro’s “Boys and Girls” she tells a story about a young girl’s resistance to womanhood in a society infested with gender roles and stereotypes. The story takes place in the 1940s on a fox farm outside of Jubilee, Ontario, Canada. During this time, women were viewed as second class citizens, but the narrator was not going to accept this position without a fight.
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 ...
“Lullaby” follows the systematic destruction of Native American culture and society on a smaller scale, depicting how the influences of outsiders led to the ruination of a single family.
Parbury (1999:64) states that Aboriginal education “cannot be separated” from the non-Aboriginal attitudes (racially based ethnocentricity that were especially British ie. white and Christian) towards Aborigines, their culture and their very existence. The Mission Schools are an early example of the connection between official education policies and key events in Aboriginal history. Aboriginal children were separated from their parents and placed into these schools which according to McGrath (as cited by Parbury, 1999:66) it was recommended that these establishments be located ‘as far as possible’ from non Aboriginal residents so as to minimize any heathen influence that Aboriginal children might be subject to from their parents. Mission Schools not only prepared Aboriginal youth for the manual labour market but also, adds Parbury (1999:67) their aim was‘to destroy Aboriginal culture and replace it with an Anglo-European work and faith ethic.’ Despite the NSW Public Instruction Act (1880) which made education free, secular and compulsory for all children Aboriginal children could be excluded from public schools based on prevailing dominant group attitudes. Consequently, the NSW Aborigines Protection Act (1909) was introduced as a result of a perceived public education crisis and Laws had already been passed, similar to protectionist type policies. This Act gave the State the power to remove Aboriginal children from their families whereby this period of time has become known as ‘Stolen Generations.’ It was during this time that Aboriginal children were segregated from mainstream schools. (Parbury, 1999; Lippman, 1994).
Munro uses a fox farm for the setting of Boys and Girls to bring out many of the social issues between genders. While her father worked outside doing all the labor work, her mother stayed inside cooking and cleaning, “it was an odd thing to see my mother down at the barn” (Munro 12). The girl was very resentful towards her mother, mostly because she did not agree with the stereotypical life that her mother led. Causing the girl to spend more time helping her father around the farm. The girl would help feed the foxes, “cut the long grass, and the lamb’s quarter and flowering money-musk” (Munro 10). Although when she turned eleven, things started to change causing the girl to not only observe gender differences between her mother and father but to experience it between her and her brother Laird when working around the farm. While Laird became more predominant with helping on the farm, the girl became less valuable to her father and was forced to help her mother around the house.
Peter Rabbit and his sisters were forbidden by their mother to enter Mr. McGregor’s garden because it was in this garden that their father had met his end and had become an ingredient of McGregor’s pie. The element of fear had been instilled in th...
Have you ever had the opportunity to do something great but someone held you back? Also have you ever had someone that tried to control everything you do and everyone around you? If so you can relate to the book “Fences” By August Wilson. Fences is about a African American man Troy that is trying to keep food on the table for his family, and raise his kids as best as he can. Troy has a wife name Rose two sons named Cory, and Lyons and has a brother named Gabe. In Fences expect to see what seems like a happy family on the outside but in the inside everything is not as good as it seems. Masculinity/Manhood is an important theme in Fences because it shows how true takes care of his family but also shows how controlling and arrogant he can be, and it also helps show August Wilson’s way of saying a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.