So, are all people created equal? Good Day, everybody. On behalf of the Mount Gravatt show and to represent NAIDOC week, I will be giving you some insight into the cultural background of the Indigenous people of Australia. This has been portrayed in the deep, protest plea for Aboriginal Human rights, the poem, ‘Aboriginal Charter of Rights’ by, Oodgeroo Noonuccal in 1962.
Aboriginal people have been identified as the continuous civilization on Earth. Oodgeroo Noonuccal, an educated Aboriginal woman has penned a poem outlining what she sees as the plight of Aboriginals in white Australia. The concentrated use of words and message help us, as the audience, to understand and gain relevant information on the Indigenous people.
Aboriginal culture
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and background reaches over 60’000 years. However, some of the defining focal areas are dancing, producing music and dreaming. They enjoyed corroborees with bodies painted in ochre as it was a way of expressing themselves and connecting with the dreamtime. As for dreaming, it was the way that the Indigenous people would educate and prepare the young. Just like Christianity, it was a way of living. It prescribed their connection to the land, bunyip and billabongs. During the 18th century, over 500 tribes existed. Nowadays, there are over 150 native languages spoken. The number of Aboriginal people today makes up 2.4 percent of the population. That means that there are over 440’000 aboriginals out of 22 million people in Australia. The poem highlights the contrast that Aboriginal people have less opportunity in society than non-Aborigines, “give incentive, not restriction” and “human rights, not segregation” are examples. The way Noonuccal has utilized these strong, contrasting phrases help us to understand her perspectives. “In our land rank as aliens?” and “circumscribe, who should befriend us?” are very influential and empowering rhetorical questions. These debates stand for the whole Aboriginal voice, encouraging them to stand up for something that was once theirs. “Give us Christ, not crucifixion” and “Through baptized and blessed and Bibled” can represent the view of the Stolen Generations as it makes us visualize the white man trying to erase the children’s Aboriginal culture and program them to be saints. Nevertheless, they punished them and were unsuccessful. On the other hand, Noonuccal demands that Aborigines have the same right as non-Aborigines. In the quotation, “Make us proud, not colour conscious” Noonuccal has eloquently used these words to target her audience in a way that makes them proud of their Aboriginal heritage and ashamed of their racism.
This accentuates the racism under which the Aborigines used to live and evokes more sympathy and empathy for the Indigenous people than the bare words, “stop racism”. She formulates rhetorical questions and imagery such as, “In our land rank as aliens?” and “Circumscribe, who should befriend us?” to indicate that she thinks that Aborigines are treated as foreigners in their own country. She uses alliteration, “banish bans”, to show the controls that Aborigines were subjected to. As well, the alliteration in, “conquer caste”, with its harsh ‘k’ sound indicates the equality that she wanted to achieve in Australian society. Noonuccal relies on contrast to define what Aborigines want now compared to what they received in the past.ie. “Not rebuff, but education”. She uses allusion and idiom, “Devout salvation-sellers”, to mock the white people in charge of the missions. Noonuccal structures the poem to have rhyming couplets, ‘AABBCC etc.’ to enhance the flow of the poem. What she repeatedly asks the Aborigines to be given is not money, but quality of
life. Noonuccal wants to replace the bureaucratically controlled life of subjugation that the Aborigine endured with a charter of human rights that states the same human rights as other Australians. The positive aspects she advocates, no! demands, show an educated, intelligent and sensitive Aboriginal woman who brilliantly expresses her demand for the human rights of Aborigines as fellow human beings.
The poem “We’re not trucking around” by Samuel Wagan Watson presents an Aboriginal perspective on Australian National identity, showing the audience that Australians still mistreat Indigenous people, expressing his perspective through the ideas that white men still mistreat Aboriginals and the marginalization of Aboriginal culture. Watson reinforces his idea through poetic and language
The East Kimberly region of Western Australia has been depict as a place of ‘grinding poverty, violence and racist exclusion in which so many Aboriginal people in the east Kimberley live, and yet at the same time through art it communicate the beauty and grandeur of their lives. ‘For those trying to communicate through art with the issue of death, harsh, pain and even compassion, were seen as necessary to maintain memories and record of Aboriginal historical events. The thirst for telling such companionate story is not easily interpreted, however, if we look at history we could see the influence of real tradition of aboriginal art emerge.
Indigenous People. In evaluating the Legal System’s response to Indigenous People and it’s achieving of justice, an outline of the history of Indigenous Australians - before and during settlement - as well as their status in Australian society today must be made. The dispossession of their land and culture has deprived Indigenous People of economic revenue that the land would have provided if not colonised, as well as their ... ... middle of paper ... ...
The Municipal Gum by Oodgeroo Noonuccal portrays the miserable, hopeless and despondent living conditions of the Aboriginal people. It expresses the feelings of the Indigenous people who are deprived and displaced from their native culture and native land by the white people. The general theme and the ideas addressed in this poem includes raising awareness of the tremendous discrimination and prejudice by white Australians against the aboriginal people. The discrimination is developed strongly within the content of the poem, with some imageries holding powerful messages and meanings. It can therefore be seen that the poem is about the tremendous discrimination by the white Australians towards the aboriginal people.
Walker feels the strong need for white society to stop "libelling" and defaming Aborigines as "fringe-dweller" that reside within "missions" "Aboriginal Character of Rights" encompasses Walkers innermost hopes, thoughts and emotions - all of which reflect upon the unjustly treatment of the Indigenous people throughout history. Walker presents a social commentary through poetry that comprehensively reviews the common rights of all Aboriginal people. She openly comments on her people's status within society and relentles... ... middle of paper ... ...
A Comparison of Civilization by Oodgeroo Noonuccal and Beds Are Burning by Peter Garrett In the Australian culture, there have been many debates about the rightful ownership of Australian land and about whether the Aborigines have the right to retain the land taken from them. Further more, indigenous writers have expressed anger and protest towards the loss of their culture to white civilization. Peter Garrett and Oodgeroo Noonuccal are two artists who seek to raise the issues of the native land title and the oppression of Australian Aborigines. "Civilization" by Oodgeroo Noonuccal is a poem, which comments on the effects of white civilization on Aboriginal people and "Beds are Burning" by Peter Garrett comments on the issue of native land title. Throughout the two texts, various poetic techniques such as imagery, irony, tone and point of view, as well as poetic form are used to express deeply held views about the values and issues raised.
Struggles by Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander people for recognition of their rights and interests have been long and arduous (Choo & Hollobach: 2003:5). The ‘watershed’ decision made by the High Court of Australia in 1992 (Mabo v Queensland) paved the way for Indigenous Australians to obtain what was ‘stolen’ from them in 1788 when the British ‘invaded’ (ATSIC:1988). The focus o...
...ed on Australia's working women and Oodgeroo Noonuccal's life is featured as one of the exhibitions. The Oxford Companion to Twentieth-Century Literature in English wrote, "Overall her work, and life, was a passionate and articulate expression of wrongs inflicted upon Australian Aboriginal people and of the Aboriginal's indomitable will not only to survive but to flourish." Oodgeroo's seemingly timeless popularity is a testament to both her survival and her prosperity.
Despite the decreasing inequalities between men and women in both private and public spheres, aboriginal women continue to be oppressed and discriminated against in both. Aboriginal people in Canada are the indigenous group of people that were residing in Canada prior to the European colonization. The term First Nations, Indian and indigenous are used interchangeably when referring to aboriginal people. Prior to the colonization, aboriginal communities used to be matrilineal and the power between men and women were equally balanced. When the European came in contact with the aboriginal, there came a shift in gender role and power control leading towards discrimination against the women. As a consequence of the colonization, the aboriginal women are a dominant group that are constantly subordinated and ignored by the government system of Canada. Thus today, aboriginal women experiences double jeopardy as they belong to more than one disadvantaged group i.e. being women and belonging to aboriginal group. In contemporary world, there are not much of a difference between Aboriginal people and the other minority groups as they face the similar challenges such as gender discrimination, victimization, and experiences injustice towards them. Although aboriginal people are not considered as visible minorities, this population continues to struggle for their existence like any other visible minorities group. Although both aboriginal men and women are being discriminated in our society, the women tends to experience more discrimination in public and private sphere and are constantly the targeted for violence, abuse and are victimized. In addition, many of the problems and violence faced by aborigin...
Over the course of history, poetry has been used to amuse, express feelings and provoke thought. Poetry has also been used as a powerful tool of protest to influence and change attitudes. One poet who did all these things is Oodgeroo Noonuccal. Noonuccal is an indigenous Australian woman who wrote in the 60s into 90s. She portrayed indigenous people suffering under the oppression of the European settlers in Australia. One of Noonuccal’s poems, ‘Time is Running Out’, expressed a very powerful message against mining. In this poem, she urges the indigenous people to act, defend and fight back against the oppressive and greedy European miners before the earth is destroyed. Noonuccal fulfills this purpose in several ways. Firstly, her powerful
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
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The inequality in Australian education can be attributed to a history of low expectations and discrimination placed on Indigenous people by the government and society. Aboriginal children were denied the right to education until the 1970s due to the discrimitory views of the government and society. The Indigenous population were the sub-standard race of humanity with little to no chance of succeeding in life and these attitudes affected the educational choices offered to them (Ray & Poonwassie, 1992). As the superior race, the Anglo-Celtic Australians, considered themselves both intellectually and socio-culturally more advanced than their inferior Aboriginal neighbours (Foley, 2013). As a consequence of these racially and culturally motivated preconceptions, children of Aboriginal descent were considered unskilled outside of their own and were deemed incapable of excelling in ‘civilised’ white society (Foley, 2013). As a result, the Australian Government, in an effort to civilise and nurture politeness within the Aboriginal people, constructed “structured” (p 139) education training institutions in 1814. However, these problems only provided sufficient schooling for menial work: Aboriginal male children were prepared for agricultural employment, while girls were trained for domesticated services (Foley, 2013). Thus, as a direct consequence of low expectation for life success, Aboriginal children were offered minimal schooling ‘consistent with the perception about the limitations inherent in their race and their expected station in life at the lowest rung of white society’ (Beresford & Partington, 2003, p43). According to Foley (2013) this combination of low expectations and poor academic grounding meant that Indigenous children we...
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