Jim - checked out lovestory from Tjapaltjarri Painting you quoted. You may've been a little child when you heard your version. Read on:

".. he engaged in his ceremony designed to capture the heart of a woman who was unsuitable for the young ancestor to marry in accordance with traditional law. The ancestor, however, was too taken by the woman to give up on her affection, so he continued his love ceremony.

Driven by passion, the ancestor’s ceremony also involved `singing` a love song, which travelled to the woman’s campsite some distance away and crept into her dreams. When the woman woke all she could think about was the young ancestor and so she made her way to Ngarlu to find him, represented by footprints that lead south to the ancestor’s ground design. Other prints in this work represent tracks of the ancestor which he made searching the area for materials used for his ceremony. The ancestor is also represented by symbolic U-shape resting near unspun tuffs of hair and a nulla nulla which also doubles as a phallic symbol.

The other phallic symbol in this work is the diamond shape motif that represents the woman and doubles to give expression to a similar looking rock at Ngarlu said to be the woman’s `sex`, which changed into stone after she and her lover-husband were killed by family members for breaking the law which prohibited them from marrying. This, however, is but one version of the law-breaking couple's fate when three are actually told: one for children, which is less of a Shakespearian love tragedy; another for the uninitiated, which the artist claimed was often told by people with little knowledge; then there is a third that the artists claims is “the true one” in which the law-breaking couple were killed, but their children were left to live on at Larumba (Napperby Soakage) as Anmatyarre, or Pultara, `children of the wrong skin`."

Artist usually knows his subject eh?

BTW which community you visit? Must get you directions to the ones I reckon you should reform! COLLECT JENNIE ON THE WAY.....

divine_msn
You actually crack me up "Ditto young Romeos trying to muscle in".

Assumptions are so easy, one I am not a man and two, well I'm Aboriginal and I often tell Dreamtime stories and their interpretations. But what would I know about interpretations?

It's interesting that you talk of gloom of doom in regards to Aboriginal Dreamtime Stories given most moral and law stories are about repercussions of actions, for example the Bible is filled with stories based on morals, law and repercussions, I'm sure you won't find a love story in the Bible! The First Testament is filled with gloom and doom! Jesus crucified on the cross after being lashed, Cain and Able, the plague, floods, famines, do I need to go on.

You should read and understand Dreamtime stories within their context and not make assumptions of knowing.

I am further amazed of your assumptions of marriage, not all tribes are the same, given there were 200 different tribal groups throughout Australia, there were similarities and differences, not every tribe practiced the same marriage ceremonies. There were certainly marriages where women and men were around the same age and there was certainly love or an obligation of looking after each other.

Traditional Aboriginal women were and are not subservient as we are not today. Aboriginal women still today play a big part in their communities, we believe that Aboriginal women are the backbone's of our society.

As for some dysfunctional families you see in Aboriginal communities today that is due to the removal of Aboriginal children from their families, as the removal policy of institionalisation and growing up without love and stability created many psychological problems that Aboriginal people are facing and trying to re-address today.

Perhaps you should read http://www.e-contentmanagement.com/books/65/orphaned-by-the-colour-of-my-skin-a-stolen. The book presents a rare autobiographical journaling of the psychological impact of institutionalisation on an Indigenous woman, her search for family, community and identity, her psychological breakdown and her personal reconstruction through telling her story. Perhaps you should learn to listen and I mean really listen first without forming or making an assumption.

Quayle - I agree about the Bible though your quotes are off target. Old Testament is Creation, Law, Genealogy, Jewish History and includes bloodthirsty tales of sin, crime and consequence, wars etc, and prophecy.(Adult reading mostly and heavy duty at that) New Testament deals with life and works of Jesus and his Apostles.

Realise there're Dreamtime stories for youngsters that are not "doom and gloom" as you say, just like Christians don't teach 8yr olds olden times punishment for breaking most 10 commandments was death.

I'm not aboriginal. My knowledge is from association and keen interest. I've read anthropology works and collections of Myths and Legends from different regions. Serious ones - not kiddies stories, are invariably ' Old Testament biblical' used to maintain social order and patriarchal hierarchy.

Yes - Patriarchal. Women had ceremonies and power to produce new life but Quayle, it's fact they had as much choice as women living in tribal Afghanistan today. Still same for some traditional women but not majority thankfully.

I truly sympathise with the plight of aboriginal people living in environments of squalor, substance abuse, violence, sexual abuse, child neglect and abuse but don't accept the "stolen generation" explanation. While forcible removals undoubtedly caused many pain and damage it also saved at least an equal number. While 'whitey' is always accused of racism, blackfellas were very colour concious at tribal level. With the laws about who gets to bonk who, birth of mixed-race children wasn't greeted with coroborees of JOY. My 'ancestors' told me life for a mixed boy precluded full acceptance (initiation)and no marriage prospects, while mixed girls were considered inferior, often treated like slaves. "They're neither one or the other" lamented Grandfather who sacked any man suspected of fooling with native women. I understood child removals began to counter the plight of these kids but despite noble intention it went overboard.
Regardless, those 'saved' gained education and skills to live in the wider world which is what Aboriginals must do to survive and thrive. BTW I had mixed-race brother, legally adopted, mother wasn't coerced. Sadly died at 19 - MVA.

Loudmouth,
Am certainly NOT criticising Aboriginal University Graduates - Oh that we would have had our "Treaty of Waitangi" for Australia in 1865, that may have given us our first Aboriginal Medical Graduate around 1900 as happenened in New Zealand !
divine_msn ,thanks for the versions of the "Love Story" . These many Aboriginal myths and stories could be our equivalent to the European - Greek and Roman Legends that we learnt about as children .
Those Landmark Geographical Features we love to take a photo of in our local areas would at one time ,not all that long ago have a wealth of Events that occurred to make them what they are .
It was Tjapaltjarri that said that basically the Story behind the painting was more important than the painting itself .
The community I visited is in the Kimberleys - their leaders are survivors from the big round-up of Aboriginal People that were taken to town from their traditional Country where they worked, and forced to live in town where many died a premature death from alcoholism,poor food and smoking diseases, the station owners preferring to employ helicopters rather than pay decent wages to their employees .
Just where are these Communities that you want to criticise ?
For me I would rather spend my time trying to help them rather than abusing them .

divine_msn please don't put words in my mouth,while I do admit that I got my Bible interpretations wrong, the gist was Dreamtime stories are about repercussions of people's actions, like the Bible. I never said all Dreamtime Stories are of gloom and doom, I actually wrote "It's interesting that you talk of gloom of doom in regards to Aboriginal Dreamtime Stories given most moral and law stories are about repercussions of actions."

In regards to Aboriginal women, please don't interpret my culture, Aboriginal women shared an interdependent relationship with the men playing a dominant role in child rearing and food gathering and sharing the roles of healers, law makers, performers, painters and custodians of traditional ways.

I am sorry to hear about your brother and maybe he was one of the fortunate few. The Human Rights Commission report "Bringing them Home" http://www.hreoc.gov.au/social_Justice/bth_report/report/index.html, mentioned many Aboriginal children who were removed and the abuse they suffered. The inquiry into the stolen children was established by the federal attorney-general in 1995. It was conducted by the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission and published its findings and recommendations in 1997.

It concluded that the forcible removal of indigenous children was a gross violation of their human rights.

As for anthropology I also find the topic area interesting, but the readings have also be known to be riddled with mistakes, especially when you are relying on writers who like to add their views, bias, assumptions and opinions and given they are looking at the world through their eyes and divine_msn remember most historical writers were not Aboriginal and tried to interpret a society, people and language, that in some instances they did not speak the language nor understood the people or society, most English people at the time could not even comprehend a democratic society. http://wwwmcc.murdoch.edu.au/ReadingRoom/serial/AJCS/1.1/Muecke.html

Just like opinions online, each person even though reading the same topic will interpret or add their versions.

Quayle,

How many cases of forcible removal have gone to court and been found to have been examples of an entire stolen generation ?

One: in South Australia. One case across all of Australia. Since 1900. Surely there should be more than one ? There must have been hundreds of examples of officious bureaucrats or coppers, in 110 years, in all the states and territories, who overstepped their powers and took Aboriginal kids into care, illegally ? Even without having to posit some devilish plot to 'turn Aboriginal kids into little white kids', something not known in any other racist society - just simple bureaucratic over-reach ?

Joe Lane