Thank you, Divine Ms_n, but I don't understand what you are getting at (or perhaps I don't want to understand?) - if you are suggesting that some of the fifteen hundred Indigenous university graduates this year are not Indigenous, or not 'sufficiently' Indigenous for your liking, or are not sufficiently politically ra-ra Indigenous for your liking, then may I suggest that that is not really your business ?

As for Alice Springs graduates, there are plenty, many of whom have graduated in every other major city in Australia, even from the Launceston Maritime College ('What!', you say, 'an Indigenous person from Alice Springs graduating from a maritime college ? How dare they ! Where are the oceans around Alice Springs ? Why aren't they confining themselves to Arid Lands Conservation, or Indigenous Health?' you may say.) They may answer: 'Go to buggery, we will study whatever the hell we like'.

It's called integration, Divine Ms_n. Integration with attitude, otherwise known as 'identity'.

And yes, policies over the last forty years have condemned outstation kids to be barred from higher education. Should the rest of the Indigenous population fall in a heap and cry in their beer ? Or should they say, bugger it, outstation life is not for us, we want decent careers and we have the right to them. And what would you say to that ?

Yes, develop all manner of pathways that will assist outstation kids to get some basic skills, and trade skills, and untimately professional skills through tertiary education - if not in this generation, then for their children. It's been a long, slow process for the Indigenous people who are making it now in 2011, they haven't had it given to them on a plate. But the pathways should be there too for their segregated cousins, condemned by policy to short, empty, blighted lives.

Joe Lane

I'm saying that there's no such thing as "Generic Aboriginality". Some people with indigenous heritage wish to wear it as a badge, some basically ignore or hide it and others anywhere in between.

I find it ludicrous when a person with an aboriginal ancestor 3 or 4 or more generations back whose genetic make-up is predominately another racial group or groups proclaims they are "aboriginal". I could understand if such individuals were reared in a tribal setting but this is rare - especially since most are now urbanised. Just like I would look a fool claiming to be an asian because great-grandpa was a chinaman. That's my POV. I'm not the only one ...

On all other fronts we agree. Education and training for indigenous kids and all ages who want it. Helping them to help themselves and their families. Real jobs - jeez we are singing off the same page there, and opportunities to thrive. Integration for better or worse because that's the only viable future.

Dear Divine Ms_n,

Thank you. You are missing the point: regardless of how dark or pale some Aboriginal people may be, they - or at least their parents and grandparents - had to put up with discriminatory policies for generations, policies which barred them from opportunities by virtue of just that factor that you complain about, the inheritance of some Aboriginal ancestry. As well, who raised the kids ? Usually the Aboriginal mothers, with any white fathers nowhere to be seen. After all, it was illegal, until the early sixties, for white men to associate with Aboriginal women (not that that stopped either party).

So I have no problem with people claiming Aboriginality, no matter how pale they might be. On the other hand, this does open the door to non-Aboriginal people purporting to claim benefits - people with not the slightest trace of Aboriginality or political/historical heritage ('culture') - but usually, Aboriginal people can pick these ring-ins pretty quickly. When I was working at the Uni of SA, I had quite a few of these and even I could pick most of them: I used to give them a 'Family Tree' form to fill out, with a big friendly smile, and usually never saw them again. They often got into another notoriously incompetent and lax program instead: one even was named their 'Aboriginal Scholar of the Year'.

Divine Ms_n, please remember that 'race', history and culture are not synonymous: Aboriginal people in the south or 'settled' areas have been immersed in a Western-type social and political environment for 150-200 years: their ancestors more or less abandoned traditional cultural practices many generations ago, when it was no longer feasible to engage in them. The key factor, the upshot of policy, history and social forces, is that Aboriginal people do not see themselves as non-Aboriginal: they've 'learnt' that they AREN'T Non-Aboriginal, and that lesson stays with them for life. Give them a break.

Joe

Divine Ms_n,

I'm concerned that you, and probably many others, find it difficult to conceive of Aboriginal people who have moved to the cities - who have urbanised themselves, to use the active voice for a bloody change - somehow are no longer Aboriginal.

It reminds me of the difficulties in recent times of newly-graduated Aboriginal secondary teachers getting employment - the bureaucratic turd at the other end of the phone would say, 'What, Aboriginal and a teacher ? Hmmm, an Aboriginal teacher, okay, we'll find you a primary school position.' The graduate would say, 'But I'm secondary-trained'. 'Well, we don't have any positions for education workers at secondary schools at the moment, but try later'. 'But I'm a qualified teacher, a secondary teacher, not an education worker'. 'What ? An Aboriginal qualified secondary teacher ? Well, I'm sorry, dear, we don't have any Aboriginal secondary schools'. And round and round they'd go. So, big surprise, with maybe forty Aboriginal people qualified as secondary teachers in SA, there are only two or three actually working in the system, usually (no, all of them) working mostly with Aboriginal kids.

So yes, there is still a lot of racism around. How hard it seems to be for whites to hold the thoughts of 'Aboriginal' and 'urban' in their heads at the same time, let alone 'Aboriginal' and 'qualified'. 'Aboriginal', 'urban' and 'qualified' must just about fry their brains. No offence, Divine Ms_n, but it is possible to be all three :)

Joe

Jeez - are the chips on your shoulder heavy to carry around or what? Can I remind you that Australian history isn't entirely based on 'persecution of the unfortunate aboriginal'?

The Chinese were persecuted mainly by whites, but plenty of instances of attack by natives and some were allegedly eaten. The white australia policy saw many of those who had migrated, mainly to chase gold, forcibly repatriated. This is said to have been the fate of my great-grandfather, although details are somewhat sketchy. The alliance with my great-grandmother which produced one child was considered absolutely scandalous and a blight on the family reputation. Apart from the fact this female child had quite exceptional intelligence, an iron disposition with a work ethic to match and built quite a nice little empire - despite the times, her sex and the prejudice she encountered as an Eurasian, her story would have been hushed up as much as possible. As it was, mentioning the chinaman was verboten.

So Joe - like me I suggest you live in the present. The time is now. Opportunities exist for people who may have no more than a smidgeon of aboriginal genetics through to 100% that are not available for others. Now that's fine by me if it helps people help themselves plus the flow on effect is usually very powerful. The increasing number of young people reaching higher levels of education is very encouraging. In other areas there are some terrible 'indigenous statistics' which need to be addressed. Like it or not - much of the trouble is from within and despite bad policy throwing money and proclaiming go forth and self determine, problems have steadily worsened.

So it seems one level of the indigenous population - the increasingly 'white' one (sorry for want of a better description)is moving forward and the other is headed for oblivion.

Thank you Divine Ms_n,

I agree with pretty much everything you write in your last post. Yes, there is a rapidly growing 'Gap' between Indigenous people who have seized opportunities, taken risks, and put effort into their lives, and those who seek to fall back onto lifelong welfare - extreme welfare, one could call it. My wife wrote a key paper on this very theme some years ago for Noel Pearson.

But what are the people who have made the jump supposed to do ? Isn't it up to the 'welfare mob' to get off their backsides and seek out opportunities as well ? Of course, there should be effective pathways to facilitate any such efforts, but effort is what it needs. Countless times, around our kitchen table, we used to enthusiastically propose what might be done in this or that situation, and our son would laugh and say "Yeah, sure, just add the miracle ingredient: effort." That usually cooled us down a bit.

But those 26,000 Indigenous graduates - one in nine adults - have shown that it is possible, if incredibly difficult. Nobody can fall back on the racist lie that Indigenous people are incapable and therefore need our constant sympathy in an alien world. And in the next decade, those graduate numbers could double. What then, for the 'welfare mob' ? Will they still be living useless lives, abusing their women and kids, beating the sh!t out of each other, boozing, burgling and car-jacking at will ? With their kids suiciding at ten times the national rate, and committing offences at twenty times the national rate ? What is the point ?

Meanwhile, the effort-oriented population will stream ahead. They don't have to wait for their welfare-oriented relations to catch up - that's the obligation of those relations, as long as there are sensible, effective and hard-working pathways for them to get from one side of the Gap to the other. Dark or pale, the working, effort-oriented population will build secure, productive lives, alongside other Australians, shaping new versions of Indigenous identity as they wish.

Joe Lane