The basic problems being faced by Australian Aborigines are not unique, but are also problems being faced by many cultures in many countries.

How to maintain your culture when the world is slowly becoming a giant McDonalds, where everything is the same and eventually becomes totally bland.

Whether Australian Aboriginals have some inherent connection with the land is questionable. That connection is not genetic, and can easily be lost in 1-2 generations. My relatives came from a country in Europe, and my relatives lived there for 10,000’s of years. However I have minimal connection with Europe, and its only been 2 generations since my relatives left Europe.

So to maintain your culture, you have to be living that culture. I’ve seen aboriginals shooting turtles with rifles. I don’t think that is maintaining their culture.

HRS,

I don't think the fact that aborigines use guns rather than spears to catch turtles to eat has any relevance whatsoever.

Are you seriously suggesting that there is no place for modern technology in aboriginal culture? Because that would be truly daft.The American Indians took up rifles and other western implements without losing themselves.

I do tend to agree with your point that culture must be lived, however. This unfortunately is at complete odds with modern western life. Adequate standards (ie at least white levels)of KPI such as health, education and housing are almost impossible to achieve for remote communities where there is no work and no hope of any in the future. Those communities which cannot sustain themselves should not be permanently inhabited. Keeping a connection with your land is a vital part of aboriginal culture, but if you want western style benefits your community needs breadwinners who have real jobs. Its as simple and as complicated as that.

Robert Chapman is the prototypical bleeding heart. Two things characterise bleeding hearts:

--Self-righteousness; and

--The fact that collectively they have caused as much human suffering and misery as Hitler, Mao and Stalin combined – all with the very best intentions of course.

So let's have a reality check.

I am a Jew. I belong to a culture that has sustained itself under difficult circumstances for centuries.

But here's the thing. Some men in black suits and women in wigs notwithstanding, Jewish culture in 21st century Melbourne is very different to the Jewish culture of the East European Shtetl's. That was in turn different to the culture of Moroccan Jews.

Living cultures are dynamic. They adapt to changing circumstances. They vary across space and across time. That's what Jewish culture does.

As a Jewish kid I learned Hebrew, had a bar mitzvah and learned to conduct a prayer service. That was, if you like, the "ceremony."

But that was IN ADDITION TO, not in place of, secular education. We never tried to adapt our secular education to Jewish culture. Instead we adapted to the secular world in which we lived.

In the end, if Aborigines want to preserve their cultures, that's what they have to do. They have to adapt their cultures. No matter what bleeding hearts like Chapman say, Australia's diverse 22 million non-Aboriginals are not going to adapt to Aboriginal cultures.

Probably that means Aborigines have to learn to be aboriginal in towns and cities where the jobs are.

In the end it's up to the Aborigines themselves. If they value their culture they will find ways pf preserving it. If not, then it will vanish. But it will be their choice.

Outsiders like Chapman can no more save Aboriginal culture than they can save Jewish culture. But by holding out false hopes, by trying to preserve an unsustainable status quo, they can prolong the agony and condemn many people to lives of needless suffering.

I'm with Steven on this. In fact, I must point out that more than 80% of Indigenous people live in towns and cities - barely 8% live in remote settlements, and almost none of them engage in hunting or gathering. As Steven says, culture - which, after all, is created, fashioned, modified, replaced, by PEOPLE - must be permitted to keep changing. Indigenous people have as much right as anyone else to hunt with rifles from the backs of Toyotas, or to use motorised boats, jet-boats even, to go fishing in - but don't call it hunting and gathering, call it what it is, a shooting trip, or a fishing trip.

Another thing: More than 20,000 Indigenous people have now graduated from universities around Australia, most at degree-level and above. A record 9370 Indigenous people were enrolled at universities last year and probably more this year. By 2020, there could easily be 50,000 graduates in total, with another 3,000 graduating each year, and another 20,000 enrolled. Two thirds of students and graduates are women. The vast majority are studying on-campus, in cities. Since 1980, more than 75,000 Indigenous people have, at some time, been enrolled at universities. The equivalent of half of the population has, is, or at some time will be, enrolled in tertiary courses. Indigenous people have achieved mass tertiary participation, on a par with Europe's. Graduates have far better health, are usually employed, rarely in trouble with the law, rarely addicted to grog or drugs, and will tend to have a far longer life-span.

Check out DEEWR's web-site if you are in doubt, on its URL:
http://www.dest.gov.au/sectors/higher_education/publications_resources/statistics/publications_higher_education_statistics_collections.htm

Joe

Loudmouth,
The laws keep changing and can vary from state to state, but at one time aborigines were allowed to hunt certain native animals because they were a native food. This was not allowed of non-aboriginies.

Shooting them is a lot easier to hunting them by spear or catching them by hand, but shooting them means that traditional hunting skills and expertise will be lost in time.

Next stop is McDonalds.

I think you are correct in that very few aborigines now have much connection with the land. To have much connection with some land you have to be getting your food, water and shelter from that land, but living off the land is very difficult.

"Looking at the oldest continuous civilisation in the world, its very longevity would be a pretty good argument for its inherent stability and capacity to provide for its members’ needs."

This is a pretty breathtaking assumption.

As there were never any major communities or structure, the term civilisation can only be applied in the very loosest sense.

As there are no records beyond 1788, the assumption that the existing culture is the same as thousands of years ago is also difficult to substantiate.

The cobbled together collection of common practises based on verbal recollection has so many holes that it cannot be seriously considered as a body of law in itself, and as such has only been used as a guide to the judge in applying Australian law.

Recently it would appear that the main purpose of cultural law has been to mitigate sentence for rape, paedophilia, wife beatings etc, and such has attracted a review. To then propose further application of this law would only perpetuate the subversion of justice.

I deeply sympathise with the aboriginal citizens of our country, but personally see the attempt to cling to the old ways as the source of their woes and not the cure.

I can see that those that cleave emotionally to the nobility of bygone cultures will attempt to rebut my comments by attaching the "racist" tag. I would challenge them to actually point out any flaws in my argument.

steven, I found food for thought in your post but it's also very obvious that the nature of the indiginous experience in Australia and jewish history have been very different.

As an outsider (not angry or condeming, possibly confused and generally somewhere between white and tanned) the jewish experience seems to have involved a number of massive upheavals, a love of a land they believe was given to them by god but which they've not always occupied. It's involved long term conflict with neighbours with quite different beliefs, it's had the written word. It's had the view that the religious practices of the faith are still relevant in distant places (I don't know how that works for indiginous australians). Jews have had a good grounding to adapt their culture, to take it to strange places and make it work for them.

The ability of the jewish culture to adapt yet hold firm to some core things is a product of some of it's elements and a lot of practice.

R0bert

Well the article made sense to me, on the whole. I grew up in the NT
btw.

It’s interesting that some people condemn Aborigines for not
adapting to the dominant culure at the same time that they are
accused of inauthenticity (or something) because a large number live in populated centres and major cities – where people are clearly doing their best to adjust to mainstream culture and have been for generations. Whichever way they go they are targets for criticism.

Interesting thing about the critics is that somehow they adopt an authoritative stance as if it’s up to them to decide what is legitimate; what is not. Nobody questions, and it would be impertinent of them to do so, whether Anglo-Aussies are more or less Australian because they hail from the city or the bush, or Europe or the Middle East or anywhere else for that matter.

As to whether ancient Aboriginal society constituted a “civilization”, I would say that identification of “civilization” is largely in the eye of the beholder. It’s more about having a shared and understood culture and social institutions like family, education, law, economy and such . The complexity of the Aboriginal culture and social arrangements are, I think, beyond our knowledge or capacity to fully appreciate.

The thing that amazes me about Aboriginal culture and society is that
despite a couple of hundred years rift between their society as it was at settlement, and now - along with lots of upheavals; relocations and separations – even with many descendents moving to cities and partnering out of their clan group – most Aboriginal people (well all that I know anyway) can identify their clan grouping by name; speak some of the original language; know what region they occupied and identify other groups as well.

I don’t know what could match that for evidence of determined survival and adaptation.

Most of these comments make even Toohey look erudite and balanced.
For a more positive, informed, and, above all, constructive, view, have a look at this paper - Ngurra-kurlu: A way of working with Warlpiri people - published in the last few days by the Desert Knowledge CRC, lead-authored by a Warlpiri man, Jampijinpa Patrick.
Link below:
http://www.desertknowledgecrc.com.au/publications/downloads/DKCRC-Report-41-Ngurra-kurlu.pdf

Pynchme

You write 'Whichever way they go they are targets for criticism.'

This is exactly how many white people feel. Many have sacrificed much to help indigenous people only to be labeled 'white trash'. I know and have heard of many who have gone to communities as teachers and nurses with good intentions only to be seen as intruders by elders. Some resent their children receiving 'white man's medicine' even if it saves a life.

It is not only the whites who have 'angry, confused and condemning voices. In most cases it is the aboriginal activist (who is often white) with a political barrow to push that screams the loudest.

Dear Dear, another blind, accepting, do gooder excuse maker. For someone professing to know so much, Chapman knows so little. Permits are nothing like the common law of trespass - they are statutory rights enshrined in separate legislation that applies no where else - the ALRA. They are not issued and revoked by Police, they are issued by the land councils and TOs. Police can't revoke them. Permits don't apply to aboriginal people whether or not they are Traditional Owners of particular land.

No other land holders have statutory permit systems regardless of the size of their land. If Police had the same powers, then, by definition, permits wouldn't be necessary. Nothing like trespass. Further, why are we putting public roads, public infrastructure and public housing on private land if you need permits to get to them? What got missed here was that permits were only being revoked for the 'public areas' so they got treated just like any other public area.

Public servants don't get them as of right - some get them according to Ministerial direction, but others had them issued by the normal processes - as was the case even for the intervention.

As for "ceremony is like school", what crap. Ceremony is important for culture but it doesn't equip people for economic independence. It doesn't teach people to read or write or to hold down a job.

An entirely useless article from someone whose whole four years of experience seems to do nothing but make excuses for the entrenched problems that Toohey was writing about and to obfuscate the issues with petty and trivial technical points - some, likepermits, that are actually wrong.

Pynchme says: "As to whether ancient Aboriginal society constituted a “civilization”, I would say that identification of “civilization” is largely in the eye of the beholder. It’s more about having a shared and understood culture and social institutions like family, education, law, economy and such."

Gee, on that basis why bother about such arcane concepts as standard definitions? If everything is to be identified via the "eye of the beholder" then I am entitled to regard a bicycle as a car, or a pigeon as an antelope? I think not.

I know Wikipedia might be derided in some quarters but I think its defintion holds water. This is it:

"A civilization or civilisation is a society or culture group normally defined as a complex society characterized by the practice of agriculture and settlement in cities.

Compared with less complex cultures, members of a civilization are organized into a diverse division of labour and an intricate social hierarchy."

Ipso facto, if pre-1788 Aboriginal societies did not settle in cities or maintain a diverse division of labour in this country, then they did not establish a civilisation.

As for Pynchme's statement that, "The complexity of the Aboriginal culture and social arrangements are, I think, beyond our knowledge or capacity to fully appreciate" - this verges on racism and would be howled down if it was said in the reverse direction.

Thats right Robert, colonialism is a fact and its not going to go away. The highly advanced technological Western world is not going to suddenly start living the way of ancient tribes using primitive methods. The Aborigines must adapt to our ways not the other way around.

I'm white but I was never given land, my spouse and I had to earn money and buy land and a house ourselves.

There are also Spaniards and Asian families who came to Australia without land and have worked hard and bought their own land and homes.
The Aborigines have the same opportunities as immigrants to learn English get an education and be able to afford land and houses.
The smart Aboriginies have done likewise.

Many countries and people throuhout history including the British themselves have had thier lands overrun and taken. Try arguing land rights with William the Conqueror, Ghenkis Khan or Julius Ceasar.

How would the Aborigines have fought off the Japanese? Sooner or later with only spears as weapons they were bound to be conquered by any superior force that came along.

Well said savage pencil... a fairly ridiculous assertion that one pynchme, that other cultures are "beyond our comprehension"...

the author contributes nothing to a well-worn debate, mere mouthing of platitudes and politically correct slogans that would resonate well in the halls of academia but are of course as useless as tits on a bull in the real world, where people want to solve problems of inequality in aboriginal health, family violence etc, and not please the armies of sociologists who make their livings from the suffering of the people they are supposed to be helping

Now that a few commentators have responded; a few thoughts in return.

So, some claim that the *complexity of the Aboriginal culture is not beyond some folks' comprehension. One wonders then why after two hundred years of contact so many of us still know so little about it. It's either a lack of capacity to understand or limited knowledge, or a pig headed determination not to respect others and other ways of being. For example, how does a feather from Papua New Ginuea end up in a ceremonial something-or-other at the opposite end of Australia ? Maybe there was more economic and social complexity than we first thought.

2. Civilization. Now, now Pencil - are you relying on people being too lazy or disinterested to go look up and reflect on the many meanings and usages of the word 'civilization' ?

You see, to me it's about complex social institutions and shared culture )as in knowledge, handed down from one generation to another). We talk of ancient civilizations don't we. To me it's also about values and noble acts and empathy towards others.

Try to imagine a society where the word 'civilization' and whatever ideas you attach to it now - didn't exist; where there was no such concept.

Anyway, on a lighter note:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTduy7Qkvk8&NR=1