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Renowned author and academic Tony Birch is known for his insightful and compelling narrative explorations into societal issues like marginalisation, Aboriginal identity and racial struggles. In conversation with Paul Mitchell, Birch discusses his work, the unique intersection of academia and creative writing, and the profound impact of historical dispossession.
250 years ago, hundreds of Indigenous languages were spoken in Australia. Today, only 3 percent survive. This echoes a painful narrative of dispossession of land, lives, and culture. But can a long-dormant language be brought back to life? A key figure in the resurgence of the Noongar language offers hope against the backdrop of cultural loss.
The images are simultaneously striking and terrifying. A raging grassfire that is shooting flames into the sky and destroying nature around it and lapping perilously close to the fences around Central NSW’s Lithgow Correctional Centre. As local residents were evacuated and highways were closed to protect public safety when the fire raged out of control just before Christmas in 2019, 400 prisoners remained detained.
It’s a tradition of mine to undertake my own “media watch” experiment following the annual Invasion Day rallies. I ended up being pleasantly surprised.
January 26 is one day out of 365. But no other date conjures up so much passionate debate amidst a cacophony of divided views. Each year there is the predictable commentary about Australia Day.
It’s usually January that white blindfold think pieces around Invasion Day start, but this year they’re getting in early. I cannot help but think this has a lot to do with the right in Victoria feeling completely dishevelled and disempowered at this point in time and lashing out.
2020 has been the year of the mask. The masks worn during the smoke of bushfires, during the threat of COVID-19, and during the Black Lives Matter protests. Masks are a powerful and complex symbol.
If our governments fail to roll out frameworks of good governance when times are good, they cannot expect to have the trust of the people during a crisis. So long as Australia fails to enter into proper legal relations with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, we will see protests, and ‘agitators’ will continue to call for justice.
We must ask: are our police forces keeping us safe? All of us? Poverty, discrimination and disempowerment cannot be solved with more policing. What if we took the money that is currently spent on policing and spent it on supporting the community?
We know that prisons are pressure cooker environments at the best of times. We can’t let them also become sites of mass infection, with potentially grave consequences, during the current COVID-19 health crisis.
From strip searches to a needlessly low minumum age of criminal responsibility, Australia continues to be a menacing place for children encountering law enforcement. The need to be seen as 'tough on crime' plagues the major parties and precludes nuances within the criminal justice sphere including the protection of the rights of the child.
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