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Keywords: Aboriginality

  • AUSTRALIA

    Deakin and the parting of names

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 14 September 2023
    4 Comments

    As the legacy of historical figures is reevaluated, Alfred Deakin, Australia's second Prime Minister, finds himself under recent scrutiny. A champion of Federation, Deakin also held views towards Indigenous Australians now regarded as abhorrent. But is erasing his name from a university the right step? 

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Bridging histories: In conversation with Tony Birch

    • Paul Mitchell
    • 23 June 2023
    1 Comment

    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.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Indigenous cultural fishing should be supported, not criminalised

    • Paul Cleary
    • 21 November 2022
    2 Comments

    An intense and often ugly battle over marine resources has been unfolding between State authorities and Aboriginal people along the NSW coast. At the heart of the conflict is the NSW government’s refusal to acknowledge the right to cultural fishing by Aboriginal people, unlike other states and the federal Native Title Act (1993). 

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Does identity politics commodify us?

    • Justin Glyn
    • 04 May 2021
    32 Comments

    The Prime Minister has recently denounced ‘the growing tendency to commodify human beings through identity politics‘. In doing so, he raises a number of important questions. The claim of ‘commodification’ of human beings and their relations is a powerful one.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Saving lives means saving culture

    • Brent Riley
    • 25 June 2020
    10 Comments

    People ask why it took the death of George Floyd to make so many Australians stand up. His experience mirrored that of so many Aboriginal people who have died while in custody. His dying words ‘I can’t breathe’ echo through our hearts, because this isn’t the first time a Bla(c)k man has uttered those words while being brutally arrested for a crime most white people would get a slap on the wrist for.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Dreaming of a better future for First Nations peoples

    • Sherry Balcombe
    • 09 June 2020
    25 Comments

    The streets were packed there were thousands of people there to march in solidarity with us. It was so incredibly heartening. Australia is growing. The only time I have felt this atmosphere was in Sydney in the 1988 march on Australia Day. But this time was different very different it was predominately young people under the age of 30. They get it, they do see it.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    The unfinished business of colonisation

    • Kate Galloway
    • 17 February 2020
    2 Comments

    Despite claims to the contrary, the decision in Love and Thoms affirms the standing of the common law, including the unassailable power of the Australian State to make and enforce law. It upholds the centuries-long common law principle of accommodation of Indigenous laws in a colonial context.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    On Aboriginal land: seeking a place at the table

    • Frank Brennan
    • 31 May 2017
    6 Comments

    Indigenous leaders this last week have called for the creation of two new legal entities. They want a First Nations Voice enshrined in the Constitution, and a Makarrata Commission set up by legislation. The Makarrata Commission would supervise agreement making between governments and First Nations and engage in truth telling about history. The envisaged destination is a national Makarrata (or treaty). So the immediate constitutional issue is the creation of the First Nations Voice. There is no point in proceeding with a referendum on a question which fails to win the approval of Indigenous Australia. Neither is there any point in proceeding with a referendum which is unlikely to win the approval of the voting public.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Growing up with Baryulgil's asbestos genocide

    • Dani Larkin
    • 14 September 2016
    9 Comments

    On 8 September the ABC's 7:30 revealed yet another heartbreaking story of just another person who has contracted an asbestos-related disease. Ffloyd Laurie is a Bunjalung man from the Aboriginal community of Baryulgil, NSW - my home town. Like the rest of the Baryulgil community, including my mother, uncles, nan and pop, Ffloyde worked and lived with no idea of the consequences and health risks caused by that asbestos. Those consequences have proven to be fatal already for my pop.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Booing Adam Goodes

    • Michael McVeigh
    • 29 July 2015
    31 Comments

    What is the difference between people who boo Goodes because they disagree with his statements on Aboriginality, and those who lined the streets of Selma to abuse Martin Luther King and his companions on their marches? What they are doing is designed to further marginalise and alienate Aboriginal voices brave enough to speak out against the status quo. The actions of those booing Goodes need to be called out for what they are - racism.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Triumph over forced adoption practice

    • Kate Howarth
    • 30 March 2015
    12 Comments

    I was sent to St Margaret's Home for Unwed Girls, and when I didn’t buckle to pressure to surrender my son for adoption, I was tossed onto the street. I went from rock bottom to rise to the top of my field, only to have everything pulled from underneath me. I managed to get back up again and realise my childhood dream of one day becoming a writer, lending a voice to tens of thousands of young women who lost their children in what is now known as 'forced adoption'.   

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Going backwards after Abbott's 'urban Aboriginal' gaffe

    • Myrna Tonkinson
    • 19 November 2012
    15 Comments

    The battle of words about what constitutes Aboriginality, sparked by Tony Abbott's ill-conceived remarks about Liberal Party member Ken Wyatt, has been discomfiting. References to Aboriginal 'blood' conjure up the absurd measurements that were used to classify and separate Aboriginal people in the past.

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