the assignment required special knowledge about australian history

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‘How’s this for a beginning?’: the tricky work of writing the story of Australian history

Anna Clark set out to write the history of Australian history. In grappling with the past, she faced up to the giants in her own family

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A nna Clark took seven years to write her latest book, Making Australian History, but it seems a wonder it didn’t take her twice as long. During her many years of research, the 43-year-old celebrated author and historian wasn’t at all sure what her opening chapter ought to be.

Perhaps that’s not surprising when you consider the almost limitless scope of the ambitious challenge she set herself: to write what is, effectively, a history of Australian history.

A chronological approach common to so much academic and popular history wasn’t going to cut it. The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander experience – those thousands of generations, those 60-plus millennia (and counting) of human experiences that span time, place and cosmology in a way that challenges non-Indigenous sensibility and intellect – is, of course, omnipresent.

But how to explain that in any “traditional” chronological history that aimed to examine what we call “Australian history”, with all its vagaries and ongoing cultural skirmishes, political captivations, blind spots and deliberate omissions?

“For example, the term ‘ Deep Time’ – history that’s tens of thousands of years old – has only come into use relatively recently,” Clark ponders in her early pages. “Does that mean it goes at the beginning or the end of a history of Australian History?”

Clark, whose previous work has won major history awards and who holds an Australian Research Council Future Fellowship at the Australian Centre for Public History at UTS, Sydney, says she “just didn’t know how to do it”.

“And then I thought, ‘What if I did chapter 1 as a history of chapter ones which shows how the idea of chapter ones change over time?’” she says.

This, in turn, helped her to devise a structure whereby each chapter – among them “Nation”, “Memory”, “Contact”, “Colour”, “Family” (about which, more, shortly) and “Gender” – is propelled by the interrogation of a text or image.

So, for example, “Chapter 0, Making histories” contemplates the Dyarubbin (Aboriginal) rock engraving Woman in a crinoline dress, while “Chapter 1, Beginnings” launches off from The History of New Holland, From Its First Discovery in 1616 to the Present Time – published in London in the pre-invasion year, 1787.

Chapter 1 begins: “How’s this for a beginning?”

Not bad, you’d have to say, given the inherent provocation of The History of New Holland, this country’s first “history”, published before the cataclysmic clash of civilisations that gathered pace with the First Fleet’s arrival a year later.

It works. Clark is a wonderful historian, one of her generation’s best. As a writer she is also an admirable stylist. Possessed of a novelist’s eye for detail, her tone is distinctively, laconically, Australian, her elegant prose marked by clarity and an absence of old-school academic pomposity and verbosity.

This won’t surprise any who know of Clark’s commitment to democratising what she does in the name of “public history” and of her other work including Private Lives, Public History and her wonderful story of Australian fishing, The Catch.

Clark will tell you that she is an obsessive “fisho” and is most comfortable about – or under – the sea.

Once she’d nailed the structure of Making Australian History, Clark spent precious, memorable months writing at a secluded south coast New South Wales family property, Ness, near Wapengo. Her family lived there during her long service leave in 2019, then through the Covid lockdown in 2020.

“I wrote according to the tides so that I could go fishing. And I thought about place a lot. And particularly, you know, Country. And changing conceptions of Country,” she says.

“I was really struck by living in the bush for that long and how much it affected how I thought about the past. You know, walking down to the beach you would be walking through middens every day – so someone had obviously been there thinking about this place and eating from it and even making histories on it for a really long time – several thousand generations.

“And it definitely made me think about the timelines and that question that I brought up earlier – you know, when does Australian history begin? And if it begins in deep time, how do we register those histories of Australia from back then?”

Making Australian History is replete with that pervasive tension between the stories of the past that early colonial historians – and many of the 20th century – chose to record as having happened on the continent and those they thought a “proud” new nation shouldn’t remind itself of.

The violence of Indigenous dispossession – the land grabs, massacres and attempted genocide – and the unsavoury convict experience wouldn’t do. And federation in 1901, she says, did not feel like a relatable human experience. Gallipoli filled the breach.

“They [early 20th-century historians] were really looking for an origin story … They had a nation and it clearly had a history but it wasn’t really up to scratch … with the convict legend and frontier violence. Those two profound origin stories weren’t the uplifting national narratives that a proud Australia should have,” Clark says.

“It [Anzac] shows that even though that history is confected and highly curated, obviously for it to have that endurance it does hang on many threads of genuine connectedness to many people, as opposed to the federation narrative, for example, which is not really about the people.”

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Another tension Clark had to wrestle was how her history of Australian history would deal with the work of Manning Clark , this country’s pre-eminent 20th-century historian – and her paternal grandfather. It was not an easy emotional hurdle for Clark who, as an undergraduate Arts student, avoided doing history until a timetable clash made it unavoidable.

How did she reckon with the titanic legacy of Manning when she began, finally, studying – and loving – Australian history?

“I pretended I wasn’t connected to him. I just sort of didn’t talk about him. Ever. I’ve tried to totally separate my professional life from my family life and he died when I was 12 so to me he really was just my granddad … it was almost like I had just managed to separate it somehow,” she says.

“And even when I conceived of this project – and I can’t believe I’m saying this now – I sort of didn’t really think that I would have to mention him, or that if I did, that I would have to mention him in a particular way.”

It is a mark of Clark’s modesty – well known to friends and colleagues – that she was concerned detailing her grandfather’s legacy (on her and the nation) might be misinterpreted as “self-indulgent”.

Ultimately, she dealt squarely with Manning Clark’s contribution to the nation’s understanding of itself throughout the book – not least in a chapter on family histories.

She says, “I don’t have any misgivings about my love for him. You know, I really did love him very much. But in order just to feel like I was making my own mark, I suppose, I didn’t always want to be known as Manning’s granddaughter.”

Making Australian History by Anna Clark is out now through Vintage Australia

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What is ‘Deep Time’ history of the First Nations People of Australia?

When we think of history, we often think of events that happened in the last few centuries or millennia. But history is much more than that.

History is the story of life on Earth, and it goes back billions of years. This is what we call 'Deep Time'. 

Deep Time is the concept that the Earth and its inhabitants have a long and complex history that spans geological eras and evolutionary changes.

It is a way of understanding the natural world and our place in it. 

Deep Time in Australian First Nations' histories

But Deep Time is not only a scientific idea. It is also a cultural and spiritual one. For Australia's First Nations peoples , Deep Time is part of their identity and worldview.

They have lived in Australia for more than 60,000 years , making them one of the world's oldest continuous cultures.

During this time, they have witnessed and adapted to many environmental and climatic changes.

As a result, they have developed belief systems that reflect their deep connection to the land, the sea and the sky. 

In addition, their stories, traditions , and knowledge systems have been passed down through countless generations.

It has produced a unique understanding of the Australian landscape and its evolution. 

How indigenous peoples remember Deep Time

It is important to note that the history of Australia's First Nations peoples is not written in books or documents.

Instead, it is said to be written in the landscape , in the stories, in the objects, in the ceremonies and in the memories.

In this way, it is a living history that is passed down from generation to generation.

Here are some specific ways that First Nations People remember Deep Time:

Dreamtime stories

Central to Indigenous Australian cosmology are the Dreamtime stories. These narratives explain the origins of the land, its features, and the creatures that inhabit it.

They are also deeply rooted in the present. When the stories are shared, they help teach the social norms, laws, and spiritual beliefs to new generations.

Land management

The deep connection to the land is evident in the sophisticated land management practices of Indigenous Australians.

Through controlled burns, water resource management, and sustainable hunting and gathering, they shaped the Australian landscape in harmony with its natural rhythms.

Art and expression

While often forgotten, ancient rock art found across Australia also serves as a testament to the deep history of First Nations peoples.

These artworks, some dating back over 17,000 years, capture the evolving relationship between humans and their environment.

Deep Time: A bridge to understanding

For many non-Indigenous Australians, understanding the depth and complexity of First Nations history can be challenging.

As a result, the concept of Deep Time can serve as a bridge: by grasping the vastness of time, one can begin to appreciate the depth of Indigenous connection to the land. 

It's not just about recognizing that Indigenous Australians have been on the continent for a very long time; it's about understanding that their culture, knowledge, and traditions have evolved and been refined over these immense time scales.

This perspective can foster a deeper respect for Indigenous knowledge systems and their contributions to modern Australia. 

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The knowledge solution: Australian history: What place does history have in a post-truth world? edited by Anna Clark

What can we learn from recurring events across the recent history of Australia, of colonisation, nationalism, racism, fighting on foreign shores, land booms, industrial campaigns and culture wars? Arguments about the discipline of Australian History, from thinkers across the ideological and historical spectrum, are distilled in these extracts and essays.

The Knowledge Solution: Australian History  is the second collection in a series that draws from the remarkable books published by Australia’s oldest university press.

262 pp, 2019

$ 40.00 $ 29.95

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Educational resources about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures

By ABC Education

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Many wonderful organisations provide quality educational resources that can be used to learn about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures.

The following collection of websites and resources is not only valuable for teachers, students and schools, but also all Australians looking to better understand and celebrate Australia's First Peoples and rich Indigenous history.

1. Reconciliation Australia — What is Reconciliation?

Established in 2001, Reconciliation Australia inspires and enables relationships, respect and trust between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and non-Indigenous Australians, for the benefit of all Australians. They have many great resources, including a Reconciliation timeline; fact sheets about Sorry Day and the Mabo Decision ; and resources to help celebrate National Reconciliation Week , held annually from 27 May to 3 June.

Their Share our Pride website also provides a great starting point on a number of topics, such as identity , culture , intergenerational trauma , and family and kinship.

2. ABC Education — Classroom resources, mapped to the Australian Curriculum

Discover hundreds of free resources about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history and culture in this wonderful collection. Choose from videos, audio clips and footage from the ABC archives that relate to history, geography, science, English, technologies and the arts.

There are also engaging collections that teach students about topics, such as Aboriginal agriculture and technology ; place names ; and colonisation stories .

3. Behind The News — Indigenous culture

For more than fifty years, BTN has been broadcasting news for upper primary and lower secondary students, helping them understand issues and events outside their own lives. They have a fantastic collection of resources about Indigenous culture , including Indigenous recognition , the call for a treaty , the history of the Aboriginal flag , discrimination , the apology to Australia's Indigenous peoples , Aboriginal Anzacs and much more.

4. First Languages Australia — Maintain and revive Australia's first languages

First Languages Australia is working with language centres nationally to develop a map of languages that reflects the names and groupings favoured by community. Explore the Gambay map that showcases more that 780 languages, watch videos, listen to people sharing their languages and use the accompanying teachers' notes .

First Languages Australia has also worked with each of the states and territories to compile Nintrianganyi: National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Teaching and Employment Strategy and the companion document Global lessons: Indigenous languages and multilingualism in school programs . These resources are designed to help education departments, schools and local communities understand what's needed to sustain the provision of a local language curriculum.

5. NAIDOC — Celebrate history, culture and achievements

The National Aboriginal and Islander Day Observance Committee (NAIDOC) makes keys decisions about activities, such as NAIDOC Week. The NAIDOC teaching resources directly support teachers in addressing the Australian Curriculum's cross-curriculum priority of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Histories and Cultures. Check out their fabulous archive of posters dating back to 1972.

6. ABC TV documentaries aligned to the Curriculum

ABC Education has worked with reputable Indigenous institutions, such as Culture is Life, to align fantastic ABC documentaries to the Australian Curriculum. Documentaries include The Australian Dream , In My Blood It Runs , Archie Roach and Back to Nature .

The resources offer questions for students to answer and things for students to think about to direct their learning. Each resource also comes with a guide for teachers, which highlights cultural considerations when teaching these resources to a class.

7. Healing Foundation — Learn about the Stolen Generations

Developed with Stolen Generations members, teachers, parents and curriculum writers, the Healing Foundation resources aim to promote greater understanding about an often-overlooked part of Australia’s history in a safe and age-appropriate way. The resource kit includes professional learning tools for teachers, along with suggested lesson plans that have been mapped to the Australian Curriculum (Foundation to Year 9).

8. SBS Learn — Perspectives for NAIDOC Week and beyond

Working with the National NAIDOC Committee, SBS Learn has launched resources for NAIDOC Week. The resources are relevant to a broad range of learners and topics and provide Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander perspectives in classrooms beyond NAIDOC Week. The resources cover English, HASS, science, history, geography, the Arts and more.

9. Narragunnawali — Create a RAP for your school

Narragunnawali's online platform provides practical ways to introduce meaningful reconciliation initiatives in the classroom, around the school and with the community. Schools and early learning services can use the platform to develop a Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP), and teachers and educators can access professional learning and curriculum resources to support the implementation of reconciliation initiatives.

10. Reading Australia — Books about Indigenous themes

Reading Australia makes it easier for teachers to spread a love for Australian texts. They present many great books by Indigenous authors that celebrate Indigenous culture and history and raise awareness about the issues faced today by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Books are accompanied by teacher resources and essays.

11. Jarjums — Children's programming on National Indigenous Television (NITV)

Jarjums is the NITV programming dedicated to children. Catering to all kids — and kids at heart — they have fun educational Indigenous and First Nations content from Australia and around the world. It includes Little J & Big Cuz, which provides a young Indigenous audience with relatable characters and offers an insight into traditional Aboriginal culture, Country and language.

12. AIATSIS — Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies

AIATSIS is a world-renowned research, collections and publishing organisation. They promote knowledge and understanding of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures, traditions, languages and stories, past and present. Use their subject guides to find materials relating to specific topics and check out their teachers’ notes and free resources .

13. Respect Relationships Reconciliation — Teacher education

The Respect Relationships Reconciliation (3Rs) study resources are designed to support teachers and educators in incorporating Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander content in initial teacher education courses. There are three study modules: Know yourself (know your world), Know your students and Know what you teach. They also provide resources to help schools review existing units of study .

14. First Contact stories — Challenge preconceptions about Indigenous people

In SBS's First Contact series , Ray Martin takes a group of six well-known Australians with diverse, deeply intrenched preconceptions and opinions about our nation's Indigenous people on a journey into Aboriginal Australia. Take the discussion into the classroom with the First Contact classroom clips from the series and curriculum-linked activities (history, English and media arts for Years 9–12). There are also Teacher Notes you can download.

15. Guidance from Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership (AITSL)

AITSL have great resources that help identify what teachers need to know and be able to do in order to teach Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students, and to teach all students about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander languages, history and culture. These resources have been developed to help Initial Teacher Education (ITE) providers and pre-service teachers understand how to meet initial teacher education and ongoing professional learning.

16. National Museum of Australia — Objects with stories

The National Museum of Australia has free curriculum-linked classroom resources to help bring the stories behind the objects in their collection to life, for students and teachers. Learn about the evidence of First Peoples , rock art , the boomerang , Pemulwuy , Mungo Lady and Uluru Statement from the Heart .

You can also watch the Australian Journey web series , which explores Australia's history through objects from the National Museum of Australia, including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture and history. There's also a learning module on Rights and freedoms Defining Moments, 1945–present for year 10 classrooms.

17. Reconciliation Film Club — Documentaries to ignite conversation

Reconciliation Australia, NITV and SBS have proudly partnered to launch the Reconciliation Film Club , an online platform that helps you host screenings of a curated selection of Indigenous documentaries from Australia’s leading Indigenous filmmakers. The website has downloadable screening kits, discussion guides, and articles and ideas to support a successful event. Bring people together to develop a deeper understanding of Indigenous people’s perspectives and histories, ignite conversation and spark change.

18. Righting Wrongs — The 1967 referendum

On 27 May 1967, Australians voted in a referendum to change how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people were referred to in the Constitution — a record 90.77 per cent of votes said YES to change the Constitution. Explore personal stories, opinions and historical recordings of what happened, what life was like for Indigenous people before the vote and how far we have come since 1967.

Find more classroom resources about Aboriginal Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures on ABC Education.

Reposted 3 May 2022. First published 8 July 2019.

Classroom resources about important Indigenous topics

Teach Aboriginal history and truths in the classroom

Classroom resources to help schools promote a broader understanding of the Stolen Generations

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• Course guide: Indigenous Education

Australian history

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• About this guide
• Indigenous cultures and lifeways
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• Indigenous language resources
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• Resources for learning through Indigenous perspectives
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​​​​​​ These are texts that cover an aspect of Australian history, generally since 1788, with a specific focus on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander experiences.

• First Australians by Blackfella Films Publication Date: 2008 This series is useful for learning about the experiences of First Nations people through Australian history. This series was written and produced by Rachel Perkins, and Arrernte and Kalkadoon woman. The 7 episodes work through Australian history chronologically, from the arrival of the First Fleet in 1788 through to Native title, covering experiences across Australia. It brings together amazing images, photos, film and audio, as well as First Nations knowledge holders.

• Sydney: first encounters by ABC This podcast is useful for learning about the arrival of the First Fleet and the interactions between peoples that occurred. This podcast has been created by a non-Indigenous journalist – Keri Phillips – and features Indigenous and non-Indigenous historians.
• In the shadow of Terra Nullius by ABC This series of podcasts is useful for learning about Australian history that has impacted on First Nations people from 1901 to 2017. These podcasts are produced by a non-Indigenous presenter – Annabelle Quince – and feature the voices of many First Nations researchers, activists and identities. Together, the 4 podcasts explain the policies that were applied to First Nations people and the fight for recognition that took many forms since 1901.
• Stolen Generations’ Testimonies by Stolen Generations’ Testimonies Foundation This website is useful for learning about the personal impacts of being removed from your family as a First Nations child. This website contains many personal stories of members of the Stolen Generations who share their experiences. The experience of being removed impacts on people for their entire lives, and also impacts on their descendants. This is not a past event, but a continuing trauma.
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Please note you do not have access to teaching notes, aboriginal knowledge, the history classroom and the australian university.

History of Education Review

ISSN : 0819-8691

Article publication date: 24 November 2021

Issue publication date: 22 November 2022

This article considers the impact of competing knowledge structures in teaching Australian Indigenous history to undergraduate university students and the possibilities of collaborative teaching in this space.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors, one Aboriginal and one non-Aboriginal, draw on a history of collaborative teaching that stretches over more than a decade, bringing together conceptual reflective work and empirical data from a 5-year project working with Australian university students in an introductory-level Aboriginal history subject.

It argues that teaching this subject area in ways which are culturally safe for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander staff and students, and which resist knowledge structures associated with colonial ways of conveying history, is not only about content but also about building learning spaces that encourage students to decolonise their relationships with Australian history.

Originality/value

This article considers collaborative approaches to knowledge transmission in the university history classroom as an act of decolonising knowledge spaces rather than as a model of reconciliation.

• Indigenous knowledge
• Ways of knowing
• Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories
• Teaching Indigenous history
• Collaborative knowledge transmission

Acknowledgements

This paper forms part of a special section “The history of knowledge and the history of education”, guest edited by Joel Barnes and Tamson Pietsch.

The authors would like to acknowledge that the student data collection discussed in this article began as part of an ACU Teaching and Development Grant, “Embedding Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander perspectives in curriculum—for staff and students”. That project, mentored by Associate Professor Theda Thomas, had two strands, one based in the ACU National School of Education (led by Associate Professor Nerida Blair) and one based in the ACU National School of Arts (led by the authors). We would like to thank and acknowledge these women, and all of the other staff who participated in the project's workshop, for their contributions to the big picture thinking that prompted our longitudinal study.

Musgrove, N. and Wolfe, N. (2022), "Aboriginal knowledge, the history classroom and the Australian university", History of Education Review , Vol. 51 No. 2, pp. 123-136. https://doi.org/10.1108/HER-04-2021-0010

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From the Frontier Wars to the landings at Gallipoli – test your knowledge on Australian History.

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Article contents

The history of education in australia.

• Troy Heffernan Troy Heffernan La Trobe University - Melbourne Campus
• https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190264093.013.1459
• Published online: 26 May 2021

Education in Australia’s history stretches back tens of thousands of years, but only a small number of changes have altered its shape in that time. The first period of education lasted for thousands of years and was an Indigenous education as knowledge of religious beliefs, society, and laws was shared from one generation to the next. Knowledge of Australia’s significant environmental diversity was also taught because possessing the skills to find appropriate shelter for the conditions, while developing methods of hunting, gathering, and fishing, was knowledge that needed to be taught to ensure survival.

Education changed when Europeans invaded Indigenous lands. Settlers who brought children as well as those who gave birth to children wanted their offspring to be part of an education system that mimicked England’s. Ex-convicts and later members of the Church provided this service and began the tradition of non-Indigenous education in Australia. It was during the 19th century as cities and towns increased in size, and the population more generally, that the final two significant periods of Australian education began. The nation’s wealthiest required religious and grammar schools that prepared children for secondary education and for university overseas, as well as in Australia as universities were established and slowly increased in number. When private education began, it was largely the only option for those seeking university degrees for their children, but this began a series of events in Australia that still sees approximately one-third of all school students attending private schools.

Public and compulsory education began in the late 19th century and gradually became more accessible. Public education, in some respects, began as governments saw the benefit in the social advantages of education, and economic incentives in creating educated laborers. However, even through the austerity of world wars and financial depression, successive generations of publicly educated individuals saw the need for increasingly continuing education beyond the compulsory school age. Public education subsequently increased in popularity through the 20th century as a growing number of students stayed beyond compulsory schooling age. Education in Australia is still seeing policies change to make schooling accessible and open to all members of society regardless of background. In the 21st century, secondary schooling is being completed by most demographic groups, and university has become accessible to a diverse group of students, many of whom may not have had access to such options only a few decades ago. This is not to suggest that systemic issues of racism and ostracism have been eradicated, but steps have been made to begin addressing these issues.

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Literacy (Version 8.4)

In the Australian Curriculum, students become literate as they develop the knowledge, skills and dispositions to interpret and use language confidently for learning and communicating in and out of school and for participating effectively in society. Literacy involves students listening to, reading, viewing, speaking, writing and creating oral, print, visual and digital texts, and using and modifying language for different purposes in a range of contexts.

Literacy encompasses the knowledge and skills students need to access, understand, analyse and evaluate information, make meaning, express thoughts and emotions, present ideas and opinions, interact with others and participate in activities at school and in their lives beyond school. Success in any learning area depends on being able to use the significant, identifiable and distinctive literacy that is important for learning and representative of the content of that learning area.

Becoming literate is not simply about knowledge and skills. Certain behaviours and dispositions assist students to become effective learners who are confident and motivated to use their literacy skills broadly. Many of these behaviours and dispositions are also identified and supported in other general capabilities. They include students managing their own learning to be self-sufficient; working harmoniously with others; being open to ideas, opinions and texts from and about diverse cultures; returning to tasks to improve and enhance their work; and being prepared to question the meanings and assumptions in texts.

The key ideas for Literacy are organised into six interrelated elements in the learning continuum, as shown in the figure below.

Organising elements for Literacy

The Literacy continuum incorporates two overarching processes: Comprehending texts through listening, reading and viewing; and Composing texts through speaking, writing and creating.

The following areas of knowledge apply to both processes: Text knowledge; Grammar knowledge; Word knowledge and Visual knowledge.

Texts in the Literacy Continuum

Texts provide the means for communication. They can be written, spoken, visual, multimodal, and in print or digital/online forms. Multimodal texts combine language with other means of communication such as visual images, soundtrack or spoken words, as in film or computer presentation media. Texts include all forms of Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC), for example gesture, signing, real objects, photographs, pictographs and braille. Texts provide important opportunities for learning about aspects of human experience and about aesthetic value. Many of the tasks that students undertake in and out of school involve understanding and producing imaginative, informative and persuasive texts, media texts, everyday texts and workplace texts.

The usefulness of distinctions among types of texts relates largely to how clearly at each year level these distinctions can guide the selection of materials for students to listen to, read, view, write and create, and the kinds of purposeful activities that can be organised around these materials. Although many types of texts will be easy to recognise on the basis of their subject matter, forms and structures, the distinctions between types of texts need not be sharp or formulaic. The act of creating texts, by its nature, involves experimentation and adaptation of language and textual elements from many different writing styles and categories of texts. As a result, It is not unusual for an imaginative text to have strong persuasive elements, or for a persuasive text to contain features more typically seen in informative texts, such as subheadings or bullet points.

Comprehending texts through listening, reading and viewing

This element is about receptive language and involves students using skills and strategies to access and interpret spoken, written, visual and multimodal texts.

Students navigate, read and view texts using applied topic knowledge, vocabulary, word and visual knowledge. They listen and respond to spoken audio and multimodal texts, including listening for information, listening to carry out tasks and listening as part of participating in classroom activities and discussions. Students use a range of strategies to comprehend, interpret and analyse these texts, including retrieving and organising literal information, making and supporting inferences and evaluating information and points of view. In developing and acting with literacy, students:

• navigate, read and view learning area texts
• listen and respond to learning area texts
• interpret and analyse learning area texts.

The element of Comprehending texts can apply to students at any point in their schooling. The beginning of the learning sequence for this element has been extended by four extra levels (Levels 1a to 1d) to describe in particular the early development of communication skills. The descriptions for Comprehending texts at these levels apply across the elements of Text knowledge, Grammar knowledge, Word knowledge and Visual knowledge.

Composing texts through speaking, writing and creating

This element is about expressive language and involves students composing different types of texts for a range of purposes as an integral part of learning in all curriculum areas.

These texts include spoken, written, visual and multimodal texts that explore, communicate and analyse information, ideas and issues in the learning areas. Students create formal and informal texts as part of classroom learning experiences including group and class discussions, talk that explores and investigates learning area topics, and formal and informal presentations and debates. In developing and acting with literacy, students:

• compose spoken, written, visual and multimodal learning area texts
• use language to interact with others
• deliver presentations.

The element of Composing texts can apply to students at any point in their schooling. The beginning of the learning sequence for this element has been extended by four extra levels (Levels 1a to 1d) to describe in particular the development of communication skills. The descriptions for Composing texts at these levels apply across the elements of Text knowledge, Grammar knowledge, Word knowledge and Visual knowledge.

The following areas of knowledge apply to both processes.

Text knowledge

This element involves students understanding how the spoken, written, visual and multimodal texts they compose and comprehend are structured to meet the range of purposes needed in the learning areas.

Students understand the different types of text structures that are used within learning areas to present information, explain processes and relationships, argue and support points of view and investigate issues. They develop understanding of how whole texts are made cohesive through various grammatical features that link and strengthen the text’s internal structure. In developing and acting with literacy, students:

• use knowledge of text structures
• use knowledge of text cohesion.

Grammar knowledge

This element involves students understanding the role of grammatical features in the construction of meaning in the texts they compose and comprehend.

Students understand how different types of sentence structures present, link and elaborate ideas, and how different types of words and word groups convey information and represent ideas in the learning areas. They gain understanding of the grammatical features through which opinion, evaluation, point of view and bias are constructed in texts. In developing and acting with literacy, students:

• use knowledge of sentence structures
• use knowledge of words and word groups
• express opinion and point of view.

Word Knowledge

This element involves students understanding the increasingly specialised vocabulary and spelling needed to compose and comprehend learning area texts.

Students develop strategies and skills for acquiring a wide topic vocabulary in the learning areas and the capacity to spell the relevant words accurately. In developing and acting with literacy, students:

• understand learning area vocabulary
• use spelling knowledge.

Visual Knowledge

This element involves students understanding how visual information contributes to the meanings created in learning area texts.

Students interpret still and moving images, graphs, tables, maps and other graphic representations, and understand and evaluate how images and language work together in distinctive ways in different curriculum areas to present ideas and information in the texts they compose and comprehend. In developing and acting with literacy, students:

• understand how visual elements create meaning.

Literacy in the learning areas

Literacy presents those aspects of the Language and Literacy strands of the Australian Curriculum: English that should also be applied in all other learning areas. Students learn literacy knowledge and skills as they engage with these strands of English. Literacy is not a separate component of the Australian Curriculum and does not contain new content.

While much of the explicit teaching of literacy occurs in the English learning area, literacy is strengthened, made specific and extended in other learning areas as students engage in a range of learning activities with significant literacy demands. Paying attention to the literacy demands of each learning area ensures that students’ literacy development is strengthened so that it supports subject-based learning. This means that:

• all teachers are responsible for teaching the subject-specific literacy of their learning area/s
• all teachers need a clear understanding of the literacy demands and opportunities of their learning area/s
• literacy appropriate to each learning area is embedded in the content descriptions and elaborations of the learning area and is identified using the literacy icon.

The learning area or subject with the highest proportion of content descriptions tagged with Literacy is placed first in the list.

The Australian Curriculum: English has a central role in the development of literacy in a manner that is more explicit and foregrounded than is the case in other learning areas.

Literacy is developed through the specific study of the English language in all its spoken, written and visual forms, enabling students to become confident readers and meaning-makers as they learn about the creative and communicative potential of a wide range of subject-specific and everyday texts from across the curriculum. Students understand how the language in use is determined by the many different social contexts and specific purposes for reading and viewing, speaking and listening, writing and creating. Through critically interpreting information and evaluating the way it is organised in different types of texts, for example, the role of subheadings, visuals and opening statements, students learn to make increasingly sophisticated language choices in their own texts. The English learning area has a direct role in the development of language and literacy skills. It seeks to empower students in a manner that is more explicit than is the case in other learning areas. Students learn about language and how it works in the Language strand, and gradually develop and apply this knowledge to the practical skills of the Literacy strand in English, where students systematically and concurrently apply phonic, contextual, semantic and grammatical knowledge within their growing literacy capability to interpret and create spoken, print, visual and multimodal texts with appropriateness, accuracy and clarity.

Learning in the Australian Curriculum: Languages develops overall literacy. It is in this sense ‘value added’, strengthening literacy-related capabilities that are transferable across languages, both the language being learnt and all other languages that are part of the learner’s repertoire. Languages learning also strengthens literacy-related capabilities across domains of use, such as the academic domain and the domains of home language use, and across learning areas.

Literacy development involves conscious attention and focused learning. It involves skills and knowledge that need guidance, time and support to develop. These skills include the ability to decode and encode from sound and written systems, the learning of grammatical, orthographic and textual conventions, and the development of semantic, pragmatic and interpretive, critical and reflective literacy skills.

Literacy development for second language learners is cognitively demanding. It involves these same elements but often without the powerful support of a surrounding oral culture and context. The strangeness of the additional language requires scaffolding. In the language classroom, analysis is prioritised alongside experience. Explicit, explanatory and exploratory talk around language and literacy is a core element. Learners are supported to develop their own meta–awareness, to be able to think and talk about how the language works and about how they learn to use it. Similarly, for first language learners, literacy development that extends to additional domains and contexts of use requires comparative analysis that extends literacy development in their first language and English.

F-6/7 Humanities and Social Sciences (HASS)

In the F–6/7 Australian Curriculum: Humanities and Social Sciences, students develop literacy capability as they learn how to build discipline-specific knowledge about history, geography, civics and citizenship, and economics and business. Students use a wide range of informative, persuasive and imaginative texts in multiple modes to pose questions, research, analyse, evaluate and communicate information, concepts and ideas.

Students progressively learn to use stories, narratives, recounts, reports, lists, explanations, arguments, illustrations, timelines, maps, tables, graphs, spreadsheets, photographs, images including remotely sensed and satellite images, and realia – to examine, interpret and communicate data, information, ideas, points of view, perspectives and conclusions.

They learn to use language features and text structures to comprehend and compose cohesive texts about the past, present and future, including: discipline-specific vocabulary; appropriate tense verbs for recounting events and processes; complex sentences to establish sequential, cause-and-effect and comparative relationships; features and structures of persuasive texts; wide use of adverbs that describe places, people, events, processes, systems and perspectives; and extended noun groups using descriptive adjectives.

Students learn to make increasingly sophisticated language and text choices, understanding that language varies according to context and purpose and using language flexibly. Their texts are often accompanied by graphics that provide significant information and are supported by references and quotations, and they understand geography’s scientific and expressive modes of writing.

As students participate in inquiry, they learn to ask distinctively discipline-specific questions and to apply participatory knowledge in discussions and debates. They learn to evaluate texts for shades of meaning, feeling and opinion, and develop considered points of view, communicating conclusions and preferred futures to a range of audiences.

7-10 History

In the Australian Curriculum: History, students develop literacy capability as they learn how to build historical knowledge and to explore, analyse, question, discuss and communicate historical information, concepts and ideas. In history, students progressively learn to use a wide range of informative, persuasive and imaginative texts in multiple modes. These texts – which include stories, narratives, recounts, reports, lists, explanations, arguments, illustrations, timelines, maps, tables, graphs, photographs and images, and realia – are often supported by references and quotations from primary and secondary sources.

Students learn to make increasingly sophisticated language and text choices, understanding that language varies according to context, and they develop their ability to use language flexibly. They learn to use language features and text structures to comprehend and compose cohesive texts about the past, present and future, including: topic-specific vocabulary; appropriate tense verbs for recounting events and processes; complex sentences to establish sequential, cause-and-effect and comparative relationships; features and structures of persuasive texts; wide use of adverbs that describe people, places, events and perspectives and extended noun groups using descriptive adjectives.

7-10 Geography

In the Australian Curriculum: Geography, students develop literacy capability as they learn how to build geographical knowledge and understanding and how to explore, discuss, analyse and communicate geographical information, concepts and ideas. They use a wide range of informative and literary texts, for example, interviews, reports, stories, photographs and maps, to help them understand the places that make up our world, learning to evaluate these texts and recognising how language and images can be used to make and manipulate meaning.

Students develop oral and written skills, making increasingly sophisticated language and text choices. They understand that language varies according to context and they develop their ability to use language flexibly. They use language to ask distinctively geographical questions. They plan a geographical inquiry, collect and evaluate information, communicate their findings, reflect on the conduct of their inquiry and respond to what they have learnt. Students progressively learn to use geography’s scientific and expressive modes of writing and the vocabulary of the discipline, including complex sentences to establish sequential, cause-and-effect and comparative relationships and wide use of adverbs and adjectives that describe places, people, events, processes, systems and perspectives. They learn to comprehend and compose graphical and visual texts through working with maps, diagrams, photographs and remotely sensed and satellite images.

7-10 Civics and Citizenship

In the Australian Curriculum: Civics and Citizenship, students develop literacy capability as they research, read and analyse sources of information on aspects of Australia’s political and legal systems and contemporary civics and citizenship issues. They learn to understand and use language to discuss and communicate information, concepts and ideas related to their studies. They learn to evaluate texts for shades of meaning, feeling and opinion, learning to distinguish between fact and opinion and how language and images can be used to manipulate meaning on political and social issues. Communication is critical in Civics and Citizenship, in particular for articulating, debating and evaluating ideas, points of view and preferred futures and participating in group discussions.

7-10 Economics and Business

In the Australian Curriculum: Economics and Business, students learn to examine and interpret a variety of economics and business data and/or information. They learn to use effectively the specialised language and terminology of economics and business when applying concepts to contemporary issues and events, and communicating conclusions to a range of audiences through a range of multimodal approaches. They learn to use language features and text structures to comprehend and compose cohesive texts involving economics and business issues and events, including: discipline-specific vocabulary; appropriate tense verbs for describing events and processes; complex sentences to establish sequential, cause-and-effect and comparative relationships; and wide use of adverbs and adjectives that describe events, processes, systems and perspectives. Students learn to evaluate texts for shades of meaning and opinion, participating in debates and discussions, developing a considered point of view when communicating conclusions and preferred futures to a range of audiences.

In the Australian Curriculum: The Arts, students use literacy to develop, apply and communicate their knowledge and skills as artists and as audiences. Through making and responding, students enhance and extend their literacy skills as they create, compose, design, analyse, comprehend, discuss, interpret and evaluate their own and others’ artworks.

Each Arts subject requires students to learn and use specific terminology of increasing complexity as they move through the curriculum. Students understand that the terminologies of The Arts vary according to context and they develop their ability to use language dynamically and flexibly.

Technologies

In the Australian Curriculum: Technologies, students develop literacy as they learn how to communicate ideas, concepts and detailed proposals to a variety of audiences; read and interpret detailed written instructions for specific technologies, often including diagrams and procedural writings such as software user manuals, design briefs, patterns and recipes; prepare accurate, annotated engineering drawings, software instructions and coding; write project outlines, briefs, concept and project management proposals, evaluations, engineering, life cycle and project analysis reports; and prepare detailed specifications for production.

By learning the literacy of technologies, students understand that language varies according to context and they increase their ability to use language flexibly. Technologies vocabulary is often technical and includes specific terms for concepts, processes and production. Students learn to understand that much technological information is presented in the form of drawings, diagrams, flow charts, models, tables and graphs. They also learn the importance of listening, talking and discussing in technologies processes, especially in articulating, questioning and evaluating ideas.

Health and Physical Education

The Australian Curriculum: Health and Physical Education assists in the development of literacy by introducing specific terminology used in health and physical activity contexts. Students understand the language used to communicate and connect respectfully with other people, describe their own health status, as well as products, information and services. They also develop skills that empower them to be critical consumers able to access, interpret, analyse, challenge and evaluate the ever-expanding and changing knowledge base and influences in the fields of health and physical education. In physical activity settings, as consumers, performers and spectators, students develop an understanding of the language of movement and movement sciences. This is essential in analysing their own and others’ movement and levels of fitness.

Students also learn to comprehend and compose texts related to the Australian Curriculum: Health and Physical Education. This includes learning to communicate effectively for a variety of purposes to different audiences, express their own ideas and opinions, evaluate the viewpoints of others, ask for help and express their emotions appropriately in a range of social and physical activity contexts.

Mathematics

In the Australian Curriculum: Mathematics, students learn the vocabulary associated with number, space, measurement and mathematical concepts and processes. This vocabulary includes synonyms, technical terminology, passive voice and common words with specific meanings in a mathematical context. Students develop the ability to create and interpret a range of texts typical of mathematics ranging from calendars and maps to complex data displays. Students use literacy to understand and interpret word problems and instructions that contain the particular language features of mathematics. They use literacy to pose and answer questions, engage in mathematical problem-solving, and to discuss, produce and explain solutions.

In the Australian Curriculum: Science, students develop a broader literacy capability as they explore and investigate their world. They are required to comprehend and compose texts including those that provide information, describe events and phenomena, recount experiments, present and evaluate data, give explanations and present opinions or claims. They will also need to comprehend and compose multimedia texts such as charts, graphs, diagrams, pictures, maps, animations, models and visual media. Language structures are used to link information and ideas, give descriptions and explanations, formulate hypotheses and construct evidence-based arguments capable of expressing an informed position.

By learning the literacy of science, students understand that language varies according to context and they increase their ability to use language flexibly. Scientific vocabulary is often technical and includes specific terms for concepts and features of the world, as well as terms that encapsulate an entire process in a single word, such as ‘photosynthesis’. Language is therefore essential in providing the link between the concept itself and student understanding and for assessing whether the student has understood the concept.

Work Studies

In the Australian Curriculum: Work Studies, Years 9–10, students develop literacy capability as they adopt an appreciation of the skills of listening, speaking, reading, writing and interacting with others. They are given opportunities to locate and evaluate information, express ideas, thoughts and emotions, justify opinions, interact effectively with others, debrief and reflect and participate in a range of communication activities to support the development of literacy skills.

The development of critical workplace-related literacy skills is essential for students to become effective workforce participants who can access, interpret, analyse, challenge and evaluate the knowledge and skills required in a constantly growing and changing world of work.

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Indigenous Australians: Australia’s First Peoples exhibition 1996-2015

• Updated 04/06/21
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The exhibition had five core themes explored through multimedia, art, cultural material and collection objects.

These extended family relationships are the core of Indigenous kinship systems that are central to the way culture is passed on and society is organised.

"All people with the same skin grouping as my mother are my mothers... They have the right, the same as my mother, to watch over me, to control what I'm doing, to make sure that I do the right thing. It's an extended family thing... It's a wonderful secure system." Wadjularbinna Doomadgee, Gungalidda leader, Gulf of Carpentaria, 1996

Kinship systems define where a person fits in to the community, binding people together in relationships of sharing and obligation. These systems may vary across communities but they serve similar functions across Australia. Kinship defines roles and responsibilities for raising and educating children and structures systems of moral and financial support within the community.

Learn about Indigenous family relationships

Elders bridge the past and the present and provide guidance for the future. They teach important traditions and pass on their skills, knowledge and personal experiences. It is for these reasons that in Indigenous societies elders are treated with respect.

Family Ties

In Aboriginal Society the family unit is very large and extended, often with ties to the community... Having that family unit broken down has just opened the floodgates for a lot of problems, a lot of emotional problems, mental and physical turmoil. If you want to use a really hard term to describe the impact that removal of Aboriginal children has had on Aboriginal families,'attempted cultural genocide' is a good phrase. Carol Kendal in 'Indigenous People and the Law' , C. Cunneen & T. Libesman (eds) Reed international Books, 1995

Indigenous communities have strong family values that are rarely endorsed or understood by government authorities. Children are not just the concern of the biological parents, but the entire community. Therefore, the raising, care, education and discipline of children are the responsibility of everyone - male, female, young and old.

Indigenous education stresses the relationship between the child and its social and natural environment, which children learn by close observation and practice. However, some knowledges are secret and are revealed only when the child is ready.

The government policies in which families and communities were separated were more than just heartbreaking for the individuals involved - they also effectively halted the passing of cultural knowledge from one generation to another.

Passing the Culture to Children - Storytelling

In Aboriginal Australian society storytelling makes up a large part of everyday life. Storytelling is not only about entertaining people but is also vital in educating children about life.

Storytelling is used in a variety of ways. It is used to teach children how they should behave and why, and to pass on knowledge about everyday life such as how and when to find certain foods. Stories are also used to explain peoples' spirituality, heritage and the laws. Dreaming stories pass on information to young people about creation, how the land was formed and populated, creation of plants, animals and humans, information about ancestral beings and places, the boundaries of peoples' tribal lands, how ancestors came to Australia, how people migrated across the country and arrived in a particular part of the country.

However, not all information can be known by all people. Some information can only be revealed to certain people. This information is known as sacred. For example, some sacred information can only be told to certain initiated women or men after they have carried out certain initiation rites.

The elders use every opportunity to educate the children about the way of life of their people. Stories are told while walking down to the waterhole or grinding up seeds to make damper (bread) or sitting around the campfire at night. As children grew older more information is passed on about their culture. Once a person becomes an adult they are responsible for passing on the information they had learned to the younger people.

Storytelling ensures that Aboriginal heritage is passed on to the younger people. This is how Dreaming stories have been passed down for thousands of years and continue to be passed on today.

Storytelling today

Today storytelling in Indigenous Australia is still a very important way of passing on information to people. For thousands of years information has been passed on through stories and songs. Today you can also see and hear it in many types of music, plays, poetry, books, artwork, on television and on the Web and you can now read in books the traditional stories that were once only spoken.

These stories keep alive the traditions and heritage of Indigenous Australia not only within Indigenous communities but also within the wider community. This helps to increase understanding and awareness between people.

Today, as well as elders in the communities, we have professional story tellers who visit schools and other educational groups passing on their knowledge about Indigenous culture and beliefs.

Indigenous children across Australia often make their own toys, and like children everywhere, they are incredibly resourceful. Some toys are models of traditional tools and weapons, such as boomerangs, spears, baskets or boats, while others are model airplanes, torches or telephones. Some toys are created specifically for Indigenous games. Special throwing objects called weet weets were used in boys' throwing game in northern Queensland. This selection of toys is just a sample of the range found across the country.

String games are common in both Indigenous and non-Indigenous cultures around the world. String figure designs often resembled objects that were, and in some parts of Australian still are, used in everyday life such as dilly bags and baskets, or they represented animals and people, or abstract ideas such as the forces of nature. As people played the string game designs would change quickly from one thing to another. This game was also used to help tell stories.

The stolen generation

They just came down and say, "We taking these kids". They just take you out if your mothers arms. That's what they done to me. I was still at my mother's breast when they took me. Alec Kruger, 1995

The greatest assault on Indigenous cultures and family life was the forced separation or 'taking away' of Indigenous children from their families. This occurred in every Australian state form the late 1800s until the practice was officially ended in 1969. During this time as many as 100 000 children were separated from their families. These children became known as the Stolen Generation.

The separation of children from their families placed into Indigenous children into government-run institutions; adoption of children by white families; and the fostering of children into white families. The last two strategies were particularly applied to 'fair-skinned' children.

These forced separations were part of deliberate policies of assimilation. Their aim was to cut children off from their culture to have them raised to think and act as 'white'.

What is Link Up?

Well there was nine of us in the family, old (Lambert) came along and said: "You can't look after these kids by yourself Mrs Clayton", but we were for months without welfare coming near us. We had the two grandmothers and all our uncles and aunties there and our father's brothers were there. We weren't short of an extended family by any means. We never went without anything. But they still took us away. What right did they have? I am still seeking answers to [my] family's removal. Iris Clayton, Wiradjuri Elder, Leeton/Canberra in 'Link-Up' Booklet 1995

Link-Up was formed in 1980 to work with Aboriginal adults who were separated as children from families. They may have been raised in state or sectarian institiutions specifically for Aboriginal children or in non-Aboriginal institutions, foster homes or adoptive homes.

Most of the children separated from their families grew up knowing little about their Aboriginal names, families, culture and heritage. These circumstances made it very difficult for those who wanted to find their families.

According to Link-Up, "empowerment is the basis of our work. Empowerment means that as workers we acknowledge the person's experience and we respect their ability to make decisions about their needs and their healing process. They are the experts of their own experience". Link-Up provides support and counselling before, during and after the reunion of families. Since its beginning Link-Up has worked with thousands of Aboriginal families.

Government Institutions for Children

Kinchela is a 13 hectare area of fertile land at the mouth of the Macleay River on the mid-north coast of New South Wales. In 1924, the Aboriginal Protection Board opened the Kinchela Boys Home with the 'official' purpose of providing training for Aboriginal boys between the ages of five and fifteen. These boys were taken from their families by the State from all over New South Wales.

Conditions at Kinchela were harsh. The boys received a poor education from unqualified teachers and worked long hours on vegetable and dairy farms run by the Board on the reserve land. Boys were beaten, tied up, given little emotional support, and no attention was given to developing skills of individual boys.

At the age of fifteen, the boys were sent to work as rural labourers. The board kept control of most of their earnings, which were supposed to be kept in trust for them until they reached adulthood. Most never saw their trust money.

Conditions improved in 1940, when the Protection Board was abolished and replaced by the Aboriginal Welfare Board. From the 1950s boys were sent to high school in Kempsey where they won many local athletics and sporting championships. Despite improvements, the fact remains that Kinchela was a home for 'stolen children'.

Kinchela closed down in 1969, when the Aboriginal Welfare Board was finally disbanded.

Cootamundra Girls Home

Cootamundra Girls Home, established in 1911, was the first of the homes for Aboriginal children set up by the Aborigines Protection Board. The main aim of the Board was to 'rescue' Aboriginal children from their families and assimilate them into the white community. Girls were the main target of the Board, especially so-called 'half-caste' or 'mixed blood' girls. The girls were trained as domestic servants and sent out to work for middle class white families.

At Cootamundra, Aboriginal girls were instructed to 'think white, look white, act white'. This was part of the process to make the girls suitable wives for white men, in the hope that through interracial marriages, Aboriginal blood would be 'bred out'. They were taught to look down on their own people and to fear Aboriginal men.

Girls in the home were not allowed to communicate with their families. They were often told that their parents were dead and even given forged death certificates. As a result, many of the girls in the home lost their families forever.

Cootamundra Home was closed in 1968, the year before the Aboriginal Welfare Board (previously the Aborigines Protection Board) was abolished.

Social Justice

These rights have been difficult to achieve for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders because of a history of governmental and colonial racism.

Social justice is what faces you in the morning. It is awakening in a house with adequate water supply, cooking facilities and sanitation. It is the ability to nourish your children and send them to school where their education not only equips them for employment but reinforces their knowledge and understanding of their cultural inheritance. It is the prospect of genuine employment and good health: a life of choices and opportunity, free from discrimination. Mick Dodson, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, Sydney Morning Herald, 25 January, 1997

What is social justice?

Non-Aboriginal Australia has developed on the racist assumption of an ingrained sense of superiority that it knows best what is good for Aboriginal people. Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, National Report

Redfern Park Speech

[I]t might help if we non-Aboriginal Australians imagined ourselves dispossessed of the land we lived on for 50 000 years, and then imagined ourselves told that it had never been ours. Imagine if ours was the oldest culture in the world and we were told that it was worthless. Imagine if we had resisted this settlement, suffered and died in the defence of our land, and then were told in history books that we had given it up without a fight. Imagine if non-Aboriginal Australians had served their country in peace and war and were then ignored in history books. Imagine if our feats on the sporting field has inspired admiration and patriotism and yet did nothing to diminish prejudice. Imagine if our spiritual life was denied and ridiculed. Imagine if we had suffered the injustice and then were blamed for it. Extract from the speech by Mr Paul Keating, Prime Minister of Australia, Redfern Park, 10 December 1993 at the launch of Australia's celebration of the International Year of the World's Indigenous People.

Social Justice - keeping score

The Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody found a long history of social injustice in a number of crucial areas for Indigenous Australians. The following statistics measure progress in achieving social justice for Indigenous Australians in these areas.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander populations comprise just over 1.6% of the total Australian population.

Two thirds of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders live in rural or remote areas. However, more Indigenous people live in Western Sydney than anywhere else in Australia.

Indigenous Australians are ten times more likely to suffer from diabetes mellitus than non-Indigenous Australians. Indigenous Australians are seven times more likely to die of a respiratory disease.

The rate of Indigenous infant mortality is two to three times greater than for non-Indigenous Australians.

The life expectancy for Indigenous Australians is between 16-18 years less than non-Indigenous Australians.

In 1991, the unemployment rate for Indigenous Australians was nearly three times that of the national average.

Employment rate in 1991:

• Indigenous Australian 30.8 %
• National 11.7 %

Indigenous Australians earn less than two thirds the national average.

Average income per year in 1991:

• Indigenous Australian $11 491
• National $17 614

For more detailed statistics go to the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission website.

Over 30 percent of Indigenous Australian family dwellings are 'over-occupied', by national standards. The national average is eight percent.

27 percent of Indigenous Australians own their own homes. The national rate for home ownership is 69 percent.

Law and Justice

At 30 June, 2016:

• There were 10,596 prisoners who identified as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, a 7% increase (711 prisoners) from 30 June, 2015 (9,885 prisoners). The number of non-Indigenous prisoners increased by 8% (2,002 prisoners).
• Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander prisoners accounted for just over a quarter (27%) of the total Australian prisoner population.
• From 30 June, 2015, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander imprisonment rate increased by 4%, from 2,253 to 2,346 prisoners per 100,000 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population. The non-Indigenous rate increased by 6% over the same period from 146 to 154 prisoners per 100,000 non-Indigenous population.
• The proportion of adult prisoners who identified as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander ranged from 8% in Victoria (535 prisoners) to 84% (1,393 prisoners) in the Northern Territory.

(Australian Bureau of Statistics)

Dispossession and Health

I thought that's a real indictment upon Australia, that Aboriginal people living in an advanced country, have third world health problems. Dr Sandra Eades, Aboriginal Medical Service in My Kind of People, Achievement, Identity and Aboriginality, 1994

Colonisation has affected the health of Indigenous communities in a number of ways. One of the most devastating impacts of European colonisation on Aboriginal people was the introduction of diseases such as smallpox, influenza, venereal disease, typhoid, tuberculosis, pneumonia, measles and whooping cough. For example, many of the Eora people who lived on the foreshores of Sydney Harbour died from smallpox in the first years of the European occupation.

Other effects of colonisation such as poverty and racism on Aboriginal health are less obvious but no less devastating.

Aboriginal incomes are generally lower than the average for other Australians.

Large proportions of Aboriginal people have inadequate housing, water quality, food supplies and sanitation. This seriously affects the health of children.

Aboriginal children are typically lighter in weight and shorter than non-Aboriginal peers.

Controlled by the State

Nothing could have prepared my mother for the experience of reading her files. The first entry in 1942 and the last 1974 - 32 years of surveillance. Jackie Huggins, Historian/Writer, Auntie Rita, Brisbane, 1994

Until 1969, state-run Aboriginal Protection or Welfare Boards controlled and supervised the lives of Indigenous Australians. These boards, which began operating in the early 1900s, could decide where Indigenous people could live, whom they might marry or have relationships with and where and how their children could be raised. They also determined which jobs Indigenous people could have, and withheld their wages indefinitely. They governed what property Indigenous people could own and how they disposed of it and also where people could travel who they could visit.

Certain exemptions were made for those Indigenous people who were deemed to have reached 'acceptable' standards of non-Indigenous civilisation, that is, a European lifestyle. These people were granted a type of 'honorary' citizenship which could nevertheless be withdrawn by the authorities. Aboriginal people referred to these exemption certificated as 'dog tags' or 'dog licences'.

Finally in 1969, the Protection Board was disbanded and the Commonwealth assumed responsibility for Indigenous affairs. This meant that under the Constitution, Indigenous Australians were entitled to the same rights as all other Australian citizens.

Albert Namatjira

Albert Namatjira was an Arrente man from the Hermansburg mission in west Alice Springs, who became known nationally for his paintings of Central Australia.

Despite his fame, Namatjira was still subject to the controls of Aboriginal Protection Boards. In 1949, his application for a grazier's lease was rejected. In 1951, his application for permission to build a house of his own was denied. At the same time as these basic rights were denied him, and even though he was not considered an Australian citizen, Namatjira was required to pay tax on his earnings.

Namatjira was awarded the Queen's Coronation Medal in 1953, and in 1957, he and his wife were granted honorary citizenship of Australia, though their children remained state wards.

In 1958, he was arrested for sharing alcohol with a relation who did not have citizenship privileges. For this 'crime' he was forced to spend two months under open arrest on the Papunya Reserve. He died of a heart attack three months later.

The Freedom Rides

In February 1965, 30 people led by Charles Perkins and Jim Spigelman undertook a bus tour of northern and western New South Wales towns to protest against racial discrimination. This group became known as the 'freedom riders'.

The tour focussed national attention on racism that had been generated and supported by the 'White Australia Policy'. Indigenous people were often denied service in shops, separated from whites in cinemas, banned from hotels and clubs and excluded from swimming pools being used by white people.

The freedom riders experienced hostility in most towns and violence in some. Eventually,'White Australia' was formally ended as government policy in 1972 and the Race Discrimination Act was passed in 1975. Nevertheless, the struggle for social justice continues today.

Reference: Horton, D, Aboriginal Encyclopedia

Reproducing the stereotypes

White Australians basically are racist. Racism stems from what you see on TV. Not seeing an Aboriginal family in these productions is part of that. It's all right to have a black American family in there, that's fine, but not a black Australian. But you can't paint a black picture if you only use white paint. Ernie Dingo, Actor/Comedian, in 'My Kind of People, Achievement and Identity and Aboriginality', 1994

In 1990, the National Inquiry into Racist Violence found that Aboriginal people (and other minority groups) saw television and newspapers as a major influence in the maintenance of racism and misrepresentation of their cultures and lives.

The Inquiry supported Indigenous Australians' concerns that issues and events involving Aboriginal people were predominantly shown in a negative light - that Aboriginal people were either portrayed as a threat to society, or as victims. This type of misrepresentation continues the cycle of misunderstanding and racism. The Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody confirmed these problems with media portrayals of Indigenous people and issues when it recommended that journalists be trained in cross-cultural awareness.

Since the early 1980s, Aboriginal community-based media organisations have been formed to provide an Aboriginal perspective and influence, in the representation of Indigenous peoples in the media.

Aboriginal Deaths in Custody

Australia must know the truth behind the deaths or else we must forever live with the knowledge that our fear of the truth or our misguided sense of priorities caused us to abandon an essential and momentous decision to examine a little of our national character and the behaviour of people in authority. Justice James Muirhead, Royal Commissioner into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody

Asking an Aboriginal what he or she regards as the important factors underlying deaths in custody often elicits as a first reply "racism"... it is an uncomfortable subject which tends not to be talked about very openly and the existence of which is vigorously denied by those who are its most obvious practitioners. Hal Wootten, Royal Commissioner into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody

Between 1980 and 1989, at least 99 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people died in prison, youth detention centres or police cells.

The relatives of a number of the dead began campaigning for a national Inquiry into the deaths. In August 1987, after the death of an Aboriginal man in the New South Wales town of Brewarrina, the sixteenth person to die in custody that year, the Prime Minister, Mr Bob Hawke, announced that a Royal Commission into deaths in custody would be held.

In 1991, the Commission presented its report and made a series of recommendations to improve the treatment of Indigenous Australians in the justice system. However, the fundamental finding of the Commission was that racism towards Indigenous Australians is ingrained at all levels of Australian society and was the major contributing factor to deaths in custody.

Five years after the Commission made its recommendations, the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Report found that between 1989 and 1996, at least 96 Aboriginal people died in custody. In 1995, 22 Aboriginal people died in custody - the highest number since 1987.

Governments claim they have implemented the recommendations but the stories of Indigenous people who died tell otherwise. Failure to implement [the Royal Commission's] recommendations within the criminal justice system is a major cause of continuing deaths. Mick Dodson, Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission press release, 25 November 1996

The findings of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody

The commissioners investigating the deaths in custody of the 99 Aboriginal people did not find widespread foul play by the custodians as was generally expected. However, they did find damning similarities in the lives of those who died. Almost half had been taken as children from their families by State authorities, most were unemployed, and nearly all had had repeated contact with the justice system from an early age.

In summary, the Commission found that the major cause of death in custody was that Aboriginal people were brought into contact with the justice system more than non-Indigenous Australians and for lesser offences. They also found that people were inadequately cared for and supervised while in detention.

The Royal Commission stressed the need to find alternatives to custody for Aboriginal people, for the involvement of Aboriginal communities in the justice system and for self-determination at the local level. Finally, they called for a process of national reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.

Community Service Alternatives to Custody

The Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody found that a history of cultural ignorance and misunderstanding over the value and practice of Indigenous law had resulted in Indigenous Australians being severely disadvantaged in the courts and over-represented in prisons.

Too many young Indigenous people were caught in an escalating cycle of encounters with police and the criminal justice system. Consequently, the Commission recommended that the community be involved in the sentencing process and that community service order be issued as alternatives to prison sentences for some offences.

Two Systems of Law

"Colonial law has been a reality in Australia since 1788. Aboriginal law has always been a reality and we are unanimous in our resolve that it continue to be so." Noel Pearson, Executive Director, Cape York Land Council, 1993.

Many Indigenous Australians live under two legal systems - the British-based Australian legal system and the Indigenous customary law system. Customary law is a term used to describe the laws and ways of living handed down to Aboriginal people by the Ancestral Beings.

In many remote of parts of Australia, Indigenous cultures are the dominant cultures. In areas such as Arnhem Land, the Western Desert (Central Australia) and Pitjanjatjara lands, a blend of British-based Australian law and Indigenous customary law is working successfully.

Reconciliation

We have extended our hand to other Australians. Those Australians who take our hand are those who dare to dream of an Australia that could be. In true reconciliation, through the remembering, the grieving and the healing, we become as one in the dreaming of this land. This is about us and our country, not about the petty deliberations of politics. We must join hands and forge our future. Will you take our hand? Will you dare to share our dream? Mick Dodson, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, Sydney Morning Herald, 25 January, 1997

Cultural heritage

One of the reasons they have survived for so long is their ability to adapt to change.

Culture : the total of ways of living built up by a group of human beings, which is passed on from one generation to the next.

Heritage : that which comes or belongs to one by reason of birth.

Maintaining one's culture, values and traditions is beyond price. Human beings cannot live without that. We are glad to share our culture with Europeans and other migrants but we will never give them up. Getano Lui, jnr, Thursday Island, 1994

Indigenous Australia has been influenced by other peoples who have come to Australia to stay and peoples who visited Australia for trade or other reasons but did not stay. Indigenous peoples also exchanged ideas and goods among themselves. Goods were exchanged and other things such as songs and dances were traded. Songs and dances were exchanged often at large ceremonial gatherings when many people collected together. These gatherings often occurred at a time and place when there was plenty of particular foods.

Although Indigenous cultures are very strong, years of European misunderstanding and indifference have affected them. Today, Indigenous communities keep cultures alive by:

• passing their knowledge, arts, rituals and performances from one generation to another
• speaking and teaching languages
• protecting cultural property and sacred and significant sites and objects

The Oldest Living Culture

We've been here a long, long time Koori Mail, October 1996

The long history of Indigenous people is found in the many significant archaeological sites throughout Australia. Archaeological sites provide information about how Indigenous people lived, used resources and were able to adapt to environmental changes in the past. These archaeological sites also illustrate how Indigenous cultures have changed over time. Archaeological investigations in the northwest of Australia suggest that Indigenous people may have occupied Australia for at least 60,000 years.

Sites of cultural significance are protected by law. Any activities which could damage these sites must be cleared by the relevant Indigenous communities.

Archaeological Sites

Botany Bay, New South Wales

One type of archaeological site that can be found on the shores Botany Bay is a shell midden. Archaeological evidence shows that a midden in Botany Bay was occupied many times during the last 3 000 years.

Middens are sites where Aboriginal people ate different kinds of shellfish, fish and other animals. Mounds of shells and other leftovers indicate the site's special use by humans.

Aboriginal shell middens commonly occur along the Australian coastline and are an important archaeological resource. Objects that are often foumd in middens along the southern part of the New South Wales coast are shell fish hooks in different stages of their manufacture, bone points and barbs.

Jinmium, north Western Australia

According to Aboriginal elders Biddy Simon and Paddy Carlton, Jinmium has always been a special place. It was only recently that archaeologists have caught up with this view.

Archaeological work at Jinmium created enormous public interest in 1996 when initial dates suggested stone artefacts (flakes and some tools) were older than 116,000 years and engravings were up to 58,000 years old. More recently developed dating methods challenged the early dates, suggesting the stone artefacts and rock-art may be less than 20,000 years old -- perhaps only 10,000 years of age.

However, these results have also been questioned, with ongoing research indicating the true maximum age of some Jinmium artefacts and rock-art to be somewhere between 20,000 and 60,000 years before present. Scientists, including both dating experts and archaeologists, simply do not agree on when the first Aboriginal people arrived at Jinmium or the rest of Australia. Only time and further research will tell.

Lake Mungo, western New South Wales

Lake Mungo in western New South Wales is a site of great Aboriginal and archaeological importance, containing material dated to at least 33,000 years ago. Lake Mungo is now dry but it was once part of a series of freshwater lakes that would have been full during the late Pleistocene period when the sites were first occupied. The lake had varying water levels during this time but 21,000 years ago the freshwater lakes gradually began to dry up and Lake Mungo itself disappeared about 17 000 years ago.

Many stone artefacts, such as flaked stone tools, have been found at Lake Mungo. The tasks for which these flaked stone tools were used are often not known, although some may have been used for wood-working.

A Changing Culture

Indigenous cultures changing through time

Archaeological evidence shows that Indigenous cultures have developed and altered a number of times as a result of changes in the environment such as rise in sea level and drying out of the continent. This has caused changes in the types of resources available to people, the tool kits and diet.

Indigenous people have been influenced by a range of cultures over time and in most recent history have managed to survive and fight against the sudden and often catastrophic changes to their cultures and ways of life brought about by Europeans since 1788.

Influences on Indigenous cultures

Aboriginal people were in contact with other cultures, sharing ideas and skills long before permanent European occupation in 1788. Many Indigenous communities have been influenced by contact with Macassans, Melanesians, Dutch, English, Portugese navigators and traders, as well as other Aboriginal communities and Torres Strait Islanders.

For over 300 years, Macassan traders from Sulawesi (now part of Indonesia) visited the coast of northern Australia to fish for 'trepang' (sea slug), a delicacy in cooking. The cultural exchange can be seen in rock and bark paintings, emblems and objects used in ceremonies, the introduction of dug-out canoes and some Macassan words in Aboriginal languages.

Images of Macassans were painted in rock and bark. Tobacco was introduced to northern Australia. There are pipes from this area made after the Macassan style but with local designs.

Indigenous 'multiculturalism'

The population of Australia's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities is extremely diverse in its culture with many different languages spoken. Think of the Kimberly region of Western Australia... if you travel through the Kimberly with its large Aboriginal population and the diversity of people within this region, it's just like travelling through Europe with its changing cultures and languages. Dot West, Chairperson, National Indigenous Media Association of Australia, Boyer Lectures, 1993.

There are many different Indigenous cultures in Australia, made up of people from various Indigenous 'nations' that speak their own languages.

Over thousands of years, communities of Indigenous Australians have exchanged ideas, technology and cultural practices with each other. As a result, many communities may share certain technologies but use them in different ways. Objects, such as shields and baskets, differ in their design, decoration and meaning from region to region.

Shields were made by men and used in ceremonies, dances and occasionally in defensive combat. The narrowest shields were usually used in hand-to-hand combat while large, broad shields protected the bearer against spears and missiles. The largest and most spectacular shields were made by the rainforest peoples of north Queensland, where they were painted with clan designs and colours.

Baskets, bags and other containers are usually made by women but are used by both sexes mainly for food gathering. Some of these containers and bags are often woven from bark, human hair, pandanus and palm fronds, grasses and bush twine made from plant fibres. They are coloured with dyes made from roots, bark and other natural substances, and are sometimes decorated with feathers and pieces of cloth.

European misunderstanding of Aboriginal life

The complexity and richness of Aboriginal cultures was poorly understood by the majority of early colonists. Government legislation and policies worked against the interests of Aboriginal people but greatly benefited the pastoralists who were rapidly spreading across Australia, setting up farms and sheep stations, often with the labour of Indigenous men and women. This lack of understanding of Aboriginal ways of life and how they used the land resulted in many clashes between settlers and Aboriginal people, particularly over land and access to land, which for Aboriginal people meant food and spiritual well-being.

Contemporary Arts

As in the past Indigenous Australian arts today are as diverse as the people that make them. Many artists work in introduced media, such as acrylic, fabric, photography or print-making. The themes of Indigenous art reflect the range of artists' concerns and experiences: from relationships to landscapes and animals to political and social injustices.

Some forms of contemporary art, such as certain bark paintings, are based on historic practices. However, most Indigenous artists express their heritage and experiences in innovative ways which both reflect Indigenous and non-Indigenous influences.

Bangarra Dance Company

Traditionally Aboriginal ceremonies have always blended dance and drama with music and visual art forms. This tradition has continued in new ways by contemporary dance companies such as Bangarra.

Bangarra's mission is:

"to maintain the link, with respect and integrity, between the traditional Indigenous cultures of Australia and new forms of contemporary artistic expression, giving voice to social and political issues which speak to all people."

Living Languages

It is a mistake to dismiss our languages as part of history, and long gone. They're not. They are alive and vibrant. They are in a new phase of growth. They're part of us as the Indigenous people of the land. Our languages are the voice of the land, and we are the carriers of the languages. Jeanie Bell, Linguist, Boyer Lectures, 1993

At the time of invasion there were over 700 different Aboriginal languages and dialects spoken in Australia. Now there are less that 250 still in use.

One of the major practices of colonists was to stop Aboriginal people speaking their own languages, which interrupted the passing of language from one generation to another. Today, many of Australia's Indigenous languages are no longer spoken as first languages. However, they live on through individual words and through varieties of Aboriginal English which incorporate the structures of Aboriginal languages.

Cultural Property

The unique aesthetic of Indigenous Australian cultural work is recognised all over the world. However, the marketability of Indigenous arts has resulted in many cases of exploitation: Indigenous artists' work has at times been reproduced without permission and without regard for the cultural and spiritual significance of the designs to the artist.

In an effort to protect the integrity of their work and share it with others, many Indigenous artists now make licensing agreements with manufacturers so that their designs can be reproduced and the artist can be fairly rewarded.

Spirituality

Its forms and practices have been profoundly influenced by the impact of colonialism, both past and present.

Some Indigenous Australians share the religious beliefs and values of religions introduced into Australia from other cultures around the world, particularly Europe. But for most people religious beliefs are derived from a sense of belonging-to the land, to the sea, to other people, to one's culture.

The form and expression of spirituality differs between Aboriginal people and Torres Strait Islanders. Aboriginal spirituality mainly derives from the stories of the Dreaming, while Torres Strait Islander spirituality draws upon the stories of the Tagai.

The Missions

So the sad thing about it all was the missionaries didn't realise that we already had something that tied in with what they'd brought to us. They saw different as inferior, and they didn't ask us what it was that we had. And it's very sad because if they had asked... things may have been different today. Our people, before the white man came were very spiritual people. They were connected to land and creation through the great spirit, there was a good great and a great evil spirit... And Satan was the great evil one. So there wasn't much difference in what the missionaries brought and what we already had... Wadjularbinna Doomadgee, Gungalidda Leader, Gulf of Carpentaria, 1996

Since the European colonisation of Australia, Indigenous Australians have had contact with missionaries and their missions. This relationship has been a difficult one. In some instances missions became instruments of government policy, engaging in practices such as forcibly separating Aboriginal children from their families in order to maximise control over the child's education into Christian ways and beliefs. In this way, missions contributed to the suppression of Aboriginal cultural practices and languages.

However, not all missions were agents of government policies. Some respected Aboriginal ways of life and the importance of ceremonies and cultural practices.

The Dreaming

The Dreaming means our identity as people. The cultural teaching and everything, that's part of our lives here, you know?... it's the understanding of what we have around us. Merv Penrith, Elder, Wallaga Lake, 1996

The Dreaming has different meanings for different Aboriginal people. It is a complex network of knowledge, faith and practices that derive from stories of creation, and it dominates all spiritual and physical aspects of Aboriginal life. The Dreaming sets out the structures of society, the rules for social behaviour and the ceremonies performed in order to maintain the life of the land.

It governed the way people lived and how they should behave. Those who did not follow the rules were punished.

The Dreaming or Dreamtime is often used to describe the time when the earth and humans and animals were created. The Dreaming is also used by individuals to refer to their own dreaming or their community's dreaming.

During the Dreaming, ancestral spirits came to earth and created the landforms, the animals and plants. The stories tell how the ancestral spirits moved through the land creating rivers, lakes and mountains. Today we know the places where the ancestral spirits have been and where they came to rest. There are explanations of how people came to Australia and the links between the groups throughout Australia. There are explanations about how people learnt languages and dance and how they came to know about fire.

In essence, the Dreaming comes from the land. In Aboriginal society, people did not own the land it was part of them and it was part of their duty to respect and look after mother earth.

The Dreaming did not end with the arrival of Europeans but simply entered a new phase. It is a powerful living force that must be maintained and cared for.

Dreaming Stories

What are Dreaming Stories about?

Dreaming stories vary throughout Australia and there are different versions on the same theme. For example, the story of how the birds got their colours is different in New South Wales and in Western Australia.

Stories cover many themes and topics. There are stories about creation of sacred places, landforms, people, animals and plants. There are also stories of language or the first use of fire. In more recent times there are stories telling of the arrival of the first Europeans on ships or stories about trading with Macassan fisherman in northern Australia.

The Tracks of Life

The journey of the Spirit Ancestors across the land are recorded in Dreaming tracks. A Dreaming track joins a number of sites which trace the path of an Ancestral Being as it moved through the landscape, forming its features, creating its flora and fauna and laying down the Laws. One of these Spirit Ancestors is the Rainbow Serpent, whose Dreaming track is shared by many Aboriginal communities across Australia.

Rainbow Serpent

"And that... is the resting place of the Rainbow Serpent, and all of the gullies and all of the lagoon itself was about the Rainbow Serpent created after he had created the universe and all the dry gullies is the tracks that he's made looking for a resting place." Carl McGrady, Aboriginal Education Assistant, Boggabilla, describing the path of the Rainbow Serpent at Boobera Lagoon, northern New South Wales, 1996.

The Rainbow Serpent is represented as a large, snake-like creature, whose Dreaming track is always associated with watercourses, such as billabongs, rivers, creeks and lagoons. It is the protector of the land, its people, and the source of all life. However, the Rainbow Serpent can also be a destructive force if it is not properly respected.

The Rainbow Serpent is a consistent theme in Aboriginal painting and has been found in rock art up to 6000 years old. The Rainbow Serpent is a powerful symbol of the creative and destructive power of nature. Most paintings of Rainbow Serpents tell the story of the creation of the landscape particular to an artist's birthplace. Some aspects of Rainbow Serpent stories are restricted to initiated persons but generally, the image had been very public. Today, most artists add personal clan designs to the bodies of Rainbow Serpents, symbolising links between the artist and the land.

The Mimi Spirits

The Mimi are tall, thin beings that live in the rocky escarpment of northern Australia as spirits. Before the coming of Aboriginal people they had human forms. The Mimi are generally harmless but on occasions can be mischievous.

When Aboriginal people first came to northern Australia, the Mimi taught them how to hunt and cook kangaroos and other animals. They also did the first rock paintings and taught Aboriginal people how to paint.

"I'm as much a Torres Strait Islander irrespective of where I live because my feelings of being a Torres Strait Islander live inside me. It is not predicated by what is outside me, it is determined with my feelings and my spirituality." Bilyana Blomely, Academic Co-ordinator, Lismore 1996

The people throughout the Torres Strait are united by their connection to the Tagai. The Tagai consists of stories which are the cornerstone of Torres Strait Islanders' spiritual beliefs. These stories focus on the stars and identify Torres Strait Islanders as sea people who share a common way of life. The instructions of the Tagai provide order in the world, ensuring that everything has a place.

One Tagai story depicts the Tagai as a man standing in a canoe. In his left hand, he holds a fishing spear, representing the Southern Cross. In his right hand, he holds a sorbi (a red fruit). In this story, the Tagai and his crew of 12 are preparing for a journey. But before the journey begins, the crew consume all the food and drink they planned to take. So the Tagai strung the crew together in two groups of six and cast them into the sea, where their images became star patterns in the sky. These patterns can be seen in the star constellations of Pleiades and Orion.

Changing it and changing with it. The land was not just soil or rocks or minerals, but a whole environment that sustains, and is sustained, by people and culture.

I feel with my body. Feeling all these trees, all this country. When this blow you can feel it. Same for country... you feel it, you can look, but feeling... that make you. Big Bill Neidjie, Gagudju Elder, Kakadu

For Indigenous Australians the land is the core of all spirituality and this relationship has been deeply misunderstood over the past 200 years or so. This relationship is central to all issues that are important to Indigenous people today.

When European colonisers first arrived in Australia they encountered an unfamiliar land occupied by people they didn't understand. As they didn't understand the peoples' society and their land 'ownership' system, Australia was deemed to be 'terra nullius' and the land was claimed by the British. However Indigenous people fought, and are still fighting, for their land and their lives. The history of these battles is not often told but they involved hundreds of incidents and thousands of people. These stories form a part of the untold history of Australia.

Land Rights

It is my father's land, my grandfather's land, my grandmother's land. I am related to it, it give me my identity. If I don't fight for it, then I will be moved out of it and [it] will be the loss of my identity. Father Dave Passi, Plaintiff, 'Mabo' Case in 'Land bilong Islander' 1990

The history of the struggle for land rights goes back to the earliest days of the European occupation of Australia. These struggles too were often resolved through violence as Indigenous people were progressively dispossessed of their land.

The struggle for land rights continues today through the legal and political systems. Some important legal milestones have been reached which show that arrangements based on cultural sensitivity and respect can be successful for all Australians.

Native Title

It is imperative in today's world that the common law should neither be nor be seen to be frozen in an age of racial discrimination. From the High Court's judgement on the Native Title or 'Mabo' Case, 1992

On 3 June 1992 the High Court of Australia handed down its decision in Mabo vs The State of Queensland , ruling that the treatment of Indigenous property rights based on the principle of terra nullius was wrong and racist.

The Court ruled that Indigenous ownership of land has survived where it has not been extinguished by a valid act of government and where Aboriginal people have maintained traditional law and links with the land. This legal recognition of Indigenous ownership is called Native Title. The Court ruled that in each case native title must be determined by reference to the traditions and customary law of the Indigenous owners of the land.

"Island people have their own portions of land which are handed down through generations and with my dad's claim, he was denied access to his land through the government and he said "Why? We all have our right to our own lands. I can show you where my boundaries are." Gail Mabo, Torres Strait Islander, Kempsey, 1996.

In 1982, Eddie Mabo and four other Torres Strait Islander people went to the High Court of Australia claiming that their island, Mer (Murray Island), had been continuously inhabited and exclusively possessed by them, therefore, they were the true owners. They acknowledged that the British Crown had exercised sovereignty when it annexed the islands, but claimed that their land rights had not been validly extinguished.

On June 3 1992, the High Court decided in favour of Eddie Mabo and the other plaintiffs. But Eddie Mabo never heard the ruling, as he died of cancer in January of that year.

The fight for Land Rights

The Aboriginal Tent Embassy

The first 'Aboriginal Tent Embassy', also known as the 'tent embassy', was established on the lawns of what is now Old Parliament House, on Australia Day, 26 January, 1972. It was called the 'embassy' in order to symbolise the feeling of many Indigenous people that they were essentially foreigners in their own country. The Aboriginal Flag was flown over the 'tent embassy'.

The embassy provided a focus for Indigenous peoples' campaigns for land rights and social justice, as well as a meeting place for all people interested in the issues. It was forcibly removed by police on several occasions, but rebuilt each time. It remained in place until 1975 when its removal was negotiated.

In January 1992, another 'embassy' was established on the same lawns to draw attention to claims for land rights. This is a replica of the 1992 embassy and is still there today.

The Wreck Bay community on the south coast of New South Wales, was the first community outside the Northern Territory or Queensland to have traditional land returned.

Wreck Bay is located along a track which Aboriginal people had used for centuries when travelling along the coast, for special occasions and ceremonies, or in recent times, looking for work. The community began as a temporary camp in the mid 1880s, and by 1900 had become permanent, though it residents remained highly mobile.

From the beginning of the twentieth century until 1987 the land was under the control of various Commonwealth and State authorities. In 1954 the community came under the control of the Commonwealth once more. In 1975, after much community lobbying to regain control of their land, the Commonwealth offered the people a lease over the reserve. The community rejected this offer and were eventually successful in winning full title to the land in 1987. Since then, the land has been managed by the Wreck Bay Community Council.

In 1995, the Community Council also obtained title over Jervis Bay Commonwealth National Park. The Council has leased this area back to the Federal Government for use by all Australians.

The issue of Aboriginal land rights was first brought to national attention in 1966, when 200 Gurindji stockmen, domestics and their families walked off the Wave Hill cattle station in the Northern Territory demanding better wages and conditions. The strike, led by Vincent Lingiari, was the catalyst for two decades of struggle as Gurindji people battled to regain control of traditional lands and establish their own cattle station.

In 1967, Gurindji people petitioned the Governor-General, claiming 1295 square kilometres of land near Wave Hill. Their claim was rejected, but in 1975, they won a lease for their land. This, along with 90 square kilometres of land voluntarily surrendered by Wave Hill owners, became Dagaragu cattle station.

In 1985, following a recommendation from Justice Toohey of the Aboriginal Land Commission that the Gurindji be granted traditional land adjacent to Dagaragu, the Gurindji lease was converted to freehold.

The decision was an important milestone in the land rights struggle - as was Dagaragu, the first Aboriginal owned and managed cattle station.

"To expect us to tell you everything in our Law in one day is arrogant. The State Government has not given us a proper hearing... Instead of talking you should have been listening; instead of assuming you had all the knowledge, you should have been trying to learn." Yungngora Community letter to Premier Court, Western Australia.

In 1971 the Yungngora people employed on Noonkanbah station walked off in protest over poor pay and conditions. Then in 1976, the Aboriginal Land Fund Commission bought Noonkanbah station for the Yungngora community, and the work of revitalising the station under Aboriginal management was begun.

In May 1978, the Yungngora community learned that an exploration company was intending to drill on areas sacred to them. The Yungngora people offered to show drillers alternative sites from the sacred areas. This was refused.

The Western Australian Government was determined that the exploration should proceed and claimed that the religious beliefs of the Yungngora had been "trumped up" or inspired by outside influences.

After court action by the Aboriginal Legal Service, the mining company was required to protect the sacred places. When this was not done satisfactorily, the community blocked access. Elders used media coverage of the blockade to explain their religious beliefs and the importance of the sites. In April 1980, the drillers were finally forced to leave the site.

In August 1981, the Western Australian Government enforced, by law, its rights to oil exploration drilling. The Government provided a heavy police escort so that drilling could continue in the area of the sacred site. The Yungngora resisted peacefully but in vain. Many were arrested and the drilling went ahead.

No oil was discovered.

Uluru is an important place for Aboriginal peoples of the Central Desert. It is a symbol of Australia and a major tourist attraction. When Uluru was returned to Indigenous owners in 1985, it also became an important symbol in development of co-operative relations between government and Aboriginal people.

The largest stone monolith on earth, Uluru was named 'Ayres Rock' by explorer William Grosse in 1875. Regarded as economically useless, Uluru and Kata Tjuta (the Olgas) were included in the South West Aboriginal Reserve in 1920. In 1958, Uluru and Kata Tjuta were excised from the reserve and declared a national park.

In 1985, the Commonwealth Government made an agreement with the traditional owners of Uluru and Kata Tjuta where the freehold title to the park area was to be vested in the Uluru Kata Tjuta Land Trust, which would then lease the park back to the National Parks and Wildlife Service.

Tourism in the park has continued to increase since the handover. The Uluru Kata Tjuta Land Trust has developed plans which aim to preserve the area's heritage value, safeguard the interests of the local Mutijulu community and protect the many sacred sites of the park.

Terra nullius

What is terra nullius?

Terra nullius is a Latin term meaning 'land belonging to no one'. When colonising Australia, the British Government used this term to justify the dispossession of Indigenous people. The British colonists did not recognise the land was being used as Indigenous people did not use the land in the same way as the British. The British saw no evidence of agricultural, social or religious structure like their own, and therefore incorrectly concluded that Indigenous people did not own the land but simply roamed it. By using the principle of terra nullius , the British Government claimed sovereignty over Australia, ignoring the rights of Indigenous people who had lived there for at least 60 000 years.

The common law of this country would perpetuate injustice if it were to continue to embrace the notion of terra nullius and persist in characterising the Indigenous inhabitants of the Australian colonies as people too low in the scale of social organisation to be acknowledged as possessing rights and interests in land. Justice Brennan of the High Court of Australia

Indigenous Land Use

My own education was a Yolngu education. It took place with our large family group living in the places on our land that hold special importance for us. With Mum and Dad we went from place to place and every place had its stories. Mandawuy Yunupingu, Artist/Performer, Arnhem Land, Boyer Lectures,1993

Over thousands of years Indigenous people have lived in Australia developing a unique system for signposting and marking the land. This system is interconnected with stories of the Dreaming and Spirit Ancestors. Indigenous people use natural features of the landscape to identify and mark the land and its significance. Many Indigenous children learn these "mental maps" of their countries and about how places relate to each other and to people.

Dreaming Tracks

"Our story is in the land... it is written in those sacred places, that's the law. Dreaming place... you can't change it, no matter who you are." Big Bill Neidjie, Gagadju Elder, Kakadu, 'Australia's Kakadu Man Bill Neidjie' 1986.

Dreaming tracks trace the creative journey of the Spirit Ancestors as they formed the land and laid down the Law. Dreaming tracks are sometimes called 'songlines' and record the travels of the Spirit Ancestors who 'sung up' the country into life. It is believed that performing the right songs and ceremonies at points along the Dreaming track gives people direct access to the Dreaming.

Many Aboriginal communities travel along Dreaming tracks with their young people, telling the stories of the sites. They explain and perform ceremonies to educate the young people about their country and their Dreaming.

Toas are carved wooden and painted objects once used by the Dieri people who live near Lake Eyre in South Australia. They are thought to have been placed in the ground as directional markers, but their true purpose remains a mystery. Their painted tops take many forms. The shape of birds heads, animals, objects such as boomerangs or abstract designs. At the turn of the last century, missionaries made large collections of them.

A Land of Plenty

"A lot of people say Aboriginal people never farmed the land... never ploughed the land and they never grew wheat and they never planted apple tres and orange trees. We never had to. Our mother, the earth, she gave herself freely to us. And because we respected her and loved her, we never had to go and do all them other things. That would have been harming our mother. So we just took what she gave us." Paul Gordon, Language Officer, Brewarrina, 1996.

Indigenous people accumulated a vast store of knowledge of plants and animals and of the foods and medicines they provided. Aboriginal people call these foods and medicines, bush tucker and bush medicine. There is a huge variety of bush tucker and bush medicine all over Australia for people who know where to find it.

The disruption of Indigenous communities and families during the conquest of Australia resulted in the loss of information about collecting, preparing and using bush medicine. However, as western societies are becoming more and more interested in other forms of healing and natural remedies, efforts are being made to record and publish Indigenous peoples' knowledge of bush tucker and bush medicine.

The sea, rivers and waterways of Australia have always played an important role in many Indigenous Australian lives. People first arrived in Australia after crossing 60 kilometres of ocean on crude rafts. They lived along the coasts, then moved inland following rivers an streams. Over time, a wide variety of boats, rafts and other forms of transport were developed, along with fish spears, harpoons, fish hooks and nets for fishing. It is thought that some fishing and boat building technology to have first been introduced by seafaring peoples from the islands to the north of Australia, while other forms were developed in Australia.

Hunting Implements

A variety of tools were developed for hunting and gathering of food. These included spears, boomerangs, clubs, nets, traps, and more recently, rifles. Spears were probably adopted soon after the first Australians arrived in Australia, while boomerangs have been used for at least 10 000 years. Spear throwers and more elaborate fish and animal traps are more recent, some forms dating back a few hundred or a thousand years. In the past, each cultural group made different types of tools, sometimes painting or incising them with clan designs or personal designs.

Bush Food and Medicine

Nutritional studies show that much bush tucker is high in nutrients. Some native grain seeds that Aboriginal people grind into flour have far higher levels of iron, zinc and fibre than wholemeal flour or rice, and the wild plum ( Terminalia ferdinandiana ) is possibly the world's riches source of vitamin C.

Most bush medicine consists of barks, roots and leaves, but non-herbal materials such as animals and minerals are also used. Bush medicine is often administrated in conjunction with ceremonies. Although many Aboriginal people know remedies for everyday ailments, older women are recognised as the experts in bush medicine.

Australia's Untold Stories

Pemulwuy - New South Wales

Pemulwuy was the first of the Aboriginal resistance fighters. Between 1790 and 1802, Pemulwuy waged a guerrilla war on the young colony of New South Wales. This was in response to the invasion of his country, the killing of his people and the restriction of his peoples' food sources caused by the British.

Pemulwuy planned and carried out several 'lightning' or guerilla attacks against the European settlements in the Parramatta and Toongabbie areas.

Pemulwuy was a strong, charismatic leader with a fierce determination to rid his land of the European settlers. He was able to organise his people into a force of more than 100 warriors. The early Governors of the colony recognised Pemulwuy as a threat and sent large parties of soldiers to protect the settlers.

After years of resisting and evading the authorities, Pemulwuy was eventually shot and captured in 1802 and died of his wounds shortly after.

Pemulwuy's reputation as an elusive and powerful leader was so great, that as proof of his death, his head was removed from his body and placed in a bottle of spirits. It was later sent to Sir Joseph Banks, the botanist who sailed into Botany Bay with Captain James Cook in 1770.

Waterloo Creek - New South Wales

In late 1837 and early 1838, Major James Nunn of the New South Wales Mounted Police led an expedition into northern New South Wales to resolve complaints by settles about attacks by Aboriginal people.

Nunn was instructed by the Acting Governor, Lieutenant-Colonel Snodgrass, to:

"act according to your judgement and use the utmost exertion to suppress these outrages. There are a thousand blacks there, and if they are not stopped, we may have them presently within the boundaries."

Nunn's expedition travelled widely looking for Aboriginal people believed responsible for the 'outrages'. They eventually cornered a group of Aboriginal people at Waterloo Creek and in a 'battle' lasting ten minutes, massacred 40-50 people. The exact number is not known. Nunn's party then continued its murderous path for the next three days, killing every Aboriginal person it encountered.

On their return journey to Sydney, Nunn and his party were welcomed like heroes by towns along the way.

Myall Creek - New South Wales

In early May 1838, 28 Kwiambal people camping on the Myall Creek station, were murdered by a posse of heavily armed men who had been out hunting Aboriginal people. Most of those killed were women and children.

Eleven men were eventually arrested and tried for murder on 15 November 1838, amid an atmosphere of anger over white men being tried for murder of Aboriginal people. In summing up the case, the Chief Justice said:

"It is clear that the most grievous offence has been committed; the lives of nearly thirty of our fellow creatures have been sacrificed, and in order to fulfil my duty, I must tell you that the life of a black is as precious and valuable in the eye of the law as that of the highest noble in the land."

In spite of the overwhelming evidence, the jury found all eleven men not guilty with only 15 minutes deliberation. However, a second trial was ordered amid great public indignation. This time, only seven men were accused. They were found guilty of murder and hanged. They were the first Europeans to be executed for killing Aboriginal people.

The gaoled men were not even aware they had broken the law, because killing Aborigines was commonly considered a frontier sport.

The Blackline - Tasmania

Tasmania is Australia's second oldest colony, therefore its Aboriginal population experienced early effects of colonisation and were constantly on the 'front line' of violence and reprisal. Random killings and massacres of Aboriginal people were commonplace and Aboriginal people responded in kind. The colonial administrators saw the only answer to the problem of racial violence was removal of the Aboriginal people to reserves or islands out of the way of European settlement.

'The Blackline' is the name given to a systematic attempt by Tasmania's Governor Arthur in 1830 to capture large numbers of Aboriginal people. The strategy involved 2200 soldiers and settlers marching through the bush in a closely packed continuous line. They forced the Aboriginal people in front of them, towards the Tasman Peninsula, where they could be rounded up and captured. This massive effort captured two Aboriginal people - one elderly man and a crippled boy.

Despite the failure of 'the Blackline' the process of removing Aboriginal people to islands continued. On the islands Aboriginal people died in great numbers because of European diseases, poor food and accommodation, ill treatment and, sometimes murder.

Kalkadoon - Queensland

The Kalkadoon people of the Mt Isa region of western Queensland first came into contact with the advancing European pastoralists and miners in the mid 1860s. At first the Kalkadoon people worked with the Europeans as guides and labourers. But as the number of settlers and their stock increased, the competition for the land's resources became more intense, leading to conflict.

The Kalkadoon people began a campaign of guerrilla warfare against the settlers and their stock from about 1871 to 1884. The Kalkadoon gained a reputation as ferocious warriors with an ability to vanish into the bush.

In 1884, the Kalkadoon people killed five Native Police and a prominent pastoralist. The Queensland Government responded by sending a large contingent of heavily armed police to confront the Kalkadoon. The Kalkadoon had retreated to a defensive position now known as 'Battle Mountain'. After fierce resistance the Kalkadoon succumbed to the greater firepower of the police.

It is estimated that 900 Kalkadoon people were killed during the six years that they fought to protect their land.

Jandamarra - Western Australia

One of the most complex figures of early Aboriginal resistance is Jandamarra. He was a Punuba man who lived in the Kimberley region of northern Western Australia from 1870-1897. In his early years he lived and worked as a respected stockman.

In 1889 after his initiation Jandamarra met an older Punuba man called Ellemarra and became more aware of the problems being caused by the settlers and their sheep. In 1888 there was a serious drought and the Punuba people were suffering. This was because of the arrival of the Europeans and their sheep had destroyed much of the food and water supplies that the Punuba protected to help them in times of drought. As a result the Punuba needed to hunt sheep to live.

Ellamarra, still considered a young man by his people, knew a lot about the Punuba law and was greatly respected by the younger men. Ellemarra was a natural leader - a good warrior and he was not afraid to stand up to the invaders. He taught Jandamarra and the other young men much about their law.

Jandamarra and Ellemarra were captured in 1889 when Jandamarra walked up to a number of police troopers he knew, and they tricked him into guiding them to his campsite. Jandamarra didn't know that he was wanted by the police. His old employer had laid charges against him for killing a sheep in May 1889, annoyed that Jandamarra had not return to the station after his initiation. The police dropped the charges against him and he returned to stock work. He eventually became a police tracker. He later helped police capture Ellemarra and 16 other Punuba warriors.

Jandamarra was scorned by his people for helping the police capture Ellemarra, so he assisted Ellemarra and the other warriors to escape. During the escape, Jandamarra shot a policeman. He joined the band of escapees and began a campaign to rid the area of European settlers. Colonial authorities responded by sending 30 police to capture Jandamarra and the band. In the battle that followed at Windjana Gorge Jandamarra was injured but managed to escape. He continued to taunt police and was soon believed immortal by his people. His campaign came to an end in 1897 when, after another skirmish with police, he was tracked and shot dead by an Aboriginal trooper.

Jandamarra is still remembered by his people as a defender of Aboriginal rights.

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The Australian Museum respects and acknowledges the Gadigal people as the First Peoples and Traditional Custodians of the land and waterways on which the Museum stands.

Image credit: gadigal yilimung (shield) made by Uncle Charles  Chicka  Madden

An Indigenous Australian Cultural Competence Course: Talking Culture, Race and Power

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Cross-cultural training in its various forms has been around in Australia since the 1980s. It has primarily been viewed as a way of improving knowledge and understanding of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and a means to improving service delivery (Fredericks in Contemp Nurse 23:87–99, 2006, Aust J Indigenous Educ 37S:81–89, 2008; Fredericks & Bargallie in Int J Crit Indigenous Stud 9:1–14, 2016). This led to government departments that serviced Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples recognised as leaders in this arena, closely followed by other agencies who offered services.

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Introduction.

Cross-cultural training in its various forms has been around in Australia since the 1980s. It has primarily been viewed as a way of improving knowledge and understanding of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and a means to improving service delivery (Fredericks, 2006 , 2008 ; Fredericks & Bargallie, 2016 ). This led to government departments that serviced Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples recognised as leaders in this arena, closely followed by other agencies who offered services. Over time, the training has developed and has come to be known as cultural awareness, cultural competence, cultural responsiveness, cultural safety, cultural sensitivity, cultural humility, cultural capability and a range of other names. Our literature review indicates that there is no consistent definition of “cultural competence” and no definition that is universally accepted. As a result, the terms have been used interchangeably even though each term accentuates particular nuances in context and aim. In Australia, the terms “cultural competence” and “cultural capability” have been primarily used in education, whereas models of cultural safety, cultural humility, cultural security and cultural competence have been associated with health care. The cultural safety model is more aligned to Canada and New Zealand, and cultural competence, or cultural competency (which term is more prominent in the USA). The term “competence” (or competency) implies a set of skills, knowledge and attributes that are obtained as a result of learning. Considering the diversity of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures in Australia, it is unrealistic to think that cultural competence could be measured or attained through ad hoc Indigenous cultural competence training courses, in a country where idealised and homogenised visions of Indigenous culture are the object that oversimplifies Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and reinforces negative stereotypes. Increasingly, Indigenous cultural competence in Australia has been broadened out from the desire to improve service delivery, towards a strategy of decolonisation and anti-racist pedagogical approaches. Indigenous cultural competence curricula design and implementation are being more inclusive of Indigenous people’s voices, worldviews, knowledges and pedagogies as key elements to address inequities between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. Numerous tertiary institutions additionally offer cultural competence training via their human resources department or professional training area or their Indigenous centre.

In this chapter, we focus on teaching Indigenous cultural competence training courses within Australian higher education institutions. Using one institution as a case study, we share how, as Indigenous designers, trainers and educators, we came to centre race within an Indigenous cultural competence training course. We offer our chapter to demonstrate how power, whiteness, race, culture and “other” interplay within such training. We now turn to our case study.

An Australian University Case Study

Central Queensland University (CQU) is a large, regional Australian university with 24 campuses, study centres and study hubs across Australia. It has a history in distance education through a range of online and flexible learning platforms. In 2012, the CQU Council approved an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander strategy to further its commitment to improving Indigenous access, reconciliation, Indigenisation of curricula and cross-cultural training of staff within the university. The Office of Indigenous Engagement (OIE), at that time led by Professor Bronwyn Fredericks, was given the task of facilitating the University’s strategic efforts regarding Indigenous engagement, the Indigenisation of curricula and cultural competence training.

In commencing the work of developing a cultural competence course, it was important to build on the evidence (Anning, 2010 ; Asmar, 2011 ; Butler & Young, 2009 ; Fredericks, 2006 , 2008 , 2009; Fredericks & Thompson, 2010 ; Kinnane, Wilks, Wilson, Hughes, & Thomas, 2014 ; McLaughlin & Whatman 2007 , 2008 , 2011 ), including what had been undertaken in other Australian universities (Adams, 2010 ; Anderson, 2011 ; Arthur et al., 2005 ; University of Sydney, 2016 ). We additionally sought to incorporate the recommendations of those working in the sector (Behrendt, Larkin, Griew, & Kelly, 2012 ; Bradley, Noonan, Nugent, & Scales, 2008 ; UA, 2011 ) and draw on our own experiences within higher education and other sectors.

Consultation took place across the university in terms of content, course length, mode of delivery, training locations, catering, resources and engagement with stakeholders, including traditional owners and elders. We were determined to develop a course that was not just an apolitical rehash of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history that failed to interrogate the role that race and racism have played in the colonising project of Australia. Similarly, we were determined not to solely focus on cultural elements that fail to recognise the fluidity and diversity of Indigenous cultures and identities, situate Indigenous people within romanticist notions of culture that position Indigenous people as the exotic “other” and/or separate Indigenous culture into pre-colonial history and the now. We did not want to position Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as the objects of the training. Bond’s ( 2014 ) work was important to draw on here; Bond warns that Indigenous educators can be easily objectified in the learning environment and advises us to focus on addressing some of the markers of objectification within the education setting. This often plays out in education environments via requests for and expectations of “Welcome to Country” and “Acknowledgement of Country” ceremonies, traditional dancers, smoking ceremonies, singers and elders talking about Aboriginal “Dreamtime” stories. While these types of activities might be enjoyable when incorporated into training and might offer an insight into some forms of Indigenous cultures (Fredericks, 2008 ; Fredericks & Thompson, 2010 ; Hollinsworth, 2013 ; Westwood & Westwood, 2010 ; Young, 1999 ), this does not mean that those activities change behaviour or challenge the way the organisation undertakes business with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. It is hard to ignore the fact that Welcome to Country ceremonies is expected to be performed by people whose descendants have been dispossessed as a result of the colonial project, and this in turn can make the act of Acknowledgement of Country a mere performance. What makes these performances enjoyable to non-Indigenous people is the “pure pleasure of proximity to the exotic” where they can enjoy “Indigenous culture and presence without feeling threatened by Indigenous sovereignty” (Kowal, 2010 ). These types of training or activity do not challenge the way participants see themselves, their actions or their complicity in maintaining racial inequities. In fact, these types of training and activity have little relevance in terms of application to participants’ day-to-day work environments; there is extremely limited evidence that this type of approach advances the lives of Indigenous people.

Young’s ( 1999 ) work, together with the work of Brach and Fraser ( 2000 ), Campinha-Bacote ( 1999 ), Fredericks ( 2006 , 2008 ), Spencer and Archer ( 2008 ) and others, offers numerous examples of problems when such training primarily focuses on culture. They all explain why training needs to centre race as the platform from which to open discussions on racism, privilege, discrimination and change. Lumby and Farrelly ( 2009 ) suggest that “content addressing racism, bias and discrimination needs to be included in any generic module of cultural competence training being undertaken by all staff and management”. They explain that this type of content in the training enables the capacity for individual change which can lead to organisational shifts. On understanding these arguments, we committed to developing a training course that would focus on contemporary Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander identities in all forms and real possibilities for connections with CQU staff. We wanted to challenge romantic and exotic notions of Aboriginality and Indigenous identity. Moreover, we wanted to challenge Eurocentric and “White” understandings of what culture is and is not, and what an Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander person is and is not (Carlson, 2016 ; Fredericks, 2013 ; Gorringe, Ross, & Forde, 2011 ; Hollinsworth, 1992 , 2013 ; Sarra, 2011 ). Statements about how someone looked or acted, and references to their Indigenous identity, had been raised numerous times by both students and staff across the university; this needed to be addressed in the cultural competence course for the university.

Before moving ahead with the development of content, a review of Universities Australia’s National Best Practice Framework for Indigenous Cultural Competency in Australian Universities ( 2011 ) also took place to ensure that the development of the course was aligned with the national platform and direction informing the sector. Last but not least, it was established that the course would be developed from our Indigenous standpoints, with race underpinning our theoretical perspectives. We drew on critical Indigenous studies and standpoints as a mode of analysis (Moreton-Robinson, 2009 ) and critical race theory (Delgado & Stefancic, 2001 ) as an epistemological framework for non-Indigenous participants to interrogate their own cultural positionings (McLaughlin & Whatman, 2011 ), and for both non-Indigenous and Indigenous participants to examine institutional racism. The course needed to centre race and challenge thinking and behaviours. It needed to offer opportunities for participants to reflect on their own cultural identity, and white privilege, attitudes, prejudices and propensity to stereotype, challenge racism and promote anti-racism practices. In addition to this, the course needed to be accessible via a face-to-face course and an online teaching platform. This would enable accessibility to all staff across the wider CQU footprint, which included over 20 campuses and study hubs. It was our view that this approach would better contribute towards the CQU goals of inclusion, engagement and building cultural competence, rather than merely offering a course about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures that does not lead to the recognition of the changes—including the structural changes—required. We agree with McGloin and Carlson ( 2013 ) that critical thinking is a crucial element in the acquisition of cultural competence and sought to embed this in the development of the course.

Developing the Cultural Competence Course

In addition to drawing heavily on examples from the large evidence base, we discussed with others within the OIE what they thought should be in such a course. We began to map out specifically what this course needed to contain. Based on the evidence, it was essential in the first part of the course to introduce and examine colonisation and the history of Indigenous dispossession, removal, trauma and pain, along with the ongoing effects of historical and contemporary federal and state policies and legislations about Indigenous people that locate racism at the core of Australian politics. We also deemed it essential to present evidence of Indigenous resistance, agency and activism, and how this continues today. We argue that it is essential to provide critical historical context to understand the contemporary experiences of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. The course demonstrates how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples enact many forms of agency as a form of resistance against the institutional racism embedded in policies and practices since the onset of colonisation.

The course’s later sessions were developed to focus on participants’ everyday work within the university. We knew it was important to discuss the concepts of race, racism, discrimination and white privilege (McIntosh, 1988 ) and how they play out within institutions such as universities. Drawing on the work of Bargallie ( 2020 ), we also wanted to demonstrate how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples experience racism through systems and structures, in their everyday work with colleagues in large organisations, such as a university. Participants were to be asked to self-reflect on how matters of race impact on their own day-to-day lives.

The final session of the course we decided on required a discussion about CQU’s commitment to “Closing the Gap” and reconciliation through its Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP). The final activity would see participants consider what they could do in their workplace that could contribute to the implementation of CQU’s RAP.

We believed this mixture of content would enable discussions that challenge stereotypes held of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and showcase how Indigenous people continue to demonstrate resistance and agency. We wanted participants to think about their positioning and how they could make a difference within their work with the university and within broader society (Westwood & Westwood, 2010 ; Young, 1999 ).

Beginning to Implement the Course

A two-day course was developed as a flexible learning course, which meant that some of the learning was to be online and some face-to-face. The full implementation of the course was to be trialled by offering it four times, across three campuses. This work was supported with funds from the Higher Education Participation Program and the OIE. Data, including written evaluations, was to be collected from each site. We additionally established roles for two colleagues—one non-Indigenous and one Indigenous—during the delivery of the first course. They were to assist in documenting the delivery of the course, including their personal observations. Before the implementation of the trial course, we were advised by senior management that it would cost too much if everyone wanted to undertake the course and leave their workplace for two days, and to cut the face-to-face component down to one day. This left us questioning the institutional commitment to the Indigenous cultural competence training in comparison with other staff development training. This chapter draws on observations and data collected from the first course offered. After the course was delivered for the first time, the content was fine-tuned, and other facilitators assisted with the delivery.

In understanding the delivery of the first course, what was strikingly obvious was the participants’ body language and the questions they asked. When we, the facilitators, talked about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, the participants appeared interested and focused on what we were saying. When we moved the discussion to the participants reflecting on themselves and discussed issues of racism and privilege, they became uncomfortable. Some participants crossed their arms as if to shield themselves, while others found it hard to stay focused within the discussion. We did observe two participants writing notes to each other across the table during this time. The lead facilitator raised the discomfort some people may have been feeling, talked about how difficult talking about race and racism can be for many people and encouraged participants to stay engaged. The discussion that followed revealed how people struggled with focusing on white privilege, actively displaying their resistance via their contributions, or lack thereof, and ongoing body language. This observation by the facilitators was supported via the documentation of our two colleagues who were observing the delivery of the course.

DiAngelo ( 2012 ) explains how it is easy to be distracted by participants who dominate or, in this case, resist, and many facilitators spend a lot of time and energy trying to reign in these participants. In such cases, many educators tend to silence “race talk” to keep participants “happy” or from “getting upset” or “offended” (Castagno, 2008 ). As facilitators, and as Indigenous women, we participate in race talk along with managing racist practices and racist behaviours every day, in a range of environments. This provides us and many other Indigenous people with significant exposure to the discourses and practices taken up in racial dialogues that function to support white domination and privilege—a “whiteness” that is similarly identified by DiAngelo ( 2012 ).

We persisted to challenge the “white silence in these racial discussions” (DiAngelo, 2012 , p. 1) despite participants feeling uncomfortable. We continued to reassure participants that we were in a “safe space” to have these conversations. We took added courage from the work of DiAngelo ( 2012 , p. 1) who states, “going against one’s grain for engagement, while difficult, is necessary and will result in the least harmful and most authentic and rewarding engagement”. To break the silence and engage in conversation, the lead facilitator used a number of strategies including asking questions to open up wider group discussion, asking participants to write down self-reflection responses to particular themes of discussion and breaking the participants into small group exercises. One of the difficulties that is not written about by DiAngelo is that we believe that some white people would rather listen and respond to white people regarding race, racism and white fragility, or to people such as DiAngelo, rather than Indigenous people or people of colour.

We also had to work through issues with a few Indigenous participants who had unknowingly been co-opted into supporting white fragility (DiAngelo, 2011 ) and white privilege (Frankenberg, 1993 ; McIntosh, 1988 ; Moreton-Robinson, 2004 ; Nicholl, 2004 ; Sullivan, 2006 ; Wellman, 1993 ). DiAngelo ( 2011 , p. 54) describes “white fragility” as follows:

a state in which even a minimum amount of racial stress becomes intolerable, triggering a range of defensive moves. These moves include the outward display of emotions such as anger, fear, and guilt, and behaviours such as argumentation, silence, and leaving the stress-inducing situation. These behaviours, in turn, function to reinstate white racial equilibrium.

White fragility is used to defend white privilege. The term “white privilege” is defined as “the unquestioned and unearned set of advantages, entitlements, benefits and choices bestowed upon people solely because they are white” (MP Associates, 2019 ). During the lunch break, some non-Indigenous participants were voicing their concerns about what they considered to be “culture” with some Indigenous participants, and saying they had come to learn about the “little spirits” and “dot art”. This prompted one Indigenous participant to question the lead facilitator after the break about why we were interrogating race and racism. This was challenging and complex, in that the Indigenous participant had dismissed issues of racism as they impact on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, and this was witnessed by both Indigenous and non-Indigenous participants. If we did not address this, it would be seen by some as also dismissing those issues, and by others as endorsing a position taken by only a small number of Indigenous people. While this was a difficult discussion to have, it was useful in demonstrating the hidden nature of whiteness issues, and how Indigenous and non-Indigenous people can be co-opted into the way whiteness has been historically constituted and normalised within mainstream Australian society.

We needed to address several difficult questions and a range of emotions expressed on the day. We understood that emotions are powerful in the learning process and need to be both harnessed and embraced. Emotions were expressed through some people revealing that they felt like a veil was lifted on the truth, and others needing to inform the group that they had recently discovered they may have an Aboriginal ancestor. Why were not they learning more about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture? Why were we focusing on them? What about their experiences of having an Aboriginal friend, or an Aboriginal relative? A number of participants were pleased the discussion was so open. Some participants cried, expressing that they felt “sad” or “guilty” about what has happened to Indigenous people. And, while we did not accuse anyone of anything or say anyone was guilty of particular incidents, a number of participants stated that they were not happy feeling that they were being accused of past events for which they are not responsible. Some participants were vocal about working hard for what they had and should not be expected to “give up their backyard”. We know from the literature that such courses and conversations about race and racism often bring up participants own white fragility and their need to protect their white privilege (DiAngelo, 2012 ).

It is our view that there was no way to deliver this training without centring race and interrogating the stories of racism. Bargallie ( 2020 ) identifies that racism, as a word, is primarily absent in conversation with non-Indigenous work colleagues. It is often off limits or never to be used. This means that institutional and everyday racism is left untouched, to proliferate. The only talk is to be happy talk and that which focuses on the pleasing elements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture. This is backed up by the common mantra that there are no racists here, there is no racism here, or it’s not racism. For many white people, the fear of being accused of racism is far worse than the act of racism itself (Ahmed, 2012 ; Bargallie,  2020 ). Bargallie ( 2020 ) argues that there is almost always the denial of racism or, furthermore, the denial of racism by non-Indigenous work colleagues; if any conversation on racism is raised, people deny there is any racism at work. This conflicts with the everyday reality of Indigenous people within the workplace, including within workplaces such as universities. In this way, Bargallie ( 2020 ) argues “racism is both absent and present”. She explains this as the “absent presence of racism” in the workplace (Bargallie,  2020 ). Lentin has coined the term “not racism” to describe this phenomenon of denial and argues that this is “a form of racist violence” (Lentin, 2018 ). We did not want to perpetuate that form of racism within this course intended for participants to learn about cultural competence.

Feedback and Evaluation of the Course

The overall feedback and evaluation revealed that we achieved what we set out to do with the course and helped us shape the following courses offered as part of the trial. While acknowledging that some of the discussions were difficult, people generally enjoyed the opportunity for open interaction and discussion. It was identified that there was a need to encourage all participants to take greater responsibility for their own learning and to do “more work” through group work, conversation, critical thinking and analysis.

What was also realised through part of the feedback was that we needed to clearly identify to participants, in advance of the course and in some detail, what they would be learning and the type of learning journey they would be taking. While this is not normally part of other types of professional development programs, participants felt this would help dispel myths around what they thought cultural competence was or was not. We also needed to clearly explain what Indigenous cultural competence was in relation to the content of our course; this could be supported through extra reading materials to be made available online to participants. The feedback also enabled us to purchase copies of the book Indigenous Australia for Dummies (Behrendt, 2010 ), one for each participant. The cost of each book could easily be built into the cost of the course and enable us to give participants a resource to take home for follow-up reference. This would be important, given that the course had been reduced to one day. The book was gratefully received by participants in the courses that followed, which confirmed our decision that had been based on the evaluation of the first course was correct.

An unexpected comment in the feedback received from a few participants was that the course should not be so “difficult”, which surprised us. On discussion with others in the university, we were advised that we should try to find a way to “dumb down” our content. This shocked us. We are sure that people in the university who deliver training where they refer to occupational health and safety legislation, discrimination legislation or fire drill procedures are not asked to “dumb down” their content, or not cover core elements of the legislation, policy and so forth when offering that training to staff. We did wonder whether the “dumb down” comments were intended to help us find a means to protect participants against discussions on white privilege, and in that way, undermine the reality of race and racism. We argue that requests to “dumb down” our content are a form of the ongoing colonising violence in Australia and to do this would be defaulting to white understandings and comfortabilities (Leonardo & Porter, 2010 ).

Other comments on the evaluation forms conflicted with one another. For example, while most people wrote that the facilitators were “passionate”, “articulate”, demonstrated “knowledge” and dealt with issues, a couple wrote that the facilitators were “aggressive” or “angry”. We know that it is common for Aboriginal women and women of colour to be positioned as “aggressive” and “angry”, rather than “assertive”, “passionate” and “articulate” which is the way non-Indigenous women and men are positioned. Lorde ( 1984 ), Moreton-Robinson ( 2000 ), bell hooks ( 2000 ) and Fredericks ( 2010 ) have all written about the trope of the angry black woman, the angry woman of colour and the angry Indigenous woman, particularly when challenging racism. Being “intelligent”, “assertive” or “articulate” are traits reserved for white people.

At the end of the delivery of the first course, we, as the facilitators, needed to debrief. Our colleagues who documented the course also articulated the need to undertake debriefing. Emotions expressed by participants during the course had impacted upon all of us. During the course, numerous racist comments and statements of denials were made by participants. The lead facilitator had felt the full brunt of the comments and statements, and, at one point, before our team met to debrief, she described how her body felt like she was having a stroke. She was not. Instead, she was feeling emotionally and physically battered. We supported one to another to work through the issues and to also feel safe again. Our experiences speak to the myth of “safe space” in race dialogue between white and Indigenous people which, we argue, is a veiled form of violence. This “safe space” is a white privilege where white people can “avoid publicly looking racist”. For Indigenous facilitators or participants, the “ violence is already there ” (Leonard & Porter, 2010 , p. 139).

The evaluation of the first course enabled us to produce a strong “Indigenous cultural competence” course that was subsequently offered three more times as part of a broader trial. We received overwhelmingly positive reviews, positive comments via emails, and some participants posted positive messages via their social media accounts (Stokes, 2015 ). Many people who had completed the face-to-face training said they wished that it had been longer than one day, despite the fact that they needed one day from their workplaces to undertake the course. Others who had not done the training had indicated that it should be one day or shorter.

Despite the very positive feedback, the course did not get off the ground for broad roll-out within the university. Instead, the senior management of the university decided to invest monies into the development of a “diversity” course from within the School of Education and the Arts, which would cover a range of “equity” groups. For example, the course would cover Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, sexual diversity, gender, disability and people from non-English-speaking backgrounds, all within a five- to six-hour course; the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander component would equal approximately “one hour”. Reducing the Indigenous cultural competence course content down to one hour and lumping it into a “diversity” course validate the concerns we had raised earlier about the institutional commitment to Indigenous cultural competence. This “diversity” course does not evoke commitment to action and is largely non-performative. As Ahmed ( 2012 , p. 53) argues, “the institutional commitment for the term ‘diversity’ is a sign of the lack of commitment to change and might even allow organisations such as universities to conceal the operation of system inequalities”. The cultural competence course developed within the OIE based on evidence and then trialled and fine-tuned based on feedback has not got off the ground.

In developing a cultural competence course, we drew on over 40 years of practice by others and what Australian universities, and universities in the international context, have offered by way of cross-cultural training, cross-cultural awareness training, cultural competence training and cultural safety training (Sherwood & Edwards, 2006 ; Westwood & Westwood, 2010 ; Yang, 2000 ). We engaged with the literature and talked with people at a number of universities. We spoke to people within the National Centre for Cultural Competence at The University of Sydney. We additionally drew on our own experiences. We have both been engaged in delivering cultural awareness training in government departments and in organisations. We knew that the course needed to be designed to be more than the basic cultural awareness training courses offered in a government department in the 1970s, 1980s or 1990s (Fredericks, 2006 ). On reviewing the literature and based on our experiences, it is obvious that those basic courses do little to bring about change either within the workplace or in the lives of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Moreover, discussions around race, racism and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander issues have moved on since the 1990s, and cultural competence courses need to reflect this.

We set out to develop a course that was based on the evidence and aligned with the directions being undertaken in the sector and by universities of Australia, to encourage participants to critically engage with content that would cover history, race, colonisation and the future. Along with this, we sought to foster critical thinking, self-reflection and discussions about cultural identities, privilege, attitudes, prejudices and propensity to stereotype, challenge racism and promote anti-racism practices. The course also needed to align with and mirror the goals and aspirations outlined within CQU’s RAP. The course we developed achieved all of this. It enabled varying degrees of personal transformation (Kelly, 2013 ; Young, 1999 ), and we hope the participants are able to utilise their transformed level of understanding to make shifts within their practices within the university. The course we developed is not going to be offered in the university and we find this disappointing, since we know that it had the capacity to develop and build tangible skills and strategies for staff. We additionally know that it would have greatly contributed to making shifts in the organisation for the future, and it is this reality that offers the greater disappointment. One of the greatest learnings for us in this process has been that despite the 40-plus years of evidence gathered, monies being made available for course development, consultation with staff and a trial being offered, this work was still derailed by the managerial processes and opinions of non-Indigenous people who think they know what is best within the cultural competence arena. This demonstrates that Indigenous cultural competence training is still largely driven by non-Indigenous people through white racial frames that inform how and what they seek to know about Indigenous people. As Indigenous educators in Australian universities, we advocate for an “intellectual solidarity” (Leonardo & Porter, 2010 ) in developing and delivering Indigenous cultural competency training fuelled by a desire to do away with racism. This requires seeing race and racism at the centre of political policy, process and practice rather than in the margins and where the struggle against the racial subordination of Indigenous Australian peoples becomes the higher good.

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Fredericks, B., Bargallie, D. (2020). An Indigenous Australian Cultural Competence Course: Talking Culture, Race and Power. In: Frawley, J., Russell, G., Sherwood, J. (eds) Cultural Competence and the Higher Education Sector. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-5362-2_16

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