Abstract: Browne-Yung, Kathryn; Ziersch, Anna; Baum, Fran; Gallaher, Gilbert Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are ten times more likely than non-Indigenous people to be homeless, which is an indicator of the level of health and social disparity that exists between the two groups. This paper presents the experiences of homelessness for a group of ten Aboriginal people located in Adelaide. Using Bourdieu's theoretical approach, we explore how these individuals interact with their environment, notably in the context of historical institutional disadvantage, and explore how this affects health and wellbeing. We highlight the subjective nature of homelessness, which is influenced by factors such as culture, age, and poor mental and physical health. We demonstrate the complex, diverse needs and heterogeneous nature of homelessness for Aboriginal people, which occur in the context of an enduring, specific historical experience of disadvantage, where the pathways into homelessness may vary and where homelessness may not always be perceived as negative. All participants experienced racism and reported resultant ill effects. Our study indicates the need for effective responses to homelessness to take account of the historical context of dispossession in developing culturally sensitive responses that reflect the nuances and diversity among homeless Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
Abstract: Brueckner, Martin; Spencer, Rochelle; Wise, Gareth; Marika, Banduk Australian government policy envisages that pervasive socio-economic disadvantage experienced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians be overcome by economic mainstreaming. Critics, however, consider the political attempt at 'Closing the Gap' between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians to be ineffective in the absence of material improvements in Indigenous welfare statistics. At issue also are the colonial mindsets and structures that have given rise to Indigenous disadvantage in the first place and the fact that economic mainstreaming largely occurs on the terms of the colonisers to enable the participation of Aboriginal people in the formal economy, which is itself a construct of the privileged. It is in this context that this paper employs a Bhabhaian perspective, exploring the work of an Indigenous social enterprise operating in north-east Arnhem Land, an organisation that is understood here as a 'third space' for cross-cultural learning. The third space enterprise is presented as an alternative pathway for Indigenous economic participation, one that is without the assimilation pressures commonly associated with the Closing the Gap policy approach.
Abstract: Neuenfeldt, Karl This paper illustrates two main points: (1) warup/buruburu drums have long been a key component of Torres Strait Islander (henceforth Islander) music and dance but as they migrate with diasporic Islanders they also carry with them profound sociocultural and multicultural meanings and engender innovative artistry in decoration, performance and maintenance; (2) Islander drums are the key musical marker of Islander identity, the sonic component of their identity narrative. After providing some pertinent historical, social, cultural, geopolitical and regulatory background, this paper explores via interviews, description and analysis how Islander drums were and are currently sourced, decorated and repaired as they are incorporated into the sociocultural life of Islander families and individuals in the Torres Strait region and also on the Australian mainland.
Abstract: Gallois, Mathieu Is the Aboriginal flag art? And, if it is, what end does that argument serve? Art is not a helpful noun; certainly it is a risky one on which to base an argument. Yet, to fail to read the Aboriginal flag as art or, more precisely, to fail to read it as Indigenous activist art, is to fail to understand the Aboriginal flag and, more broadly, the role of culture in Indigenous activism post colonisation. This reading of the flag, through my research, appeared in every direction, far on the horizon, until I spoke to Indigenous historian Victoria Grieves. Grieves helped me recognise the value and intent of this argument from an Indigenous perspective. The Aboriginal flag is art. The Aboriginal flag's Indigenous and Western art epistemologies are instrumental in shaping its form and semantics. As Aboriginal art, the flag represents a continuum with traditional Aboriginal themes and aesthetic values. In a Western context it is read as a flag and it exists as a mass-produced object. In all its guises the Aboriginal flag has melded itself into many aspects of popular imagination and become one of Australia's significant symbols.
Abstract: Xu, Daozhi This paper draws on theories of the gift to address the ethics of representing Aboriginality in Australian children's literature, which is a contentious debate that centres on who is eligible to tell Aboriginal stories and how the stories can be told. Considering the historical indebtedness in Australian racial relations, the paper suggests that children's books that incorporate reference to Aboriginal cultural elements constitute a metaphorical 'gift' exchange between Aboriginal custodians as the givers and writers as the recipients who are expected to 'return' such an intellectual gift through their books in an appropriate manner. In this view, the paper specifies the ethical issues confronted by non-Aboriginal writers for children, including Patricia Wrightson, Phillip Gwynne and Kate Constable, and examines the way in which the gift relationship sheds light on the question of how to avoid infringement of Aboriginal protocols without submitting to self-censorship. A caring gesture, underlining the relationship between self and others in gift exchanges, is identified to negotiate the writer's interests in Aboriginal stories with cultural sensitivity against unauthorised appropriation. The paper therefore argues that the morality of gift exchanges, which demands a balanced consideration of disparate interests in obligatory reciprocation, offers a possible solution to the dilemma of non-Aboriginal writers in the treatment of Aboriginal subject matter.
Abstract: Drew, Neil; Wilks, Judith; Wilson, Katie; Kennedy, Gillian Data quality and availability in relation to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students' higher education participation and pathways remains a persistent challenge. In this paper we identify that, to date, there has been no systematic attempt to conceptualise and summarise many important aspects of data quality. The research reported in this paper, enabled through funding from an Office for Learning and Teaching seed grant, redresses this and proposes a conceptual framework for identifying and understanding the impacts of matters of data quality. We argue that the pursuit of a shared statistical literacy is best viewed through the dual lens of whiteness and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander terms of reference. Borrowing from the health sector, we conceptualise data quality issues as upstream, midstream and downstream. This framework identifies the locus of responsibility and intervention as a catalyst for purposeful action to address data quality challenges at the national, sectoral and institutional levels. The benefits of applying the proposed framework include a conceptual lens through which cultural issues may be unmasked; enhanced sector-wide critical statistical literacy; and a systematic accountability framework for assessing efforts to improve data quality. Finally, it is proposed that key elements from this framework might be usefully applied to the development of sector-wide guidelines for the collection, interpretation, use and storage of quality data and statistics to enhance the transition, participation and retention experiences of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander higher education students.
Abstract: Treloyn, Sally; Martin, Matthew Dembal; Charles, Rona Googninda Repatriation of song recordings from archives and private collections to communities of origin is both a common research method and the subject of critical discourse. In Australia it is a priority of many individual researchers and collecting institutions to enable families and cultural heritage communities to access recorded collections. Anecdotal and documented accounts describe benefits of this access. However, digital heritage items and the metadata that guide their discovery and use circulate in complex milieus of use and guardianship that evolve over time in relation to social, personal, economic and technological contexts. Ethnomusicologists, digital humanists and anthropologists have asked, what is the potential for digital items, and the content management systems through which they are often disseminated, to complicate the benefits of repatriation? How do the 'returns' from archives address or further complicate colonial assumptions about the value of research? This paper lays the groundwork for consideration of these questions in terms of cultural precedents for repatriation of song records in the Kimberley. Drawing primarily on dialogues between ethnomusicologist Sally Treloyn and senior Ngarinyin and Wunambal elder and singer Matthew Dembal Martin, the interplay of archival discovery, repatriation and dissemination, on the one hand, and song conception, song transmission, and the Law and ethos of Wurnan sharing, on the other, is examined. The paper provides a case for support for repatriation initiatives and for consideration of the critical perspectives of cultural heritage stakeholders on research transactions of the past and in the present.
Abstract: Lee, Emma; Tran, Tran Indigenous governance in Australia is determined by connections to country and enacted through family structures. Often unrecognised and/or inappropriately treated through non-Indigenous policy structures that govern protected areas and Indigenous-owned lands, Indigenous peoples on representative boards, councils and committees find themselves in opposition to Western governance systems. This often results in perceptions of governance dysfunction and conflicts of interest, while delegitimising kinship and family structures. This paper discusses the growing questions surrounding how Indigenous governance is framed by interrogating the formal mechanisms where Indigenous and non-Indigenous governance is discussed and influenced. We reflect on critical information gaps that are required to be filled to ensure equity among actors in land and sea management.
Abstract: McLean, Jessica; Howitt, Richard; Colyer, Claire; Raven, Margaret; Woodward, Emma Collaborative research in Indigenous geographies encompasses a wide range of approaches, practices and relationships in multiple contexts. Working collaboratively on creating and applying knowledges presents some very significant challenges - conceptually, methodologically, logistically and organisationally. Cognisant of these challenges, and the opportunities that collaborative research brings, the Institute of Australian Geographers (IAG) Indigenous Peoples' Knowledges and Rights Study Group held a workshop, 'Giving back: collaborative research in Indigenous geographies'. The workshop was held at, and co-sponsored by, AIATSIS in Canberra as part of the lead-up to the 2015 IAG conference. The workshop was attended by 30 Indigenous and non-Indigenous researchers.
Abstract: O'Connor, Michael Review(s) of: Invisible country: Southwest Australia: Understanding a landscape, by Bill Bunbury,2015, UWA Publishing, Crawley, WA, 256pp, ill., ISBN 9781742586250 (pbk).
Abstract: Lea, Tess Review(s) of: Beyond communal and individual ownership: Indigenous land reform in Australia, by Leon Terrill,2016, Routledge Complex Real Property Series, Milton Park and New York, 303pp, ill., maps, ISBN 9781138853911 (hbk), ISBN 9781315722474 (ebk).
Abstract: Laughren, Mary Review(s) of: Desert dreamers: With the Warlpiri people of Australia, by Barbara Glowczewski, 2016, Univocal, Minneapolis, MN, 322pp., ISBN 9781937561963 (pbk).
Abstract: Godden, Lee Review(s) of: Beyond communal and individual ownership: Indigenous land reform in Australia, by Leon Terrill,2016, Routledge Complex Real Property Series, Milton Park and New York, 303pp, ill., maps, ISBN 9781138853911 (hbk), ISBN 9781315722474 (ebk).
Abstract: Alcorso, Simonne Review(s) of: Country women and the colour bar: Gassroots activism and the Country Women' Association, by Jennifer Jones,2015, Aboriginal Studies Press, Canberra, 248 pp, ill., map, portraits, ISBN 9781925302967 (pbk), ISBN 9781925302912 (ebk).
Abstract: Heiss, Anita I am a Wiradjuri woman. I'm from central New South Wales. I'm a Williams from Cowra, Brungle Mission, Griffith and Tumut. I was born and bred in Gadigal Country - most of you will know that as the City of Sydney - but I spent most of my life until two weeks ago, when I moved to Jaggera Country, living on the land of the Dharawal, near La Perouse. My heart - and my urban homeland - is strategically placed between the Long Bay jail, Malabar sewerage and Orica industrial estate. It is the perfect setting for creative inspiration and I've written some books there.
Abstract: Sculthorpe, Gaye The history and exhibition of ethnographic collections in museums are rich topics for debate and research. Yet despite an explosion of theorising and publications over the past 20 years, it remains the case that museum collections in Australia and over seas contain thousands of individual Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander objects that are surprisingly little researched or published on. Some decades ago, Australian researchers such as Plomley (1961), with his work on Tasmanian collections, and McBryde (1977, 1978), with her work on collections from Port Phillip and the Richmond River regions, highlighted the significance of United Kingdom (UK) and European collections. Later surveys such as Cooper's (1989) report on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander collections in overseas museums and Coates' (1995) unpublished report on archival sources in the British Museum highlighted strengths of other collections in Britain. Philip Jones (2001:18) suggested that there are perhaps up to 40,000 Australian Aboriginal objects in museums in Europe and flagged the potential for integrated databases to digitally reconnect such collections. More recently, as a follow up to Ian Coates' work, the British Museum, the Australian National University and the National Museum of Australia jointly undertook more detailed work on the significant Australian collections in the British Museum.1 Research from this project was included in exhibitions and associated publications of both museums in 2015 (NMA 2015; Sculthorpe et al. 2015).
Abstract: Craw, Charlotte Review(s) of: Performing indigeneity: Global histories and contemporary experiences, by Laura R Graham and H Glenn Penny (eds), 2014, University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London, 444 pp, ISBN 9780803271951.
Abstract: Hogan, Eleanor Young Aboriginal women account for the largest and most enthusiastic group of users in the Home Internet Project, which trialled household internet and computer technology access for the first time in three very remote Central Australian communities. Over a twoandahalf year period researchers regularly employed a life events survey to examine the impacts that internet access might have on community members' everyday lives. Women, especially younger ones, emerged as the main users, managing access to the computers within individual households and performing activities online for other family members. These findings counter trends that gender digital divide researchers originally observed of men and boys as 'early adopters' and greater users of digital technology. They are also the reverse of those from a study of Papunya's shared computing facility that found young men predominated as users. This paper explores the implications of gender identification with particular social spaces - the household in the small communities and the shared facility at Papunya - for digital inclusion in remote Aboriginal contexts. A further dimension of this research is how the association not only of space but of human resources, roles and activities, with different social groups, may impact the equity of internet and computer access and usage within remote Aboriginal communities.
Abstract: Harvey, Mark An extensive research literature focuses on stone as an instrument in, and output of, manufacturing processes, including substantial literature in ethnoarchaeology which reports and analyses manufacturing processes from the perspective of people with knowledge of these processes. By contrast, there is a dearth of literature on either stone as an input to manufacturing or on stone in other contexts. There has been no examination to determine if there are systematic subclass oppositions within stone terminologies and, if so, which parameters these oppositions reflect. Developing an overall understanding of stone terminology - ethnogeology - will advance analysis of the conceptualisation of both raw materials and manufacturing in hunter-gatherer economies. Wagiman stone terminology is presented as a detailed example.
Abstract: Judd, Barry; Butcher, Tim This paper provides an overview of Aboriginal interventions in the sport of Australian (Rules) Football in the period since the formation of the Australian Football League (AFL) in 1990. Recalling several pivotal events that have defined and redefined the relationship between Aboriginal people and the Australian game of football, this paper finds that the struggle to end on-field racial vilification in the 1990s attracted widespread support from the overwhelmingly non-Aboriginal public because these actions were consistent with the political principle of equality. The key actions of Nicky Winmar and Michael Long gained general appeal because they demanded that Aboriginal people be treated as though they were Anglo-Australians. In this regard, the 1990s fight against on-field racism in the AFL was a continuation of the Aboriginal struggle for rights associated with Australian citizenship. As the 1967 Commonwealth referenda on Aborigines demonstrated, most Anglo-Australians understood and supported the political principle of equality even though the promise of citizenship in substantive improvements to social and economic outcomes almost 50 years later remains largely unfulfilled.
Nevertheless, in the recently concluded 2015 AFL season, Adam Goodes, the most highly decorated Aboriginal man to play the sport at the highest level, was effectively booed into retirement. Goodes became a controversial and largely disliked figure in the sport when he used the public honour of being 2014 Australian of the Year to highlight the disadvantage and historical wrongs that continue to adversely impact Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and their communities. This paper argues that Goodes effectively sought to shift the paradigm of Aboriginal struggle beyond the sympathetic notions of racism and equal treatment to issues of historical fact that imply First Nations rights associated with cultural practice. Goodes' career initiates a new discussion about the place that Aboriginal cultures, traditions and understandings might have in the sport today. His decision to perform an Aboriginal war dance demonstrates that the new paradigm we propose is primarily about the political principle of difference, not equality.
Abstract: Cavanagh, Jillian; Shaw, Amie; Bartram, Timothy This study builds on understandings of how learning occurs for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander men in Men's Groups and Sheds across Australia. Wenger's (1998) model of mutual engagement, joint enterprise and shared repertoire provides the theoretical framework to underpin this study. Qualitative methods are presented and analysed; methods comprise yarning circles (focus groups) and semistructured interviews with 15 groups and 45 men. Findings reveal that Men's Groups and Sheds provide a safe and conducive environment for men to yarn and learn new skills about educational, employment and economic matters and enhance their social learning and ability to reconnect with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander traditions and culture. Men's Groups and Sheds are a unique and culturally sensitive way to provide Indigenous men with the skills that may lead to employment. The improvement of the social determinants of Indigenous men's lives is critical to enhancing their employability.
Abstract: Robertson, Francesca; Stasiuk, Glen; Nannup, Noel; Hopper, Stephen D The Synergies of Meaning Research Project, based at Kurongkurl Katitjin, Edith Cowan University, constructs a working relationship between traditional Aboriginal knowledge and Western natural and social scientific knowledge. The aim is to find ways of going forward together. One recently completed focus, Nyoongar Boodja, required the development of a collaborated timeline of the formation of Nyoongar land. Cooperative inquiry and research of narrative methods were used. Eleven eras are identified, with the focus of the first eight being land from (1) The Nyetting (The cold, dark time = Permian ice ages 350 million years ago) to (8) Wardanaak boodja (The Holocene flood, 7000 years ago). Astonishing resonances between the knowledge sets were discovered. This coincidence of Nyoongarinherited lore with Western scientific discoveries about the evolution of Nyoongar boodja highlights the value of walking together, cross-culturally, seeking synergies of meaning.
Abstract: Singley, Blake Review(s) of: Warrior: A legendary leader's dramatic life and violent death on the colonial frontier, by Libby Connors 2015, email: Allen and Unwin, Crows Nest, NSW, 280pp, ISBN 9781760110482 (pbk).
Abstract: Arabena, Kerry A new way of considering reconciliation is explored in this work. Converging wisdom from Indigenous peoples' philosophic traditions with Earth system, environmental, quantum and ecological sciences provides new opportunities for considering our human role and place in the living systems that give us life, context and meaning.
Abstract: Schofield, Toni; Sebastian, Tarunna; Donelly, Michelle; Anderson, Craig Australian tobacco use and its social acceptance have declined significantly (AIHW 2014). The rates of smoking among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, however, disclose only a very small decrease, and mortality and morbidity rates attributed to tobacco use continue to be higher for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people than they are for other Australians. The lack of any significant reduction in smoking among Indigenous Australians is especially marked among young people, who are reported to smoke daily at more than double the rate of their non-Indigenous counterparts (AIHW 2014). This paper analyses prevailing approaches to 'the social' in causing smoking among Indigenous Australians and argues that such approaches provide a limited foundation for understanding tobacco use among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in general, and among students of high school age in particular. The paper proposes a critical sociological approach that represents and understands tobacco use as an embodied, collective social practice that persists or ceases according to the opportunities arising in the lives of those engaged in the practice. Such opportunities, we propose, are not random but, rather, socially structured. In other words, they arise from the 'sediments of past collective practice' (Schofield 2015:31) and are identifiable as patterns over time. In the case of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, including those of high-school age, we propose that the dominant social structure or dynamic is that of indigeneity (Schofield and Gilroy 2015). We argue that smoking cessation programs for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students need to have a coherent conceptual foundation that includes the adoption of Indigenous research to inform policy development and implementation.
Abstract: Hickey, Sophie This paper explores the collection of Aboriginal identification within a longitudinal health study that has continued though decades of socio-political change. The Mater - University of Queensland Study of Pregnancy is a birth cohort study that commenced in Brisbane in the early 1980s. Until 2014 it relied on mother-reported race-based categories at baseline to determine Indigenous status. Thirty study-children (now adults) who were originally identified as having a parent who was an 'Australian Aborigine' were followed up 30 years later. Only 15 of this group self-identified as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander. Considering recent studies have shown Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are increasingly more likely to self-identify as such, an archival investigation of the original questionnaires was undertaken to check for systematic miscodes. Handwritten markings on the original questionnaires showed that group affiliation cannot always be easily classified into imprecise race-based categories. To do so ignores the reality and complexities of a lived cultural identity, including multiple ethnicities or ancestries. This paper takes a sociological approach to explore some of the difficulties in attempting to capture ethnic identification in administrative datasets.
Abstract: Anderson, Sue In 1973 the Aboriginal Task Force was formed in the South Australian Institute of Technology to provide Indigenous South Australian welfare workers with qualifications commensurate with the duties they were already performing in the workforce. It was so successful that the program quickly expanded into a national Aboriginal-focused tertiary education facility that was the forerunner of the University of South Australia's David Unaipon College of Indigenous Education and Research (DUCIER) and the model for other Australian university Indigenous centres. To commemorate DUCIER's twenty-first anniversary and the fortieth anniversary of the Task Force, in 2013 a team of DUCIER academics began researching this history in order to showcase the outstanding achievements of the alumni and staff of the Task Force. Central to the research is the collection of oral histories from participants. These are being recorded through either (or both) audio and video media, with segments being used in an exhibition. Oral history is considered imperative to the project because a history taken solely from the scant archival records will not reflect the processes involved in the program's development, nor the impact of the Task Force on the lives of those who contributed to the program and benefited from it. These issues are discussed in relation to the first years of the Task Force program.
Abstract: Konishi, Shino This paper contributes to the burgeoning scholarship on the significance of emotions in the history of cross-cultural encounters. Rather than focusing on face-to-face interactions, it examines how emotions governed European engagements with Aboriginal cultural landscapes and shaped Europeans' imaginings of how places could be constituted as sacred. It looks specifically at the writings of Fran ois Peron, one of the scientific crew of the Baudin expedition, a French Revolutionary voyage that visited Australia and Timor between 1801 and 1803. During the exploration of Australia the French expedition discovered two Aboriginal places that were interpreted as religiously significant to the local people: a grove discovered at Geographe Bay in the south-west of Australia and two tombs found at Maria Island off the south-east of Tasmania. Peron's extended discussion of these Aboriginal sites highlights the significance of emotions in the construction of ethnographic accounts, as well as the role of emotions in transcultural perceptions of place.
Abstract: Rowse, Tim Review(s) of: Protests, land rights and riots: Postcolonial struggles in Australia in the 1980s, by Barry Morris 2013, Aboriginal Studies Press, Canberra, 21 6pp, ISBN 9781922059345 (pbk); Fighting hard: The Victorian Aborigines advancement league, by Richard Broome 2015, Aboriginal Studies Press, Canberra, 27Spp, ISBN 9781922059864 (pbk).
Abstract: Marmion, Doug This paper reports on a project at AIATSIS to revive the Ngunawal language of the Canberra and nearby New South Wales region. This project is grounded in a close collaboration with a group of representatives from the Ngunawal community, who drive all aspects of the project. While still in its early days, the project has produced valuable outcomes both in terms of the language work carried out and the collaborative research process that has underpinned these outcomes.
Abstract: Judd, Barry; Butcher, Tim This paper introduces an Australian Research Council research project currently being undertaken at the remote Aboriginal community of Papunya in the Northern Territory. The project, led by Barry Judd and Tim Butcher from RMIT University, explores the role organised Australian Football plays in community wellbeing in a remote community. While mainstream narratives of sport view wellbeing as a natural outcome of participation in organised competition, this project critically interrogates the positive outcomes assumed in this relationship. The authors argue that the promise of Australian Football to transform the lives of remote community residents in positive ways is largely false and that participation in mainstream competition in Alice Springs may be socially and economically detrimental to the wellbeing of the people of Papunya. The paper questions the place that Aboriginal people occupy in Australian Football and suggests that cultural identity has only a tenuous place in the sport. It explores this theme in the context of the Northern Territory Emergency Response, or 'Intervention', which has positioned remote community residents as unwanted outsiders in Alice Springs and other 'white' spaces in the Northern Territory. It further argues that these issues are of national significance and that the treatment of Australian Football League star Adam Goodes underlines sport's limitations in delivering wellbeing to Aboriginal peoples and their communities.
Abstract: Lowe, Shelly C Review(s) of: Teaching indigenous students: Cultural awareness and classroom strategies for improving learning outcomes, by Thelma Perso and Colleen Hayward 2015, Allen and Unwin, Crows Nest, NSW, 280pp, ISBN 9781743316061 (pbk).
Abstract: Eira, Christina Review(s) of: Melbourne dreaming: A guide to important places of the past and present (2nd edn), by Meyer Eidelson 2014, Aboriginal Studies Press, Canberra, 146pp, ill., maps, ISBN 9781922059710 (pbk), 9781922059727 (PDF ebook).
Abstract: Moyle, Richard Review(s) of: Circulating cultures: Exchanges of Australian Indigenous music, dance and media, by Amanda Harris (ed.) 2014, ANU Press, Canberra, 276pp, ISBN 9781925022193 (pbk).
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