aboriginals and globalisation
DESCRIPTION
By Sidse and JulieTRANSCRIPT
ABORIGINALS
Facts
• The Aboriginal Indigenous
Australians migrated from the
African continent around 70,000
years ago, and arrived in Australia
around 50,000 years ago.
• The word has been in use in English
since at least the 17th century, to
mean "first or earliest known,
indigenous". It comes from Latin,
Aborigines, derived from ab (from)
and origo (origin, beginning).
• There were more than 250
languages spoken by Indigenous
Australians prior to the arrival of
Europeans. Most of these are now
either extinct or moribund, with
only about fifteen languages still
being spoken by all age groups.
• The 1996 census reported that
almost 72 percent of Aboriginals
practised some form of Christianity;
16 percent listed no religion. There
has also been an increase in the
number of followers of Islam among
the Indigenous Australian
community
• The didgeridoo, which is widely
thought to be a stereotypical
instrument of Aboriginal people,
was traditionally played by people
of only specific regions of
aborigines, and then only by men.
Racism and Aborigines
The British colonisation of Australia began
in 1788, and brought many diseases, such
as measles, smallpox and tuberculosis.
These diseases led to the death of many
aborigines.
By 1806, racism from colonizers and
soldiers reached a very high point. Not only
were sacred Aboriginal places violated and
ABORIGINALS
desecrated, the Aboriginals themselves
became hunted like kangaroos for pleasure
and fun, like trophy prizes. The soldiers
used to visit Aboriginal villages offering
gifts, while the real purpose of the visit was
to contaminate the village water supply
with arsenic. Whole communities including
children, elderly, women and men were
removed by arsenic poisoning. Rum,
initially imported from England, was freely
offered to Villagers. The introduction of
rum made many villagers drunk for a
whole week until death arrived from
alcoholic comas. The English soldiers took
advantage of this stage of alcoholism to
create wars between friendly villages,
leaving them to kill each other. It was a
massacre.
Later, the Aborigines were recruited to
work on cattle farms. Payment was
ridiculous low, compared to a white mans
wage. To justify this act, the farmers made
allegations that the Aborigines had no
feelings with horses (which was true due to
the fact that they were nomads and used to
travel by foot). Secondly, the Aboriginals
spiritual life style was totally connected
with the environment. In reality, the
Aborigines didn't understand why they had
to raise horses and sheep when the sea and
nature provided everything necessary for
living. They were considered lazy and
insolent. But, they worked for less than 2
pounds per week as payment, while the
white man never worked for less than 9
pounds. Also, because of their dark skin,
the Aborigines were able to work for long
period of time under the hot sun, while the
whites used to get sunburned very quickly.
http://www.yesaustralia.com/Estilo-‐
aborigenesing.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indigenous_
Australians
ABORIGINALS
Aboriginals and their rights
After all these years of horror in Aboriginal
history, the Aboriginals slowly gained more
and more rights in Australian society:
• In 1962, the Aboriginals were given
right to vote in Commonwealth
election
• In 1965 a group of students
organised a tour of western and
coastal New South Wales towns, to
raise awareness of the state of
Aboriginal health and living
conditions. This tour also aimed to
highlight the social discrimination.
• In 1967 allowed the Commonwealth
to make laws with respect to
Aboriginal people, and for
Aboriginals to be included when the
country does a count to determine
electoral representation. The
refenderum passed with 90.77%
support from the voters.
• In 1971, Neville Bonner joined the
Australian Senate as a Senator for
Queensland for the Liberal Party,
becoming the first Indigenous
Australian in the Federal
Parliament. One year later, the
Aboriginal Tent Embassy was
established on the steps of
Parliament House in Canberra.
ABORIGINALS
Aboriginals and Globalisation
Since the late 1980s, the word
“globalisation” has been widely
used, both quantitatively and
qualitatively. Most people would
probably suggest that
globalisation is first and foremost
the spread of capitalism in the
wake of the collapse of
communism, the emergence of a
single worldwide market and so on. Others
might think of globalisation as a break
down of national frontiers, as a result of the
extraordinary development of
transportation and computer technologies.
• Since the 1980s, Australian
economy has improved a lot.
• However, the globalisation has
increased the unemployment of the
unskilled and uneducated.
• This has lead to a huge difference
between rich and poor.
• The unemployment and social
differences means that many
Aboriginals are unemployed and
poor. Therefore many Aboriginals
are dependant to the public sector.
• However, the globalisation has
opened a new possibility to sell and
export their tribal art – this
possibility is marginal though.
• Because of globalisation, migrants
came to Australia in large numbers,
especially from Asia, and therefore a
multi-‐cultural politic took form,
which lead to a possible platform for
ABORIGINALS
both Aboriginal land rights and
Aboriginal self-‐determination.
• All this seems good for the
Aboriginals, but then things started
to change drastically. Pauline
Hanson’s extreme right-‐wing ideas
started to form a sort of new racist
nationalism, as foreign people were
increasingly blamed for Australia’s
rising unemployment (note: The
Aboriginals are called “foreigners” –
even though they arrived in
Australia first)
• Though, people are opening their
eyes to the recognition of its “first
nation” peoples. White Australians
are so determined to delete any
differences between black and
white that the Aboriginals’
millennia-‐old culture is used to
anchor the Australian identity.
ABORIGINALS
Other aspects of globalisation:
• The Aboriginal cultures have not
remained isolated – the Aboriginals
had, as mentioned, a very rich
religious and musical culture, which
now has been “copied” and sold as
souvenirs.
• The spread of the English language
is making it hard for the Aboriginals
to maintain their own native
language. They have to speak
English to communicate with their
bosses or costumers.
• The Aboriginals’ traditional
hierarchy is undermined by good-‐
owners, and therefore the authority
of elders is disappearing slowly.
• Some even see globalisation as
cultural imperialism. They are
warning that a drastic reduction of
cultural diversity is taking place.
The rich culture of the indigenous
Australians is now replaced by
cultural assimilation. Some white
Australians identify themselves with
the Aboriginals’ culture. The
Aboriginals have to sell out of and
mass-‐produce their culture to
survive in a more and more money-‐
orientated world.
HTTP://LISA.REVUES.ORG/1991