Dhangu Djorra'wuy Dhäwu: A Brief History of Writing in Aboriginal Language

1994 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-34 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary-Anne Gale
Keyword(s):  
Aboriginal People ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Literal Translation ◽  
History Of Writing ◽  
History Of ◽  
Aboriginal Languages

Since leaving ‘the bush’ I have been continually surprised at the ignorance that still exists about Aboriginal people and their languages. When people chat to me, and it is revealed that I used to work in Aboriginal schools in the Northern Territory, they say things like “Do you speak Aboriginal then?… Maybe you could make a sign for us saying ‘Welcome to our Kindergarten’ in Aboriginal?” I then have to explain that there are many, many different Aboriginal languages, not just one, and to say or write such things in any one of these languages requires a lot more than a mere literal translation. When I began doing research on the topic of writing in Aboriginal languages. I was again surprised at the sorts of comments people made to me. Comments like “How can you do research on writing in Aboriginal languages; I thought the Aborigines didn't even have an alphabet!”

Dhangum Djorra'wuy Dhäwu: A Brief History of Writing in Aboriginal Languages

1994 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 33-42
Author(s):  
Mary-Anne Gale
Keyword(s):  
Aboriginal People ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Literal Translation ◽  
History Of Writing ◽  
History Of ◽  
Aboriginal Languages

Since leaving ‘the bush’ I have been continually surprised at the ignorance that still exists about Aboriginal people and their languages. When people chat to me, and it is revealed that I used to work in Aboriginal schools in the Northern Territory, they say things like “Do you speak Aboriginal then?… Maybe you could make a sign for us saying ‘Welcome to our Kindergarten’ in Aboriginal?” I then have to explain that there are many, many different Aboriginal languages, not just one, and to say or write such things in any one of these languages requires a lot more than a mere literal translation. When I began doing research on the topic of writing in Aboriginal languages. I was again surprised at the sorts of comments people made to me. Comments like “How can you do research on writing in Aboriginal languages: I thought the Aborigines didn't even have an alphabet!”

‘Japan Fight. Aboriginal People Fight. European People Fight’: Yolngu Stories from World War II

2008 ◽  
Vol 37 (S1) ◽  
pp. 65-72
Author(s):  
Noah Riseman
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Aboriginal People ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Oral Histories ◽  
World War ◽  
Prisoner Of War ◽  
War Effort ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Rich ◽  
Australian Soil

Abstract Did you know that a Bathurst Islander captured the first Japanese prisoner of war on Australian soil? Or that a crucifix saved the life of a crashed American pilot in the Gulf of Carpentaria? These are excerpts from the rich array of oral histories of Aboriginal participation in World War II. This paper presents “highlights” from Yolngu oral histories of World War II in Arnhem Land, Northern Territory. Using these stories, the paper begins to explore some of the following questions: Why did Yolngu participate in the war effort? How did Yolngu see their role in relation to white Australia? In what ways did Yolngu contribute to the security of Australia? How integral was Yolngu assistance to defence of Australia? Although the answers to these questions are not finite, this paper aims to survey some of the Yolngu history of World War II.

Legislating for Land Rights in Australia

2001 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicolas Peterson
Keyword(s):  
Aboriginal People ◽  
South Australia ◽  
Land Rights ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Royal Commission ◽  
Land Trusts ◽  
Terra Nullius ◽  
History Of ◽  
Policy Work ◽  
The Government

A commitment in applied anthropological policy work to maximising cultural appropriateness or even to supporting what indigenous people say they want is not always possible. This proved to be the case in connection with formulating recommendations for land rights legislation in Australia's Northern Territory. Until 1992 the only rights in land that Aboriginal people had as the original occupiers of the continent were statutory (that is, through acts of state and federal parliaments). No treaties were signed with Aboriginal people and until that date the continent was treated as terra nullius, unowned, at the time of colonisation in 1788. From early on in the history of European colonisation, however, areas of land had been set aside for the use and benefit of Aboriginal people. These reserves were held by the government, or by one of a number of religious bodies that ministered to Aboriginal people, usually supported by government funding. Beginning with South Australia in 1966 all of the states, except Tasmania, have passed legislation that gives varying degrees of control of these reserves to land trusts governed by Aboriginal people. Each of these pieces of legislation had/have different shortcomings which included some or all of the following: the total area that had been reserved was small; the powers granted over the land were limited; the majority of the Aboriginal population did not benefit from the legislation; and none of them addressed the issue of self-determination. In 1973 a Royal Commission into Aboriginal Land Rights, with a single Commissioner, Mr. Justice Woodward, was established by the newly elected Federal Labor government, the first in 23 years. It was planned that it would deal with the continent but that it would begin by focusing on the Northern Territory which until 1978 was administered by the Federal government. At the time there were 25,300 Aboriginal people in the Territory making up 25% of the population.

Towards a History of Aboriginal Education in New South Wales

1984 ◽  
Vol 12 (5) ◽  
pp. 24-32
Author(s):  
David Huggonson
Keyword(s):  
Aboriginal People ◽  
Aboriginal Education ◽  
Detailed Knowledge ◽  
Moral Code ◽  
European Contact ◽  
South Wales ◽  
Written Form ◽  
History Of ◽  
Aboriginal Society ◽  
Aboriginal Languages

A common misapprehension still prevalent in Australia is that traditional Aboriginal society had no organized educational system. This misapprehension seems based on the ethnocentric concept of British nationalism reinforced by the belief that Christianity was sacrosanct and provided an unassailable moral code. When coupled with the profit motive of capitalism, this belief justified the wholesale destruction of Aboriginal society (Rowley 1970, Reynolds 1981). Prior to European contact most of the instruction of children was carried out by women, and both sexes gained a detailed knowledge of their physical environment. Women were also responsible for the complete spiritual instruction of girls and of boys up to the age of puberty. A boy’s uncle assumed a mentor role during his adolescence (Cowlishaw, 1981). These educational methods were successful in that children were prepared for the particular way of life of their tribe, and there were very few ‘drop outs’, or failures in this system (Hart, 1969).The tragic deaths of the British explorers, Burke and Wills, demonstrated the worthlessness which the Europeans attached to Aboriginal knowledge. Burke habitually chased Aboriginal people away from his camp with his revolver (Woolf, 1974). The earlier explorer, Charles Sturt had been saved from death by scurvy because the surgeon, John Browne, fed him salt bush berries after observing the Yandruwandra people collecting and eating this source of Vitamin C.The British believed English to be the language of enlightenment and viewed the 633, (Reed 1969) different Aboriginal languages and dialects as immoral and primitive. The British made little attempt to learn any Aboriginal languages and the fact that the languages did not exist in a written form further enforced the view of their worthlessness. Contemporary linguistic studies show Aboriginal languages are grammatically complex and that most species of plants and animals to be found in a tribe’s country were represented in their language’s detailed vocabulary (Robertson, 1983). Obviously, if Burke and Wills had been less impatient and arrogant they would not have perished even in the arid lands of Central Australia. They could have survived by developing a rapport with local Aborigines. However, if one’s object is to take possession of a people’s land by exterminating them, it is better to view them psychologically as sub-human or a relic from a different evolutionary era, as many social Darwinists did, than to develop an empathy with them (Fromm, 1942).

Language and communication in Aboriginal land claim hearings

1990 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 1-47 ◽  
Author(s):  
Harold Koch
Keyword(s):  
Intercultural Communication ◽  
Aboriginal People ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Standard English ◽  
Communication Failure ◽  
Legal Procedure ◽  
Land Claim ◽  
Communication Processes ◽  
Aboriginal Languages ◽  
Australian Languages

This paper discusses aspects of the intercultural communication processes involved in the quasi-legal presentation of claims to traditional land by Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory before the Aboriginal Land Commissioner. The findings are documented by means of selected extracts from the transcripts of proceedings. Although the proceedings took place predominantly in English, there was some use of interpreters, liberal use of words from Aboriginal languages, and even considerable usage of nonverbal gestures. Most of the Aboriginal witnesses spoke some form of non-standard English influenced by Kriol and traditional Australian languages. The most salient features of their non-standard English are described here. Aboriginal witnesses accommodated their language toward Standard English. Some of their non-standard utterances were clarified by others for the record. The court also accommodated somewhat to Aboriginal styles and forms of speech. Nevertheless there were numerous instances of communication failure, which had various specific causes but were not aided by the culturally alien general legal procedure of question-and-answer elicitation of information.

The Northern Territory: An Aboriginal View of the Past

1977 ◽  
Vol 5 (5) ◽  
pp. 42-44
Author(s):  
P. Read ◽  
J. Read
Keyword(s):  
Aboriginal People ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
The Past ◽  
Almost Everywhere ◽  
Unlimited Time ◽  
History Of ◽  
Written Word ◽  
Aboriginal History ◽  
Aboriginal Children ◽  
History Books

In 1975 we were preparing a source book of the Northern Territory for the Northern Territory Curriculum Branch. There was a thick book at the end of it, but it was evident to us that only one section of the population was represented. That was the European, and only the literate part of that. The Aboriginal view of the past was simply not available from history books, nor, except to Aboriginal children, from anywhere else. It was obvious, that to produce an Aboriginal history of the Territory, we would have to move from reading the written word to listening to the spoken.This was the task we set ourselves for 1977–78. Employed by the Curriculum Branch, and backed by the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies, we would act as editors in the task of presenting an Aboriginal history of the Northern Territory to school children. All interviews and discussions would be taped, and cassettes made to go with each booklet of transcriptions and illustrations.Faced with an enormous amount of material, vast distances to cover, and not unlimited time, we decided, rather than produce a hotch-potch volume of what we had managed to record, to edit a series of shorter books on different themes. Some are on specific topics, like the Coniston massacre, or wartime recollections. Other topics are more general but no less interesting: how, when and why did Aboriginal people give up (or were forced to give up) traditional life; how they adapted to the European intrusion; why there has been a shift to out-stations and a preference for bicultural education?Obviously we have not been able to visit large areas of the Territory. We chose mostly to visit places where we already knew someone. Often this was the teacher, who would ask the community in advance if it were interested in taking part in the project. Almost everywhere, the older people were keen to tell stories of the early days, especially when they knew their words would be heard and read by children throughout the Territory. Generally the stories are no older than the third generation, and in English.

The Impact of Asian - Aboriginal Australian Contacts in Northern Australia

1994 ◽  
Vol 3 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 295-310
Author(s):  
Christine Choo
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Western Australia ◽  
Aboriginal People ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Northern Australia ◽  
Australian Aborigines ◽  
State Legislation ◽  
The North ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Impact

The long history of Asian contact with Australian Aborigines began with the early links with seafarers, Makassan trepang gatherers and even Chinese contact, which occurred in northern Australia. Later contact through the pearling industry in the Northern Territory and Kimberley, Western Australia, involved Filipinos (Manilamen), Malays, Indonesians, Chinese and Japanese. Europeans on the coastal areas of northern Australia depended on the work of indentured Asians and local Aborigines for the development and success of these industries. The birth of the Australian Federation also marked the beginning of the “White Australia Policy” designed to keep non-Europeans from settling in Australia. The presence of Asians in the north had a significant impact on state legislation controlling Aborigines in Western Australia in the first half of the 20th century, with implications to the present. Oral and archival evidence bears testimony to the brutality with which this legislation was pursued and its impact on the lives of Aboriginal people.

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