Talk:Indigenous Australians/Archive 1

British colonisation

[My remarks are in square brackets]

In 1770, Captain James Cook took possesion of the east coast of Australia and named it New South Wales in the name of Great Britain. The Aboriginal population was decimated by British colonisation which began in 1788, when news of the land's fertility spread to Europeans causing them to begin settling in the Aborigines' land. A combination of disease, loss of land (and thus food resources) and outright murder reduced the Aboriginal population by an estimated 90% during the 19th century and early 20th century. A wave of massacres and resistance followed the frontier. The last massacre was at Coniston in the Northern Territory in 1928. Poisoning of food and water has been recorded on several different occasions.

[Some fairly able scholars would question whether or not "A wave of massacres and resistance followed the frontier." Some would say there was no frontier war as such. It should also be noted the aboriginal people themselves committed massacres, albeit on a smaller scale.]

The number of violent deaths at the hands of whites is still the subject of a vigorous and politically-loaded debate, with some figures—notably Prime Minister John Howard—rejecting what Howard terms "the black-armband" view of Australian history. Figures of around 10,000 deaths have been advanced by historians such as Henry Reynolds. Historian Keith Windschuttle claims such numbers are not backed up by documentary evidence, finding evidence existing only for a much smaller number. Reynolds attacks Windschuttle's interpretation of the existing evidence, points out that documented proof that Windschuttle requires is unlikely to be available, and questions Windschuttle's rejection of other forms of evidence such as oral history.

[The term "black-armband" was coined by Professor Geoffrey Blainey, one of Australia's most celebrated intellectuals. Windschuttle actually when through Henry Renold's books and found that his footnotes and references didn't correspond to what he was talking about.]

User:Premier 20 Jan 2005

• Apparently Aborigine is capitalized in proper usage as it refers to this particular ethic group. User:Fredbauder

Aborigine is a noun, aboriginal isn't.

Mambo / Land rights / the stolen generation

Mambo / Land rights / the stolen generation all deserve a mention if someone has the motivation

• I have the motivation but not, alas, the expertise. Tannin 18:20 17 May 2003 (UTC)

• I guess he/she means Mabo (not Mambo) :) Ianbrown 03:32, 29 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Mambo == surf brand. Just for those who don't know. :P

Bias?

I removed this header (which was recently added to the entry) as, although I agree entirely with it, the placement of it was such that it served to suggest that the remainder of the entry was terribly biased and should be ignored. Nothing wrong with the sentiment, but a similar comment could equally well be made about almost any topic in modern history. Tannin 08:35 27 May 2003 (UTC)

• Important: There is a lot of distorted history circulating about interaction between Aboriginals and the White Settlers. Make sure you read widely, especially of different view points and of events happening around that time to place things in perspective. This topic is still of political importance within Australia so facts may be exaggerated to promote a particular viewpoint.

Tjukurrpa

"...spiritual values based upon reverence for the land and a belief in the Dreamtime or Tjukurrpa"

Could we please see something clarifying which language the word "Tjukurrpa" comes from?

Mudrooroo

Although this is a sensitive issue, I removed Mudrooroo from the list of well-known Aborigines because his own family have said that he is not Aboriginal and is more likely to be of African American descent. As far as I know he has refused to comment on this. While I understand that he identifies strongly with Aboriginal people, I don't feel that is sufficient qualification in itself.

Posing

Perhaps there should be a sub-section on "Aboriginality"? This could also deal with other non-Aboriginal authors and artists (etc) who have posed as Aboriginal, as well as the issue of Aboriginal people such as Sally Morgan who have been brought up to believe they were NOT Aboriginal. (Grant -- March 2, 2004.)

• "posing" is a tricky one. It's often held to be a cultural and ethnicity thing, not just DNA. I would suggest not just deleting names willy-nilly without a detailed section. See Tasmanian Aborigine for similar. - David Gerard 10:13, Mar 2, 2004 (UTC)

1967 Referendum

How come no mention of the 1967 Referendum?-Daeron 03:08, 4 May 2004 (UTC)

• Was that when Aborigines were finally granted citizenship? Something about that certainly needs to be added (and possibly also to the constitutional and political articles on Australia as well). Lisiate 21:15, 11 May 2004 (UTC)

Do they call themselves Aborigines?

Do they call themselves Aborigines? or is this a name given them by the settlers? If they call themselves something else, what is the name? If it's in the article, why is it not more prominent?

Shouldn't we call people by the names they want to be called instead of forcing our concepts onto them? Duemellon 12:00, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Each individual group has its own name - there's no one Austrlaian Aboriginal language and no one name. 129.94.6.28 01:26, 24 Sep 2004 (UTC)

A generally acceptable indigenous name for most of the Aboriginal people in New South Wales and Victoria is Koori or (Koorie). Aboriginal groups in other parts of Australia have their own names, such as Murri in southern Queensland, Noongar in southern Western Australia, Nunga in South Australia and Palawah (or Pallawah) in Tasmania. These names are not "tribal" but refer to the languages spoken (or once spoken) by many groups over large areas

• These names are also used as self referential by Aborigines. I'm in Queensland, so its common for Aborigines to refer to each other as Murri(e)s. I didn't realised it changed in regions and thought it had something to do with The Murray River untill I read this page.

"Indigenous Australian" or "Indigenous Peoples of Australia" is also sometimes used wihout an offensiveness. As general because Aborigine (i.e. original inhabitants) is somewhat correct (as noone would dare mention Aborigines actually migrated here at some point - unless you follow my Aus-Afro origin of humans hypothesis) nomenclature anyway, it has been adopted as formal term by most people and official organisation and beats other alternatives like "Blacks".

--ZZ 03:58, 24 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I always thought that "Aborigine" had negative connotations and that "Australian aboriginal people" or "indigenous Australians" were the prefered terms and that's backed up in the article. Perhaps a move to "Australian Aboriginal people" or "Indigenous Australians" is worth considering. Aaron Hill 07:33, Oct 28, 2004 (UTC)

Part of the reason this is so difficult is because any "grouping" of all the first peoples of Australia is imposed and artificial. The words "indigenous", "native", "aboriginal", have been used to describe any original population discovered by white settlers/invaders; American, New Zealand etc. Not only this, but these terms have been used by these same white people to describe flora and fauna found in the new lands. To group all peoples as "native" regardless of country is to deny the uniqueness of each race, and to classify people under the same terms as plants and animals is downright insulting.

This is where we come to describing the Australian situation. To group all the first people of Australia together is a European/white concept. Australia the continent was more than two hundred separate countries, each with strict boundaries and different language and family groups. Each name these people give to themselves - Nyungar, Murri, Koori, Arrernte - is translated to mean "people" or "human being". When people ask each other what they should be called, they don't ask them, "Are you a human being?" but rather "What is your country?". So the ideal solution is to refer to each people in relation to where they come from. Failing that, any of the above terms should be accompanied by "Australian" - to acknowledge the difference from other countries' first people, and "Peoples" in the plural, to acknowledge the many different countries, cultures and languages that existed before the imposed grouping as one mob.--Batronibat 02:59, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Fish farming

I'm confused about the use of the term 'fish-farming' in the following paragraph. Should this be fishing/farming? -Andrew Moran

The large fish-farming economy in south-west Victoria, for example, was entirely unknown to science until the turn of the 21st century, when investigations by a team of archaeologists working with and guided by surviving members of a local Aboriginal community began to unearth the foundations of houses and rediscover the irrigation system.

Fish .. farming? I've never heard of aboriginies farming fish? Spear fishing yes, but not an organised farming, nor the mention of irrigation systems. Any references to this worth checking out for further reading please? Jachin 05:17, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

My reading suggests that this discussion of Lourandos and intensification should be focused on the evidence for eel farming in southwest Victoria. Fish traps are part of this landscape also, but the really striking evidence is the remains of 100s of possible hut-structures, more than 75 square kilometres of artificial channels and ponds for farming eels, and smoking-trees for preserving the eels for trade. The ABC have produced popular accounts of recent work on this subject: Catalyst and News in Science. Comtebenoit 01:32, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

Here are some refs, from the Australian Archaeological Association media release (I added

Mulvaney and Kamminga 1999):

Builth, H. 1996 Lake Condah Revisited: Archaeological Constructions of a Cultural Landscape Unpublished Honours thesis, Deptartment of Aboriginal Studies, University of South Australia, Adelaide.

Builth, H. 2000 The connection between the Gunditjmara Aboriginal people and their environment: The case for complex hunter-gatherers in Australia. People and Physical Environment Research 55-56:1-18.

Builth, H. 2000 The Connection Between the Gunditjmara Aboriginal People and their Environment: The case for complex hunter-gatherers in Australia. In G. Moore, J. Hunt and L. Trevillion (eds), Environment-Behaviour Research on the Pacific Rim. Sydney: Faculty of Architecture, University of Sydney.

Builth, H. 2002a Analysing Gunditjmara settlement: The use of an appropriate methodology. In G. Carver and K. Stankowski 2002 Proceedings of the Third National Archaeology Students' Conference, Adelaide, 2000. Blackwood, S.A.: Southern Archaeology.

Builth, H. 2002b The Archaeology and Socioeconomy of the Gunditjmara: A Landscape Analysis from Southwest Victoria, Australia. Unpublished PhD thesis, Department of Archaeology, Flinders University, Adelaide.

Clarke, A. 1994 Romancing the stones: The cultural construction of an archaeological landscape in the western district of Victoria. Archaeology in Oceania 29(1):1-15.

Coutts, P.J.F., R. Frank and P.J. Hughes 1978 Aboriginal engineers of the Western District, Victoria. Records of the Victorian Archaeological Survey 7.

Lourandos, H. 1997 Continent of Hunter-Gatherers: New Perspectives in Australian Prehistory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Mulvaney, J. and Kamminga, J. 1999 Prehistory of Australia. Sydney: Allen and Unwin.

Newby, J. 1994 Blackfellow Never Tired: An Investigation of the Interpretations of the Lake Condah 'House' Sites. Unpublished Honours thesis, Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, Australian National University, Canberra.

Nicolson, O.E. 1996 A Fish Called Condah: An Analysis of Archaeological Interpretations of the Cultural Landscapes of the Lake Condah Region in Southwest Victoria, Australia. Unpublished Honours thesis, Department of Archaeology, Flinders University, Adelaide.

Wesson, J. 1981 Excavations of Stone Structures in the Condah Area, Western Victoria. Unpublished Masters Preliminary thesis, Latrobe University, Melbourne.

Williams, E. 1984 Documentation and archaeological investigation of an Aboriginal 'village site' in southwestern Victoria. Aboriginal History 8:173-188.

Williams, E. 1988 Complex Hunter-Gatherers: A Late Holocene Example from Temperate Australia. BAR International Series 423. Oxford.

Nomadic

Regarding the following paragraph:

Aboriginal people dislike being called nomadic, as to them, this makes them sound primitive and barbaric. This is despeite the fact that prior to colonisation and for a period afterwards, nomadic would serve as a correct description of their societies.

I was about to correct the spelling mistake when it occurred to me that it has several other problems. Apart from the spelling and the wording, which could be improved, it is an issue that possibly deserves further attention and would really belong somewhere else in the article. It ties in strongly with European perceptions of Aboriginal land use, which were (and are) generally very ignorant and negative. Probably a whole section or at least a large paragraph could be written contrasting the "old" view of Aborigines as people that had developed along the same path as Europeans but had only as made it as far as "the" Stone Age, versus the more modern view of an assemblage of land use practices superbly tailored to suit sustainable inhabitation of the Australian continent. Nomadism yes, but not because people were too "primitive" or "barbaric" to think of anything better to do -- rather because in many environments nomadism is a good choice.

As it stands the paragraph could easily be interpreted as saying "some people call them nomads but they don't like it because it emphasises the fact that they are primitive and barbaric" ... so I suggest that it be deleted altogether until a more in-depth discussion along the lines of the above can be crafted. (I don't consider myself qualified to do so). Comments? Rkundalini 03:32, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Well, nomadism isn't a good survival choice for a group of humans. Many people do the whole "europeans stole the aboriginal land" et cetera route of thinking, but realistically another kind of human spread further and succeeded better at survival through an organised system of development. When looking at cultures and people, we tend to look at it passionately as humans seeing humans, if we take a step back and take a scientific look at things, in the grand scheme of development over time, you could say that nomadic systems of living would be almost equivilent to primates by comparison to organised social structures of expansionists.

The counter would be that nomadism is a fine choice for not over-exploiting the land. It's like farmers and graziers putting all their sheep or cattle in one paddock for a while, then moving them all to the next one, rather than putting a few cattle in each paddock over the entire farm. Nomadism allows the benefits of social interaction on land that cannot support a high population. I expect the Victorian Aborigines were much less nomadic than central Australian Aborigines for exactly the same reasons the white population in southern Victoria is higher than it is in central Australia - the land can support it. --ScottDavis 05:35, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Criticism

I wish this article would say more about what Aboriginal culture was like pre-colonisation, and less about what it isn't like. I don't want to hear that this stereotype is only correct in 70% of cases, or that stereotype is wrong, I just want a detailed description of their way of life. The article seems to be attempting to deny that they nomadic or primitive, as if being nomadic or primitive is somehow bad. In particular:

Despite their reputation as stone-age relics, there is evidence of substantial change in Aboriginal culture over time.

Not all readers of this article know about their reputation, and even fewer care for references to it, especially when it's phrased in such a demeaning way. What is a stone-age culture anyway? What sort of stone-age culture was it, if that's what it was?

Lifestyles varied a great deal, and the stereotyped image of a proud and naked hunter standing one-legged in the red sand of the central Australian desert cannot be applied across the board.

I'm not here to read about stereotypes. Did they hunt or didn't they?

The 2nd, 3rd and 4th paragraphs of the pre-colonisation section give the impression that nothing is known for certain about these people. That may be true, but if anything is known, I'd like to read about it, preferably before I read about the bits that aren't known.

-- Tim Starling 06:01, Nov 25, 2004 (UTC)

They were hunter gatherers with most of their dietary intake coming from insects and small bush animals. Whilst heavy research was thrown into their history in the early years of federation, especially, most of the last two decades has been spent tearing down the 'stereotypes' that that research put forwards and done very little into investigating further their lifestyle and history.

The history of aboriginal culture is forced upon all high school students in Australia, it is a compulsory topic, which I, as a student, found to be obnoxiously full of propaganda and not an inkling of facts on their lifestyle or actual history. That vexed me beyond belief, more time was spent demonising white settlers than actualy telling us about the people themselves.

I do concur that more details should be put into defining them than defining what they are not.

Jachin 22:43, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Moving the page

I propose that this page be moved to a location that has a less offensive connotation than "Australian Aborigine". The people who this term is used to refer to consider this an offensive usage and I believe that means that it is necessary to move the page. I think we should move the page to the redirect "Indigenous Australian", the term that so called "Australian Aborigines" actually call themselves in the modern era. - Aaron Hill 22:52, Nov 29, 2004 (UTC)

If that's true (that that's what these people call themselves), then that sounds fine to me. – Quadell ^{(talk) (help)}[[]] 00:30, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)

I've never heard "Indigenous Australian" before, I was taught in school that Aborigine and Aboriginal are acceptable, although perhaps "Koori" is better. Is this something that has changed in the last 5 years? I hope this is a term applied by the group to itself, not promoted from the outside -- "Indigeneous Australian" has pleasant patriotic overtones, but we shouldn't presume that these people wish to conform to our idea of nationalism. -- Tim Starling 03:06, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)

From my experience at school in SA, its totally changed.. I remember in Year 4/5 (in the mid 1990s) there was a lot of reference to the "Aboriginal people", when I left last year we did "Indigenous studies"... Its a complex issue, I must admit, but the word "Aborigine" makes me cringe because of its increasingly negative meaning. I'll investigate the source of the change in language. - Aaron Hill 05:20, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)

From the UniSA Indigenous College website:

The terms Aborigine/Aboriginal are often used to include Australia's other indigenous people, the Torres Strait Islanders, whose language and culture differs considerably from those on the mainland. It is preferable to either say Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders or use indigenous Australians.

I'm a white Anglo-Saxon guy myself, so its particularly hard for me to comment on this issue from the perspective that "this is what the people want", but it seems to be a growing consenus towards "indigenous Australians" and "Australian aboriginal people" away from the term "Australian Aborigine". - Aaron Hill 05:31, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)

That quote doesn't support your growing consensus though. Do you have any references that do? -- Tim Starling 08:43, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)

• Some Google statistics:

koori: 156,000

"indigenous australian": 70,200

aborigine: 245,000

"australian aborigine": 22,000

aboriginal: 7,090,000

"australian aboriginal": 252,000

Some more:

indigenous australian (no quotes): 1,990,000

australian aboriginal (no quotes): 1,750,000

Indigenous is often used in the context: "Australia's indigenous people..." or similar, reducing results in quotes. If there were an Aboriginal word for the whole people, I would prefer it (self-determination), but unfortunately none exists. - Aaron Hill 22:22, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)

What I think there is at least a growing consensus that the form "australian aborigine" is unacceptable. - Aaron Hill 22:25, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)

I will support a move to Indigenous Australians (dealing with a plural entity, should be plural, no?), though I do not entirely ahve a problem with the current article title. Would this new article make a distinction between Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders.

• A generally acceptable indigenous name for most of the Aboriginal people in New South Wales and Victoria is Koori or (Koorie). Aboriginal groups in other parts of Australia have their own names, such as Murri in southern Queensland, Noongar in southern Western Australia, Nunga in South Australia and Palawah (or Pallawah) in Tasmania. These names are not "tribal" but refer to the languages spoken (or once spoken) by many groups over large areas.

"Koori" is only applicable to Aborigines in the South-East corner of Australian. Koori, Murri, Noongar, Nunga and Pallawah should all probably have their own article. Even if such an article is merely a short description and a list of language groups and smaller tribes within them.--ZayZayEM 03:04, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)

• I agree. - Aaron Hill 23:38, Dec 2, 2004 (UTC)

I think it would be favourable for a new article to have a section differentiating between mainland and Tasmanian indigenous Australians and Torres Strait Islanders as there is significant differences between the culture and language of the two peoples. However, many issues can be covered in a single article (like land rights) and do not necessitate the creation of two fully separate pages. - Aaron Hill 01:35, Dec 3, 2004 (UTC)

• At the very least, shouldn't this page be at Australian Aboriginal, rather than here? --Dante Alighieri | Talk 01:57, Jan 19, 2005 (UTC)

• Egad, no!!!. Aboriginal is an adjective. Aborigine is a noun. As this article is about a people (noun) it should be Aborigine. Aborigines is the plural of the single Aborigine.--ZayZayEM 03:30, 21 Jan 2005 (UTC)

• Well, actually, aboriginal is both a noun AND an adjective. Plus, aborigine is an etymologically improper singularization of aborigines, but I suppose it doesn't matter that much. --Dante Alighieri | Talk 09:01, Jan 21, 2005 (UTC)

• Actually' its not. Its that kind of insensitive nonsense that really pisses off ethics comittee. I'd like you to find me a suitable respectable reference which says that is the way to go (not just Aboriginal being used improperly somewhere official-ish). Aboriginal is an adjective. This article was in agreement with me last time I checked.--ZayZayEM 00:57, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

• Ah Yes - Strictly speaking Aboriginal is an adjective and Aborigine is a noun. It is therefore correct to refer either to Aboriginal Australians or Australian Aborigines, but not to Australian Aboriginals. This is partly because Aboriginal people increasingly dislike being called Aborigines. (Note that the once-common abbreviation Abo is highly offensive.) Today the preferred usages are Aboriginal People (as in "This is what Aboriginal people want") or Indigenous Australians.

Using the OED as a source for information about the English language is insensitive nonsense? I'll wait here for your apology. :) --Dante Alighieri | Talk 12:09, Jan 23, 2005 (UTC)

One year later and no response or apology... shocking. --Dante Alighieri | Talk 23:31, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

I oppose the hyper-politically correct mentality that there is anything offensive in the nomenclature of 'Australian Aboriginie', I live in a highly aboriginally inhabited region of Australia, and the folks here quite happily refer to themselves as 'abo's (which is an abbreviation of aboriginie and turns city folk pale, running to the media screaming 'racism' if heard, although is the most common taxonomy applied to aboriginies as inhabitants of the country and not specific tribes / regions). There is nothing offensive about this nomenclature in my eyes, let it stay.

"Indigenous"

My people come from an Ulster-Scottish background but I regard myself as 'Indigenous Australian'.

After more than 200 years surely decendants of the colonial population are not non-Indigenous, which is the only label you can give them if Aboriginies are indigenous. The article could also point out that many aboriginies approve of the arrival of europeans into Australia - apparently. According to sources in the media 64% of aborignies are living with or married to a non-aboriginal, something which learned academics acknowledge as an important social indicator. Upwards of 70% of blacks list as their religion one of the Christian denominations. Less than 2% beleive in an aboriginal religion.

Also, the abolition of ATSIC is quite an important moment in aboriginal history which the article dosen't talk about much. Separate elected representation for aboriginies has now been abolished in Australia and it is very difficult to see a future federal administration bringing it back. Isabell Coe and her fellow radicals can jump up and down on the spot until the earth moves - aboriginal soverienty is not an issue in the Commonwealth of Australia.

Groups interested in aboriginal welfare like the Benelong Society basically advance the view that aboriginal assimilation is not only inevitable but desirable (although they don't get as much media coverage as they might - their arguments are quite compelling actually).

Perhaps somebody could work this stream of thought into the article.

• One could imagine quite strong arguments counter to your claim to be "indigenous". Are the descendants of the Pilgrims indigenous to North America? I was born in California... does that make me a Native American? --Dante Alighieri | Talk 22:49, Jan 20, 2005 (UTC)

• Suggest you read Indigenous peoples. You (and I) are not indigenous Australians. Descendants of the _original_ people are. Perhaps you're an indigenous Celt. By the way - I'm fairly sure that the term "blacks" is considered offensive. Ianbrown 14:10, 21 Jan 2005 (UTC)

• If you want to be picky, he's probably an indigenous Beaker person. And, most likely an indigenous Dane, Angle, Roman and [Saxon]] as well. (It must be very confising for him). Further there's good evidence that there were two successive pre-european waves of people to arrive in Australia; are half of the Australian Aborigines not aboriginal then? I'm not denying the usefulness of the concept, but theres a (cultural) choice we're making when we identify with particular ancestors and not others.

• Aboriginies only came here on boats in the first place like my Ulster-Scottish people did. I don't think they've been here for 50,000 years either - according to the Christian bible the first human beings only appeared 6,000 years ago.

• I don't think the term "blacks" is offensive either. I've heard some of those self-appointed aboriginal community leaders speak about "whites". If there is a basic difference i'd like to know.

• Political correctness seems to be comming to a thudding halt in Australia and New Zealand.

• whether it's 50,000 or 6,000 is irrelevant. They're direct descendants of the original people. Ianbrown 08:34, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

By the logic raised in this article, the aboriginal people of Australia are not indigenous, just as 'European settlers' aren't either. I would like to argue the toss with those who claim they are the direct decendants of the 'original people' of the country as that cannot be stated nor substantiated as a fact. Jachin 16:45, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Aboriginal Colonisation

I have a 1971 book which says that "The present theory" is a Three Wave Aboriginal colonisation theory. Tasmanoids (Negroid stock) arrived, then Murrayians who drove the Tasmanianoids off teh mainland, and settled in E/SE Australia, and then the Australoids, of more Caucasian origins (from Indian subcontinent) who "never penetrated south of the tropics". This replaced the old theory of Two waves, first negroids, then Caucasians.

Incidentally their date of initial colonisation is 20,000 or more years go (I guess 50,000 is "more").

It also mentions a theory that Tasmanoids never actually reached the mainland (because no archeaologic/palentologic evidence suggests this).

Anyone know what present theory is? Because the article seems to suggest a single wave of origin.--ZayZayEM 03:02, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Quoting from "Gagudgu Man", by Bill Neidjie, JB Books 2002 - "The occupation of Australia by humans probably began as long as 65,000 years ago when, during a period of low sea level, a small group of coastal people made a ... voyage across the final gap separating this land from the Indonesian lowlands. ... It is most likely the Ancestor Aboriginals arrived at a time when a glacial period was in full swing. The sea level had dropped some 100 metres. The last time the levels were as low as that was between 15,000 and 20,000 years ago. However, at that time people were grinding their tools near the caverns by the East Alligator [River]... and Aborigines had been camping at Lake Mungo for at least 3000 and more years. The low sea level previous to the last was between 50,000 and 55,000 years ago. That then is a likely arrival period."

Edit:Re-reading the above I note this does not clarify whether there were two "waves" or one. It may be that this recent low level they speak of may have brought more people from the Indonesian area. As archaeological evidence is sketchy for anything other than determining if people were present or absent at a time, I would suggest looking for a Dreaming that talks of new arrivals. Many Dreamings have accurately told of events happening more than 10,000 years ago, and later confirmed by methods of science. --Batronibat 03:19, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Removing Image

As I have seen the image of the elderly gentleman featured on this page (image "Aborigene23323.jpg") on postcards and the like, I am removing it from the page as it is no doubt copyright. If someone can show that it is not copyright, then feel free to return it to the page. --Roisterer 01:06, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Some (more) criticisms

Where to start...

I'll start with this quote from Jackie Huggins (Indigenous historian)

"a" is for apple, agile, anger, another, address, alphabet, but not Aboriginal. It is insulting and destructive to use a small "a". This spelling is extremely racist, as are the biologically racist definitions of part, quarter, half caste and full blood Aboriginals. It's like calling us boong, coon, nigger or abo, and just as blatant and condescending. It is also similar to spelling a Christian name such as dianne or gail like so. Negating our identity and nationality, it also tacks empathy and understanding as any Greek, Italian or Jew would understand - though they are paid the privilege of getting their names spelt with a capital. It is indicative of notions of inferiority/superiority of Blacks and whites [sic] in this country. On the basis of white superiority it could be presumed that the initiators of small "a" subconsciously act our their power games in order further to maintain their privileged position, and to keep Blacks in their "subjugated" line. The usual excuse is that there has been a "typo", but I have yet to see "europeans" or "australians" in Australian books. Why therefore does the typewriter possess an incredibly persistent disability when it comes to Aboriginal? My preference is for the term "Aboriginal" both as noun and adjective. "Aborigines" has long been a term used to classify and demean Aboriginal people in the repressive state of Queensland, particularly by the old Department of Aboriginal and Islander Advancement [sic]. It also assumes an "air of superiority" by a dominant culture and attempts, as does small "a", to operate as a divide and role tactic.

My point is that why is 'Australian Aborigine' still being used in this article? Even when the article itself notes: "this is partly because Aboriginal people increasingly dislike being called Aborigines. Today the preferred usages are Aboriginal People or Indigenous Australians". There is a reason WHY these are the preferred usages, because terms like 'aborigines' or Australian 'aborigines' are OFFENSIVE, colonial terms. Why the article does make a point of this concern and still neglects to apply this sensitivity to the body of text is mind boggling.

Do they call themselves Aborigines? or is this a name given them by the settlers? If they call themselves something else, what is the name? If it's in the article, why is it not more prominent?

Shouldn't we call people by the names they want to be called instead of forcing our concepts onto them? --Duemellon 12:00, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

• Yes, 'we' should. 'Aborigines' is the language of colonisation, Aboriginal People /Aboriginal Australians/Torres Strait Islanders or as a collective, Indigenous people/Indigenous Australians are the most acceptable terms. Terms like 'Koori' and 'Murri' are fine, but are not-inclusive of all Indigenous people, as they have region affiliations, thus Aboriginal Australian/Aboriginal People/Indigenous People(s/Indigenous Australians, which are inclusive of people from all over the continent, and of the islands, respectively. The curious thing is, the article DOES use these terms, at times. The opening for example,

"Australian Aboriginal people often have their own names for themselves such as Koori or Murri; these names are specific to various regions. See note on nomenclature below.Torres Strait Islanders are an indigenous population, who, although they have some links, are culturally and linguistically distinct from Aboriginial peoples; a term used to embrace both groups is Indigenous Australians"- Yet the article remains titled 'Australian Aborigine', which is more suited to a 19th-century anthropology text-book, than a MODERN encyclopedia.

To be a lot more succint, the phrase 'Aborigines' needs to be dropped from this article, the fact that much of the article has already adopted the terms i'm proposing leads me to wonder why it has not been standardised already? "The Australian Constitution originally did not permit Aborigines to be counted in the census", should be, "The Australian Constitution originally did not permit Indigenous Australians to be counted in the census", Aboriginal people is not specific enough in this case, because it is excludes Torres Strait Islanders who were also overtly excluded from the constitution. Surely these changes are not controversial? If they are, please explain why.

One other point,

"Although prior to colonisation and for a period afterwards, Aboriginal society was accurately Nomadic, they dislike being described as such, since to them, this makes them sound primitive and barbaric." -Why is this in the article? It has no factual basis whatsoever, it's 'comment'/opinion, and highly dubious comment at that.

This is a completely euro-centric fallacy. Aboriginal people were and are not 'nomadic'. Every inch of the Australian continent was the 'country'(divided territory) of over 200 clans/skin groups/kin groups. Nomadic implies that Aboriginal just 'wandered about' from place-to-place, depending on the seasons etc. That is a EUROPEAN fallacy, it was never true. The whole idea of the 'nomadic aborigine' was the creation/ignorance of European observers of Aboriginal society/culture/people, because they didnt find bustling european-style cities they assumed that Aboriginal had no concept of land ownership or tenure. Aboriginal people don't dislike being described as nomadic purely because of the negative connotations that it entails, it's because it's plainly NOT TRUE and the assertion of this idea reflects a complete ignorance of Aboriginal ideas/notions of land-tenure/ownership.

As each territory was divided amongst a clan group, in order to pass through or into another groups country you required their permission, and contradicts a notion of nomadism, which implies that there is no notion of land ownership/tenure. Moreover, territories were clearly defined between groups, members of one group would not just 'accidently' wander into another groups territory as a 'nomad', because they KNEW better. Furthermore Aboriginal people built permanent dwellings and had permanent camps, though the degree varies depending on the geography, some areas were more easily maintained as 'permanent' than others. There has also been some interesting research into an eel farm (think, i cant remember the exact location off the top of my head), that was run by the local people, pre-dating european invasion, so there is evidence of 'farming' in a european-sense, in Australia, by Aboriginal people.

edit: yet another fallacy,

we've gone from the 'nomadic abo' to the 'passive abo', with, "In general, the first European colonisers were welcomed, or at least not opposed, but there were violent conflicts from time to time frequently culminating in murder". I'm sorry, but that's just more WHITE-washing of Indigenous history. SOME Aboriginal people "welcomed" europeans BRIEFLY, most were turned away with spears and stones. As soon as it was made clear that the Europeans intended to stay, things took a major turn for the worse (for europeans), and a sustained Indigenous resistance took place, into the late 19th-century. This article is perpetuating the idea (destroyed by historian Henry Reynolds) that European colonisation/invasion was a 'peaceful' process. The idea itself is rooted in racist European notions of the 'noble savage', and this section needs to be dramatically edited/deleted. I will try and find some sources (something this article clearly lacks is actual source material, most of this is opinion), and put forward a modification.

• I think you make good points, Black Dagger, although I do not entirely agree with them. Last point first, the eel farming you mention: there has been a good deal of recent work, carried out jointly by local people and academics, in the Hamilton district of Victoria. We now know that farming of the Short-finned Eel in that area was well-established and part of a significant trade system that stretched across much of the state. Another place where fish farming was (I seem to remember) a major economic activity was in the Murray-Darling Basin - though this can't have been eel farming, as there are no eels there nor, so far as I know, any record of eel species in that area. Some other fish, no doubt.

Now to terms. I think it is entirely appropriate to use terms for a people that the people in question themselves prefer. Here, however, lies an enormous difficulty. To the best of my knowledge, there is at present no really acceptable term available and suitable for use in all parts of Australia. The nearest-to-acceptable term we have right now is "Australian Aboriginies". (Capitalised correctly, of course.) To substitute "Australian Aboriginals" is simply ungrammatical nonsense. For example, I could sensibly write "Fred is Aboriginal" but cannot pretend that the word is a noun by writing "Fred is an Aboriginal".

I take your point about perjorative use of the term "Aborigine" - but am far from convinced that it is particularly different from any of the several other terms that might be substituted, notably "Aboriginal" - which seems to be equally capable of taking on a perjorative tone, but is also ungramatical - i.e., bad two different ways.

My last point: I think that you read rather too much into people's failure to capitalise correctly. Yes, it is clearly disrespectful and should be corrected by other editors as a matter of routine, but I suspect that the main reason for it is simply ignorance. Most Wikipedia contributors are not Australian and know very little about this place. They are used to using the term "aborigine" in its more general sense - e.g., one might (quite correctly) write "James is a North American aborigine" meaning that he is a Native American. It is only when we are talking about Australian Aboriginal people that the capital letter is appropriate. What I'm saying here, in other words, is that many, perhaps most, of the failures to capitalise correctly here are simple ignorance and habit on the part of people unfamiliar with Australia and its people. Australian contributors, however, should certainly know better. Either way, in this context, any miscapitalised instances of "Australian Aborigine" should be corrected. (If you dig far enough down in the edit history of Australian Aborigine you'll see that I systematically went through this article and all the articles that linked to it maybe a year ago doing just that - but I imagine that it needs doing again by now.)

Tannin 11:54, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

As I have outlined previously in talk above, the term "Indigenous Australians" encompasses more correctly the people described in this article, as it includes Torres Strait Islanders and it is a far less offensive term. To the above references on a growing consensus that I showed I include:

• "The Minister for Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs", Sen. Amanda Vanstone, a woman few would describe as a rabid politically correct lefty..
• Centrelink's index for Indigenous Australians [1]

It's time the name of this page used not just a less racist term of self-identifcation, but the common usage employed by the government. - Aaron Hill 12:04, Apr 26, 2005 (UTC)

Tannin, as regards to the Eel thing, what is your point? I'm not quite sure if you're criticisng or supporting my assertion? Eels or no eels, eel farming or fish farming, it's still 'farming' in an european context, which is thus a negation of terra nullius and the idea that Aboriginal people wandered the continent as 'nomads'.

• To the best of my knowledge, there is at present no really acceptable term available and suitable for use in all parts of Australia. The nearest-to-acceptable term we have right now is "Australian Aboriginies". (Capitalised correctly, of course.) To substitute "Australian Aboriginals" is simply ungrammatical nonsense. For example, I could sensibly write "Fred is Aboriginal" but cannot pretend that the word is a noun by writing "Fred is an Aboriginal". Tannin 11:54, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)*********

• There IS an acceptable term, i thought i made this clear. Aboriginal Australians to describe main-landers, and Indigenous Australians if the reference is meant to include Islanders as well (if not appropiate, then Aboriginal people/Indigenous people). Either of those are completey accepted by Indigenous people, the only term(s) that are contentious are ones which include 'Aborigines', for the reasons i have already outlined. I never suggested the 'ungrammatical nonsense' of Australian Aboriginals, so why you mentioned that i dont know, i also understand what nouns and adjectives are, i

The simple fact is that we need to refer to Indigenous people who are not Torres Straight Islanders. The article should give a full and accurate description of what indigenous peoples' views are on nomenclature, but as far as titling goes, I await a better, neutral term that refers specifically to indigenous Australians who are not Torres Straight Islanders.

• As for farming in a European context, well, I'm unaware of what the scholarly, authoritative view is and I'd love it if anyone could provide us with any idea. I myself was planning to add material on indigenous land use, but the resources I have are somewhat limited. (The Fatal Shore being my main reference). It shouldn't really matter what we call it so long as we characterise it accurately, and mention how patterns of land usage varied according to the terrain involved. Slac speak up! 12:54, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• The simple fact is that we need to refer to Indigenous people who are not Torres Straight Islanders. The article should give a full and accurate description of what indigenous peoples' views are on nomenclature, but as far as titling goes, I await a better, neutral term that refers specifically to indigenous Australians who are not Torres Straight Islanders.

How many times does this point have to be made? Aboriginal Australians or Aboriginal people are accepted, 'neutral' terms that refer specifically to Indigenous people of the mainland, ie. not Torres Strait Islanders. Aboriginal Australians, Aboriginal people, this SHOULD be a non-issue --Black Dagger 13:22, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

• I'm afraid it's simply not true to say that 'Aboriginal' is not a noun. On ABC radio a few minutes ago I heard an eminent barrister talking about 'Aboriginals'. If it enjoys widespread usage amongst native speakers of English as a noun, then it is a noun. despite its etymology. Many Aboriginal people talk about 'Aboriginals', and I think it's quite acceptable to talk about 'Australian Aboriginals'. However, I agree with Black Dagger above, that 'Aboriginal people' or 'Aboriginal Australians' are well-known, widely used neutral terms for referring to indigenous Australians other than Torres Strait Islanders (although it should be noted that Tiwi people think of themselves as different in much the same way as TSI do, and I'm not sure what the preference of Tasmanian Aboriginal people is).

I also have to say that I don't like the 'note on nomenclature' much. The central claim, that Aboriginal people had no name for themselves, is demonstrably false. It is true however that many of the names referred primarily to languages, and only secondarily to the speakers. Also, to say they never encountered outsiders is very ethnocentric. Surely there were encounters between members of different groups?

--Dougg 08:08, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

Slavery

[Slavery was illegal..] So was homosexuality in Tasmania, until very recently, but there was/are still gay people in tasmania, despite the fact that it was 'technically' illegal. Slavery was very much alive and well in N.Queensland, the fact that some people were forced into work, which was not paid, qualifies as slavery, whether it was 'legal' or not, it happened, and was NOT actively discouraged by the colonial government. The point is whether or not people were treated as slaves, not whether there was a 'let's ensalve the darkies act' 1864 (cth). Conditions did not 'virtually amount to slavery', actual slave conditions existed, not EVERYWHERE, but they did exist. --Black Dagger 13:48, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The article should reflect that indigenous people in many places had no control over their labour, and were often paid inadequate or non-existent wages. If the article does state that, then it can't be faulted from a factual point of view. If it says that, it shouldn't matter what we call it, since the facts speak for themselves. You make the point yourself that a systematic, legally endorsed slavery regime did not exist nationwide. Given that many of our readers are from the US where such a thing did exist, it is preferable in the interests of accuracy to avoid giving such an impression. Slac speak up! 21:17, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

"As large sheep and cattle stations came to dominate outback Australia, Aboriginal women, men and children became a significant source of labour (primarily as domestic servants or station-hands), sometimes on a voluntary basis, but often under conditions that amounted to virtual slavery."

The first part of the article mentions the massacre of the aboriginies culling their population down by killing off an estimated 90% then the 20th Century section goes on to claim that Australian aboriginies were a significant source of labour, these two facts are quite contradictory when you consider that the population of the settlers would have by then vastly outnumbered the aboriginies of the area.

Jachin 22:54, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Nomadism

Okay, re this word 'nomadism'. It's silly trying to capture a large variety of human lifestyles with one word. To many people 'nomadism' means to wander around without a home base. I have heard it said (and seen it written) that Aboriginal people were nomadic, therefore they would wander anywhere in Australia without caring where they were. This is simply not true. As best we understand it, in pre-European Australia (if I may use this term to refer to the post-1788 situation), many Aboriginal people did move around, but normally within a given 'home' area. There was much variation in how much people moved around, depending on seasons, environmental conditions, etc. Some Aboriginal people moved around a lot, across a large range (ie Western Desert people), while some moved around relatively little (ie people in Cape York, or the Yolngu of north-east Arnhem Land). Using the word 'nomadic' really tells the reader nothing useful, and I advocate that it not be used, unless heavily qualified. Dougg 04:47, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

• A lot can still be said on pre-colonisation lifestyles, etc. Hopefully we can work on improving it. Slac speak up! 21:17, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

I think anyone who thinks 'nomadic' stipulates wandering around without caring where one is would be mildly retarded and probably incapable of reading this text to begin with. Nomadic is understood as member of a group of people who have no fixed home and move according to the seasons from place to place in search of food, water, and grazing land, which is exactly what the Australian aboriginies were.

I think the term nomad applies perfectly to the aboriginal people as it does to desert nomads through to Mongols, if the people in question accept the term as a valid nomenclature, it's not up to us to interpret it as offensive or derogatory.

Jachin 22:59, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Languages

The second para says that Torres Strait Islanders are '... culturally and linguistically distinct from Aboriginal peoples'. This is only half correct. There are, linguistically, two main groups in the Torres Straits: in the west there live speakers of an Australian language (one name for which is Kala Lagaw Ya), a member of the Pama-Nyungan family (the family of languages which covers most of Australia's mainland); in the east are speakers of a Papuan language called Meriam Mer (there are various spellings). The former group have close linguistic ties with 'Aboriginal people' while the latter have close linguistic ties with the Papuan people of the nearby coast of PNG.

A bit further down it is said that there were about 200 languages. Actually, it is generally accepted that there were more like 250, or even more. Dougg 05:01, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

Moving the page (again)

I'm going to propose moving the page again, because the current title is potentially offensive, and because it doesn't reflect official usage. I suggest a choice of two new titles, Indigenous Australians (which could also cover Indigenous Tasmanians and Torres Strait Islanders), or Aboriginal Australians. The former is the term in official usage at DIMIA, at various educational institutions (eg the Centre for Indigenous Education, and at international organisations (eg the United Nations). The latter uses the adjectival form, and is consistent with phrases such as "Aboriginal people" and "Aboriginal communities". Currently there are ten different phrasings which redirect here. At the very least it would be good to establish a consensus one way or another as to which term is best and then start updating articles to reflect that usage. --bainer (talk) 9 July 2005 12:39 (UTC)

My preference is Indigenous Australians at the top level, but there will still need to be an article on Australian Aborigines which is the common referent to the indigenous peoples of the mainland and Tasmania Paul foord 9 July 2005 12:59 (UTC)

Participation in crime?

I've just reverted an anonymous edit which added that Aboriginal participation in serious crime is higher than the total population. I would like to see a sentence like that substantiated before being in the article. While I believe Aborigines may be over-represented in jails, I don't think it's due to serious crimes. Anyone with references? --ScottDavis 00:59, 12 July 2005 (UTC)

Problems with Aboriginal Society

Is someone going to add discussion on the problems with Aboriginal society in Australia, ie: high rates of incarceration, alcoholism, petrol sniffing, high illiteracy, high unemployment - or is the bleeding-heart viewpoint only allowed to be presented to the world at large? (I haven't created an account yet, but plan on doing so)

Wiipedia as a campaign platform for One Nation propaganda? Expect strong NPOV opposition and subsequent failure. (Unsigned, I don't need my talk page to get spammed by Nazis).

How is truth and facts propaganda? Just look at the recent attention in the media (as of 12th August) of the petrol sniffing problem in Alice Springs? All the problems I mentioned above, the stats which are way higher than mainstream Australia, ie: health, education, employment, crime, alcoholism, petrol sniffing, etc... How is that propaganda? Please don't let your ideology bury your head in the sand and neglect the sad state of affairs that Aboriginal Australia is in. The world at large should know the plight that these people face, rather than the bleeding heart, social-engineer, do-gooder view. Face reality.

Go ahead.--Ezeu 00:48, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

There's no need to resort to name calling like Nazis, Bleeding Hearts or anything else. This is incredibly silly! I don't think that mentioning problems that do exist is necessarily contrary to a bleeding heart viewpoint, nor is it necessarily One Nation propaganda - depending on how it is written. It is a fact that indigenous communities all over the world experience substance abuse, unemployment disease and mortality rates higher than the settler populations. This is acknowledged by settler populations and Indigenous people themselves and there are often calls for these situations to be addressed. Sometimes they are, and sometimes they are ignored. - I don't see anything wrong with stating that these issues exist. People need to be aware of them and both governments and communities need to be doing something to address them. I don't see how a so called 'bleeding heart' would disagree with that, and I don't see how its 'One Nation propaganda' - hence I see no need to name calling. Perhaps we should use the heading Problems Facing Indigenous Communities rather than Problems with Aboriginal Society to try to be slightly less confronting. It might also be an idea to post any proposed text on the talk page before including it in the article as it appears that it might be controversial. (14 Aug 2005. 13:15 AEST).

Good idea for the name change of the section (Problems Facing Indigenous Communities). Like all entries in Wikipedia, this needs to be objective, not subjective.

Funnily enough, I was having a discussion with a group the other day on how difficult it is to obtain unbiased (is there such a thing?) information on the problems facing indigenous societies, and I promised I'd start putting some stuff in Wikipedia on this if it wasn't already there. And then I saw your note on this discussion page! So it seems there are at least two of us planning to put in some material like this. My goal, in the best wikipedia tradition, would be to write something that either John Howard or Noel Pearson could read without objection, stating the problems, statistics, and attempts at solution, without preaching and without politicking. Is this possible? So we might, for example, have a subsection on aboriginal heath, document the problems, statistics on child mortality, etc, and then document what governments and NPOs have done to try to address the problem. Answering why the problem still hasn't been solved would probably be beyond the scope of the article - I don't think anybody knows the answer. Does this seem like a reasonable start? Rayd8 22:28, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

Rants

There are 400,000 blacks in Australia and 300,000 have been assimlated - no connection to traditonal ways. Zero. Most are now of mixed decent and 69% are either living with or married to an non-aborignal.

Where is this information in the article?

Where does it say that aborignality as we now it has no future?—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 203.51.88.184 (talk • contribs) 19:46, 18 August 2005.

This is an encyclopædia. We document fact, not speculate - especially not on the basis of POV, as you seem to be proposing.--Cyberjunkie | Talk 10:23, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

I'm a white Australian with no connection to traditional white ways (serfdom and subsistence farming). What's your point? --Scott Davis ^Talk 12:27, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

Self-denomination

I would suggest that all aboriginal tribes knew of the existence of other humans. In fact thats what 'yolgnu' and 'gudjitmara' (amongst many others)means-- 'human being' The guff introduced by Adam Carr about them not having a collective name for humans is pure invention and without any support(as usual). It needs removing and rewriting. Eric A. Warbuton —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Eric A. Warbuton (talk • contribs) --Scott Davis ^Talk.

Did he mean they don't have a collective name for humans, or specifically for Australian Aborigines (as a whole, but excluding people from elsewhere)? --Scott Davis ^Talk 13:46, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

It makes no difference. For the yolgnu they considered themselves true humans -there were other people but a sort of hierarchy existed with the yolgnu at the top very very similar to british western view of the world actually. Eric A. Warbuton

Koori redirects to Australian Aborigine

Hottentot posed the question (in his edit summary) of why Koori and Yamaji were not wikilinks. Presumably the answer was that there aren't articles for them. Koori is a blue link, but it's a redirect back to this page. Does anybody know enough to write more than the one-sentence stub I could on Koori, and stop it being a redirect? --Scott Davis ^Talk 11:36, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Created Koori stub. --Ezeu 22:14, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Homo Erectus

I read somewhere that it has been proposed that Australian Aborigines may have some genetic admixture of Homo Erectus. This would have putatively come from some residual population in Indonesia or Australia encountereed by the modern Homo Sapiens during their migration to the area. This is prompted in part by some physionomic characteristics of many aborigines (brow ridgs, large teeth, etc.) which more resemble archaic hominids and are different than the aborigines proposed ancestral populations in South India and Indonesia. I know this is the area of the world that homo erectus would likely have survived the longest on account of its archipelago geography (the "Hobit" miniaturized variant recently discovered supports this). Does anyone have any information on this? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.166.238.6 (talk • contribs) 08:13, 3 September 2005.

All Homo sapiens would be an 'admixture' of H.erectus. Your ideas would presuppose the existence of pure bred H.sapiens which is genetically impossible. All this talk belongs in a discussion on greyhound breeding-not people. When man arrived on the Aust. continent he was one of us. Personally I believe that the 'business suit' is evidence of genetic degradation-but I have no evidence Eric A. Warbuton 03:44, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

Indigeneous vs. Aboriginal (again)

I'm about to add some material on indigenous Australians to wikipedia, but first I'd like to run a question past this discussion group. At the risk of boring people, I'd like to see if there is a consensus on acceptable terminology.

First, I think we all agree that the best way of referring to people is in a way that doesn't lump them together at a homogeneous group, or have any derogatory overtones, by using specific terms such as Koori, Yolngu, etc. However, that isn't always practical, and we need a collective term for both indigenous and non-indigenous people that can be used in a sentence such as "Indigenous Australians have a lower life expectancy than non-Indigenous Australians". "Indigenous Australian" works fine, but is a heck of a mouthful if it's used many times in a paragraph. "Aborigine" also works well, has both a noun and a verb form, and is easier to say, but I'm told that some consider it to have colonial overtones. I'm not sure why, since "aboriginal" and "indigenous" have essentially the same meaning. Furthermore, aboriginal has a noun form ("aborigine") whereas indigenous doesn't (other than the long-winded "Indigenous Australian"). So aboriginal/aborigine would be preferable, provided it doesn't cause offence.

Although I'm from an anglo-saxon descent, I'm privileged to have several aboriginal friends, and my work brings me in to contact with many aboriginal communities, from SE Australia right up to NT. No aborigine that I know takes offence at the word "aborigine". Please note that I'm not accusing anyone of misrepresentation, it's just that I don't know where the objection to the word "aborigine" comes from. Can someone please help me there?

On a related subject, how should we refer to non-aborigines in a discussion such as life expectancy of aborigines? People frequently use words like "European", "Anglo-Saxon", or "white", but they all seem to exclude people such as my colleagues of asian descent. Has anybody a better suggestion that "non-aborigine"?

Rayd8 01:36, 2005 September 10 (UTC)

My opinion is that "Aborigines" (capital A) is acceptable, and is the subset of "indigenous Australians" that excludes Torres Strait Islanders. I think if you want to group Australians descended from all races other than Aborigines and TSI, you're stuck with "non-indigenous Australians". --Scott Davis ^Talk 03:09, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

Depending on the context, "settler population" can also be used to describe non-indigenous Australians/newcomers. I've been told that Indigenous should be written with a capital 'I' when referring to a people, just as 'Aboriginal' should be written with a capital A when referring to Australian Aboriginies (as opposed to small a aboriginal to refer to indigenous people generally of any area - be they from North America, NZ, Japan, or anywhere else).

Regarding the other question of using 'Indigenous Australians' or Aboriginal people, you need to think about what you are trying to say. Are you talking about statistics or facts which refer to all Indigenous Australians (including Torres Strait Islanders) - such as health statistics, or something which refers specifically to Aboriginal people, such as "the Aboriginal languages of the central desert". It might be a bit inflexible and seem like a mouthful, but if you want to be accurate, you should use the correct terms in the corrct contexts. Adz 23:50, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

Many thanks for those helpful comments. Clearly "Aborigine" is inappropriate when including Torres Strait Islanders. And thanks for reminding me to use upper case A. But from comments so far, I see nothing to exclude the use of "Aborigine" as a generic term when referring to groups that happen not to include Torres Strait Islanders, such as "The Aborigines in the central desert region urgently need improved access to healthcare." (Note that e.g. Arrente would not be appropriate here, as I am referring to several language groups.) And yet there is a common perception that some find such a use offensive in some way, although I haven't seen that perception properly sourced. Rayd8 22:59, 2005 September 11 (UTC)

I've just had someone change the word "Aboriginal" to "Indigenous" with respect to Canterbury, New South Wales. It was not TSI people who lived in the Sydney basin, so why bother? As for comparative statistics, the comparison is usually with the "general population." It's also possible to construct phrases like "relative to other Australians" or "compared to the rest of the population" --Dlatimer 06:55, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

Map

File:Australia map showing location of some aboriginal communities.JPG

The reason why I only included those communities in the map is because they are the ones which already have articles in Wikipedia. I can copy all the communities from the [2] map, but this has many differences with the [3] map, and some communities aren't even mentioned in either, or a different name is given. I don't think an "all or nothing" attitude is very useful here - its a start, and people can add to and reupload the image later. Cfitzart 14:55, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

I believe AIATSIS allows its map to be used and so I understand that map could be uploaded. The advantages are that at least it covers all Australia and is authoratative. I think where communities aren't mentioned it is because they are seen as part of a larger community that is mentioned . Furthermore, the AIATSIS map is based on language rather than tribes and the two categorisations are similar but not synonomous.--User:AYArktos | Talk 22:20, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

AIATSIS is a government website, so wouldn't the map be PD? --Hottentot

Thats only US government images that are PD I think. The permission to use the map form is here: [4] (pdf). I emailed them a request to use it, it says they take 8-10 days to reply.. Cfitzart 00:31, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

You need to get them to release the image under a free licence, compatible with the GFDL. Releasing it to WP with any other conditions is not good enough [5]. Also, since the criteria for online use include whether the site is password protected, whether it has limited/restricted access and whether the material will be taken down after a certain time, I doubt they'd grant permission anyway. --bainer (talk) 04:11, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

While the map that was inserted was problematic (particularly the Luritja and Pitjantjatjara areas) it is silly to remove it for not (as Thebainer says) 'showing all Indigenous nations or we have none at all' because this is an impossible ask. Every such map ever made of indigenous Australian groups has problems, and the Horton map (the one from AIATSIS that people have been talking about) is no exception. Unfortunately it's not clear what data it was based on because the hard copies of the underlying dataset are not available. Some of its problems appear to derive from reliance on Tindale's (1974) map. The main problem is probably a result of the fact that, in many parts of Australia, there are no clear 'tribes' or 'nations' (I'm not even sure exactly what those words are supposed to mean in the Australian context). I might be biased (being a linguist) but it seems to me the most doable map is one that attempts to show all of the indigenous languages of Australia, but even that has problems as it can be very difficult to distinguist between different languages and dialects of a single language. I think, if it's possible, it would be reasonable to put the Horton map on the page, but it should have a caveat warning that it is only an approximation and contains errors. There has been talk at AIATSIS about a new, improved, edition of the map, but I don't know when (or if) it'll ever get done. Dougg 00:18, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Showing all groups might not be necessary, but any map should show as many as possible, even if they don't have articles. The AIATSIS map is currently the most authoritative source, so any map should probably be based on that data. --bainer (talk) 04:11, 10 October 2005 (UTC)