Does NAIDOC Week do anything to promote integration?

[old man emu]

Integration:  the process of becoming part of a group of people:

When I lived in the city, I was supportive of the Aboriginal cause for equality between Aboriginal people and the other people inhabiting and making up this Nation. For years I had been subjected to the "Poor bugger, me" rhetoric.

 

But now I live out of the city, on the borders of the traditional lands of the  Wiradjuri, Kamilaroi & Wailwan nations. Do I see any efforts at integration? Not by the Aboriginal people, and only by people like me who grew up in the cities. Those non-aboriginals born and bred here still won't have a bar of it.

 

Does NAIDOC help integration? Not that I can see. It is simply a week of expressions of differences. Many Aboriginal people have either made a go of integration, while not abandoning their heritage. But around here, it's an excuse to complain that nothing is being done for Aboriginal people. There's more government money spent on projects for aboriginal people than for anyone else in the community.

 

What I find ironic is that ABC radio in its Classics programs is highlighting music from modern Aboriginal composers and singers. I hear songs sung in the language of the people of, say, Arnhem Land, and I wonder if , like me, the Wiradjuri, Kamilaroi & Wailwan people near me have any clue as the what is being said. It's like asking a Greek fisherman to understand the songs of a Finnish caribou herder. It seems that if an Aboriginal composer, who has studied the forms and structure of European music, adds a didgeridoo and clap sticks to a piece, then it is universally Aboriginal, But the didgeridoo was only ever used in far northern Australia in pre-European times.

 

 

The suggestion here is that the first didgeridoos were of bamboo; and that because of the availability of bamboo in the north-western region of the Northern Territory, the first didgeridoo players may well have belonged to that region. The fact that bamboo didgeridoos were quite common among northerly groups in the Northern Territory during the last century is confirmed by the word 'bamboo' which is still used in the lingua franca by some Aborigines when referring to the instrument, though 'didgeridoo' may be gaining ground.

 

in the south east of Australia, where in fact Didgeridoo has only recently been introduced, the international dissemination of the "taboo" that women must not touch or play the didgeridoo  results from the myth's compatibility with the commercial agendas of New Age niche marketing.

[Yenn]

It is all smoke and mirrors. I notice that the TV often has words to the effect that the ABC or SBS acknowledge the local aboriginal tribes. but what does that mean. In my opinion it is just to pretend that the non aborigines care about the culture of the aborigines, while they really don't care a damn.

Personally I don't either. The aborigines had a culture I suppose, but what it was I don't know. All over the world there are tribes that have been displaced and then displaced again. What we really need is to all get along together rather than one group expecting handouts and respect for beeing the losers. Rather as Israel has been since its inception.

[spacesailor]

Yenn

Hence the Need for that One language for communication.

French to be the Second language spoken in France. 

English the same Second language  spoken in England.

AND

The same through out this world.

If the scientists have made " Esperanto " . We Should try to Comunicate with it.

spacesailor

[old man emu]

46 minutes ago, Yenn said:

words to the effect that the ABC or SBS acknowledge the local aboriginal tribes.

For one thing, it's divisive. It basically says that you are not indigenous and can never be.  The whole "Welcome to Country" bit is as Tony Abbott said, ""a genuflection to political correctness" . Strewth, I'm quoting M Rabbott in a positive way!!.

 

I was born and raised in an area of Sydney known as the Sutherland Shire, on the part that was originally occupied by the Gweagal clan of the Dharawal people. The Gweagal men were the first to meet up with Cook on the shores of Botany Bay. They told him and his mates to get back on their ship and bugger off. Cook and his landing party attempted to communicate their desire for water and offered the Aboriginal warriors gifts of nails and beads. The two warriors launched stones and spears at the landing party which responded with small shot from their muskets. One of the warriors was wounded and they both retreated, leaving behind spears and a shield. No native haka there.

 

 Ernie Dingo and Richard Walley developed a ceremony to welcome a group of Māori artists who were participating in the Perth International Arts Festival. The welcome, extended on behalf of the Noongar people, was intended to mirror the visitors' own traditions, while incorporating elements of Aboriginal culture. Walley recalled: "Māori performers were uncomfortable performing their cultural act without having been acknowledged or welcomed by the people of the land".

 

The ceremony has attracted criticism from some politicians, historians and commentators including Bess Price, Keith Windschuttle, Andrew Bolt and Bill Hassell. Critics consider such ceremonies to be a form of tokenism, and claim that they do not reflect any element of traditional Aboriginal culture.  Price, a Warlpiri woman and former parliamentarian, characterised Welcomes as "not particularly meaningful to traditional people". Windschuttle calls them "an invented tradition". 

 

[willedoo]

21 minutes ago, spacesailor said:

If the scientists have made " Esperanto " . We Should try to Comunicate with it.

spacesailor

Esperanto never really took off. I recon there would be more drunks in the world speaking shorthand than there would be people speaking Esperanto.

[octave]

I really don't personally see the problem here.   Many groups in Australia have their own identity and have their week of celebration or recognition weather it be the Jewish community or any other group.   I cant see that getting rid of NAIDOC week will solve any problems. 

 

Recently I flew to Adelaide and on landing we were welcomed by the cabin crew to Adelaide,  Kaurna country.   I went to school in South Australia and spent the first 17 years of my life there and at no point in school was I taught any history form before white settlement.   I can never remember any discussion of anything Aboriginal.  I do remember in early primary school in my social studies book an line drawing of a group of Aborigines happily waving at the arriving Endeavor.     

 

The history I did learn was of heroic English men who were too good to be true.   Every countries history has its embarrassing bits.  We should not wallow in the bad bits but nor should we sweep them under the carpet. 

 

About 20 years ago or so when worked in Canberra I was involved in a NAIDOC week musical collaboration with some Aboriginal musicians, it was anything but divisive.

 

Looking at a list of NAIDOC week events  https://www.naidoc.org.au/local-events/local-naidoc-week-events  I cant see anything outrageous.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Bruce Tuncks]

I grew up in Alice Springs along with lots of real aborigines. There were no stolen ones among them, but us kids thought that some of the aborigines had been badly treated before about 1960.

The story was that current aborigines owe their handouts to the Hungarian uprising of 1954... all of the west got up in the UN to denounce Russia. But when Australia did the same, the Russians were ready with a list of statistics which "proved" that the Australian aborigines were worse off than any ethnic group in the Soviet Union.

Apparently Australia spoiled the whole attack, and they were treated as pariahs as a result.

Only as a result of this were aborigines even accepted as being citizens.

Prior to this, I well remember Albert Namatjira being treated badly, let alone all the gins who were dressed in flour bags. But in grade 4, I sat next to a nice kid called Walter who hailed from Boroloola. Walter used to go home for school holidays, so he was treated well and it was like he was at a boarding school.  So were many of the other black kids. The official policy was "assimilation" and we were not racist that I noticed. Well not at school anyway.

[old man emu]

2 hours ago, octave said:

it was anything but divisive.

Like every group, there are positive people and negative people. We hear more from the negative side than from the positive.

[spacesailor]

The ' positive ' people have nothing to whinge about! ,

The negative need oiling for the ' squeaky wheel ' problems. 

If a negative  dies for lack of oil.

The positive will say " more manure  " to make the garden grow.

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

21 hours ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

Only as a result of this were aborigines even accepted as being citizens.

Is this in itself not a blight on our history?

[old man emu]

On 05/07/2022 at 5:52 PM, Bruce Tuncks said:

we were not racist that I noticed. Well not at school anyway.

Kids are colour blind until after puberty.

[spacesailor]

Our governments ARE.

spacesailor

[facthunter]

Don't forget it was not long ago women got the vote and some lost their jobs IF they married. Nev