Merlan 2005 Aboriginal Movements Australia

AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
Indigenous Movements
in Australia
Francesca Merlan
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2005.34:473-494. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
School of Archaeology and Anthropology, Australian National University, Canberra

ACT 0200, Australia; email: Francesca.Merlan@anu.edu.au
by Northeastern University on 04/06/14. For personal use only.
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. Key Words

2005. 34:473–94
Indigenous-settler relations, action, social transformation politics,
The Annual Review of
Anthropology is online at religion, reconciliation
anthro.annualreviews.org
Abstract
doi: 10.1146/
annurev.anthro.34.081804.120643 The metaphor of “movement” has been applied in limited measure
Copyright
c 2005 by to indigenous action in Australia, and more to recent events (∼1960s
Annual Reviews. All rights and afterwards) than to earlier ones. This review characterizes move-
reserved ment in social-semiotic terms that allow consideration of such a no-
0084-6570/05/1021- tion over a longer time span and range of social circumstances than
0473$20.00 is usual in Australianist literature. Examination of a limited number
of relatively well-documented cases from differing times and places
reveals differences in the grounds of action and kinds of objectifica-
tion that movements appear to have involved and also a continuing
shift toward shared indigenous-nonindigenous understandings and
forms of activism in the face of persisting social differentiation. The
arguably limited impact of indigenous movements needs to be con-
sidered in the light of systematic constraints on them.
473
AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
tion of inauthenticity of action on this account

Contents (see e.g., Goodall 1996, p. 274), I take these
kinds of interaction as central subject matter
INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 474
in my account of indigenous mobilization and
MOVEMENT? IDEAS ABOUT
the moral and political terms in which it has
INDIGENOUS RESPONSE . . . . 475
proceeded.
MOBILIZATIONS: CASES IN
Any properly analytical treatment of
TIME AND SPACE . . . . . . . . . . . . . 476
movement must show how that notion is re-
Kurangarra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 476
lated to broader concepts of social action and
Jinimin-Jesus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 477
what is particular about it. Movement is not,
THE ADJUSTMENT
in the first instance, a category of critical social
MOVEMENT IN ARNHEM
analysis but a term of everyday language famil-
LAND . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 477
iar to us from our social experience (women’s
FROM PROTECTIONISM TO
movement, peace movement, etc.). It focuses

PROGRESSIVISM:
attention on social change and transformation
INDIGENOUS ACTIVISM IN
as purportedly distinct from ordinary social
THE AFTERMATH OF THE
reproduction. It overlaps in social science lit-

“SECOND DISPOSSESSION” . . 478
erature with such categories as protest, mo-
DISADVANTAGE, LAND
bilization, collective action, and many oth-
TENURE, AND DEFERRED
ers. Given our familiarity with movement as a
JUSTICE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 482
term of ordinary language, some of this liter-
RECONCILIATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 485
ature presupposes a great deal about the na-
CONCLUSIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 488
ture and objects of social movements (for im-
portant accounts, see Blumer 1951, Calhoun
1993, della Porta & Diani 1998 and ref-
erences therein, Gusfield 1981). Considera-
INTRODUCTION tion of what may usefully be included in the
The indigenous people of Australia include category of indigenous movements, however,
Aborigines and Islanders (of the Torres Strait). cannot presuppose such familiarity.
Together, they comprise an estimated 2% of Movement is taken to involve (a) interac-
the total population. tion among a plurality of actors and types of
Although indigenous people are a small actors (variously dispersed or solidary); (b) el-
minority, Australian indigenous issues tend to ements of meaning and action that are to some
have a high profile nationally and internation- extent grounded in, but also differ from, ex-
ally. Have “movements” been a form of ac- isting cultural norms and ordered forms of
tion over which indigenous actors exert con- social behavior (see Gusfield 1981, p. 325;
trol, through which indigenous interests are Burridge 1969; also della Porta & Diani 1998,
defined and satisfied? The aim of this review p. 51); and (c) a focus on action as out of the
is to illustrate the range of action that might ordinary in contrast with the everyday, under-
be considered movements, before a return is stood as such by participants (and often, also
made to this question in conclusion. by others). Such out-of-the-ordinary action
Indigeneity (like all identity categories) is inherently associated with efforts to build
does not designate a fixed entity but sug- up a shared space, or common vantage point
gests processes of interaction and differen- (Taylor 1985, p. 273), across felt, sometimes
tiation. Indigenous mobilization in Australia explicitly identified discontinuities. Move-
has involved not only indigenous but also, ment thus involves an orientation of a commu-
in fundamental ways, nonindigenous actors nicatively purposive kind. This is not to assert
and forms of action. Rejecting any imputa- that actors have a sovereign self-consciousness
474 Merlan
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concerning what they are doing and their con- dramatically reduced everywhere by disease
ditions. Nor need we suppose that the under- and violence), and technological disadvantage
standings and descriptions guiding actors nec- meant that, considered in broad terms, Abo-
essarily involve notions of achieving specific riginal presence offered limited impediment
kinds of change or transformation; in partic- to settler occupation of the continent, com-
ular, that action should be undertaken in re- pared with, for example, the occupations of
lation to some objectified notion of society or North America and New Zealand. In many
social order. In some cases, this may be true; ways, Aborigines rendered considerable assis-
in other cases, it is not. Extraordinary, com- tance to settlement and not only opposition.
municatively purposive action may be based Consistent with the third emphasis, so-
in a wide range of modes of objectification of cial anthropologists’ attention devoted to tra-
the self and of situation. ditional life and institutions until recently
took precedence over any explicit scholarly
development of understandings concerning

MOVEMENT? IDEAS ABOUT indigenous-nonindigenous interactions in the
INDIGENOUS RESPONSE colonization and settlement of the continent.
Until fairly recently, many views of Aus- There were some notable exceptions. Elkin’s
tralian indigenous people and their cultures (1951) phase model of Aboriginal response to
tended to overlook or downplay degrees settlement (approximately contemporaneous
of creativity in their responses to colonization with similar acculturation models elsewhere,
and continuing settlement such as might be e.g., in Americanist anthropology) at least
implied by the notion of movement. Several accorded significance to interaction between
factors appear to explain its limited applica- settlers and indigenous people, and thus im-
tion. First was a widespread view of Aborigi- proved on the prevailing romantic dualism be-
nal social orders as crushed by colonial impact tween the preservation of traditional life ver-
(Sharp 1952; Burridge 1969, p. 39; Rowley sus destruction of it. Hartwig’s (1965) Marxist
1970; McMichael 1984, p. 42). Second, and account of Central Australia shed light on the
seemingly in contradiction with the above, conditions of Aboriginal-settler interaction.
were notions of social orders as unchanging Berndt (1969) reflected on “The Concept
[Charlesworth (1986 [1984], p. 383) terms this of ‘Protest’ within an Australian Aboriginal
the “standard view”] (Bos 1988, p. 423). Third Context.”
was the valuation of social orders mainly to the He posited not the continuous existence of
extent that they are thought to remain tra- protest but rather its gradual and late emer-
ditional or distinct from the dominant soci- gence in Australian Aborigines’ responses to
ety and its subcultures (Jones & Hill-Burnett change and disorder resulting from the im-
1982, p. 228; Merlan 1998; Povinelli 2002). pacts of outside settlement. He found that
Consideration of the social complexity of “external intervention and stimulus” (1969,
indigenous response has eventually shown the p. 39) had everywhere been fundamental to
inadequacy of any simple resistance position protest and described Aborigines as heard in-
in response to earlier views of societal collapse directly, their voices amplified through exter-
(compare Lippmann 1981; further on the in- nal agents (p. 40). Noting great situational dif-
adequacy of traditional models of resistance, ferences in the terms of Aboriginal people’s
see Merlan 1978; Rowse 1987; Cowlishaw socialization and understanding, he charac-
1999, pp. 67–71). But there is no disagree- terized some more-activist Aborigines as “for
ment about the drastic character of long-term all practical purposes Australian-Europeans,”
outcomes of settler colonialization. Loose, seeking common identity in the Aboriginal
noncorporate Aboriginal social organization, past, this trend itself a “kind of social move-
limited Aboriginal numbers (undoubtedly ment” (p. 41). He concluded that once people
www.annualreviews.org • Indigenous Australia 475

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“see themselves in relation to others, once interior desert. Wooden ochred boards were
they are in a position to compare, the way be- transferred (see Petri 1954, pp. 256–68, and
comes wide open for the kind of protest I have Lommel 1969, pp. 165–78, for a detailed de-
been talking about” (p. 42). scription of ritual). A final dance featured a
Berndt saw “non-Westernized” Aborig- white desert ghost figure called Djanba. He
ines as unable to express opposition to eco- was understood to be Leprosy, and the ku-
nomic, racial, and cultural oppression directly rangarra boards in general to be charged with
and Aborigines who had become activist as in- the powerful new ailments, such as leprosy,
authentic. Both positions would attract con- syphilis, and other venereal diseases, that were
siderable criticism today. However, a sym- ravaging the Aboriginal population. Djanba
pathetic (perhaps anachronistic) reading of was said to live in a corrugated iron house
Berndt might refigure his argument this way: and to be able to infect people with syphilis
that protest emerges not simply as means to a and leprosy by means of little sticks that had
set of ends in the defense of Aboriginal inter- lain in weeds near it. People who have ku-
ests, but as part of the very substance of social rangarra boards are also able to infect others,
transformation of Aborigines’ situation and whereas kurangarra initiates were thought to
self-objectification. Aboriginal protest arises gain immunity. The distribution of boards was
from the felt burdens of marginalization and imagined to be carried out using airplanes and
oppression particular to indigenous social sit- steamers. The ghost asked for remuneration
uations, but styles of activism and ideas that in sugar and bread (not indigenous foods) for
inform it arise in interaction with, and come showing the boards to other ghosts.
to share much with, forms of thought and ac- Cult activity was carried out in pidgin En-
tion central to the Australian socio-political glish. Place-based like other ritual, kurangarra
mainstream. differed in that it had to be performed in the
vicinity of European settlement. Its organiza-
tion was modeled on European practice: di-
MOBILIZATIONS: CASES IN rected by a boss with powers to infect as well
TIME AND SPACE as heal, the boards were stored by a clerk,
A few relatively full descriptions suggest in- feasts announced by a mailman, and order and
digenous modes of address to settler occupa- discipline were maintained by policemen. Re-
tion, disease, and disorder framed (and de- gional myth variants emphasized a reversal of
scribed) more as ritual action (cult) than as the position of men and women and the arrival
ethical or practical rationalist discourse and of the eschaton as the result of transmission of
action (protest). With some caution, the in- kurangarra boards by Djanba’s wife (Lommel
stances of Kurangarra and Jinimin-Jesus may 1950, p. 24).
be taken as exemplary. Kurangarra was not overtly hostile to
whites. It did not explicitly propose revitaliza-
tion of Aboriginal practice. It objectified de-
Kurangarra cline dramatically (in the dances), not verbally
The most portentous events of the first pre– (as far as evidence goes). It was not infused
World War II period of fieldwork in north- with any Christian elements. Like many Abo-
western Australia of German ethnographers riginal rituals, it connected people over long
Helmut Petri and Andreas Lommel (Lommel distances. No explicit notion of an imperme-
1950, 1952, 1969; Petri 1954; Petri & Petri- able boundary between Aborigines and whites
Odermann 1970, 1988; Beinssen-Hesse 1991 was evident. Elements of settler culture, both
on the facilitating Frobenius Expeditions and material and social, such as these which had
contrasting emphases in the resulting studies) been apprehended were incorporated into the
involved the arrival of kurangarra from the ritual. (For reports of the fate of kurangarra,
476 Merlan
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see Lommel 1969, p. 178; Wilson 1961, p. 47; plex, balanced by a hopeful imagery and
Swain 1993, p. 244.) In these various respects, rhetoric. There is also imaginative appropri-
kurangarra may be briefly contrasted with the ation of valuable things for an Aboriginal fu-
Jinimin-Jesus complex. ture. At the foot of a mountain range southeast
of Fitzroy Crossing was said to be a large
stone ship sent by Jinimin-Jesus from heaven.
Jinimin-Jesus Informants said the ship had been in this place
In September 1963, Petri learned that a since the Dreaming (i.e., attributed the same
cult complex known as wanadjara had been constancy to it as Aborigines typically do to
brought to the border area between Western other meaningful features of landscape). Af-
Australia and the Northern Territory. Here, ter the annihilation of Europeans, this ship
it was said, Jinimin (also called Jesus) had ap- was to serve as an ark for Aborigines. Filled
peared to Aborigines about to conduct ritual with gold and crystal, it was to be the basis of
on a missionary station. their future well-being.

Petri & Petri-Odermann (1988, p. 394; Petri & Petri-Odermann (1988, p. 394)
1970) characterize this complex as millenar- suggest that a transition to an aggressive mood
ian in aim, syncretistic, and with distinct re- may be associated with the fact that the Aus-
vitalistic and aggressive nativistic tendencies, tralian state as well as mission policies to-
emergent in a culture-contact situation and ward Aborigines had begun to be liberalized.
comparable to, for example, movements in The leaders were young and middle-aged men
Melanesia (Worsley 1957). who were tradition conscious and attempted
Jinimin-Jesus was said to have both black to respond actively to their experiences with
and white skin. He proclaimed the leveling outsiders (1988, p. 391).
of difference between black and white Aus- Though there are differences between ku-
tralians: Before he ascended to Heaven, he rangarra and Jinimin-Jesus, the communica-
promised people that, following a successful tive mode of both (as we can understand
fight with the whites, they would be cleansed it from the literature) is largely dramatis-
by holy water and become light-skinned. For tic. In Jinimin-Jesus, sensuous explicitness
this to happen, Aborigines must keep their (e.g., in the imagery of black and white skin)
law (uphold ritual and its practice as a cen- is, however, linked with articulated notions
tral source of value). He also declared Aborig- of overcoming difference and the necessary
ines owners of all the land (contra their actual persistence of Aboriginal law.
experience of displacement). For an earlier, pastoral-area geographically
The Jinimin-Jesus complex is less fatalistic expansive cult movement overtly hostile to
than kurangarra. Though matters are partly whites (Mulunga), see Kolig (1982), Swain
couched in a mythic idiom, there is also con- (1993, pp. 227, 230), and the possibly derived
scious articulation of the situation as oppo- but “less radically antiwhite” (Swain 1993,
sitional. Whereas in kurangarra the differ- p. 232) Red Ochre cult. For discussion of
ence between black and white appears to be recent Christian religious revivals, see Bos
a given of the ritual enactment, expressed by (1988) and for changes in Aboriginal ritual
elements associated with settlers in the cult, practice, see Kolig (1981).
in the Jinimin-Jesus complex this difference
is explicit, embodied in the difference be-
tween black and white skin and also couched THE ADJUSTMENT
in the rhetoric of conflict and postconflict MOVEMENT IN ARNHEM LAND
equalization. Anthropologist Ronald Berndt (1962) became
Limitations of local power seem to be rec- aware of an “adjustment movement” in north-
ognized explicitly in the Jinimin-Jesus com- east Arnhem Land in 1958, and on subsequent

AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
revisits. Aboriginal people in this area had ex- e.g., the sermon reproduced in Berndt 1962,
perienced and participated in the activities of p. 77). Indigenous people were increasingly
whites (including local Methodist missionar- realizing the existence of diversity within the
ies of a Pentacostal bent) for a number of settler social order (Berndt 1962, p. 79). An
decades. However, the presence of outsiders indigenous social and moral order, previously
had not been numerically overwhelming as self-sufficient, is still clearly associated with
in some other parts of Australia. Aborigines notions of positive value, but also with social
had been deeply affected by the fact that fragmentation and jealousy. Its unification is
the American-Australian Expedition of 1948, conceivable in the context of a twinned or-
which had visited various parts of Arnhem der, involving “two Gods,” “two races, one
Land, had filmed their sacred emblems, or dark and one white” (1962, p. 78). (For more
rangga. Several key men, closely involved with on the adjustment movement, see McIntosh
the mission but also active in indigenous rit- 1994, Morphy 1983.)
ual life, urged others to come together and There is evidence of Aboriginal social or-
put their rangga on display, creating a memo- der objectified and contrasted with a settler
rial next to the Methodist Church at Elcho order (also suggested in Jinimin-Jesus). A new
Island (now Galiwin’ku). position on something like a social order (or,

From Berndt’s accounts of the leaders’ as Aborigines might say, a law) comes about
comments and sermons, we learn of some of in its relativization to another.
the meanings these activities had locally. Par-
ticipants understood themselves to be honor-
ing the missionaries and expressing thanks for FROM PROTECTIONISM TO
the things they had brought them, and also, PROGRESSIVISM: INDIGENOUS
in displaying their most valued objects, tran- ACTIVISM IN THE AFTERMATH
scending their attachment to (what the mis- OF THE “SECOND
sion and Bible had given them a means of DISPOSSESSION”
thinking about as) “graven images.” They also The turn of the twentieth century and sev-
hoped to gain wider access to the valuable eral decades thereafter saw increasing indige-
things they perceived whites having to offer nous activism in the more densely settled
(schools, training, etc.). parts, the urban fringe, of the continent. Al-
Among difficult issues they seemed to be most everywhere, drastic changes in popu-
working through in attempting this display lation structure had become apparent in the
were changes in gender relations (Berndt first half of the nineteenth century, includ-
1962, p. 67); achieving unity among them- ing an absence of babies and young children.
selves about and through the display of rangga; Subsequently, remaining Aborigines, gener-
and imagining a future course for themselves ationally differentiated but at least some of
that would involve their participation in what whom were survivors of these first shock
they could see of white society without loss of waves, were brought together from their ex-
autonomy. Although the leaders attempted to posed position into nascent communities and
unite and persuade, some men refused to dis- settlements. Often, though they were notion-
play their own clan emblems, and it became ally under the control of a protectorate, they
apparent that even the leaders were holding had been moved about a great deal and were
highly valued decorated objects in reserve. destitute. The establishment of missions and
The imagining of two forms or ways, dis- other communities was subject to the political
tinctive indigenous and nonindigenous laws, battles of land use regulation in the colonies,
was perhaps only implicit for many partic- in which the needs of Aborigines were a low
ipants but seems to have been articulated priority. For detailed regional accounts of
clearly by at least some of the leadership (see, communities and the relations between their
478 Merlan
AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
residents and officialdom or management, see ment policy (e.g., Goodall 1996, p. 118),
Biskup (1973), Haebich (1992), and Barwick thus (inadvertently, from the government
(1998); for the Torres Strait, see Beckett perspective) laying some groundwork for
(1987). later pan-Aboriginal identification (Jones &
The later nineteenth and early twentieth Hill-Burnett 1982).
centuries saw the tightening of welfare mea- At somewhat differing times in various
sures and increasing close regulation of Abo- parts of Australia (usually compelled by leg-
rigines’ lives. The efforts of government were, islative enactments), many people of mixed
or became, protectionist and transformative, descent left established communities to earn
generally aiming at assimilation (of those for a living in rural labor, or somewhat later,
whom this was deemed possible) to a homo- in cities. The well-documented instance of
geneous Australian mainstream, conceived as Coranderrk, the main government station in
composed of persons of shared civic, cultural, Victoria, may serve as an example of the estab-
and racial character. Different practical, im- lishment and disestablishment of a commu-
mediate possibilities were seen as appropri- nity (Barwick 1998). As a result of Aboriginal
ate depending on the character and poten- persistence and the assistance of a white man-
tial of Aboriginal subjects, understood largely ager, Coranderrk was established (after many
in racial terms. The power of racial notions, early vicissitudes) in 1863; by 1870, there were
and especially the ambiguity, complexity, and well-built houses and a farm. By 1884, the
obsessive character of dominant-society at- originally temporary reservation of land was
titudes toward persons of mixed descent made “permanent.” But by 1886, “half-castes”
throughout the nineteenth and twentieth cen- were excluded, forced to leave to earn a living
turies, and the implications for regulatory, elsewhere. In 1893, 2400 acres, nearly half of
tutelary, and legislative schemes directed at the acreage earlier achieved, was excised. In
Aborigines, should not be underestimated 1924, the station was closed and most remain-
(e.g., Haebich 1992, pp. 47–51, 260–67; ing inmates compelled to move. In 1941, the
Biskup 1973, pp. 89, 42–44, 143–46; Bennett last resident died, and in 1948 the reserve was
1989, pp. 51–52, 58–59, 112; Beckett 1988, revoked.
pp. 196–200; Goodall 1996, pp. 118–19, 127– Although communities formed and re-
29; Peterson & Sanders 1998, pp. 4–14). formed until after World War II, in the south-
They had important implications for the pro- east, in a few instances by around World
cesses of subject formation and potential for War I, but in greater numbers by the 1950s
mobilization. In many places, e.g., Western and 1960s, at least some of their residents
Australia, policy envisioned harsh legislative (as above, often the “half-caste”) were ei-
controls and segregation of the (generally, ther exiled to impoverished rural locations
phenotypically more full-blooded) Aborig- or forced to resettle in the vicinity of cities
inal remote reserve and settlement popu- like Melbourne (Haebich 1992; Read 1988;
lation from the wider community but ab- Goodall 1996, pp. 149, 238–39 writes of a
sorption into the white population of the “second dispossession” with reference to the
“coloureds,” or those of lighter skin color expulsion of residents from communities, re-
(Haebich 1992, p. 316). The oppressive char- moval of children, and persistence of ap-
acter of state controls may have encouraged palling health and livelihood conditions in
passing into the mainstream population for New South Wales).
some who could do so, i.e., a process op- From the youthful generation of indige-
posite to conspicuous mobilization. In con- nous people whose families had been exposed
trast, it sometimes prompted identification directly to these closures, exiles, and con-
of people with others of varying degrees trols came a remarkable cohort of activists, in
of descent against the grain of govern- “settled” Australia, particularly from the late

AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
1920s and the 1930s. Largely known and in along with others, established and financed
some cases related to each other over partic- the first Aboriginal-controlled newssheet, the
ular regions, these men and women rose to Australian Abo Call (Goodall 1996, p. 238).
AAL: Aborigines
Advancement prominence in the pursuit of better condi- Many of the indigenous leaders came from
League tions and opportunities for their people. On diverse ethnic and racial origins, often in-
the north coast of New South Wales, the first cluding some other component considered
Aboriginal political organization to create for- “nonwhite” in Australia of the time (e.g.,
mal links between communities over a wide Mauritian; Goodall 1996, p. 150), as well
area took shape in the early 1920s, headed by as from Anglo background (Haebich 1992,
Fred Maynard (who was influenced, as May- p. 270). Such personal histories combined
nard 2003 shows, by Garveyism). William feeling for and understanding of racially based
Cooper (Attwood & Markus 2004, Markus discrimination and also tended to be asso-
1986) was a generational exception in the ad- ciated with higher levels of education than
vanced age (around 70) at which he left the many other Aborigines had, an understanding
Victorian community of Cumeroogunga in of the workings of Australian institutions, and
1932 for Melbourne, where he was a prin- an ability and propensity to express and shape
cipal founder of the Australian Aborigines’ dissatisfaction in activism and protest. Ethnic
League (AAL) (Clark 1965, p. 91; Aborigines and racial diversity became part of the new in-
Advancement League 1985). Doug Nicholls, digenous embodiment, especially in settled or
born at Cumeroogunga in 1906, left the com- nonremote Australian contexts and brought
munity at age 14, worked, and became a noted with it important stimuli to the sensibilities
sportsman in Melbourne, then pastor, Aborig- and organization of political activism. An im-
inal activist, and eventually the appointed gov- portant element of this was the conceptualiza-
ernor of South Australia. William Ferguson of tion of a category of “Aborigine” or “native”
Dubbo, New South Wales (Horner 1974), and beyond the local or regional scene—a reflex-
Jack Patten, like Ferguson a leader in the Abo- ive view of an inherently contradiction-laden
rigines Progress Association in Dubbo, orga- category of persons, originary and now sub-
nized a Day of Mourning to be celebrated in ject to the state. Localism and the divisive ef-
protest of the commemoration of the 150th fects of government policy had meant that it
anniversary of the landing of the First Fleet was by no means inevitable that indigenous
in 1938. In 1926, William Harris founded the people think of themselves as a single kind:
Native Union in Western Australia (Haebich In many instances, degree of caste or color,
1992, p. 269). These and many others in- so emphasized administratively, acted as a dif-
volved themselves in activism and the de- ferentiating force. (See, e.g., Wilson 1961,
velopment of organizations dedicated to im- p. 41, on the refusal of “light coloureds” to
proving the lot of Aborigines (Attwood 2003, support strike action undertaken by mainly
Attwood & Markus 1998, Maynard 2003, “full-blood” Aborigines; see also Markus
McGregor 1993). 1994; Cowlishaw 1999, 2004.)
All the principal activists had formative re- The indigenous leaders of the drive for
lationships, not only within indigenous fami- recognition and societal participation dif-
lies and social networks, but also with whites as fered on the question of the desirability
employers, interested activists, and represen- of white involvement in their activist cam-
tatives of supportive and sympathetic groups paigns. Charges of isolation and separatism
[such as churches, unions, the Communist were sometimes made by groups with prin-
party, Freemasons, and feminists (Broome cipally white membership, like the Commu-
1989; Goodall 1996, pp. 186, 203–4, 232– nist Party of Australia (Goodall 1996, p. 234).
36, 273–77; Lake 1998)]. In 1938, publisher In the case of particular actions—like the
and right-wing nationalist P.R. Stephensen, Aboriginal Day of Mourning in 1938—some
480 Merlan
AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
insisted that the planning and the meeting it- to weld disparate progressive groups into
self be open only to Aboriginal participants. a council that could represent them all to
(Occasions of state-mandated, nationalist the Commonwealth. Prominent and distin-
FCAATSI: Federal
celebration—such as the Day of Mourning guished white advocates, professional, church, Council for the
in 1938, the Cook Bicentennial in 1970, the and union groups, academics, and left par- Advancement of
and Bicentennial of the First Fleet landing in ties lent support to the establishment of such Aborigines and
1988—have typically spurred oppositional in- a broad body. The Aboriginal Advancement Torres Strait
Islanders
digenous collective action and garnered some Leagues of Victoria, South Australia, and
support from the wider public.) Aboriginal ac- Western Australia came together to form the
tivists made use of methods including the for- Federal Council for the Advancement of Abo-
mation of leagues and groups and networks rigines, which held its first meeting in Ade-
of contacts among them, publicity campaigns, laide in February 1958. The Council’s basic
and dramatic public actions including strikes, aspirations were equal citizenship with other
petitions, and deputations of protest. The Australians for Aborigines; an adequate living
ideas and vocabulary of such campaigns and standard; equal pay and industrial protection;
actions are indicative of shifts in indigenous free and compulsory education for “detribal-
political subjectivity and frames for action. ized” Aborigines; and the absolute retention
Most assumed the efficacy of greater involve- of remaining reserves, whether in communal
ment of Aborigines in government: One of the or individual ownership. Renamed the Fed-
first (but unsuccessful) petitions of the Aus- eral Council for the Advancement of Aborig-
tralian Aborigines League was to be presented ines and Torres Strait Islanders (FCAATSI) in
to King George asking for direct Aboriginal 1964 (Bandler 1983), this group successfully
representation in the Commonwealth Parlia- lobbied the federal government to conduct a
ment. Broome (1982, p. 167) characterizes the referendum to give the federal government
aims of these groups as “citizenship and assim- powers to legislate on behalf of Aborigines
ilation into the wider community” and posits and to census them federally (Bandler 1989).
that they “largely accepted absorption as their (On the Referendum, see Attwood et al. 1997,
fate and some even welcomed it.” (On citizen- Attwood & Markus 1998; for regional differ-
ship, see Peterson & Sanders 1998; Beckett ences and conditions on the vote, see Bennett
1987, pp. 172–76). Such actions also typically 1989, pp. 53–54; and on the growth of national
assumed the greater supportiveness and effi- representation with respect to the Torres
cacy of higher levels of governance, first the Strait, see Beckett 1987, pp. 79, 171–201.)
Commonwealth as compared with the States, In the mid-1960s, as a national indige-
and more recently, international as com- nous body was taking shape, the conduct of
pared with national institutions (Chesterman protest became influenced by American civil
2001a). rights and Black Power styles and activism.
In this era in which Aboriginal affairs were Most indigenous activists rejected violence,
managed by the states, a widely shared objec- and some accepted the help of concerned
tive of indigenous activism was the assump- whites (Burgmann 2003, p. 58; Chesterman
tion of oversight of Aboriginal affairs by the 2001b; Foley 2001; McGuinness 1971; Read
federal government. In the early twentieth 1990; Turner 1975; on the relation to the
century, proposals for constitutional reform women’s movement, see Burgmann 1982; on
to confer responsibility for Aboriginal affairs the influence of Black Power on elites in
on the federal government were prompted by Papua New Guinea around this time, see
fear of Australia’s being considered interna- Hannett 1971). A Freedom Ride (Curthoys
tionally backward (Paisley 1998; for efforts 2002), based on U.S. civil rights activism,
toward a national policy in the 1930s, see was organized in 1965 to demand change di-
Goodall 1996, pp. 238–46). Activists worked rectly in discriminatory practices in towns of

AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
rural New South Wales. Those involved were World War II period, but especially from
mainly white Sydney students supported by the early 1970s, as indigenous difference it-
politicians, church leaders, and others. self was revalued in the wider society and be-
By the end of the 1960s, the federal gov- came a focus of indigenous activism, in the
ernment clearly had a mandate with respect Australian context many issues that had their
to Aboriginal affairs. As a result of the 1967 origins in struggles over inequality, disadvan-
Referendum, it assumed powers to legislate tage, and powerlessness, including relations
with respect to them, sharing and negotiat- to land, were transformed in ways that fore-
ing them henceforth with state governments. grounded notions of indigenous culture. One
From the early 1970s, there was a shift in could at least partly interpret this shift as in-
both formal and informal policies and prac- volving the containment of these issues within
tices. After decades of efforts aimed at assim- regulatory schemes, their working out made
ilation, there emerged (especially underwrit- possible within the procedural terms of the
ten by the Labor side of politics and supported dominant society.

by intellectuals and some other segments of First, the ways in which syndicalist mod-
the middle class) a federal policy of self- els of struggle informed action before indige-
determination. Increased globalization (as we nous difference was placed center stage will be
now call it) of the economy and of cultural briefly illustrated from episodes in the Torres
politics in the aftermath of World War II Strait and Western Australia. Second, the
had created a new countercurrent, an orienta- transmutation of issues of disadvantage and
tion toward difference, which began to make inequality into ones framed by questions of in-
itself evident in the now-nationalized con- digenous culture can be illustrated by consid-
duct of indigenous affairs. (There are paral- ering some of the main events generally seen
lels elsewhere, for example, in New Zealand, as contributing to the development of a notion
where there was a new surge in Maori politics of land rights as an indigenous issue.
in the 1970s and the Waitangi Tribunal was The strike was explored as a medium
created by 1975; see Moran 1998 on “indi- of mobilization in the depression years in
genising nationalism.”) The Australian Labor the Torres Strait Islands, among Australia’s
government elected in 1972 brought into be- other indigenous minority. Colonization and
ing a revamped corporate government body, Christianization began together there in the
the Department of Aboriginal Affairs. Jones & 1870s. Missionaries and a resident gover-
Hill-Burnett (1982) capture many of the de- nor were principal sources of authority until
velopments of this period in terms of a no- 1904, when the Strait came “under the Act”
tion of “ethnogenesis” and discuss the diver- (the Queensland Aborigines Protection Act
gence of “political” and “cultural” emphases of 1897), with its draconian controls. Torres
in the uneven emergence of a pan-Aboriginal Strait Islander pearlers and divers, aggravated
identity and movement. by oppressive work conditions and the eco-
nomic downturn of the 1930s, went on strike
for four months in 1936. Probable sources of
DISADVANTAGE, LAND this form of action included unionists on the
TENURE, AND DEFERRED mainland, perhaps even master pearlers them-
JUSTICE selves, and models in the 1920s and 1930s
Whereas assimilation was the key concept in of strike action by Japanese divers and inter-
government policy into the 1960s, the main national seamen (Beckett 1987, p. 53). As a
goals of indigenous mobilization included im- result, the Islands were granted a consider-
proved conditions, recognition of equality and able degree of local-government autonomy,
the rights of full citizenship, and concomitant including control over island police and courts
dismantling of discrimination. In the post– (Beckett 1987, p. 54).
482 Merlan
AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
In remote areas, just as in the more settled 1986, CH Berndt 1950). In March 1967, they
ones, Aboriginal activism of the early and mid- “walked off” and established their own town-
twentieth century first crystallized in protest ship at Wattie Creek, advised and assisted by
against dismal social conditions. In 1946, a Communist activist Frank Hardy (Attwood
new community arose in the Pilbara Dis- 2003, pp. 187–90, 260–82 on Hardy’s cen-
trict of northwestern Australia from a strike trality to the protest actions; Hardy 1968).
movement that spread among the Aborigines Their earlier central demand for improved
who had been native labor on pastoral sta- wages (related to contemporary investigation
tions (cattle ranches) (Wilson 1961, Palmer of a pastoral Award or minimum wage, and its
& McKenna 1978, Read & Coppin 1999). implementation from 1968, which ultimately
Don McLeod, a white miner-prospector and resulted in the displacement of thousands of
contractor with trade union experience in- Aborigines) was complemented by a demand
troduced the idea of strike action and group for a portion of land from the Wave Hill lease,
bargaining for wages (Wilson 1961, p. ii) on which they planned to establish their own
among Aboriginal people of the area. Though cattle company.
McLeod was clearly the central activator of In 1975, the federal government granted
the movement, he worked closely with se- the Gurindji only leasehold interest in just
nior indigenous leaders, forming a group, or 25 of the 500 square miles they had claimed,
Pindan, as the community came to be called, leaving the rest within the Vesteys lease
economically based mainly on the min- (Burgmann 2003, p. 71). Despite this paltry
ing of mineral concentrates. Aims of the result, the “return” of land to the Gurindji, in
movement included achievement of better the symbolic form of Prime Minister Gough
wages, and more broadly, economic and social Whitlam funneling a trickle of dirt into the
self-sufficiency. hand of leader Vincent Lingiari, has remained
The movement fostered many new aware- a key media image, often replayed on televi-
nesses and practices among Aborigines of the sion (reproduced in Peterson 2000, p. 624).
area. But issues including capitalization ver- The original claims by Aborigines to im-
sus immediate consumption, privileges and provement of their living conditions were
prominence of leaders in a context of egali- transmuted into a much broader demand
tarian expectations, and the fractious leader- (see Attwood 2003, p. 263) which, though
ship style of McLeod, which some Aboriginal it resonated strongly with Gurindji under-
people found unyielding and culturally alien, standings, was in conception and organization
led to the development of factions. These fac- partly of outside origin.
tions deepened, disrupting kinship and cere- Events at Yirrkala in northeastern Arnhem
monial ties and dividing the social movement Land are also invariably seen as precursors to
into two communities with only limited ties further development of land rights as a na-
between them. tional political issue. In 1968, following five
Initially comparable in many ways to the years of fruitless protest against the federal
Pindan movement, but unlike it now, often government’s decision to allow mining explo-
cited as a key episode in the development ration on what they considered their lands
of land rights, were the occurrences at Wave (Morphy 1983, Williams 1986), the Yolngu
Hill in the northwestern Northern Territory (people) of Yirrkala brought a case against
(Doolan 1977, Hardy 1968, Middleton 1977). the mining company Nabalco and the federal
Gurindji people had been dependent pastoral government before the Northern Territory
labor at Wave Hill, a property of more than supreme court, with assistance from support-
12,000 square kilometers of the English com- ers (including the Methodist mission). The
pany Vesteys, since the 1880s, residing in de- decision handed down in 1971 found (among
plorable living conditions (Berndt & Berndt other things) that there was no doctrine of

AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
communal native title in Australian law and Australia, with its base in the inner-Sydney
that although the Yolngu had complex re- suburb of Redfern, the other two being the
lationships with land, their rights were not establishment in Redfern of the first Aborig-
proprietary. The court was also not satis- inal Legal Service in 1970 and antiapartheid
fied that the group relationships to land had demonstrations in response to the tour of the
persisted unchanged since the declaration of South African Springbok rugby union team
British sovereignty over Australia, which the in 1971. (See also Turner 1975 and Spoonley
presiding justice held to be a necessary con- 1995, p. 100, on later protests in New Zealand
dition for finding in favor of the Yolngu against South African rugby tours.) Aborigi-
(Williams 1986). This long-running dispute nal and wider activism around land rights had
provoked much immediate response, as well become a feature of the national political land-
as relationships of later significance. scape, and determination to advance a land
From the mid-nineteenth century, Aborig- rights platform was shared by major political
inal leaders in “settled” Australia had been parties (Maddock 1983; Peterson 1985, 2000;
asking for portions of land as theirs by right, Peterson & Langton 1983; Rowse 2000b,
but also as the basis of livelihood, often farm- pp. 34–52).
ing; livelihood and land were paired consid- The transformation of Aboriginal music
erations. The various elements of land rights by a growing number of indigenous bands
in its current acceptation—as an aspiration (No Fixed Address, Warumpi Band, Coloured
to the preservation of a distinctive Aborig- Stone), the rise of a wave of settlement bands,
inal way of life, grounded in forms of tra- and the expression of more assertive indige-
ditional relationship of Aboriginal people to nous consciousness in drama, film, and other
specific areas and less directly grounded in forms of art must all be considered forms or
issues of livelihood—did not come together aspects of movement that accompanied the
until the 1960s. Wave Hill and Yirrkala pro- intensification of indigenous activism in the
vided objects around which broad national 1970s and 1980s (Macgowan 2000, Rowse
mobilization could be imagined, national im- 2000a, Sykes 2000, Walker 2000).
ages of traditional indigeneity reinforced, and All these kinds of action seem to have been
the concrete grievances and local aspirations important media of the transformation and
of remote-area indigenous people shaped and confirmation of indigenous subjectivity. For
joined with developing political thematization some, especially urban Aboriginal people who
of land rights at the national level. had been made to feel remote from publicly
In 1972, when Coalition Prime Minister valued sources of indigenous identity, involve-
McMahon confirmed government policy as ment in protest action became a way of “be-
allowing a grant of exploration licenses and coming” experientially Aboriginal, a center
mining tenements on reserves (Burgmann around which identity could be reconstituted.
2003, p. 72), Aboriginal activists erected To forms of land rights implemented
the Tent Embassy outside Parliament House in some states from the mid-1960s (e.g.,
in Canberra (Foley 2001, Lippmann 1981, the Aboriginal Lands Trust Act of South
Robinson 1994). Their enunciated land rights Australia 1966, the Aboriginal Lands Act
program included provisions for monetary 1970 of Victoria, both recognizing indige-
compensation for land, indigenous ownership nous ownership of reserved Crown land),
of areas in cities, as well as ownership of re- was added the Aboriginal Land Rights
serves and settlements and title to minerals (Northern Territory) Act 1976, a benefi-
(Attwood & Markus 1998, pp. 257–58). Foley cial federal statute that emerged, in good
(2001), himself a key participant, regards the part, in reaction to the unfavorable Yirr-
Tent Embassy as one of three seminal events kala decision. Under its traditionalizing, reli-
in the rise of the Black Power movement in giously framed requirements, claims to land
484 Merlan
AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
have resulted in nearly half the land area ing tendency of that class to become absorbed
of the Northern Territory becoming Abo- professionally into government. In like man-
riginal land under inalienable, group-based ner, land rights became institutionalized in the
CAR: Council for
freehold title. form of land councils and related policies and Aboriginal
More recent findings of a high court programs. Institutionalization has accompa- Reconciliation
case Mabo v. Queensland (2), brought by the nied the development of native title processes
Meriam people of the Torres Strait (cul- in the form of the National Native Title Tri-
turally more Melanesian than continental bunal, its linkage to the federal court system,
Australian), have been that “native title” may and an enormous proliferation of Aboriginal
survive the extension of British sovereignty associations and corporations. Correspond-
over Australia and that native title is recogniz- ingly, land rights is now not so clearly a move-
able at the common law. This was the product ment as a consolidated complex of interlock-
not of indigenous social movement, but of fo- ing institutions and types of actors (Blumer
cused collaborations between indigenous so- 1969, p. 99). Local voices and senses of in-
cial actors and others who, aware of national digenous priority and need, such as were per-
and international developments, believed it ceptible in Pindan and at Wave Hill, must deal
was possible to revise the Australian situa- with and through these.
tion with respect to land rights (Bartlett 2004;
Sharp 1996, pp. 22–43). The high court deci-
sion left the government, and the public, un- RECONCILIATION
prepared. In its wake, the federal Native Ti- The years 1991–2000 were a decade of rec-
tle Act (1993) was rapidly formulated, which onciliation. Under this rubric is understood
in the national post-Mabo anxiety, was struc- the aim of creating a new relationship be-
tured to protect and give “certainty” to other tween settler Australia and its indigenous peo-
interests as much or more than indigenous ples. Reconciliation was characterized by the
ones. deputy chairman of the Council for Aborigi-
From the 1960s, increased positive valu- nal Reconciliation (CAR) as “quintessentially
ation of cultural difference ushered in an era a people’s movement” (Nossal 2000, p. 17).
of “indigenizing” national management of in- What sort of movement is, or (perhaps) was,
digenous affairs (Moran 1998). One manifes- it (Brennan 1994, de Costa 2002, Dodson
tation of this was emergence of land rights as 1993, Reynolds 1996, Tatz 1998, Tickner
a recognizable category. 2001)? Its diffuse and populist nature il-
A more favorable (though stereotyped) lustrates (as does land rights in a different
view of Aborigines based on positive valua- way) difficulties of policy and practice in
tion of their cultural difference came to under- integrating moral vision with a substantive
lie the land rights agenda, offering one public treatment of issues (de Costa 2002, Short
alternative to the always-present “problem” 2003).
orientation in Aboriginal affairs. Truth commissions, tribunals, and in-
Despite the benefits undoubtedly ac- quiries occurred in many countries in roughly
hieved, the emphasis on land rights and this period as a response to injustice, rights vi-
its proceduralism must also be evaluated as olations, and sometimes acknowledged mass
the narrowing and institutionalization of the atrocities (Ellis 1997, Ensalaco 1994, Minow
struggle of an oppressed population. Jones & 1998, Short 2003, Wilson 2001). Although
Hill-Burnett (1982, p. 224) remark on the situations differed, common attempts to build
growth of government support and funding a culture of rights may perhaps be under-
for indigenous affairs generally in the 1970s stood as part of a sea-change in global pol-
as accompanied by the emergence of an in- itics (Wilson 2001, p. 1) and the rise of hu-
digenous middle class, and on the overwhelm- man rights as the language of democratic

AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
transition and reconstitution. All these at- sion (HREOC) inquiry into practices, which
tempts inevitably confronted questions of had continued into the 1970s, of remov-
the interpretation of history and vari- ing Aboriginal children from their parents.
HREOC: Human
Rights and Equal ably addressed issues of responsibility and The HREOC “Stolen Generations” report
Opportunity consequences to be drawn. “Bringing Them Home” was tabled in May
Commission Precedent struggles in Australia to the rec- 1997 (HREOC 1997). One of its recommen-
onciliation era may be briefly mentioned here, dations was that a formal apology be made by
following. One point of constant comparison all Australian parliaments for forcible removal
between Australia and other Commonwealth of children (Haebich 2001). The new Liberal-
countries has been the absence of any treaties National Coalition government (elected in
with its indigenous peoples. By 1979, in the 1996) took the view that people of today who
context of waxing land rights, there were had no part in the removals (and other el-
calls (largely from a social and academic elite) ements of what historian Geoffrey Blainey,
for a treaty (Brennan 1994; Coombs 1979; and later, Prime Minister John Howard, have
Harris 1979; Rowse 2000b, pp. 174–92; dubbed a “black arm-band view of history”)
Wright 1985). There were also proposals of should not be made to accept blame for them
substantive measures to be taken by the fed- (Manne 2001). Apology has remained an un-
eral government, among them recognition of resolved issue, and some indigenous spokes-
prior indigenous occupancy of the continent people have concluded that no apology will
and the payment of compensation for land and be forthcoming. Thus, many contentious is-
damages. Both demands had been put forward sues have continuously been laid on the pub-
by the occupants of the Tent Embassy in 1972, lic table and have made evident different
and subsequently also by the first indige- views of history, responsibility, justice, and
nous member of Parliament, Senator Neville reparation.
Bonner of Queensland in 1975. By the early 1990s, the public contention
The report of the Royal Commission into regarding treaty, such statements as Keat-
Aboriginal Deaths in Custody (1991), formed ing’s, the spectre of forms of compensation,
to investigate the disproportionate deaths of and other matters had begun to be chan-
indigenous prisoners in custody, events which neled into bipartisan consultation on the es-
themselves often give rise to community- tablishment of a statutory body to promote
level mobilizations, was important in bring- reconciliation. A formal process was inaugu-
ing about national acceptance of the rated with the passage of the Council for
institutionalization of reconciliation. Aboriginal Reconciliation Act (1991). Estab-
Although a renewed federal Labor party lished as a statutory authority, the CAR was
initiative on national land rights was soundly charged with the task of improving the rela-
defeated in 1984 (Rowse 1988), in Australia’s tionship between Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Bicentenary Year, 1988, Labor Prime Minister Islander people and the wider Australian com-
Bob Hawke was still talking not treaty, but munity (Counc. Aborig. Reconcil. Act 1991).
agreement (in the Barunga statement of June It was to educate the nation on indigenous-
12, a declaration made at a Northern Territory nonindigenous relations and bring it to a new
Aboriginal community; see Morphy 2000, level of tolerance and inclusiveness. Prepara-
pp. 100–2; Tickner 2001, pp. 40–41). In 1992, tion of the public was felt to be the only basis
in a now-famous speech in Redfern, Labor on which future changes—including mooted
Prime Minister Keating delivered a state- constitutional amendment, treaty, compen-
ment of settler responsibility for indigenous sation, and others—might be undertaken.
oppression and disadvantage. Correspondingly, the focus of reconciliation
Keating also established the Human shifted from investigation of the social history
Rights and Equal Opportunity Commis- of disadvantage and questions of institutional
486 Merlan
AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
reform to mobilization of change in national tional Aboriginal owners” of the locales where
attitudes. Issues of the role of government events are held have become nearly manda-
were increasingly sidelined from the debate tory on certain occasions and in certain envi-
ATSIC: Aboriginal
(de Costa 2002, p. 52). Council activities ronments (e.g., educational and governmental and Torres Strait
tended to promote goals of understanding institutions). Islander Commission
and community-level projects of facilitation: More broadly, however, despite the growth
a “people’s movement.” By its sunset date in of these observances and some support for the
2000, CAR estimated that there were 396 lo- notion of reconciliation within the popula-
cal reconciliation groups and more than 1500 tion, there is apparently little collective will
local study circles guided by “learning cir- for major institutional change (Short 2003).
cle kits” (CAR 2000, Ch. 6) and such pro- The Council had engaged in a large-scale
grams as Ambassadors for Reconciliation, in- civic awareness campaign in terms of what
tended to prompt prominent Australians to was, after all, a binary conception of citizen-
speak for reconciliation and other awareness subject positions: indigenous and nonindige-
campaigns. Investigators have analyzed me- nous. Like the Truth and Reconciliation
dia documentation of local groups, reveal- Commission in South Africa (Wilson 2001),
ing the extent to which their operation was its activities were partly grounded in Chris-
double-edged, both raising awareness of dis- tian notions of reconciliation, forgiveness,
crimination but also giving it a new location and atonement.
in which to surface (de Costa 2002, pp. 109– More recently, Australia appears to have
19). The general public was confused and per- entered a phase of redoubled neo-liberal con-
haps resistant about linking reconciliation to servatism with such emphases much reduced.
other contentious issues, such as ongoing de- The four terms of the Liberal-National Coali-
bates concerning native title and the “Stolen tion government, 1996 to the present, have
Generations.” been characterized by the hardening of a
On May 28, 2000, in CAR’s final year, the distinction between symbolic and practical
People’s Walk for Reconciliation saw a quar- reconciliation, the former identified with
ter of a million people crossing the Sydney an indigenous rights agenda and the latter
Harbor Bridge on foot, following a major with socioeconomic improvements, largely
public event called Corroboree 2000. CAR to be delivered by a “mainstreaming” rather
produced its final report in December 2002, than “special” approach. The government an-
asserting, “Reconciliation has begun to enter nounced its intention to close down ATSIC
the hearts and minds of the Australian peo- (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Com-
ple creating one of the most determined and mission), the corporate body of indigenous
vibrant people’s movements ever seen in the affairs, in April 2004. Its personnel has been
history of the nation. Aboriginal and Torres folded into mainstream departments. ATSIC
Strait Islander and other Australians are in- has been replaced by an indigenous advisory
creasingly working together to recognize and body, a move that marks a return to advi-
help heal the wounds of the past and move on sory status of peak indigenous bodies (Bennett
together.” This report was not accepted by the 1989, pp. 37–41; Jones & Hill-Burnett 1982;
federal government. Weaver 1993).
After 2000, Reconciliation Australia be- Proposals emanating from the reshaped
came a nongovernment, not-for-profit foun- federal ministry, which now includes indige-
dation. Sorry Day has become an annual event nous affairs (Immigration, Multiculturalism,
in some places, commemorating the tabling and Indigenous Affairs), are that agreements
of the “Bringing Them Home” report by be made between indigenous communities
the signing of Sorry Books. Initial declara- and government and service providers on a ba-
tions of recognition and thanks to the “tradi- sis of shared or “mutual” responsibility. This

AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
idea is perceived by some as a return to as- The kind of historical change that is ob-
similationist policies of the past and, by oth- servable in the movements discussed above is
ers, as a more meaningful step forward toward not one from the “pre” or “nonpolitical” to the
practical reconciliation (Altman & Hunter “political.” Rather, it is a shift in the terms of
2003). The government view (apparently understanding and objectification, and in the
widely shared) is that indigenizing policies forms of action and identity that come about
of the past have failed. The government is in mobilization. Earlier, objectifications aris-
frustrated and embarrassed about this fail- ing from the settler-indigenous conjuncture
ure and together with the public is newly tended to be cast in terms of the endogenous
resolved to be more skeptical about sup- imaginative repertoire and life-world (with
porting social practices and cultural concep- its ritual and other forms of action). In the
tions divergent from, or in opposition to, the later movements, action and aims are increas-
mainstream. ingly framed in exogenous terms, which, how-
ever, become at least partly indigenized in the

process.
CONCLUSIONS Innovation, shifts in forms of action and
This discussion of movements in Australia understanding, may arise from any interac-
has necessarily been selective, concentrating tion that provokes significant relativization
mainly on better documented ones. In all of perspectives. Differences in understanding,
of them, problematic relations between in- objectification, and representation, which his-
digenous and nonindigenous peoples are a torically distinguished indigenous and non-
principal source of activism. They span geo- indigenous actors, can be reduced without
graphical locations ranging from what may be removing the grounds for activism, particu-
considered “remote” Australia (from the per- larly as long as social difference and inequity
spective of settler occupation) to urban ones. remain. Prolonged interaction with settlers,
Each setting deserves a fuller description of bringing with it oppression and insistent de-
the conditions limiting and stimulating mo- mand that indigenous people modify their
bilization. Notwithstanding the considerable behavior and see their situation through the
differences among them, all the actions dis- lens of understandings and templates for ac-
cussed meet the broad criteria of movement tion pressed on them, were stimuli to mo-
set out above. bilization, often galvanized by nonindige-
Distinctions have sometimes been made nous people. Prolonged interaction (even if
between ritual-expressive and political mobi- unequal) leads to a greater sharing of the
lizations, or between “prepolitical” and “po- grounds of social action despite social and af-
litical” terms of reference of social agitations fective distance. Already in the 1860s, occu-
(see, e.g., Hobsbawm 1963, p. 2, who de- pants of Coranderrk had come to understand
fines the “political” as the emergence of a the institutions and importance of contract
“specific language” in which aspirations about (Barwick 1998, p. 39). Given prolonged ex-
the world are expressed; see also discussion posure to missions, settlement administrators,
of Berndt 1969 above; compare Fields 1985). and other regulatory institutional actors, we
Here I find such a distinction unhelpful. One find indigenous activists of the 1920s and
reason is that it falsely suggests that move- 1930s mobilizing in terms of notions of equal-
ments in modern society are devoid of ritual ity, denouncing the unacceptability of their
elements. More generally, it is misleading to conditions, in ways that share ever more with
categorize social action in such a way as to iso- differentiated sectors of wider Australian so-
late its ritualized or formalized aspects from ciety. This, in itself, does not erase the dif-
its political ones, as well as its material from ference between indigenous and nonindige-
immaterial ones. nous social actors and forms of action. But
488 Merlan
AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10
this enculturation involves indigenous recon- One of the greatest constraints on indige-
stitution. Such forms of action reach a wider nous mobilization (which, as we have seen,
audience and at times permit wider mobi- has always involved nonindigenous persons
lization. They serve to solidify indigeneity and institutions) has been conceptualization
as a distinct identity but inevitably do so in terms of an antinomy of indigenous same-
in terms that are grounded within a wider ness in relation to a “mainstream” (“as-
national—and, increasingly, international— similation”) or difference from it (“self-
public sphere. Such shared terms of refer- determination”). Categorical thinking about
ence do not presuppose equality between sameness and difference seems limiting with
the indigenous and nonindigenous. On the respect to an internally diverse minority
contrary, they serve to highlight inequali- whose “difference” will not be sundered from
ties that persist in indigenous-nonindigenous broader questions of justice and openness to
relations. different conceptions of the social good.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
For comments on drafts of this paper, my thanks go to Jeremy Beckett, Paul Burke, Ravi de
Costa, Les Hiatt, Ian Keen, Tim Rowse, and Alan Rumsey.
LITERATURE CITED
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Altman JC, Hunter BH. 2003. Monitoring “practical” reconciliation: evidence from the recon-
ciliation decade, 1991–2001. Tech. Rep. Pap. 254, Cent. Aborig. Econ. Policy Res. Canberra:
Aust. Natl. Univ.
Attwood B. 2003. Rights for Aborigines. Crows Nest, Aust.: Allen and Unwin
Attwood B, Markus A. 1998. Representation matters: the 1967 Referendum and citizenship. In
Citizenship and Indigenous Australians: Changing Conceptions and Possibilities, ed. N Peterson,
W Sanders, pp. 118–40. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press
Attwood B, Markus A. 1999. The Struggle for Aboriginal Rights: A Documentary History. Sydney:
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Contents ARI 12 August 2005 20:29
Annual Review of
Anthropology
Volume 34, 2005
Contents
Frontispiece
Sally Falk Moore p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p xvi
Prefatory Chapter
Comparisons: Possible and Impossible

Sally Falk Moore p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 1
Archaeology
Archaeology, Ecological History, and Conservation

Frances M. Hayashida p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p43
Archaeology of the Body
Rosemary A. Joyce p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 139
Looting and the World’s Archaeological Heritage: The Inadequate
Response
Neil Brodie and Colin Renfrew p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 343
Through Wary Eyes: Indigenous Perspectives on Archaeology
Joe Watkins p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 429
The Archaeology of Black Americans in Recent Times
Mark P. Leone, Cheryl Janifer LaRoche, and Jennifer J. Babiarz p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 575
Biological Anthropology
Early Modern Humans

Erik Trinkaus p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 207
Metabolic Adaptation in Indigenous Siberian Populations
William R. Leonard, J. Josh Snodgrass, and Mark V. Sorensen p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 451
The Ecologies of Human Immune Function
Thomas W. McDade p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 495
vii
Linguistics and Communicative Practices
New Directions in Pidgin and Creole Studies

Marlyse Baptista p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p33
Pierre Bourdieu and the Practices of Language
William F. Hanks p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p67
Areal Linguistics and Mainland Southeast Asia
N.J. Enfield p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 181
Communicability, Racial Discourse, and Disease
Charles L. Briggs p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 269
Will Indigenous Languages Survive?
Michael Walsh p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 293

Linguistic, Cultural, and Biological Diversity
Luisa Maffi p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 599
International Anthropology and Regional Studies
Caste and Politics: Identity Over System

Dipankar Gupta p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 409
Indigenous Movements in Australia
Francesca Merlan p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 473
Indigenous Movements in Latin America, 1992–2004: Controversies,
Ironies, New Directions
Jean E. Jackson and Kay B. Warren p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 549
Sociocultural Anthropology
The Cultural Politics of Body Size

Helen Gremillion p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p13
Too Much for Too Few: Problems of Indigenous Land Rights in Latin
America
Anthony Stocks p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p85
Intellectuals and Nationalism: Anthropological Engagements
Dominic Boyer and Claudio Lomnitz p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 105
The Effect of Market Economies on the Well-Being of Indigenous
Peoples and on Their Use of Renewable Natural Resources
Ricardo Godoy, Victoria Reyes-Garcı́a, Elizabeth Byron, William R. Leonard,
and Vincent Vadez p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 121
viii Contents
An Excess of Description: Ethnography, Race, and Visual Technologies

Deborah Poole p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 159
Race and Ethnicity in Public Health Research: Models to Explain
Health Disparities
William W. Dressler, Kathryn S. Oths, and Clarence C. Gravlee p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 231
Recent Ethnographic Research on North American Indigenous
Peoples
Pauline Turner Strong p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 253
The Anthropology of the Beginnings and Ends of Life
Sharon R. Kaufman and Lynn M. Morgan p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 317
Immigrant Racialization and the New Savage Slot: Race, Migration,
and Immigration in the New Europe

Paul A. Silverstein p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 363
Autochthony: Local or Global? New Modes in the Struggle over

Citizenship and Belonging in Africa and Europe
Bambi Ceuppens and Peter Geschiere p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 385
Caste and Politics: Identity Over System
Dipankar Gupta p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 409
The Evolution of Human Physical Attractiveness
Steven W. Gangestad and Glenn J. Scheyd p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 523
Mapping Indigenous Lands
Mac Chapin, Zachary Lamb, and Bill Threlkeld p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 619
Human Rights, Biomedical Science, and Infectious Diseases Among
South American Indigenous Groups
A. Magdalena Hurtado, Carol A. Lambourne, Paul James, Kim Hill,
Karen Cheman, and Keely Baca p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 639
Interrogating Racism: Toward an Antiracist Anthropology
Leith Mullings p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 667
Enhancement Technologies and the Body
Linda F. Hogle p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 695
Social and Cultural Policies Toward Indigenous Peoples: Perspectives
from Latin America
Guillermo de la Peña p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 717
Surfacing the Body Interior
Janelle S. Taylor p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 741
Contents ix
Theme 1: Race and Racism
Race and Ethnicity in Public Health Research: Models to Explain

Health Disparities
William W. Dressler, Kathryn S. Oths, and Clarence C. Gravlee p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 231
Communicability, Racial Discourse, and Disease
Charles L. Briggs p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 269
Immigrant Racialization and the New Savage Slot: Race, Migration,
and Immigration in the New Europe
Paul A. Silverstein p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 363
The Archaeology of Black Americans in Recent Times
Mark P. Leone, Cheryl Janifer LaRoche, and Jennifer J. Babiarz p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 575
Interrogating Racism: Toward an Antiracist Anthropology

Leith Mullings p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 667
Theme 2: Indigenous Peoples
The Effect of Market Economies on the Well-Being of Indigenous

Peoples and on Their Use of Renewable Natural Resources
Ricardo Godoy, Victoria Reyes-Garcı́a, Elizabeth Byron, William R. Leonard,
and Vincent Vadez p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 121
Recent Ethnographic Research on North American Indigenous
Peoples
Pauline Turner Strong p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 253
Will Indigenous Languages Survive?
Michael Walsh p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 293
Autochthony: Local or Global? New Modes in the Struggle over
Citizenship and Belonging in Africa and Europe
Bambi Ceuppens and Peter Geschiere p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 385
Through Wary Eyes: Indigenous Perspectives on Archaeology
Joe Watkins p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 429
Metabolic Adaptation in Indigenous Siberian Populations
William R. Leonard, J. Josh Snodgrass, and Mark V. Sorensen p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 451
Indigenous Movements in Australia
Francesca Merlan p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 473
Indigenous Movements in Latin America, 1992–2004: Controversies,
Ironies, New Directions
Jean E. Jackson and Kay B. Warren p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 549
x Contents
Linguistic, Cultural, and Biological Diversity

Luisa Maffi p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 599
Human Rights, Biomedical Science, and Infectious Diseases Among
South American Indigenous Groups
A. Magdalena Hurtado, Carol A. Lambourne, Paul James, Kim Hill,
Karen Cheman, and Keely Baca p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 639
Social and Cultural Policies Toward Indigenous Peoples: Perspectives
from Latin America
Guillermo de la Peña p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 717
Indexes
Subject Index p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 757

Cumulative Index of Contributing Authors, Volumes 26–34 p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 771
Cumulative Index of Chapter Titles, Volumes 26–34 p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 774
Errata
An online log of corrections to Annual Review of Anthropology chapters

may be found at http://anthro.annualreviews.org/errata.shtml
Contents xi

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AR254-AN34-24 ARI 25 August 2005 15:10

School of Archaeology and Anthropology, Australian National University, Canberra

Annu. Rev. Anthropol. Key Words

tion of inauthenticity of action on this account

movement, peace movement, etc.). It focuses

reproduction. It overlaps in social science lit-

development of understandings concerning

www.annualreviews.org • Indigenous Australia 475

on a missionary station. their future well-being.

www.annualreviews.org • Indigenous Australia 477

Island (now Galiwin’ku). position on something like a social order (or,

www.annualreviews.org • Indigenous Australia 479

www.annualreviews.org • Indigenous Australia 481

ten by the Labor side of politics and supported dominant society.

www.annualreviews.org • Indigenous Australia 483

www.annualreviews.org • Indigenous Australia 485

www.annualreviews.org • Indigenous Australia 487

ever, become at least partly indigenized in the

www.annualreviews.org • Indigenous Australia 489

Beinssen-Hesse S. 1991. The study of Australian Aboriginal culture by German anthropologists

99–120. New York: Barnes and Noble. 3rd ed.

www.annualreviews.org • Indigenous Australia 491

Adelaide: Aust. Assoc. Study Religions

www.annualreviews.org • Indigenous Australia 493

bridge Univ. Press

Volume 34, 2005

Sally Falk Moore p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p xvi

Comparisons: Possible and Impossible

Archaeology, Ecological History, and Conservation

Early Modern Humans

Linguistics and Communicative Practices

New Directions in Pidgin and Creole Studies

Michael Walsh p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 293

International Anthropology and Regional Studies

Caste and Politics: Identity Over System

The Cultural Politics of Body Size

An Excess of Description: Ethnography, Race, and Visual Technologies

and Immigration in the New Europe

Autochthony: Local or Global? New Modes in the Struggle over

Theme 1: Race and Racism

Race and Ethnicity in Public Health Research: Models to Explain

Interrogating Racism: Toward an Antiracist Anthropology

Theme 2: Indigenous Peoples

The Effect of Market Economies on the Well-Being of Indigenous

Linguistic, Cultural, and Biological Diversity

Subject Index p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 757

Cumulative Index of Chapter Titles, Volumes 26–34 p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 774

An online log of corrections to Annual Review of Anthropology chapters

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