Issues for Aboriginal

Spiritualities in relation to:

-The effect of dispossession
Discuss the continuing effect of dispossession on
Aboriginal spiritualities in relation to:
-Separation from the land
-Separation from kinship groups
-The Stolen Generations

Dispossession

As European settlement spread across Australia, many Indigenous people were forced off their
lands. They were dispossessed. Throughout the 19th century, white Australians believed that
Aboriginal people would eventually die out, or that they must be assimilated into the white
Australian population to survive. During this time, it was believed that Aboriginal people were
racially inferior to the European settlers.

The Aboriginal attitude towards the land was not taken into account. Colonial Australians began
cultivating the empty land by using the theory of Terra Nullius. Settlers argued that the land
was empty as there were no buildings, boundaries or roadways on the land that would signify
any occupation of the land, therefore, the Europeans believed they were free to settle in
Australia.

Along with the introduction of livestock, many crops and dwellings, the settlers also introduced
many foreign diseases to the Aboriginal people, which caused many of them to die.

Dispossession

The concept of half-caste children was later introduced as many white and Aboriginal couples
began to have children. The government then introduced the Protection policy, which saw these
children forcibly removed from their families as a way of protecting them from their inferior
heritage.

Christian missionaries were established to protect these children and to also evangelise.
Children were forced to speak english, practise the Christian tradition and were trained to be
labourers (boys) and house servants (girls).

Some missionaries, whilst evangelising and protecting Aboriginal children, were in fact
advocates for the children. They often argued against excessive legislation put in place, often to
no avail.

The missions and the protection policy led to dispossession and affected the expression of
Aboriginal spirituality; two of the greatest factors were separation from the land and from
kinship groups.

Dispossession Causes
1.

Reduced life expectancy

2.

Increased infant mortality

3.

Overrepresentation in prison

4.

Educational disadvantages

5.

Higher rates of unemployment

6.

Higher use of drugs and alcohol

7.

Higher use of government services.

Each of these is an
indicator of a poor
underclass in society.

They are caused by

separation from land,
kinship and family.

Separation from the land

Separation from the land removes the sense of belonging to life. Belonging to life involves
belonging to a world. Belonging to the Dreaming gives life purpose and therefore removal from
the land removes the purpose of life.

Part of the Dreaming concept is the belief in a return to the spirit world after death. Removal
from the land withdraws an Aboriginal person from their place in the Dreaming and most
specifically the place of their spirit after death.

An equivalent for a member of one of the five major world religions is to remove any concept of
Heaven or eternal life with God or the concept of Nirvana.

By 1945, a number of major factors had resulted in the removal of a majority of Aboriginal
people from their lands. This was especially the case when that land had economic value for
white settlers. Terra Nullius held that the land did not belong to anyone and so the settlers could
govern.

Separation from Kinship Groups

Languages were often lost or severely restricted in their use. Ceremonies related to kinship were
not enacted and so were lost. The place and role of tribal elders was undermined, and much
cultural information regarding kinship obligations and taboos was also lost.

The laws of social behaviour are based on kinship and prescribes the range of activities which
allowed in certain circumstances.

Removal
from kinship
causes:

Loss of human identity

Loss of direction in life

The Stolen Generations

The Stolen Generations is a term used to describe the many children of Aboriginal and mixed
blood who were removed from their Aboriginal families to be cared for on missions, in
institutions such as the Cootamundra Aboriginal Girls Training Home, or fostered with white
families.

The government claimed that the aim of this removal was to protect children from the perceived
abuses of the Aboriginal communities, to ensure they were given a good education, and to help
them assimilate into Western society.

Perhaps one of the greatest ongoing effects of the Stolen Generations is the loss of Aboriginal
culture. As it was predominantly an oral culture, the removal of a generation from the lineage of
cultural transmission means that far fewer children received their cultural heritage in its
complete form.

Today there are many children who have lost touch with the specific knowledge and culture of
their tribes. They feel the loss of this heritage deeply.

During the Stolen Generation, many girls

were trained to be house servants. Once
trained, they were then offered to
families as slaves. Here is an
advertisement for these girls, and a
response from one citizen.

The aftermath- Bringing them Home

The Bringing them Home enquiry began in 1995. The final report was based on the stories of
Aboriginal children who had been forcibly separated from their families and had lost their
language, culture, identity, links with the land and thus their spirituality. In many cases, they
never saw their family members again. Controversially, the report concluded that genocide had
taken place.

Genocide: planned extermination of a national or racial group.

One of the recommendations of the report from the Bringing them Home enquiry was for an
official apology by the Commonwealth Government to the Stolen Generations.

Throughout the late 1990s the Howard government chose not to deliver this apology. Howard
believed that, however wrong their actions were, people who took Aboriginal children from their
homes had the right intentions.

One of the first acts by the newly elected Rudd Labor government was to apologise. On 13
February 2008, the nation stopped as Prime Minister Rudd delivered his apology.

Activities
https://docs.google.com/a/syd.catholic.edu.
au/document/d/1cgovLU_2K8DLRUp43Y7XBKe8yqTxe41bYYtvX3Lndbg/edit