https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-27/last-daughter-film-brenda-matthews-story-stolen-generation/102267702
Search for family, identity? $\implies$Childhood innocence, cannot recognise their disenfranchsing/manipulation
sad music fr
Not white, dont fit in with "Blackfellas", who do you fit in with?
assimilation into white society
1973 - age 2, 6 siblings taken from parents, taken into foster system without cause
child welfare $\implies$ separated her from her now white family, with her new Indigeous Australian parents
on a journey to mend the wounds
asked mother
$\implies$ before separation, ordinary indigenous australian family, i.e. small family unit, father was a pastor
illegally taken children away
took 7 children, unable to say goodbye to father
22nd February 1973 $\implies$ neglected parents neglected children
$\implies$ facadical nature of the dolls - coping with loss
This map attempts to represent the language, social or nation groups of Aboriginal Australia. it shows only the general locations of larger groupings of people which may include clans, dialects or indivdual langauges in a group. It used published resources from the eighteenths century - 1994 and is not intended to be exact, nor the boundaries fixed.
From 1570.
Ideas of European exploration prevalent at the time.
We place ourselves on top of history $\implies$ history is our bedrock
Historical fiction is a literary genre where the story takes place in the past. Historical novels capture the details of the time period as accurately as possible for authenticity, including social norms, manners, customs, and traditions. Many novels in this genre tell fictional stories that involve actual historical figures or events.
Makes an attempt at being historical accurate, despite the narrative being shaped, formed, partially imaginary. $\implies$ still want to be authentic but uses imagination
"To be deemed historical (in our sense), a novel must have been written at least fifty years after the events described ,or have been written by someone who was not alive at the time of those events (who therefore approaches them only by research)"- Historical novel society
"We also consider the following styles of novel to be historical fiction for our purposes":
5 Common Elements of Historical Fiction (taken from masterclass.com)
For a successful historical fiction, all these things should be accurate to the period! $\implies$ we want to put ourselves in the perspective of the characters we are trying to convey - how do they see conflict for example
History is about facts and time, while literature is about fiction and language.
In The Order of Things, Foucault argues that the relationship between literature and history might be more complicated than this binary suggests. He explains systems of understanding, including subjects or disciplines.
The work of historian Hayden White follows this line of thinking. White points out that history is intimately involved in the representation of prior events.
Hisory is always being made rather than something safely secured in what we might call and recall as the past. So, the practice of writing history relies on interpretation and representation, the very devices of fiction and fiction-reading.
White concluded, not uncontroversially, that "history is no less a form of fiction than the novel is a form of historical representation" (1987: 122). The historical record is a discursive entity, a selective account of events, responses and emotions, which is not to say that is fiction or untrue or unreal but rather that it is, to a degree, made up.
Literature, in turn, can bring into being (so the argument goes) that which the archive does not retain traces of
Historical record is flawed $\implies$ gaps and silences
Historical fiction supplements these gaps!
Through knowledge of history, and goal of accuracy, we can recreate history within a fictional construction
"In the Old Testament, God asked the prophet Ezekiel, 'Can these bones live?' He answered yes: and so do I. The task of historical fiction is to take the past outof the archive and relocate it in a body."
"Most historical fiction is, I like to think, in dialogue with the past."
1788-1901
Two different cultures:
Indigenous/'traditional' and European/Modern (try not to place this categories in opposition to each other - they are different, not always in opposition - grey area)
Different world views, different epistemologies
Different perspectives on nature, family, wealth, country, etc.
One recorded history.
Trying to loot Australia for its resources (minerals etc.)
Indigenous, Western stories kept separate, but now during Colonial Australia, these stories collide
At this time, no black vs white binary
Are there stories missing?
The complications of belonging
Importance and consequences of historical truth - dealing with cultural guilt
Facing the limitations of the traditional Australian National identity
The connection between violence and masculinity
Connections between trauma of national experience
Achieving reconciliation and atonement
Indigenous self-determination
Now, we are complicating what it means to belong in Australia.
Cultural/collective guilt
Connection between violence and masculinity. Is this good? How does this make "young men" think (men 👍)
Referendum, we gotta think about these things
Limitations to the identity
Genre texts essentialy ask the audience, "Do you still want to believe this?" Popularity is the audience answering, "Yes". Change in genres occurs when theaudience says, "That's too infantile a form of what we believe. Show us something more complicated." Leo Braudy, The World in a Frame, 1977
The most important part
Are historical fictions about the past?
Or are they about the present?
They are about both!
Most importantly, they are a dialogue with the past.
insert Tim Winton, p.1
Realism through vernacular
Realism mainly came out of Latin America
Magic realism $\implies$ we take something unreal, otherworldy, infused with the construction of realism
Although magical elements aren't real, since they are placed next to real elements, we feel them to be more real.
Playing with narrative construction.
"Back in time"(35-36)
Daisy Bates is a historical figure
Untrained anthropology
Magic realism creates dialogue with past $\implies$ australia is a haunted nation, through this we can talk about the past
No Sugar
The Secret River
That Deadman Dance
Placing the two cultures together, we get a dialogue
By analysing it, we construct our own dialogue
Different way of expressing ones self from a literature perspective
Subverting social/family expectations - back then, rapping was cringe (still is today)
My g got jumped
Eshays cant take a joke
Indigenous perspectives across literature.
What I would like you all to consider:
What I would like you all to gain from this presentation:
We say Indigenous language groups (not tribes etc.)
Why did the stolen generation happen?
Why did government feel the need to intervene?
From what perspective or even emotion did these policies come from?
"[T]hey have to be protected against themselves whether they like it or not. They cannot remain as they are. The sore spot requires the application of the surgeon's knife for the good of the patient, and probably against the patient's will."
Why did people think that the stolen generation was the right thing to do? Was this expected? Culturally? Perspective wise?
A.O. Neville was the "Chief Protector", meaning he was the legal guardian of Indigenous children, not their parents!
How much of our identity, do we determine for ourselves? How much of Indigenous Australians' identity been determined by themselves, versus by Western society.
Lost identity, stolen identity, kids taken from parents, language groups land.
History of Aboriginal Australians is full of trauma, which leads to loss of identity
The Stolen Generation (approx. 1890-1970)
"I have no identity, really." - Cynthia Sariago (daughter of a stolen women)
"We never heard the words 'I love you', so we never learned to say them to our family... or feel them. We became empty vessels, out of touch with our feelings." - Sharyn Egan
"My mother did not bond with her mother and I did not bond with mine." - Barbara Cummings
"I was hurting and had found no way of safely healing the pain... I couldn't see any hope in the future." - Joy Makepeace, taken aged less than 1 yr old.
The "Bringing them Home Report", 1997.
If we can't name or learn our feelings, we cannot express them.
Good story telling engages us because we can relate to the story, what the characters are going through. If you don't know yourself/identity is hollow or fragmented, how can we engage with the characters?
To make connections with Indigenous text, we must understand the contention, and the dual perspectives.
Dr. Margaret Mead (1901-1978), Cultural Anthropologist
When asked about the first sign of Human civilisation she answered: "A 15,000 year old healed femur."
A healed femur bone showed:
The assumption made is that the first sign of civilisation was compassion/selflessness, considering your own survival as a secondary priority.
Lake Mungo remains
This showed:
Someone cared enough for the deceased to ensure a proper process was followed
Someone thought that there was some aspect of a higher power/God
The area where the deceased was found holds some significance (cnnection or importance)
Someone thought that there was some manifestation of life after death
Someone either stayed at or continued to return to the burial or cremation site
Indigenous perspectives run similar to Western/established perspectives
Yet, Indigenous storytelling is not given the same level of importance/credence
What are song lines?
"The Song lines shouldn't be just an anthropological footnote, but a part of Australian history as it is taught in schools. To tell the real story of this continent, you've got to have both histories. They are held in different ways, told in different ways, but are essentially complementary. To really belong to this place, you ..... (too fast)"
Seven sisters song lines creation tracks.
Indigenous interpretation
Notice how similar the stories are
In a Western society, we place Greek mythology on an absolute pinnacle of society/literature.
Yet Aboriginal culture came to the same conclusions, but is placed at a lower level.
Question: why?
Why is one more important, when they are essentially the same story? Why don't we lift Indigenous stories to the same level?
Set during the Great Depression, post-colonial Northam, WA, Moore River Native Settlement and Perth.
Follows the story of the Millimurra (an Aborigial Australian family) and their struggle for survival.
Act 2, Scene 6: The Corroboree Scene
Question: How jarring is it for a white audience to watch a Corroboree? To listen to a foreign language?
"Iraqi, Indonesian, Sri Lankan and one crazy Aboriginal ... who lives with a typewriter but not with the brevity of a visa on my head; no, my longevity was guaranteed before I was born in the 1967 referendum the freedom to practice the voodoo of semantics"
"a haven from Saddam, Suharto, the Tamil Tigers and One Nation"
"... I am a pencil that cannot sharpen, ink that slides off paper, outside of our time,
I am lost, a one ended boomerang."
Early(ish) example Gothic Literature
Dual personalities
Freedom to act out hidden inhibitions (from alternate personalities)
Public vs Private personas
Internal conflict: Good vs Evil
This all can relate to the Indigenous context!
(i love personal computer theory fr)
Postcolonialism deals with effects of colonisation on cultures and societies.
Particular theory/discourse used to discuss social/cultural/systemic effects of colonialisation.
Differing responses/contexts to colonial incursions.
Contemporary colonial legacies in pre/post independent countries.
Definition: Similar to cultural studies and assumes unique view on politics. Literature produced by colonial powers, and by those who were colonised. Looks at issues of power, econs, pols, religion, and culture and how these elements work in relation to colonial hegemony.
How to use:
Introduction: briefly introduce some theoretical framework.
OR Start of first body paragraph…succinct, abridged explanation, postcolonialism characteristics and use to signpost ideas & rest of response.
Make sure know how to use relevant metalanguage, discourse.
Ideology: Set of beliefs/characteristics of a group of individuals -> broken down into values/attitudes/beliefs.
Example. Colonial ideology: maintaining or reinforcing colonial power, silencing, othering, etc. other group.
Discourse: Describe communication, conversation and how language used in terminology used in particular field of study.
Traits become naturalised…continual reinforcement.
Post-colonial lit critically scrutinises colonial relationship. Resists colonial perspectives. Overhauls dominant meaning.
Post-colonial writers give expression to colonised experience, seeking to undercut thematically and formally discourses supporting colonialisation – myths of power, race classification, imagery of subordination
Recognise that postcolonial texts devise a range of stratagems to resist colonial perspectives.
Alert to various expressions of colonised experience, voice which have historically been silenced.
Note clashes which often occur between two different kinds of discourses in texts, discourses of power and discoursed of colonised.
Understanding significance of voices in texts deeply marked by experiences of social and political exclusion.
Colonial policies: Assimilation policy, undermined Indigenous identity and culture, justified dispossession of Indigenous people & removal of Indigenous children.
Assimilation policies embedded in misplaced settler notion of Australia as Terra nullius” a blank page, unpeopled, un-cultured wasteland…self-legitimising fiction.
Maintaining peaceful and friendly relations with the native inhabitants – Indigenous Australians defined to be British subjects & subject to British law.
Since 1788, colonial attitudes; punitive reprisals, expeditions, martial law – massacres and genocides, convictions and executions under British law (Tasmania), various government protection policies of assimilation & segregation, legislative controls and enforced regulation the “assimilation policy” disregard of Indigenous rights and interests, deaths in police custody.
Conventional subject-matter/themes
Indigeneity
Indigenous Australian cultural identity; celebration & mourning
Hybridity
Culture/identity between heritage and coloniser. Representation of identity. Idea of “What is it to be Australian?” Stereotypes – look from colonial origins, foundations OR
Should we re-write colonial narratives? Embedded systemic prejudices?
First contact
Appropriation
Commercialisation/capitalist exploitation of indigenous culture. Tokenistic representation and pigeonholing/stereotypes.
Focus on negative stereotypes which unconsciously perpetuating colonial attitudes.
Binary opposition of
Race relations
Language use
Dismissive attitudes/linguistic prejudice towards non-English. Cultural assimilation.
Dying language/culture…cultural artefacts, mythology, etc. fade away with our language
Can’t voice concerns to express issues from language to another.
Land rights & ownership
Belonging
National identity
Marginalisation
Exclusionary legislation, colonial cultural zeitgeist (dominant, prevailing attitude)…late 19th century (for example)
Those not part of hegemony being pushed to the periphery
Resistance
Mimicry
Historical narratives
National identity
Marginalisation
Exclusionary legislation
Samuel Wagan Watson
Indigenous country/culture: Queensland, Brisbane.
Poet of indigenous & non-indigenous heritage.
Many works explore through concept of cultural hybridity, mimicry in his text; people who still feel displaced, conflict with sense of self, difference of background.
Significant themes/representations of urban & suburban Australian life/Australian general/identity/ethnicity/gender
Some of poetry will explore things removed from Indigenous perspective…identity, gender, youth -> things separate from Indigenous context.
Bildungsroman – coming of age.
