INTERVIEW: Aboriginal Health - Canberra, 13 February 1998

Introduction -

    It was a health steering committee, another inquiry, yet again, into Aboriginal health. There was a Parliamentarian from the House of Representatives, and four members [of the Committee? ]We had to talk and the submissions were presented. Those who were able came to Canberra to present [the submission] and they asked me to go along with them. So I listened to the various people who spoke on the submissions. Then it was our turn and they asked me to talk. I said that the Aboriginal Health people have to start thinking, and these are white people and the authorities and so on. All have to start thinking and asking what the concept of Aboriginal health is, because I told them it was bloody [?] low in spirit. And ....

A Certain Kind of Justice

Introduction -

    In 1993, the politicians only just got home from Canberra in time for Christmas. Paul Keating kept them in so that his 127 page Native Title Act could be passed. Christmas 1997 will be a repeat performance now that John Howard has produced 264 pages of amendments in the name of workability and simplicity.  The politics is even more complex than the law. The Howard Government wants to wind back native title as far as the Senate, the High Court and the Constitution will permit. As for the Senate, that will depend on the ALP because the minor parties are happy to maintain a full blooded recognition of native title.

Witnessing Whiteness in the Wake of Wik

Introduction -

    White race privilege in Australia is based on the theft of our lands, the murder of our people and the use of our slave labour. Whites' position in our land and the benefits they reap have resulted from the historical fact of White dominance, which was built upon a belief in White racial superiority. If White people today share the beliefs and values of their White ancestors and enjoy the race privileges established by those ancestors, then by 'Whitefella' logic they are complicit in that historical dominance (Moreton-Robinson 1998:7).

Pearl King's Aspirations for the Future

Introduction -

   How to secure a future for the next seven generations? As an Aboriginal Australian I feel it's my responsibility to say, in order to move confidently forward, we must first settle the past and align it with the present. Australia is currently having this difficulty with precisely this issue. I believe the enemy of our secure future is in the mind-set and behavioural patterns of Australians at large.

A Pastoralist Speaks Out

Introduction -

   Excerpt from a speech by Camilla Cowley, pastoralist from Ballon, Western Queensland, reproduced from October edition of the Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation (Qld) newsletter.

    You maybe aware of the history behind my public entry into the native title arena. My family property was placed under native title by the Gunggari people, which in my ignorance about native title, terrified and angered me.

Bloodlines - not extinguishment

Introduction -

    Kathy Rum-Sing of the Millera people spoke to Zohl de Ishtar about the proposed gold mine on her ancestral lands in New South Wales, Australia: "Millera country is Gold Dreaming and we as the Millera people are the children of the Gold Dreaming," With the voice of her family, Rum-Sing has vowed to stop the mining of her ancestral land on the Timbarra (Millera) plateau in northern NSW (near Grafton). The Millera people are placing an injunction in the Federal court to stop the mine from going ahead. The Millera form a tribe of the greater Bundjalung nation.

Justice: A Variable commodity

Introduction -

    In April 1997 the Queensland government issued a directive that all Cabinet documents and all legal advices be removed from locations on administrative files and returned to the control of the Cabinet Secretariat for "safe storage".! This does not refer to records of Cabinet deliberations which are already sealed at State Archives for a 30-year period. So why this new action? And why now? I'd like to use this forum to look briefly at the context of this extraordinary edict, to signal the ramifications for Aboriginal interests and to suggest a course of action to protect those interest from political abuse.

John Koowarta - Mabo of the Mainland

Introduction -

    On 23 December it will be one year since the High Court's Wik decision was handed down. As Australians acknowledge this momentous anniversary, it is important to remember that the Wik people's campaign for land justice did not come out of the blue.  The Wik campaign stretches back over 30 years and features a little known Wik man from Aurukun, on the Western side of Cape York Peninsula, called John Koowarta.

Human Rights and Wrongs: Indigenous Employment

Introduction -

    It is common know ledge that Indigenous Australians are the most disadvantaged members of our society on a range of measures, including health, housing, education, income and employment. It is the latter of these areas, employment, which will be examined here, in terms of the current state of disadvantage, and the role of historical exclusion from employment and equal wages in producing current disadvantage not only in employment but in other areas. Finally, what this state of affairs says about Australia's efforts to ensure the human rights of its citizens will be briefly canvassed.

Equality, Diversity and Excellence - or Old-Fashioned Discrimination?

Introduction -

    The title of my paper reflects a perspective that I share with many other academics and students about recent developments in the field of student equity in higher education in Australia. In 1995, the then Labor government commissioned a review of the national framework for student equity in higher education. As a member of the team that provided research for that review, I felt some pride that Australian universities, supported by the government of the day, were taking a very positive approach to addressing the problems remaining in the system that hindered the participation and success of all sectors of society in higher education. While we were engaged in interviewing staff and collating and interpreting the data for this review, I had a sense that a significant shift. was about to occur in higher education in Australia, that we were on the track to cultural change that would eventually result in a system that might genuinely embrace diversity in its student and staff populations and reflect this in all its day-to-day practice. Events of the last eighteen months, however, have led to a profound pessimism that we have actually made an about-turn back to the 'good old days' of elitism and discrimination.

I'll Never be Your Woman: The Spice Girls and New Flavours of Feminism

Introduction -

    The year 1997 will be remembered as the year under the spell of Spice. While Whitetown's "Your Woman" interrupted the near-continuous chart success of the Spice Girls, this single, although sung by 'a man,' maintained an interest in the feminine condition.  The identity and ownership of the term 'woman' seemed to float in the pop semiosphere. Certainly British popular music has had many Queens. From Dusty Springfield and Helen Schapiro to Lulu and Cilla Black, strong women with big voices and a provocative visuality have been the trademark of British musical invasions of Europe and the United States. Dusty Springfield's ice white lipstick and soaring beehive triggered a myriad of mimicries, just as Lulu's powerful rendering of 'Shout' vocalized the passion and fashion of a committed and controlling femininity. What makes the Spice Girls significant to this narrative is that, as a group, each are performing a splinter of the contemporary feminine continuum. Mel B, Mel C, Emma, Geri and Victoria do for feminism what the Village People did for gay politics: they grant a spirit, power and humour to the performance of difference. The Spice Girls could never be feminism's woman. This paper investigates the reason why Girl Power is fashionable and colourfully affirmative, while feminism is the vestimentary equivalent of a brown cordouroy jacket, patched at the elbow. We assess whether the Spice Girls offer a space for a new way of thinking about feminist theory and a new way of living feminist politics.