Historical Roots Of The New Zealand

Aboriginal people, since British settlement, have faced great inequalities and much racial discrimination on their own soil. Aboriginal Australians through great struggle and conflict have made significant progress in the right to their own land. To better understand the position of the Aboriginal Australians, this essay will go into more depth about the rights that Aboriginal people had to their own land prior to federation. It will also include significant events and key people who activated the reshaping of land rights for Indigenous Australians and how that has affected the rights Aboriginal people now have in the 21st Century, in regards to their land.

The first paper by Ladner and Orsini, (2003) gives a detailed account, review and analysis of the First nations governance act. The paper reflects on the act and provides arguments supporting the fact that it is an example of a gentler, subtle form of colonialism that is still in practice today. It argues that although the government has well researched the problems affecting the first nations, it has not efficiently advocated the involvement of these people in their own welfare and improvement.

Since the beginning of European colonization in 1788, Aboriginal people have experienced displacement, have been the targets of genocidal policies and practices, and have had families destroyed through the forcible removal of children. Decades of colonial exploitation and a prolonged systematic attempt to destroy Aboriginal people and culture have led to legislations and policies that are punitive and restrictive towards Aboriginal people. Such legislation reflects the dominant society’s perceptions of Aboriginal people and how they ought to be

Their struggle is soon brought to court where they requested to be considered citizens of the Nisga’a nation, rather than being considered citizens of Canada. Eventually, a treaty is signed between them and the federal government so the Nisga’a people can claim sovereignty over their ancestral homeland, while still being confined within the nation-state. This article helps answer the question of this essay by showing the effects of globalization through colonization on aboriginal people’s identities. Since their land had been under colonization, the Nisga’a found it absolutely necessary to fight for their national identity to claim autonomy from the colonizers. By having the right to call themselves Nisga’a citizens instead of Canadian citizens, their national identities have immensely strengthened due to oppression (Blackburn 2009).

The British invasion of Australia has unfortunately had multiple negative impacts on all Indigenous Australians, and additionally has created historic legacies that frequently effect the way in which people perceive, and work with Indigenous peoples. One of the historic legacies evident throughout Aileen’s case is the horrific occurrence of the stolen generation. One of the most profound consequences of colonisation, involving the removal of Aboriginal children from their families into missions, reserves or other institutions (Dudgeon, Wright, Paradies, Garvey & Walker, n.d.). This historic legacy can be identified in Aileen’s case, which has potential to impact on the processes taking place, and the decisions being made by the stakeholders.

The powerful interaction of power and privilege is thoughtfully explored throughout The Secret River (2015) by Diana Reid which shows the discriminatory ,ethnocentric practices between the Australian Colonizers and the Indigenous people that defines the period. Before Colonization in 1788, Aboriginal Civilization was composed of over 600 different nations that organized the Australian landscape which was more than 40millenbia (Broome 2010). Privilege is a benefit that only a single person or group of individuals usually has because of their position whereas Power is the potential to control the people and events .(Barbara 1994). Several factors lead to power differences between the Indigenous and European cultures that resulted in dispossession

Annotated Bibliography: INDG 1160 Colbung, K., ‘On being Aboriginal: a personal statement’, in Berndt, C. and Berndt, R. (eds.), Aborigines of the West: Their Past and Present, Perth, University of Western Australia Press, 1980, pp. 100-105. In this concise, yet powerful proclamation of self, Ken Colburg a Noongyar man and chair of the Aboriginal Land trust describes growing up in a time of extreme oppression of his people. He depicts the prolific way the Australian government has defined the Aborigines through a series of legislation instead of letting his culture have the freedom to self-identify. This statement was written in 1980 during a controversial time where mining bills superseding the previous land grant legislation.

For years we have witnessed the Indigenous population’s political struggle for recognition of rights to Australian land. At times the effort appears to be endless and achieving recognition almost seems impossible. Native Title and Land claims have become a step closer in achieving this recognition; however, for land rights to exist in an absolute form, they cannot exist as a mere Act of Parliament but must form a fundamental part of the Australian Constitution. This

Colonisation was justified and expedited on the grounds of terra nullius, whereby the First Settlers claimed the land from an ethnocentric and an ignorant standpoint of there not being a sovereign they could deal with, in addition to the land’s perceived lack of use, development or cultivation (McCorquodale, 1986). Fforde, Bamblett, Lovett, Gorringe, & Fogarty (2013) attest that this initial assumption and justification, has aggressed cultural relations in Australia since first contact, and is a fundamental element of racism and prejudice due to its situating of Indigenous peoples within constructed notions of deficiency and deficit. As noted by Dodson (1994, p. 4), rather than characterising Indigenous peoples in positive terms, they were defined in terms of what they were perceived to lack, such as being ‘primitive’ or ‘backward’, inclining their portrayal as being problematic. This deficit discourse assists governments to apply the policies of authority, subjection and assimilation in addition to wider social processes of legitimation and

The challenges faced By Indigenous Peoples in achieving justice, are both complex and extensive. These issues stem from successive centuries of asserted colonial power, which consequently has resulted in the undermining of rights for many Indigenous communities, including the Australian Aboriginal Peoples and Maori Peoples of New Zealand. Systemic abuse of power has resulted in the gradual erosion of Indigenous culture, and as thus, rights of Indigenous communities, including Intellectual Property and Cultural Rights, have been neglected. As a result, a growing body of declarations, statements, and other developments both within governmental systems, as well as in the wider international justice arena have been received. However, many

Broome points out in the early 20th century indigenous people were controlled in two ways by the Europeans. First was being controlled by special legislation, known as the ‘Aboriginal protection Boards’ which imprisoned people on reserves, their daily routines and family gathering split that denied aboriginals civil rights. Second control was by unauthorized customary discrimination, known as ‘caste barrier’, which were against aboriginals on their basis of their skin colour. Broome presents the ways of how indigenous people were treated and discriminated from certain areas.

For over 200 years Aborigines have endured a long history of suffering due to the unpropitious effects of internationalism and western colonization; in Europeans attempt for cultural assimilation and taking their land to which has caused catastrophic consequences within individuals and the community as a whole by

A Key conflict that endures as one of the most noteworthy events in New Zealand’s early history is the Waikato war of 1863-1864. The significance of the battles lies in the definition of the status of Maori and Pakeha in New Zealand. Particular historic debate surrounds whether the Waikato war was caused more primarily over the dispute of land or sovereignty. Maori were rising against British control and domination over them exhibited by establishment of the Kingitanga movement and the resistance to land sales. Responding in a way they saw that they had the right British invaded the Waikato. The outcomes of these events still hold debate and controversy in the regions of occurrence even today. With large loss of lives on both sides directly from the clashes, as Maori retained their pride refused to surrender to the British’s superior technology. New laws were passed as a result of the resistance involving shameless policy’s which marginalised Maori and there rights further. The consequences of this war were drawn out until the late 20th, when finally reparations were made in full.

The article, Stereotypical Constructions of the Maori ‘Race’ in the Media, written by Melanie Wall (1997), can be summarised as an article focusing on the effect the colonisation of New Zealand had on the Maori as a population. It mainly focuses on the way Maori have been imagined as the stereotypical ‘Black Other’. It speaks of the perpetuation and (re)formation of Maori identities, including the way Maori are constrained by their ‘Black Other’ stereotype within New Zealand. The article talks about representations of race through ‘identity images’, the effect of the Maori Renaissance (in particular its effect on identity formations), and Maori Stereotypes in the Media.

In the beginning of the 19th century, almost all New Zealanders were considered to be Maoris. The Maoris made up nearly the whole country, with a population between 100-120,000, while the European population was down in the hundreds. In 1818, the Musket Wars resulted in the loss of over a fifth of the Maori population, at least 20,000 dead and thousands more captured (“Overview of NZ”). The Musket War was a war that began when the Europeans introduced their advanced technology and muskets into New Zealand. The Musket Wars were a series of inter-tribal wars caused by tribes all trading to obtain muskets. At the end of the wars, in 1830, a new conflict for the Maori population took rise when “warfare gave way to economic rivalry” (“The Musket Wars”). From 1830 on, Europeans would come to New Zealand in waves of hundreds and thousands of people, threatening the Maoris’ once complete control over the land. This brewing economic rivalry was what paved the way for the Treaty of Waitangi, New Zealand’s founding document. This treaty was interpreted differently by the English and Maoris, something the British had purposely done. The British plan to deceive the natives resulted in both land and governmental conflicts. Land disputes caused by the treaty’s misinterpretations between the Maori people and the settlers sparked the New Zealand Wars in 1861-1870. At the end of these wars, new laws were passed that nearly abolished Maori rights. In 1896, New Zealand was no longer a Maori