The Red-Headed Aborigine

“The only sounds I could hear above the trotting of the pony’s hooves and the rumble of the wheels and the creek of the cart were sudden harsh weird cries from birds near and far.”

“James,” he says. We begin walking where there is a bundle of people and he looks concerned. “How about I send you to the sheriff’s station? They will surely help you out,” he says. “If it will help,” I say. The chirping of birds seems to follow me, it triggers a memory of home. When Mama and I would take short walks through the meadow behind our home. Whistling along with the bird's melody is what we did. Back then, I had no worries at all. Now, all I have is worries.

This Assessment will be my personal reflection and analysis of contemporary issues raised for post-colonial Indigenous Australians through two programs on the National Indigenous Television station (NITV), Living Black and NITV News. I will reflect on how these issues have impacted on the relationships between Indigenous Australians and non-Indigenous Australians, and how Indigenous culture impacts 21st century Australia. Through this I will also consider my own feelings and opinions on how these issues are raised and considered.

When European colonists settled in Australia they treated the Aboriginal people extremely different to that of their fellow white men. The Aboriginals were not seen as first class citizens through the European eye and as a result were victims of extreme oppressions and had nearly no rights or freedoms. Since then Aboriginal people have fought to be treated equally to the white men through various different ways. I will discuss the previous struggles faced by the Aboriginals, the Australian strife for equality and finally the level of success and degree of rights and freedoms given to Aboriginals in modern Australia.

In this essay I will consider the roles of city and country in three short stories; Water Them Geraniums by Henry Lawson, Short-Shift Saturday by Gavin Casey, and Trees Can Speak by Alan Marshall. I will argue through contributing to character development, they provide insight into the construction of contempory Australian identity. In Water Them Geraniums the outback is shown to be an emasculating force, particularly for women, that strips away their humanity until they function in a mechanical way to survive off the land. In Short-Shift Saturday the narrator is a product of an inherited colonial culture and imagines that it is the alien landscape and culture in which he lives that is the agent of his suffering. In reality, the

Flannery delves into the formation of the continent, the evolution of its species, the origin of the aboriginal people, the arrival and development of European society, and the possible future of the continent and its people. While many of it is an accurate description of the country and provides a good background, a visit to the land itself would more accurately provide an idea of the state of Australia.12 The experience of the aboriginal people became very hard as a result of European colonization. Some were wiped out by war and disease, others left their land to avoid this. Some left willingly, others were forced.

Living close to nature or living in harmony with nature is the whole purpose of Aboriginal life. There was no superior and inferior status between humans and nature. In fact for aboriginals the land and all the creatures have become inseparable companions. (Eds Dwight N Hopkins, P.71) But over the decades after settlement in Australia, Europeans disturbed the bond aboriginals have established with nature. In the following poems, one can see the poignant agonies of aboriginals for the disappearance their culture.

Noel Pearson’s speech ‘an Australian history for us all’ discusses his approach to trying to solve some of the most systemic problems facing Australian Aboriginals today. The speakers are successful in understanding the ideas and values of the speech. Through the uses of various language techniques and context, Pearson’s speech details the struggles of the relationship between the first European settlers and Aboriginal Australians.

The construction of Aboriginality in Australia has been achieved through a variety of processes, in various places and at various levels of society, giving rise to a complex interaction between the constructions. At the local level, the most striking line of tension may seem to lie between what Aboriginal people say about themselves and what others say about them. But crosscutting this is another field of tension between the ideas of Aboriginality (and non-Aboriginality) that people of all kinds construct and reproduce for themselves, and the constructions produced at the national level by the state in its various manifestations, the mass media, science, the arts and so on (Beckett, 1988).

In 1788 the first Fleet arrived in Australia bringing European soldierse, convicts and settlers. This bought aboriginals in contact with white people for the first time. Some aboriginal groups tried to resist this occupation and they used violence and force the archive it. This essay will explain why that resistance was justified by examining the causes, identifying some examples of Indigenous resistance and will assess short and long term effects of this conflict.

At the bird’s appearance and apparent vocal articulation, he is at first impressed, then saddened. He compares this evening visitor as only another friend which will soon depart, just as “other friends have flown before” (58). But the raven again echoes quite aptly his one-word vocabulary, thus leading the man on to think more deeply about the possibilities that exist at this juncture. Somewhere deep inside him, he has realized that it doesn’t matter what question he poses, the bird will respond the same.

Each of the pieces holds a small detail and when combined, clear pictures form and come to life for the two. In stanza 11, Merrill goes more in-depth about how the boy feels about the parent’s unfortunate divorce. “Gates close behind them, Houri and Afreet. Both claim the page.”

Australian Aborigines are thought to have the longest continuous cultural history in the world. Yet, within a hundred years, the near extinction of the Aboriginal culture almost occurred. This single event, the invasion of the Australian continent by European settlers, changed the lifestyle, the culture, and the fate of Australian Aborigines. Their entire lives were essentially taken away and they were forced into a white, European world where the lifestyle change could not have been any different. Aborigines in Australia today are struggling to deal with a past in which they lost touch with their culture and now are trying to regain some of that cultural identity.

He wonders why the birds are just waiting in the sky as if they are waiting for a command, why they are restless, and he thinks it is strange that they are little birds and they are the type of the birds that normally keep to their own territory and don’t have a history of attacking people . When he looks out toward the coast, he sees the birds flocking in his direction and he believes that for some odd reason, they are going to come down to the

An Australian Short Story, written by Ryan O’Neill, is such an in-depth piece of literature. The story’s artistic format brings a new meaning to Australian literature, and the typical stereotype. Ryan O’Neill took a chance on this story, because he isn’t an Australian. But after living in Australia for many years, he took the time to really notice things. And with that, he chose to write what he saw and