Transcript Aborigines

Aborigines
Johanna Dietz
Kristine Hergert
Structure
In general
Culture & Society
Way of life
Religion
Music & Art
History
Before the white settlement
After the white settlement
Situation today
Sources
In general
Aborigines are the native Australians
The name was first used in 1770 by
James Cook and the white settlers
Aborigines aren’t a uniform nation,
they consist of many tribes and clans
The Aborigines name themselves
different concerning the territory they
live in
Flag of the Aborigines
Culture & Society
Difference to the native Americans
No recognizable political structures
They have no chiefs
They do not distinguish between
related or not related
In their sense everybody is related to
everyone else
Way of life
They see themselves as a part of their
natural surrounding
For Aborigines land does not belong to
individuals, the people belong to the land
They live in simple huts or shelters made
out of twigs and bark
For hunting and fishing they use spears
and boomerangs
They use boomerangs as a weapon, but
also for competitions
They live in bands consisting of 20-30
members
Every band has the right of an area
where they live in and find everything
they need to survive
The tribe and the area are named by
the language
The men take the dominating role, the
women are just workers
The aborigines get their food out of
hunting and gathering, the women
gather and the men hunt
They eat whenever the food appears,
not regularly
They are nomads inside their area
Members of other tribes aren’t
allowed to step on the areas of others
It’s not totally clear how many
different languages they have
There are between 200 and 300
Today only 20 languages are still
taught to the children
Many Aborigines speak also the
languages of other tribes
Religion
In all tribes there is the religion about the
“Dreaming”
That’s a time in the past, the time of the
creation, it exists a land of the dead people
They believe in the “kangaroo-man”
They think the “Dreaming” isn’t only past,
it’s also present and future
The most important figure is the Yurlunggur
(rainbow-snake)
It’s a ghost of fertility, male and female
They believe that everything exists on
the planet for a reason, everything
has a purpose
There are no freaks, misfits or
accidents, there are only
misunderstandings and mysteries
They believe the world is a place of
abundance
They have a lot of rituals
Music & Art
The Aborigines play a lot of instruments
The most popular one is the Didgeridoo
(Yidaki)
It’s a wind-instrument that they made out of
Eukalyptusholz and bamboo
Their most important instrument is the
human voice
The music is entertainment, but also
communication
The Aborigines don’t know a writing
Art is their mean of communication and
expression
The traditions and the history of them are
recorded in paintings
Visual art in Aboriginal culture takes a
number of different forms
Aborigines express their intellectual and
religious attitudes to the land and the
meaning of life through art and ceremony
Basis = the strong relationship with
ancestral heroes and the landscape
Representational art showing human and
animal forms exists beside abstract
symbols
They can be used for a number of
purposes, members of different groups
understand each other’s symbols
The meaning of the symbols varies in
every painting
History
It isn’t sure how and when the
Aborigines came to Australia
Between 40,000 and 50,000 before
Christ
Archeologists think that they came
from South Africa and first settled in
north-west Australia
Before the white settlement
They lived in the east and the outback of
Australia
They lived in a community with 500 people
divided into smaller groups
By the time of the first white settlement
300,000 Aborigines were living in Australia
Most of them lived in the area around
Murray River
They adapted their way of life to the
surrounding
All of them were hunters, fishers and
gatherers
They lived over large areas of land
Their weapons varied from region to
region (spears, boomerangs)
They got their food in different ways,
but only a few did farming
They ate animals (e.g. kangaroos),
nuts and fruits
They lived as nomads and halfnomads
They survived in all climates
They used fire for different ends
Drawing pictures was very important
for them and they renewed them
regularly
After the white settlement
They were killed in large numbers by
settlers and by diseases introduced
by the Europeans
They were forced to give up and
leave their land
It was taken without compensation
Their place in Australia’s history has
been played down or ignored
completely
Their children were taken away and
placed in institutions or white families
They should lose their Aboriginality
and assimilate into white society
Aborigines were denied many rights
1967 right to vote, access to social
benefits
1972 Aboriginal or Tent Embassy in
Canberra
1976 Northern Territory Act/Aboriginal
Land Rights Act
1980s End of racial segregation at
school
1992 Mabo Case
1993 Native Title Act
1996 Wik Case
Situation today
2000 Olympic games in Sydney
Cultural program drew attention to
Aboriginal issues
Aboriginal myths at the opening and
closing ceremony
Cathy Freeman won a gold medal
and enlightened the fire
Created a positive image of one of the
world’s oldest culture
Interest in traditional Aboriginal culture has
grown immensely
Tourists are interested in the Aboriginal life
in the outback
Aboriginal activists have done much to
improve their rights
Social situation is extremely bad, on every
social scale they suffer the greatest
disadvantage
Thousands know little about their original
families and tribes
Great success in areas such as sport,
music, film, theatre and dance
The market for Aboriginal culture goes
well beyond national borders
Aboriginal art has also become an
important international aspect
It has attracted the interest of art
collectors and is now represented in
all Australian galleries
Modern Aboriginal art: painting, printmaking, ceramics and fabric printing
Traditional art: baskets, string bags,
weapons
Traditional art is religious and is
considered the exclusive copyright
They live in a compromise between
traditional and modern way of life
02.02.2007
Aborigines got the rights for the
rainforests at the Australian eastcoast
They are allowed to use them for
hunting, fishing and national parks
They hope to get more jobs out of this
Sources
Australian Encounters 1
Wikipedia
Thanks for your attention!