Aborigines – Review of Commission Enquiry
The following review concerns only part of the “Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Bringing Them Home: National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families, Sydney: Sterling Press, 1997”. This thirty-page part is divided into two chapters, the first presenting a “National Overview” of the “separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from their families” and the second focusing on the “New South Wales and the ACT” data that pertain to the issue. This issue is characterised in the text of the Commission as the “forcible removal” or “separation” of Indigenous children from their families, a terminology that parhaps secures the “detached”, “objective” and “accurate” perspective of a commission inquiry, but fails to address the intimate, personal and existential dimension of the issue .
To phrase it differently, what the Commission’s Inquiry is in fact dealing with is not just about what it terms “removal” or “separation” –however forcible– of Indigenous children from their parents. More importantly, what lies behind that is the fact that successive generations of Indigenous children were virtually abducted and stolen from their parents, extensive families, kinship bonds, and cultures. Consequently, what the Commission’s Inquiry is really dealing with is the stolen generations or, as Anna Haebich has so aptly put it, the broken circles that fragmented Indigenous families (Haebich 2000).
[1]. seems that such a shortcoming is implied when the Commission’s Inquiry states that “Such surveys [i.e., statistical surveys about the numbers of removed Indigenous Children] cannot capture the experiences of those people whose Aboriginality is now unknown even to themselves” (p. 37; my emphasis). Furthermore, it could be said that the inclusion of confidential evidences, submissions, and other texts on the part of Indigenous people within the Commission’s Inquiry aims at balancing the rather “objective” intention of the Inquiry.
This overall theme is explained through a set of interrelated ideas that “form the national background and thinking behind” the “laws, practices and policies” (p. 27) that brought about the dark heart of the stolen generations history. More specifically, these ideas are (1) the prevailing racist attitude of non-Indigenous Australians towards Indigenous people , (2) a wide-ranging typology of Social Darwinism that was implemented in the case of Indigenous Australians , and (3) the paternalistic interest that Christian missions showed in the living conditions and future of Indigenous Australians . Of course racism, Social Darwinism and Christian paternalism are not by definition related to each other, but in the case of Indigenous Australians they came to be practically combined (cf. Hemming 2001: 17).
These three basic ideas that underlie the policy of forcibly separating Indigenous children from their homes are basically presented in the first chapter (“National Overview”). This is done by means of a historiographical survey of what was going on throughout Australia “since the very first days of the European occupation” (p. 27). In particular, this historiography of the stolen generations follows a more or less standard pattern in regard to Indigenous – Non-Indigenous relations. Thus this pattern consists in a sequence of periods, namely, the periods of segregation, protection, merging, assimilation, integration, and self-determination , that cover the whole span of time from invasion through colonialism to post-colonial Australian history.
[2] For an introduction to the issue of racism in Australia, see Bulbeck 1993. In regard to the racist attitude of non-Indigenous towards Indigenous Australians, see Lippman 1991; 1981; 1973.
[3] For the theory of Social Darwinism in regard to Indigenous Australians, see McConnochie, Hollinsworth and Pettnam 1988; McGregor 1997.
[4] For the paternalistic attitude of Christian missions towards Indigenous Australians, see for instance Thompson 1994: 53, 80, 108, and 110.
[5] See also Thompson 1994, where this pattern is used to show the shifts of non-Indigenous religious attitudes towards Indigenous people from one period to another.
In dealing with each of these periods, the Commission’s Inquiry concentrates on how the above-mentioned ideological perspective affected the separation of Indigenous children from their families. So during the 19th century the policy of segregation and protection set the foundations of the rationale that was to determine the fate of Indigenous Australians. This rationale was nothing less than a total control over Indigenous people, which meant that the Protection Boards were substituting for Indigenous parents, on the one hand, and that missionaries were free to convert to Christianity and educate Indigenous children according to European culture, on the other.
Then came the periods of merging and assimilation, partly because previous policies had failed and partly because there was an ever growing “mixed descent population” that had to be dealt with. Thus the fundamental control rationale had to be modified: the presence of European “blood” rendered mixed descent Indigenous children suitable for non-Indigenous society. So separation from their parents was envisaged as leading inevitably to a merging with the rest of the population. Once again education and employment according to the modes and needs of non-Indigenous Australians were employed in order to enforce the “inevitable” outcome.
In particular, assimilation was the most extreme version of this attitude, since it took the form of surveillance and saw nothing of value in Indigenous cultures. By the early 60s, however, it was acknowledged that these two policies were leading nowhere. Thus after a short period of integration policy, that is, after a short period of trying to persuade Indigenous people that they could choose to assimilate or not, the government shifted to a period of self-determination. The latter witnessed a decline in the removal of Indigenous Children and the involvement of various Indigenous organisations and services in Child Welfare.
In general, this historiographical survey offers an adequate context that can help one understand better the issue of the stolen generations. It explains the key terms of the policies employed and relates the sequence of the various periods. However, it gives the impression that its main objective is incomplete. In other words, does it want to show that regardless of the changes the rationale of the removal of Indigenous children remained the same, or does it want to demonstrate that the removal of Indigenous children should not be treated as an unvarying practice? Undoubtedly, the Commission’s Inquiry presupposes both views, but it could have made that point in a more straightforward way.
The second chapter (“New South Wales and the ACT”) is actually an application of the first chapter in regard to a specific region. In this respect, it does not offer any further information. It does, however, elaborate the picture by providing specific numbers of removed children on different occasions, by giving the names of specific reserves and stations and some details concerning their operation, and finally by letting those who were separated from their families speak for themselves. It is this last element that seems to be the tout de force of the whole chapter. While the whole Inquiry is written in a detached and rather dry manner –something by the way that does not appeal to the general reader– the Indigenous voices that are heard in the second chapter allow it to become more sensitive and humane. Finally, one could say that the second chapter focuses mostly on the experiences of Indigenous girls and thus leaves the reader with a rather poor picture as to what was really happening with Indigenous boys.
As a whole the two chapters of the Commission’s Inquiry neither confuse the readers nor misrepresent the “true” history of the stolen generations. It seems that the Commission has paid much attention so that all angles and perspectives are represented. Thus it has incorporated statistical data, historical studies, and personal accounts, in order to produce an inquiry as comprehensive and “objective” as possible. At this point, though, one should keep in mind that the value of such endeavours lies in the fact that they can serve only as a first step towards understanding; especially when this understanding involves the living memory and the running sores of whole peoples. In other words, if it aspires to substitute for the crying history of the stolen generations or even worse to serve as a compensation for the harm that has been done to thousands of Indigenous children, then it most certainly has missed the point.
In conclusion, it could be said that the Commission’s Inquiry itself implies and points to the direction where understanding is most likely to be achieved. More precisely, it is through the Indigenous voices, through the cries of those children that did not have the chance to experience the joy of childhood and family or –to slightly paraphrase the words of Jennifer– through the feelings of those who feel that their childhood has been taken away from them and it has left a big hole in their lives (p. 55), that one can hope to realise what really happened in Australia. But what purpose would such a realisation serve? Could it help anyone to regain a childhood that has been stolen? Could it bring back parents, brothers or sisters that have passed away? Certainly not, but it could contribute to a society where blacks do not have to “Talk like whites, behave like whites / pray like whites. Be white” (p. 56); to a society that is both and equally black and white.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
[1]. Bulbeck, C. (1993) Social Sciences in Australia: An Introduction, Sydney: Harcourt Brace. [2]. Haebich, A. (2000) Broken Circles: Fragmenting Indigenous Families, 1800-2000, Fremantle, WA: Fremantle Arts Centre Press. [3]. Hemming, S. (2001) “Changing History: New Images of Aboriginal History”, in Bourke, C., E. Bourke and B. Edwards, Aboriginal Australia: An Introductory Reader in Aboriginal Studies, St Lucia, Queensland: University of Queensland Press, lpp. 16-37. [4]. Lippman, L. (1973) Words or Blows: Racial Attitudes in Australia, Ringwood: Penguin Books. [5]. Lippman, L. (1981) Generations of Resistance: The Aboriginal Struggle for Justice, Melbourne: Longman Cheshire. [6]. Lippman, L. (1991) Generations of Resistance: Mabo and Justice, Melbourne: Longman Cheshire. [7]. McConnochie, K., D. Hollinsworth and J. Pettman (1988) Race and Racism in Australia, Wentworth Falls, NSW: Social Science Press. [8]. McGregor, R. (1997) Imagined Destinies: Aboriginal Australians and Doomed Race Theory, 1880-1939, Melbourne: Melbourne University Press. [9]. Thompson, R. (1994) Religion in Australia: A History, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
