DREAMING ANCESTORS REINCARNATE - FIRST PEOPLES.
Bruce Reyburn
February - May 2014
“In every tribe without exception there exists a firm belief in the reincarnation of ancestors.” (Spencer and Gillen, 1904)
Acknowledgement of country.
I acknowledge First Peoples and their living countries.
Introduction: Re-constituting Australia to accommodate First Peoples’ realities.
Recognition, Sovereignty and Deep Respect
“RECOGNITION” is the call from one part of indigenous Australia – and there is a well coordinated campaign – recognition of First Peoples in the 1901 Australian Constitution.
The Recognise campaign is tied to the various governmental undertaking to hold a referendum to do something by way of belated Constitutional recognition of this country’s First Peoples. A mention in the Preamble perhaps?
“SOVEREIGNTY” is that call from another part of indigenous Australia – less coordinated and from a more marginalised part of ‘mainstream’ life – and highly suspicious of any moves of Anglo-Australia authorities to codify First Peoples rights in the absence of genuine treaties or treaty.
"TREATY" is the call from a wider range of indigenous Australia - Treaty or Treaties - addressing a key issue which was neglected by the British at the time of colonisation and long overdue for correction.
"RESPECT" - well earned by First Peoples, and sadly lacking in much of the dealings from Anglo-Australia to date. A core ingredient for a genuine healing solution.
Can First Peoples be recognised – by non-indigenous Australians - on terms which are acceptable to First Peoples own authorities?
And who are those authorities? Given the great mix-up of people and country, who can decide, with any authority, on the Dreaming identity of surviving First Peoples?
No doubt this is part of a struggle which involves Westernised indigenous people, relatively junior indigenous men and senior law people. No doubt also, compromises will have to be made.
After the long denial – by Anglo-Australian authorities - of the place in life of senior lawmen in this country’s life many may have underestimated the resiliency of those lawmen and of the Ways they embody.
Some senior law people have kept alive the core cultural value that living people are reincarnated Dreaming ancestors.
Where does this sit in comparison with the claims of privilege made for the British Sovereign as Head of the Australian State?
Life’s answers to these deep issues will be produced by a political process, not by a single writer.
Issues to do with the appropriate form of recognition for First Peoples carry with them questions about the appropriate forms of representation.
There is a related question at work in all this – can modern secular anthropologists ever be expected to be able to fashion adequate forms of representation of First Peoples realities?
Based on the evidence from the 20th century my answer to this is “No.”
European forms of reason during the age of their imperial expansion systematically ignored the place of First Peoples in relation to their living countries. Europeans wanted the country, not the people.
If we reject the mentally of terra nullius from the outset, and take a healing perspective, we have to insist that First Peoples – when in the place which has been pre-ordained for them by life itself – are sacred. Peoples-and-countries are not only one, but their Ways have been ‘blessed’ by transcendental forces outside of modern European understanding.
It is an act of violence to separate First Peoples from country – both conceptually and practically. It is an act of violence to deny the prime position of their Ways and to impose Western cultural forms upon them.
COLONISATION - CLONING ANALOGY
The form of colonisation used in this country by British authorities – and prolonged by their Anglo-Australian imperial heirs – can be compared to the process of cloning.
With cloning, the nucleus of the cell is removed and a foreign nucleus substituted in its place. The foreign nucleus is then able to access the life-supporting resources in order to thrive and reproduce.
Similarly there has been a sustained attempt to suppress the original cultural core of this country and to substitute the foreign British ‘nucleus’. This has allowed some to flourish, just as it has caused enormous damage to the lives and living countries of First Peoples.
There is ample evidence of the past and ongoing efforts to suppress the original peoples and the original cultures. While this appalling situation may be regarded as ‘normal’ for many Australians, genocide and ethnocide can never be granted a resting place in life.
Within the narrow scope of my own interests, the question arises as to what has been – and continues to be – the role of modern anthropology vis-à-vis the ‘cloning’ process which systematically privileges foreign views of life at the expense of indigenous views.
Modern anthropologists, in Australia, have probably done more than any other non-indigenous group or profession, to inform the wider community of the vital relation between First Peoples and their living countries.
Therefore it is highly ironic to have reached a position that is, itself, critical of modern anthropology. But it is now time for anthropology to flex itself and transcend its own limitations.
MODERN ANTHROPOLOGY AND SECULAR MODELS
The craft of the modern anthropologist is to fashion secular models of sacred peoples lives.
Using forms of representation which are akin to those of Naturalism, they are unable to accurately capture the transcendental dimensions of First Peoples modes of Being.
This limitation – when combined with the workings of the Anglo-Australian political and legal systems – can result (in some instances) in such absurdities as Aboriginal Land Commissioners being unable to officially recognise (as traditional Aboriginal owners) young men right before their eyes when these young men are painted up in their true colours by senior lawmen - but do not meet Anglo-Australian statutory definitions.
Senior women too have been denied recognition. In the 1985 Warumungu land claim the Aboriginal Land Commissioner ‘found’:
“[Senior woman’s name –BR] claimed to be kirta for the Aakiy at Wakurlpu because she was born at Greenwood Station, and this Dreaming belonged to her mother’s mother’s people…The conclusion to be drawn is that it was birth at Greenwood Station which conferred [Name – BR]’s claim to be kirta rather than her descent. Together they constitute powerful attachment to the land and its Dreamings, but they do not place her within a local descent group of owners within the meaning of the Act.” (Maurice 1988:96)
Aboriginal Land Commissioners are bound by statutory definitions of ‘traditional Aboriginal owner’ which derive, in part, their apparent meaningfulness from modern anthropology, the Aboriginal Land Commissioner may opt to sacrifice First Peoples living reality in order to preserve Western conceptual systems.
The conceptual compartmentalisation necessary for modern anthropology to attempt to make sense First Peoples Ways has no equally necessity in relation to the features inherent in those Ways.
The modern anthropological secular models serve to render ‘tame’ this country’s living realities – realities with which Europeans, deeming themselves superior (and therefore not sensing any need to learn First Peoples cultures and languages), are unable to relate.
These 'tame' forms of representation are crafted to satisfy conscious and unconscious specifications arising from European/Western cultural master narratives. They are not subject to checks regarding adequacy from the people they aspire to represent.
DECOLONISING MODERN ANTHROPOLOGY
The question of forms of representation fashioned by modern anthropologists is a secondary one to the challenge of crafting forms of representation for First Peoples to be able to participate effectively in this country’s forms of governance.
However, attention to questions of forms of representation is of importance given the role modern anthropological understandings of First Peoples realities has served as a substitute for First Peoples themselves during the 20th century – in relation to such matters as statutory definitions of their rights.
Life turns on some very fine points. The challenge life presents to us in this country – and beyond - is to be able to learn to live with new forms of representation which systematically enable the healing perspective and the sacred character of First Peoples.
MUCKATY RADIOACTIVE FUTURES
The present dispute relating to the Commonwealth’s proposal to locate a radioactive waste facility at Muckaty in the NT – via a statutory process which rests on the Commonwealth’s 1976 Aboriginal Land Rights (NT) Act – provides a rich area for the investigation of the view that there is a clear mismatch between First Peoples living realities and modern anthropology’s understanding of those realities.
Anthropological evidence – from both sides of this dispute - is yet to be made public in relation to the Federal Court case regarding the radioactive waste facility proposed by the Commonwealth of Australia Government for Warlmanpa country at Muckaty.
When this professional evidence is produced, we will should be able to confirm the working hypothesis:
“The forms of representation fashioned by modern anthropologists unconsciously reproduce the structures of authority of their own social formation.”
In the Australian context, these structures are premised on the denial of any form of authority for First Peoples Ways and senior law-people. These modern authority structures are entirely ‘one-sided’ – in a profoundly bi-cultural country.
A good degree of self-decolonisation/self-realisation is required for such a challenging task, and this has not been the pattern in the 20th century.
Decolonisation has not been embraced either by modern anthropology as a profession nor, on the part of its senior practitioners, as a vocational life-choice.
more to come ...
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MUCKATY INFO
For more on the Federal Court Case to oppose the radioactive waste facility at Muckaty see my other blogs
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