1. EUROPEAN COLONISATION
Impact on Aboriginal culture in Australia

2. Pre –European contact
Aboriginal people lived in relative peace and harmony with their land for over years
One million people
600 to 700 tribes
500 languages

3. 1788 Cultural Contact
1770 Captain James Cook attempts several landings
1788 the first settlement takes place under Captain Arthur Phillip

4. Many Aboriginal groups, their cultures and their languages have been devastated by:
White settlement
Warfare
Disease
Religion
Education and
Economic exploitation

5. Aboriginal response
Impossible to fight against disease and ecological change resulting from feral and domestic animals

6. However …
there was resistance to those settlers who tended flocks and herds
Guerrilla wars were fought all along the expanding front-line of European settlement.

7. Aboriginal people
resisted the occupation of their lands by the British until the end of the 19th Century.

8. Terra nullius (land belonging to no one)
British government ignored the sovereignty and strong resistance of the aboriginal people and claimed discovery of a new land.

9. Terra nullius was – and still is-
a deliberate social construction designed to enable European settlement without compensation for the dispossession of the indigenous peoples.

10. Terra Nullius led to attempted Genocide
Mass poisoning of water holes, rations and blankets.
So-called ‘dispersals’ – euphemism for murder of Aboriginal people.
Indiscriminate shootings
‘Revenge parties’

11. European Settlement
Aboriginal people who were discovered close to the site of an invasion were
Sometimes killed
And always suffered immediate interference with their economy and lifestyle.

12. Aboriginal suffering due to white settlement

13. This was because they both the colonists and Aboriginals wanted the same things:
Good sources of water
Sheltered positions
Access to fish

14. As the colonists made it plain they were staying by
Altering the landscape – clearing trees, building fences-
Resistance grew more and more.
Aboriginal people were killed.

15. As the land was occupied
their numbers reduced and the way of life destroyed, the survivors began living within or on the fringe of the new European community.

16. The subsequent history of settlements was strongly influenced by factors such as
Which religious group ran the mission
What government policy was operating at the time
The attitude of individual pastoralists towards Aboriginal people

17. Who else was also present in an area influenced Aboriginal settlement.
Gold rushes had major impacts.
Sealers in the south stole women and killed men and children.
Pearlers in the north stole young boys to dive.

18. Aboriginal groups living in settlements and missions were
similar in size to those which traditionally formed for ceremonial occasions, however their were two important differences.

19. Differences to traditional settlement
Groupings were permanent
Their composition imposed as a result of non-Aboriginal considerations
Movement controls isolated Aboriginal people like never before.

20. The bases for Aboriginal culture was undermined
Insufficient numbers to sustain complex religious and cultural practices.
Aboriginal identity and self-esteem were difficult to maintain.

21. Aboriginal culture undermined by white contact and destruction included
Customary law and authority.
A hunter-gatherer economy.
And a close relationship with the land.

22. Aborigines of the south-east adjusted to this destruction by
Firstly interpreting whites as deceased kinsfolk returned, making it possible to establish contact.
Secondly, after violence erupted, ceremonies for ridding the returned kin were used.

23. Both attempts, to see whites as kin or to eradicate them, failed;
The spiritual authority resting in the lands of the south-east was pushed aside,
their spirits would not return to their lands now filled with white spirits, but would travel to a better land.

24. Despite the destructive efforts
Physically, spiritually and culturally of the colonising society
Aboriginal people continue to survive.
This survival is set against the enormous assimilation pressures, particularly in the last sixty years.