British Influence On Australia

Since the time of the first fleet until now, Australian law has been divided between two types of Australians, the settlers and the indigenous. Since the time of the first fleet, the settlers put into place English law to rule the land known as Australia and make laws on the rights of the people, the indigenous and the land. Since then, Australian law has come a long way in the development of a fairer constitution and enacting laws for the indigenous to close the gap between them and the settlers.

A landmark event for Aboriginal People’s struggle for rights is February 13, 2008, when in Federal Parliament the then-Prime Minister Kevin Rudd stood up to apologise to the Aboriginal People, for Australia’s past mistreatment on laws, policies and practices that effected the people of the stolen generation (Welch, 2008 and National Sorry Day Committee, 2014). Aboriginal People have struggled for rights since the British came to Australia but it was especially highlighted when the Aborigines Act 1905 came out. There were multiple things that lead to this landmark event, though the Bringing them Home Report in 1997 was a huge step in helping the apology to come about (National Sorry Day Committee, 2014). This essay will discuss in more depth what led to this event, what the goals of the apology were, what the outcomes were and the ongoing impact has resulted.

The National Apology of 2008 is the latest addition to the key aspects of Australia’s reconciliation towards the Indigenous owners of our land. A part of this movement towards reconciliation is the recognition of Indigenous Australians and Torres Strait Islanders rights to their land. Upon arrival in Australia, Australia was deemed by the British as terra nullius, land belonging to no one. This subsequently meant that Indigenous Australians and Torres Strait Islanders were never recognised as the traditional owners. Eddie Mabo has made a highly significant contribution to the rights and freedoms of Indigenous Australians as he was the forefather of a long-lasting court case in 1982 fighting for the land rights of the

Under the ‘terra nullius’ law, the Aboriginals lost their land, which is now known as dispossession. To justify this dispossession, the English followed the set of beliefs that are now identified as social Darwinism. “Social Darwinism, with its powerful racially based doctrines, ranked Indigenous Australians as inferior to Europeans and provided a rationale for dispossession by drawing on the ‘laws’ of natural selection to justify the ‘inevitable’ extinction of Indigenous Australians in the face of the arrival of the ‘superior’ white race” (Psychology and Indigenous Australians, Foundations of Cultural Competence, 2009, pp. 75). By having their land taken away from them, the Aboriginals lost part of their spiritual connection and their sense of belonging and identity because Aboriginal culture is based heavily on the spirits of the land. These connections that bonded the Aboriginals to the land were never understood by the English settlers, who only saw the land as possible income (Psychology and Indigenous Australians, Foundations of Cultural Competence, 2009.). They also lost a lot of their sacred areas, spiritual areas and meeting places because they were on the land that the white people had divided and fenced of the land that these areas were on and if an Aboriginal was trying to

The takeover by force of Australia’s First People’s land and the subsequent exploitation of their land and people, with total disregard for their customs, laws and rights resulted in the subordination of the First People’s to their British overlords.

Terra Nullius was once apparent in Australian society, but has now been nullified with the turn of the century and the changes of societal attitudes. With the political changes in our society, and the apology to Indigenous Australians, society is now witnessing an increase in aboriginals gaining a voice in today’s society. Kevin Rudd’s apology as described by Pat Dodson (2006) as a seminal moment in Australia’s history, expressed the true spirit of reconciliation opening a new chapter in the history of Australia. Although from this reconciliation, considerable debate has arisen within society as to whether Aboriginals have a right to land of cultural significance. Thus, causing concern for current land owners, as to whether they will be

The continuing effect of dispossession on Aboriginal spiritualities affected most of the Aborigines’ aspects’ of life due to the variety of policies that the White British brought out under the slogan of protection, support and Aboriginal’s benefit. Terra Nullius was one of the British laws that applied in Australia and prevented Aboriginal people performing the necessity of the Dreaming such as, hunting, ceremonies and visited their sacred sites. Terra Nullius simply defined as the empty land, white people who they arrived to Australia considered that the Australian lands belong to no one. This British impression about Australian land derive from the earliest days of British settled as a result of Aboriginals’ lands included no fences which

For thousands of years prior to the arrival of Europeans the Indigenous Australians lived as fishers, hunters and gatherers. They developed their own set of laws, ceremonial traditions, languages, knowledge and customs of survival with social rules and kinship obligations. However, The British invasion of Australia in 1788 marked the beginning of the end for this ancient way of life. The Indigenous Australia’s forceful submission to British rule, and later assimilate into Western Culture ensured the collapse of Australian Aboriginal society. Undoubtedly, after the federation indigenous Australians still weren’t treated as free and equal in dignity by the successive governments of Australia.

For years we have witnessed the Indigenous population’s political struggle for recognition of rights to Australian land. At times the effort appears to be endless and achieving recognition almost seems impossible. Native Title and Land claims have become a step closer in achieving this recognition; however, for land rights to exist in an absolute form, they cannot exist as a mere Act of Parliament but must form a fundamental part of the Australian Constitution. This

The experience of Aboriginal Australians since European settlement is replete with suppression of their cultural practices and knowledge by the dominant cultural groups in Australia. In the first century of settlement, these included land dispossession by force, theft of women, slavery and war, introduced diseases, and the missionary zeal for Aboriginal people to embrace Western religion and reject their own spiritual beliefs such as the dreaming. Moreover, settlement brought with it the assertion of British sovereignty and law, which effectively displaced indigenous customary law in the 20th century, further intervention into Aboriginal culture and life was evidenced in the Government’s White Australia Policy and an explicit strategy of indigenous

The term 'terra nullius' meant a land that belonged to no one, Australia was titled this by Captain Cook in the 18th century and it legally meant that no one could claim rights over the land because no one lived there. However, people were living there, the indigenous people of the country had been living here for many centuries, and once the land was claimed by European settlers the Aboriginal people lost their rights of the land that had been theirs for such an extensive

Throughout the 20th Century Indigenous Australians rights have been detrimentally and unjustly affected by the frequent changing of governmental policies. This has been evidenced throughout the history of Australia, starting as early as the beginning of colonisation, to current time. In this time, Indigenous Australians have been forced from the land that they not only have used to sustain their physical needs, but is significant to their spiritual beliefs and Dreamtime. During the course of Australia’s shared history, there has been many different periods greatly dependant on the Government at the time and their beliefs when it come to the rights of the Indigenous people, discussed in this essay are the, Protection Policy, Assimilation Policy,

Colonisation was justified and expedited on the grounds of terra nullius, whereby the First Settlers claimed the land from an ethnocentric and an ignorant standpoint of there not being a sovereign they could deal with, in addition to the land’s perceived lack of use, development or cultivation (McCorquodale, 1986). Fforde, Bamblett, Lovett, Gorringe, & Fogarty (2013) attest that this initial assumption and justification, has aggressed cultural relations in Australia since first contact, and is a fundamental element of racism and prejudice due to its situating of Indigenous peoples within constructed notions of deficiency and deficit. As noted by Dodson (1994, p. 4), rather than characterising Indigenous peoples in positive terms, they were defined in terms of what they were perceived to lack, such as being ‘primitive’ or ‘backward’, inclining their portrayal as being problematic. This deficit discourse assists governments to apply the policies of authority, subjection and assimilation in addition to wider social processes of legitimation and

The dispossession of Indigenous people in early Australia has lead to years of suffering and disconnect for those across Australia. As European settlement began to spread, the Indigenous were forced off their land for claims of protection and assimilation. Since the first fleet, settlers were the ones with the power - they had weaponry, resources, and strength to build a modern nation. The colonists believed Indigenous Australian’s were racially inferior, giving them the means to claim ‘terra nullius’, starting the dispossession process, destroying their inextricable connection by destroying the land with livestock and disease. Bob Randall of the Mutitjulu, states in the documentary ‘Kanyini’, “It may look like bush to you but it is my family”,

The Australian Indigenous community hold extremely significant corrections to the land of Australia, of which they refer to as ‘Country.’ Indigenous people acquire deep meaning from the land, sea and the countless resources derived from them. This special relationship has formed for many centuries. To them ‘Country’ is paramount for overall wellbeing; the strong, significant, spiritual bonds embody their entire existence. Knowledge is continually passed down to create an unbroken connection of past,