Excerpts from Indigenous Education Assessment Task - Historical Report

Executive Summary
Indigenous education history cannot be considered in isolation . . . it is deeply embedded within
the totality of Australias colonial history, it is a complex nexus of social and educational policy
(Herbert, 2012, p. 95).
The historical experiences of Australian Indigenous people have had an incontrovertibly
significant and detrimental impact upon their contemporary circumstances, in terms of culture,
social wellbeing, and education. Understanding the legacy of Australias shared history is vital, as
it provides some explanation of the present sense of injustice felt by Indigenous people, as well
as their disadvantaged status today (Johnston, 1991. p. 3). This disadvantaged status has both
caused and been compounded by Indigenous students being positioned at the periphery of
education (Herbert, 2012, p. 96). The proceeding report intends to examine this complex
relationship between Australias past and present. It will discuss the impacts of a number of
Australias major historical practices and social policies on Indigenous people and their cultures.
Specific focus will be placed on the Indigenous experience of education, and on potential
strategies for improvement.
Cultural Context
When explaining Indigenous cultural concepts, it is imperative to acknowledge and remain
consistently aware of the immense diversity that exists throughout Australia. The experiences,
beliefs, and identities of one community or language group may not necessarily be universally
applicable to others. The Dreaming, as the most central and yet most elusive aspect of
Aboriginal culture is a concept that is subject to this diversity (Rose, 1998, p. 242). The Burarra
people of Maningrida in the Northern Territory possess complex spiritual identities, and see the
Dreaming as both timeless and immediate (Magin, 2005, p. 50). It encompasses not just the
period of creation and the totem ancestors, but also the actions of the recently deceased, and is
therefore simultaneously remote and accessible (Magin, 2005, pp. 50-51). Equally valid are the
spiritual beliefs of the Yarralin people on Victoria River Downs Station in the Northern Territory,
and the emphasis they place on the notion of Dreaming Law (Rose, 1998, p. 240). It includes a
set of fixed moral principles by which life, as a system of interconnected parts, is maintained.
Intrinsic to this Dreaming Law and the Yarralin peoples spirituality is the idea that all parts of the
cosmos are alive (Rose, 1998, p. 242). One significant element of the Dreaming that is common
among Australian Indigenous people is the understanding that the spiritual world is not distinct
from the material and the secular, but is rather embedded in it (Edwards, 1998, p. 82). This is in
contrast to the Western acceptance of the dichotomies that exist between various facets of
religion and reality (Edwards, 1998, p. 81).

The Indigenous relationship with the land, or Country, is a major aspect of the Dreaming, as it is
where these spiritual and secular experiences are located. The landscape is considered to have
been formed by the movements and activities of the Spirit Beings, as the dramatic events of The
Dreaming were and are enacted (Edwards, 1998, p. 81). For Indigenous people, Country is a
nourishing and living being that possesses a consciousness, giving and receiving life (Rose,
1996, p. 7). As it is multi-dimensional, it is composed of people, animals, plants, and all
environmental factors (Rose, 1996, p. 8). With these dimensions in mind, each community
understands its specific Country to be a unique and inviolable whole (Rose, 1996, p. 12).
Additionally, Indigenous notions of land use and ownership differ significantly from those typically
held by Western societies. While the Pintupi people of the Western Australian Desert do operate
in defined areas of land, described as band territories, they do not live completely within the
boundaries of one such territory for longer than a year. Their social groups are instead
characterised by considerable flexibility and permeability of boundaries (Myers, 1986, p. 181).
Kinship structures in Indigenous communities are also closely related to the Dreaming, Country
and many other aspects of culture. In Indigenous society, there is emphasis placed on social
identity rather than on that of the individual, as well as on the obligations to and expectations of
others. The fact that a person is rarely addressed by their personal name but instead by a term
that indicates their membership of a social category confirms this emphasis (Edwards, 2004, p.
52). The sociocultural structures of Indigenous groups can be examined at the three levels of the
language group or tribe, the local group or clan, and the family. Indigenous family or kinship
groups are immensely complex, consisting of relationship ties of descent and marriage (Edwards,
2004, p. 57). Their intricate structural and organisational characteristics are in stark contrast to
the typical nuclear family of Western society (Schwab, 2006, p. 1).