I would like to acknowledge and honor the Giabal and Jarowair Peoples’ of Toowoomba; the Jagera, Yuggera and Ugarapul Peoples’ of Springfield and Ipswich; the Gadigal People of the Eora Nation, Sydney; and the Kambuwal Peoples’ of Stanthorpe as the traditional owners of the land and waterways where the University of Southern Queensland is located.
Further, we acknowledge the cultural diversity of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples’ and pay Respect to Elders past, present, and future. We celebrate the continuous living cultures of First Australians and acknowledge the important role played by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples’ in Australian society (USQ, n.d)
This essay will begin by explaining what the Aboriginal day of Mourning was. It will then provide an overview of the activism that was inspired by events of The Aboriginal day of Mourning, including the production of the first-ever Aboriginal publication found on newsstands. It will then cover the creation of the National Aboriginals Day Observance Committee, the 1965 Freedom ride, and the resulting presentation of the 1967 Australian Referendum. Then this essay will Conclude by giving a further brief explanation about why the Aboriginal day of Mourning and the activism that followed was so crucial. The Aborigines in terms of the History they suffered and the fight they fought to obtain Citizenship and are still fighting in some senses for equality.
The Day of Mourning was a protest help by Indigenous Australians on 26 January 1938, the 150th anniversary of the British colonization of Australia. The day that symbolized the cataclysm of sudden suffering and momentous changes lead to the loss off Indigenous culture, land history, and human rights due to the landing of the first fleet (Broome 2010). The protest started with a silent march to Sydney Town Hall, led by the Aborigine’s Progressive Association (APA) activists William Cooper, William Ferguson, Jack Patten, and 1000 Indigenous and non-Indigenous supporters. The day of mourning congress called for Indigenous Australians to have access to the same civil rights as white Australians. These rights included, their land being returned, improvement in health, education and housing standards, equal employment opportunities, and that Indigenous children could no longer be taken from their families (AIATIS, n.d).
The 1938 Aboriginal day of Mourning was such a significant event in Aboriginal History, although they did not get the results they were after they continued their fight to achieve equality. Calls for Indigenous issues to be dealt with at a federal level began as early as 1910. However, the Day of Mourning was the first national Aboriginal civil rights gathering and represents the identifiable beginning of the contemporary Aboriginal political movement that can still be seen today (National Museum Australia, n.d).
Three months after the Day of Mourning, the first issue of The Australian Abo Call publication appeared on newsstands. With the help of Jack Patten, The Australian Abo Call’s first issue proclaimed the continued demand for rights and equality for Indigenous people, “The Abo Call is our paper. It has been established to present the case for Aborigines, from the point of view of the Aborigines themselves” (AIATSIS, n.d). The second issue of The Australians Abo call’s issue wrote
“The white community must be made to realize that we are human beings, the same as themselves. Persecution of Aborigines here is worse than the persecution of Jews in other countries. We have been called the ‘dying race’, but we do not intend to die. We intend to live, and to take out place in the Australian community as citizens with full equality” (Patten, 1938).
In 1957 with the support and cooperation from Federal and State Governments, and significant Indigenous organizations created a National Aboriginals Day Observance Committee (NADOC). The NADOC mission was to increase the awareness in the broader community of the status and treatment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders’. Now thanks to the NADOC, the second Sunday of July has become a day of remembrance for Indigenous people and their heritage (NAIDOC, 2019).
In 1965 in rural Australia, dispossessed, poverty-stricken Indigenous people where still being confronted with racism within towns by local people and business. A group of students at a Sydney University created an organization called Student Action for Aborigines (SAFA). SAFA would go on bus tours into some of the most racial country towns in NSW and would demonstrate against racial discrimination. While they were challenging the mentalities of local town’s people, they would record the hostile responses they would receive, and made them available for news broadcasts on radio and television. The responses shocked Australian viewers and resulted in public debate as it exposed the public knowledge of racial discrimination and segregation still prevalent in country towns. The government started to receive mounting pressure for inclusion, equality, and full Citizenship. The efforts of these Sydney students contributed to the outcomes of the 1967 Australian referendum (Essays, 2018).
In 1967 the Australian public was presented with a referendum and asked:
Do you approve the proposed law for the alternation of the Constitution entitled ‘An Act to alter the Constitution so as to omit certain words relating to the people of the Aboriginal race in any state so that Aboriginals are to be counted in reckoning the population’?
The results of the referendum were an overwhelming ‘yes’ with 94% of the Australian public voting to amend the Constitution to allow the Commonwealth to make laws for Aboriginal people and to include them in the census (Thomas, 2017).
The Aboriginal day of Mourning and the activism that followed was such an essential factor in the changes in the lives of all Aborigines. From when the first fleet landed in 1788, and the ‘white men’ came and forced the removal of Aboriginal children from their homes into Christian homes and schools to learn about white culture, values, beliefs, and customs, in the hopes to de-aboriginalise them. Because of the separation, it made it prevented them from sharing their ceremonial teachings with their children according to their dream time spirituality and religion. Many Indigenous were imprisoned without any rights of freedom. The white men destroyed temples and sacred places of ceremony, preventing the Aboriginal people from burying their dead according to their law and customs.
Even through all of this, the Indigenous kept fighting to be heard, and that is precisely what happed at The Aboriginal Day of Mourning. It provided enough motion to push for inclusiveness, equality, and Citizenship of the Indigenous. While the Indigenous are now included in the census, there is still a long way to go for a complete reconciliation, to fully regain their sense of The Dream Time, their History, and the continued practice of it.
References:
AIATIS, n.d., We hereby make protest: The 1938 Day of Mourning, viewed 10 October 2019, retrieved from <https://aiatsis.gov.au/exhibitions/day-mourning-26th-january-1938>.
Broome, R. 2010, Aboriginal Australian, 4th edn, Allen & Unwin, Crowns nest, NSW.
Essays, UK. (November 2018). The Rights For Freedom Of Aboriginal Australians History Essay. Viewed on 9 October 2019, Retrieved from https://www.ukessays.com/essays/history/the-rights-for-freedom- of-aboriginal- australians-history-essay.php?vref=1
National Museum Australia, n.d., Day of Mourning, Viewed 20 October 2019, Retrieved from < https://www.nma.gov.au/defining-moments/resources/day-of-mourning>
NAIDOC, 2019, NAIDOC history, viewed on 10 October 2019, Retrieved from < https://www.naidoc.org.au/about/history>
Patten J, 1938, The Australian ABO CALL: the voice of the Aborigines, viewed on the 15 October 2019, Retrieved from <https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_ Library/FlagPost/2017/May/The_1967_Referendum>
Thomas M, 2017, Parliament of Australia, The 1967 Referendum. Viewed on 11 October 2019, Retrieved from < https://aiatsis.gov.au/sites/default/files/images/collections-and- library/collections/oe_dom/11/1102/110202.pdf>
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