University of Tasmania
Browse

File(s) under permanent embargo

Contested forms of belonging: anthropology, history and culture in the era of native title

journal contribution
posted on 2023-05-20, 18:03 authored by Rolls, M
Calls to imagine new ways of thinking about place, difference and belonging in the Australian context often pre-suppose extant crude binaries. Overlooked in such exhortations to think anew is the fact that life, as the saying goes, goes on, and its going on is in the context of entanglements which produce “the ever-changing conditions of possibility” (Bauman 334), and that “social and cultural structures are reproduced” (Weiner 218) within those changing conditions. This issue arises in the context of the new social fact of native title, or more specifically, in the legislation giving effect to recognition of native title. A distinction is increasingly drawn between so-called traditional owners of country, and those whose relationship to country is historically constituted, or in other words, those whose relationship to country is at least in part an artefact of dispossession and other post-contact ructions. Although this is familiar terrain to anthropologists, more broadly the relevant tensions remain largely unknown or unacknowledged where so. This article explores these tensions. It critiques the instrumentalities which with (mostly) good intentions seek to give due recognition to Indigenous interests and specificities, but in doing so harden borders and further reify binaries not only between Indigenous and non-Indigenous, but between Indigenous peoples too. The overarching concern of the article, however, is how new social facts which have their derivation in misunderstandings of cultural esotery sediment into culture and praxis and become the orthodox and authoritative understanding of culture. The challenge for us is to be aware of our role in this.

History

Publication title

Journal of the European Association for Studies of Australia

Volume

10

Pagination

73-81

ISSN

2013-6897

Department/School

School of Humanities

Publisher

Barcelona University

Place of publication

Barcelona, Spain

Rights statement

Copyright 2019 European Association for Studies of Australia (EASA)

Repository Status

  • Restricted

Socio-economic Objectives

Other culture and society not elsewhere classified; Expanding knowledge in language, communication and culture; Expanding knowledge in human society

Usage metrics

    University Of Tasmania

    Exports

    RefWorks
    BibTeX
    Ref. manager
    Endnote
    DataCite
    NLM
    DC