Good evening social psychians,
In my search for interesting information I found a website with a short video clip which I thought would be beneficial to watch. It's sbout 2 minutes in length but can show viewers a brief clip of Aboriginal culture before colonisation of Australia affected their lives. It may be appealing if you’ve never come across this sort of clip before.
http://dl.filmaust.com.au/module/662/
More to come shortly,
Jac :-)
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Sunday, August 26, 2007
Stereotypes in Aboriginal Communities
Hi all,
I’ve been researching some of the blog 1 questions for a few weeks and decided I’m going to stick with my original topic on stereotypes. I believe that stereotypes are a considerable problem in society and that there are many stigmas attached to even the littlest things, which can influence or change our opinion on an issue, person or race almost immediately. I’ve thought about a few stereotypes which I could include in my blog, but as I have a close friend who is of Torres Straight Islander Background I thought it would be interesting to focus on stereotypes in either Torres Straight Islander Communities or regarding Aboriginal people. Lately as most of you are aware, there has been a lot of upheaval in the Australian Government with the prohibited alcohol issues for Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory. Moreover, there are currently a number of stereotypes of Aborigines circulating within Australian society and popular culture. For example, that indigenous Australian people are primitive and lack complex laws and social organisation, are all alike, that they are racially more prone to alcoholism, violent, ancient, emotional, criminal, mindlessly cruel, lazy, simple, mystical, and live in a timelessness state.
I believe that there is a lot of ignorance, intolerance and misunderstanding uncovered by research towards Aborigines generally and land rights more specifically. On a broader scale however, the continued lack of recognition of indigenous rights and reconciliation manifests aspects of the ongoing processes of colonisation in Australia.
During research on Aboriginal culture for my first blog, I have found the following stereotypes which I thought were extremely degrading and disrespectful.
-Aboriginal people get too many handouts.
-Aboriginal people get more than the whites.
-Land rights are just one more handout.
-Aboriginal people are like spoilt children.
-Aboriginal people don't use the land.
-Drinking rights are to blame.
-Aboriginal people drink their money.
-Aboriginal people were immigrants like the rest of us and thus don't deserve land rights.
-Equal opportunity = equal treatment.
-We are not responsible for the past.
-We don't owe them anything.
-Aboriginal families are like leeches and drain away each others' resources.
-Real Aboriginal people = full-bloods.
-Full-bloods are gentle people; part-Aboriginals are grizzlers.
-Part-Aboriginals have bad blood and are whingers and stirrers.
-Do-gooders are to blame; Aboriginal people are being manipulated by communists.
-Aboriginal people are problems and Aboriginal people have problems.
Do you have any thoughts about these stereotypes that are profoundly common in Australia?
Jacqui
I’ve been researching some of the blog 1 questions for a few weeks and decided I’m going to stick with my original topic on stereotypes. I believe that stereotypes are a considerable problem in society and that there are many stigmas attached to even the littlest things, which can influence or change our opinion on an issue, person or race almost immediately. I’ve thought about a few stereotypes which I could include in my blog, but as I have a close friend who is of Torres Straight Islander Background I thought it would be interesting to focus on stereotypes in either Torres Straight Islander Communities or regarding Aboriginal people. Lately as most of you are aware, there has been a lot of upheaval in the Australian Government with the prohibited alcohol issues for Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory. Moreover, there are currently a number of stereotypes of Aborigines circulating within Australian society and popular culture. For example, that indigenous Australian people are primitive and lack complex laws and social organisation, are all alike, that they are racially more prone to alcoholism, violent, ancient, emotional, criminal, mindlessly cruel, lazy, simple, mystical, and live in a timelessness state.
I believe that there is a lot of ignorance, intolerance and misunderstanding uncovered by research towards Aborigines generally and land rights more specifically. On a broader scale however, the continued lack of recognition of indigenous rights and reconciliation manifests aspects of the ongoing processes of colonisation in Australia.
During research on Aboriginal culture for my first blog, I have found the following stereotypes which I thought were extremely degrading and disrespectful.
-Aboriginal people get too many handouts.
-Aboriginal people get more than the whites.
-Land rights are just one more handout.
-Aboriginal people are like spoilt children.
-Aboriginal people don't use the land.
-Drinking rights are to blame.
-Aboriginal people drink their money.
-Aboriginal people were immigrants like the rest of us and thus don't deserve land rights.
-Equal opportunity = equal treatment.
-We are not responsible for the past.
-We don't owe them anything.
-Aboriginal families are like leeches and drain away each others' resources.
-Real Aboriginal people = full-bloods.
-Full-bloods are gentle people; part-Aboriginals are grizzlers.
-Part-Aboriginals have bad blood and are whingers and stirrers.
-Do-gooders are to blame; Aboriginal people are being manipulated by communists.
-Aboriginal people are problems and Aboriginal people have problems.
Do you have any thoughts about these stereotypes that are profoundly common in Australia?
Jacqui
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