(Blogger now has backlinks – very similar to the trackback feature in Movable Type. The TrackBack specification was created by Six Apart,…

Culture is what we decided to keep or amend from beliefs of our parents.

Culture will be what our children decide to keep or amend from our beliefs.

I do not wish to dwell on lament. Not at all. My head is hurting from this thread (not for the first time), and my heart is torn as well. But at the end of the day, we have gifts in our lives, and that is what I try to return to. I don’t know what the story above is about, though I wrote it, other than it holds questions – and that there are gifts we can enjoy of our lives right now…

And! That there are “new” gifts we can bring into our western lives, right now. We, too, can learn from our Aboriginal friends. They can educate us. That, really, is such an important thing to establish.

The scenario of no power and no cars is not an entirely unreal one, and of the need to gather, and celebrate and laugh, and cherish things in our lives, is common to us all. Let me call it philosophical, or spiritual, or traditional, or lifestyle, or anything that relates this point: the Aboriginal understanding of land and sustenance, of the “human” “being”, of the organism that holds these within them, and the continuing ritual of celebration of these, among much else, holds tremendous power for us of western thinking, faced with modern dilemmas of our “culture”’s doing.

I’m saying, not to criticise anything we do, but to highlight this gift available to us from the traditional Aboriginal life, and to bring it into the connection with them, through our interventions and our schools, will do the western way of life enormous good, and it will – which I stress – provide some reason, some purpose, for some Aboriginal folk. It may provide for them, in fact, a reason to live. I’m saying within the traditional Aboriginal culture is a set of powerful keys ready, willing and very able to be given to the world, not just this place.

This set of keys directly relates to our concerns for “the environment”, and should we go looking into Aboriginality, and listening, we can find answers and solutions for us all who inhabit the planet.

What a beautiful gift to give, in return, to the Aboriginal culture.

But we are not ready yet, I feel. Either we need to hurt more (and I’m not wishing this on anyone or anything, it simply seems to be a way we go about things) OR – we can utilise our considerable skills to actively seek to achieve this now, through gentle, sensible, wonderful – allow me that word – considered action.

May we do the latter.

I have heard of similar laments from old men in Arnhem Land. It can be unutterably sad to lose some of the things that made life good, even though we may not have identified them when we had them. They tell the story of making the decision years ago that resisting the whites was not possible so that they would need to go along with them if they were to survive.

They have survived. They have retained much of their culture. There have been changes to many of the things that they do but the things that set them apart – their system of values and traditions – are still strongly in evidence. They want their children to retain those values and respect those traditions and they want them to live and live well. That means dealing effectively in and with the wider world.

Sad definitely but, in the course of history, not a new story.

Hofstede’s book ‘Cultures consequences’ is a great read an am happy to adopt his broad definition of culture for the moment (though I’m not sure if we get anywhere by using his 4 constituent parts of culture – power distance, masculinity, etc. If I recall correctly he further refined them in later work to includes fine mazed and rough mazed). I will in passing note that your focus on values as the core part of culture is not a definition of culture that Hofstede would approve of (values are not even one of his 4 and he thought the term too vague).
The key quote you make however is “In the definition I think makes most sense culture is passed from generation to generation. It is taught and learned by generations.”
couldnt agree more. Hence my insistence of the central role of education in the shaping and destruction of cultures.

A key earlier quote from you was “In dealing with people who you seek in some way to change there is a fundamental need to effectively communicate. Effective communication requires that you recognise that you analyse, make judgements and decisions on the basis of your cultural mores, just as the people in the group you want to change do. Understanding of your culture and respect for their culture, is both good manners and sensible if you indeed seek positive outcomes.”
Which seems to point to the basic connundrum in this field: policies that are effectively geared towards assimilation and destruction of the prior culture whilst simultaneously having the need to communicate under the guise of respect for each other’s culture (at least within today’s dominant social norms of interaction). I do not see how that basic tension can be resolved without deliberate subterfuge, which brings us back to the question of indoor truths and outdoor lies in my post from last week.

RUGBY LEAGUE BANNED

One of the greatest traditions of Australian life has been banned. Last night’s State of Origin game of Rugby League was exactly that: the last. As from today, the Purple people who arrived here last week have banned Rugby League from the Australian nation.

“This is a joke, surely!” Bluey says.

“It’s an April Fools thing,” his mate replies. “Don’t worry.”

But it turns out to be anything but a joke. Rugby League was banned, and then went Rugby Union, Softball, Cricket, Aerial Ping Pong and, even Soccer. Gone.

You can no longer watch sport, participate in it yourself, or have your kids play.

You feel at a loss – a deep, terrible loss.

Without sport any more, the Purple people saw no need for you to have a television, and under their laws and with their greater ability to enforce them, they come into your house and take it away. Out the door it goes.

Soon, people gather in the street, talking. “What the hell?!” they cry, in unison.

Three weeks later, all books are banned. Bookstores close, your houses told to remove them from the shelves.

In six months, the electricity grids are switched off. Owning a car is outlawed.

Completely at a loss, now, and beyond shock, beyond grief, you are told to take off your clothes.

“This cannot last forever,” one brave man says.

“Come here,” a woman holds out her arms to a child playing happily with other kids who’ve gathered now, along with hoards of families, in the parks. At the centre of the group was an older couple, who’d seen our World Wars, and felt the need to lead a session of song, to try to raise the spirits – or just to keep at by their own feelings of crying destitution. “Come here, quickly,” the mother says, lest the Purple people take the child away. She is aware anything could happen now.

The Purple people come with food, and it is eaten gratefully. “They communicate well,” one of us said.

In eight months, you begin not to believe those older people who speak of what your life once was. You feel you are walking dead.

“Here,” says a Purple person. “Drink this.”

You do, because it takes away the cold from your naked body. You hear stories, told from people who’ve walked down from the north, that it’s the same up there – the drink takes away the pain of sunburn, too.

“You’ve had too much,” one Purple person says, as you lay around numb to the cold. Out of jail, you meet another Purple person. “Drink this,” you are told.

Then, when the time is right, a highly trained Purple person comes up to you.

“There is another country we must do this to. I want to teach you how to do it.I can help you.”

You consider your position. Unsure you ask the stranger, sharing your fate, beside you. “What should I do?”

“You’ll be forever cold and naked if you do,” says the stranger, eyes black and deep, talking quietly while he doodles a shape in the dirt with a stick. “You will certainly have food, though.”

“I want back how I used to live,” you say, in desperate defiance. “It was much better. There is no future in this way of living – it obviously cannot last.”

From behind the beautiful Liquidambers nearby, their rich leaves, thick, a hundred feet high and struck by sun to be red as the flourescent lights you lost and now realise you loved so much, comes the sound of children, unaware of your destitution of soul, playing and laughing.

The explanation is in the sentence after the one you quoted (the very last sentence of my post). Basically, there is nothing about education itself which requires the schooling for Aboriginal students to be assimilationist, even though it largely has been. And as for agreeing with Marx’s assertion – I have no idea but I’ll think about it I ever get around to reading any of Marx’s works .

Pleased to oblige.

From the many definitions of ‘culture’ on offer I prefer that provided by Hofstede which basically holds that culture is collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one human group from another. Culture, in this sense includes systems of values and values are among the building blocks of culture.

So my focus is on the shared values of a group, values that are acquired rather than innate. In the definition I think makes most sense culture is passed from generation to generation. It is taught and learned by generations.

Values do change as a result of range of influences but, in many cases, they can be highly resistant to change. For instance, the apparently desperate need for Western clothes and cars by young Japanese does not appear to have brought with it the value of individuality. The power of the group remains.

Similarly, the value of sharing with those with whom you share specific relationships, something that distinguishes many Aboriginal cultures, is clearly in evidence today, just as I am told it has always been.

I understand that there are other definitions. But I am primarily concerned with effective communication and this way of looking at culture is the one that I find most relevant to that.

I could go on but the State of Origin is on. NSW need my support. A loyalty learnt as a pup. Some values dont change

I’ll show you my definitions if you show me yours.

One definition of ‘original Aboriginal’ culture is pre 1777 culture (which is highly fragmented diverse). Current ‘prior culture’ would then be whatever remains today of that pre 1777 culture. The actual current culture of any group is then a mix of prior culture, Western culture, and, for want of a better term, ‘coping culture’ (i.e. a new bit that’s not Western but has evolved in response to Western influence). The explicit aim of intervention seems often to counter the coping culture (such as alcoholism and welfare dependence), but will destroy any remnants of the prior culture too.

Now show me yours?

Is it this ‘prior’ culture idea that seems to be getting you confused? Perhaps you would like to be more precise about when this particular ‘prior’ culture was in place? Was it before the internet, TV, motor vehicles, missionaries, government settlements, store bought food, whites or possibly the Macassans? Which one? Or perhaps it was at some mythical point in time?

In dealing with people who you seek in some way to change there is a fundamental need to effectively communicate. Effective communication requires that you recognise that you analyse, make judgements and decisions on the basis of your cultural mores, just as the people in the group you want to change do. Understanding of your culture and respect for their culture, is both good manners and sensible if you indeed seek positive outcomes.

I am not terribly fussed what label is found for me. Over the years many applied to me have not been complimentary but, if you conclude that support for the proposition that a young Aboriginal kid should receive an education that allows that child options including that of a job in town, is assimilationist then I suggest that you need some more work on your definitions.

And if you do some more work on definitions it would make sense to start with ‘culture’. Can be a sloppy term that one and if it is going to be the basis of a debate then it would be valuable if you put your definition forward.

What are the differences between the dominant mode of life and christianity in 13th century Europe and now? The 13th century was almost exclusively village-based with noblemen exploiting the peasants for all they could. It was the century of the plague and of a reduction of the European population by about a third. Its mental landscape included a firm belief in an imminent end-of-days, the inherent sinfulness of humanity, an absolute belief in the doctrine of the Catholic church, no education system, no central taxation, massive differences in languages, only limited trade, and no such notion as a nation state to which all other interests are subservient. Would an uneducated farmer of that era feel any kinhood with modern day culture; with being stuck in offices; with eating foods that were mostly unknown in the 13th century; with life oriented around close family rather than a community in which people lived and died; with having to follow education for 20 years learning languages and skills alien to him; with being told the actual words of the bible rather than being given latin sermons he couldnt understand?

Ken, when I reflect on it, my honest answer is ‘no, the average European of the the time of Thomas of Acquino would probably feel almost entirely alienated by modern culture.’ Has more than a semblance of that culture survived till now? No, not really. Even the content of Christianity has changed radically since then. The 13th century was a time in which the popes had kids and ran brothels, collected punitive taxes, and peasants were told their masters were appointed their masters by god. Churches were still full of naked statues, your place in the afterlife could be bought, relics were worshipped, and the approach of Armageddon was continuously on everyone’s mind. Not much of that type of Christianity left, is there now?

Returning to our original discussion, I may add to this that the difference between the Aboriginal hunter-gather lifestyle and the modern service-oriented nation state is several orders of maginitude bigger than the difference between our nation state life and the eclesastical court life Thomas of Acquino lived under. It took Eurasia 9500 years to go from initial agriculture to Thomas, but only 733 years till now.

Surely it isnt beyond our wit to begin learning the lessons of the past and synthesising a new set of policies that draw on the strengths of previous policies and overcome their weaknesses.

I doubt that it’s beyond our wit; just beyond everyone’s politics.

OTO it may be that key aspects of traditional indigenous culture and religion (animist, collectivist, little emphasis on time, property etc etc) are much more fundamentally inimical to modern post-industrial capitalism than was Christianity. Weber, of course, even argued that Christian values (the Protestant work ethic etc) were quite central to the rise of capitalism in the West. So it may well be that any real and comprehensive embrace of modern education and training by remote indigenous communities WILL, as Paul argues, result in an extremely radical transformation of that society.

However, acknowledging that likelihood does not negate the need to treat existing Aboriginal people and their culture with “respect”, while at the same time taking active steps to push indigenous communities in the direction of modernising change at a much more rapid pace than has been evident in recent decades. As David Coles has pointed out, genuine respect, communication and working in partnership will be essential to achieving such change. Coercive, blunt, disrespectful assimilation policies have been tried in the past and failed dismally, for reasons David implicitly canvasses in his primary post. Neither reversion to old-fashioned assimilationist policies nor stubbornly clinging to entrenched welfarist left-liberal “self-determination” rhetoric is very helpful. Surely it isn’t beyond our wit to begin learning the lessons of the past and synthesising a new set of policies that draw on the strengths of previous policies and overcome their weaknesses.

However my disagreements with you are not a matter of desperation.

I refer you to comment #33. I have considered this and indeed offer your very suggestion as the logical position to take for those wishing to preserve Aboriginal culture. You seem desperate to disagree with me on this point, Gummo, but in fact we’re in agreement. If you read my comments carefully, you will see that I nowhere make a statement about what I think is desirable. I’m merely trying to point out the logical inconsistencies in people who one the one hand argue for Western education, health, and moral norms to be imposed on Aboriginal groups, and yet on the other hand hypocrytically talk about respect for it.

Now, if you seriously wish to argue that more than a semblance of Aboriginal culture survives the onslaught of Western education and our welfare system, then we indeed disagree fundamentally, Gummo.

Jacques,
we’re in full agreement when you say “insofar as aboriginal culture reflects the conditions of life pre-settlement, its doomed.” Couldnt have put it better. I happen to think Marx was right when he argued culture eventually follows the conditions of life and I’m somewhat baffled to see someone naming himself after Trotsky disagreeing with it. As to using dichotomies, that’s merely a Marxist debating style to make issues clear. We can talk subtle shades of culture if you like, but the main point would be lost.

Still in general, insofar as aboriginal culture reflects the conditions of life pre-settlement, it’s doomed. However the essence and much of the content can endure, grow and adapt, much as Judaism and Christianity grew and adapted from the conditions of agricultural people in and around modern day Israel.

I guess its a matter of perspective.

A matter of timing, actually. Kormilda has evolved from a purely aboriginal boarding school into a mixed multi-streamed affair with lots of great facilities, mostly courtesy of money from Rio Tinto.

You may consider those logical conclusions – I’d call them absurd, irrational and incomplete.

To reach your conclusions you’ve excluded a lot of middle – it’s either throw the communities off welfare and back into the bush to live in what you conceive of as a primitive hunter-gatherer culture which speaks an indigenous dialect in place of English, teaches its kids canoe making in place of science, ceremonies and sacred sites in place of an awareness of World religions, traditional healing in place of Western medicine, bush tucker in place of Maths, spearthrowing in place of Cricket, dream time stories in place of Computing and spirits and land in place of (unnecessary) Traffic laws or assimilate to whatever we think of as “mainstream Australia”. You have persistently refused – in a dismissive and condescending way – to consider any suggestion that elements of indigenous culture -such as language – might be preserved while imparting a “Western Education” – hence the absurdity and irrationality.

Your conclusions are incomplete because you haven’t considered what would be necessary to preserve what you regard as traditional aboriginal culture like a fly in amber – that is, the complete restitution of tribal lands and the complete withdrawal of “white” industries from those lands. The complete withdrawal of policing and our system of law, so that this tribal enclave can operate traditional systems of law and a traditional economy.

the logical consequence of saying Hunting, gathering, fishing and fire farming are much harder ways to survive than dole money. If anything is destroying aboriginal cultures, its welfare and the outstations.

seems to me to be:
1. IF you want to stop the destruction of Aboriginal culture, you should exclude them from the welfare system and mop up the outstations.
2. IF you are not prepared to exclude any group from the welfare system and mop up the outstations, THEN you are NOT REALLY interested in halting the destruction of Aboriginal culture.
quite a damning conclusion for it would mean there’s probably no-one left who is prepared to do what it takes to preserve Aboriginal culture.

David,
you are quite right that you’re in excellent company with your assimilatory credientials. Once you accept that that is your agenda though, I refer back to comment #10 on this thread: an assimilatory agenda and respect for prior culture are mutually exclusive. Let me paraphrase the tension between the two by giving you a fictitious conversation with an Aboriginal:

W: “Good-day, mate, respect on you. I’ve come to help you”

A: “That’s great. What have you come to do for me?”

W: “I’ve come to teach your kids how to be different from you; I’ve come to tell you how to behave in order to have the same health as me; how to talk like me; how to stop drinking and looking at porn, unlike me; and how to behave towards your spouse like I should;”

A: “Jees, mate, and what if I think I’m doing fine and dont want to comply with this ‘help’?”

W: “I take your welfare away, I’m contemplating taking your kids away, and I lock you up. Not because I dont respect you, but because you’d be violating the law that holds equally for all Australians and has been decided upon by a the fair process called democracy”

A: “Its a good thing you respect me then.”

I guess it’s a matter of perspective.

It was located miles from Darwin proper in an area where groups of drunken men hung around. There was no housing in the area; I can’t rightly recall now but I think it was semi-rural, certainly not a suburban neighborhood.

The pupils were entirely Aboriginal, there were behavioural problems and the staff was entirely white. It was not then a high school and the older kids were bussed to school in Darwin every day. It was a form of apartheid.

Two things got to me at the time. One was I thought that behaviour modification techniques might have done wonders and the other was that the children did not have bicycles whereas most Darwin kids surely would have. Neither measure would have cost that much.

The high school kids joined classes of white kids during the day but outside school hours they were sequestered. Education is what Kormilda was attempting but at the same time they were enforcing racial segregation.

If the proof of the pudding is in the eating then some evidence could be the clear impression that Aboriginal leaders such as the 6 Territory Indigenous MLAs along with the highly educated Aboriginal people that lead major instrumentalities, manage major government functions and run significant non government organisations appear to have obtained their education without loss of identity.

Paul – I guess if I am to be an assimilationist because I advocate that Aboriginal kids should have the right to an education that gives them options including jobs in town then I stand condemned. I am in good company though. The Wadeye community adopted the overriding goal of ‘giving every kid a chance’ back in November 2001 and has never deviated – a few bumps in the road definitely, but never a deviation from the goal.