58227 Introduction to Aboriginal Cultures

Warning: The information on this page is indicative. The subject outline for a particular semester, location and mode of offering is the authoritative source of all information about the subject for that offering. Required texts, recommended texts and references in particular are likely to change. Students will be provided with a subject outline once they enrol in the subject.

Handbook description

This subject focuses on south-eastern Australian Aboriginal cultures and traditions. The subject draws upon a range of intellectual disciplines, including history, anthropology, archaeology alongside Indigenous knowledge to develop an understanding of Indigenous ways of knowing and being, including relationships to land and water, kinship networks, gender and social and economic modes of organising. The subject draws upon Aboriginal creation and control of their own cultural representations through various mediums including autobiography, life stories, documentary and feature films, poetry, painting, music and dance. Aboriginal culture, and the various disciplines that have sought to understand and detail them, is investigated in relation to the ideas that have informed them including tradition and modernity, romanticism, intersubjectivity, post-colonialism and cultural renewal.

Subject objectives/outcomes

At the completion of this subject, students are expected to be able to:

1. analyse their own beliefs, assumptions and expectations applying key concepts of the social sciences
2. describe Indigenous ways of knowing and being, including relationships to land and water, kinship networks, gender and social and economic modes of organising
3. describe theoretical and disciplinary approaches to understanding Aboriginal society and culture.

Contribution to course aims and graduate attributes

This subject makes a major contribution to the students’ capacity to think analytically, using concepts of the social sciences, and to apply their knowledges and skills to understanding Aboriginal society and culture. The subject makes a major contribution to their critical capacity to understand and respect the plurality of perspectives that inform social and cultural understandings. It makes a minor contribution to their capacity to value social inclusion.

Teaching and learning strategies

The subject provides students with access to a wide range of intellectual resources and seeks to create an environment that supports lively, intellectually challenging and stimulating debate. The combined lecture-seminar format will incorporate a range of teaching and experiential learning strategies including case studies, role plays, structured small group discussion and student presentations. Students will be required to participate in film screening, attend field trips and immerse themselves in Aboriginal cultural events where possible. This subject incorporates learning experiences that will facilitate student knowledge of the social theory field and how this can be advanced or challenged through its application to the area of Indigenous Australian critical studies. Students will be encouraged to develop practical skills in liaising with Aboriginal communities or organisations and participate in relevant professional, industry or community-based projects. This approach is consistent with UTS's commitment to practice-based learning.

Content

In this subject we will develop an understanding of the cultural, social and political life of Aboriginal people in NSW and the changing relationships and practices following colonisation. In doing this we will consider how particular disciplines (anthropology, sociology, politics and history) have documented and informed this process.

Assessment

Assessment item 1: Analysis of Key Texts

Assessment item 2: Tutorial Presentation and Written Paper

Assessment item 3: Journal Based Case Study

Minimum requirements

Attendance is important in this subject because it is based on a collaborative approach which involves essential workshopping and interchange of ideas with other students and the tutor. An attendance roll will be taken at each class. Where possible, students should advise the tutor in a timely manner if they are unable to attend.

Students who fail to attend 85% of classes may be refused to have their final assessment item assessed (see Rule 3.8).

Indicative references

Anderson, K. (1994) 'Constructing Geographies: 'race' place and the making of Sydney's Aboriginal Redfern', in Constructions of Race, Place and Nation, Jackson, P. and Penrose, J., (ed.s) Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, pp 81-99.

Beckett, J (1988) The past in the present; the present in the past: constructing a national Aboriginality, Aboriginal Studies Press for the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies, Canberra.

Cowlishaw, G., (1992) Studying Aborigines: Changing Canons in Anthropology and History, in Attwood & Arnold (Eds) Power Knowledge and Aborigines, Bundoora, Vic. La Trobe University Press in association with the National Centre for Australian Studies, Monash University.

Davis J. Muecke, S. Narogin, M, & Shoemaker, A., (eds) (1990) Paperbark: a collection Paperbark: a collection of Black Australian writings, St. Lucia, Qld.

Dodson, M. (1994) 'The end in the beginning', Wentworth Lecture, available @ http://www1.aiatsis.gov.au/ exhibitions/ wentworth/ wentworthcontents.htm

Flood, J. (2004) Archaeology of the Dreamtime, Pymble, N.S.W. HarperCollins.

Grossman M. (2003) Blacklines: contemporary critical writing by indigenous Australians, Carlton, Vic. Melbourne University Press.

Langton, M. (1993) "Well, I heard it on the radio and I saw it on the television -" : an essay for the Australian Film Commission on the politics and aesthetics of filmmaking by and about Aboriginal people and things, Australian Film Commission, North Sydney.

Luhrmann, B. (2008), Australia, distributed by 20th Century Fox.

McNiven, I.J. Russell, L. & Schaffer, K. (eds) (1998) Constructions of colonialism: perspectives on Eliza Fraser's shipwreck, London; New York, Leicester University Press.

Mitchell, T. (2006) Blackfellas rapping, breaking and writing: a short story of Aboriginal hip hop, in Aboriginal History, Vol. 30, Canberra,

Muecke, S. (2004) Ancient & modern: time, culture and indigenous music, Sydney, Pluto Press.

Muecke, S. (2005) Textual spaces: aboriginality and cultural studies, Perth, W.A. API Network, Australian Research Institute, Curtin University of Technology, 3 10-14 Aug.

Muecke, S. Lonely Representations: Aboriginality and Cultural Studies, in Attwood & Arnold (Eds) Power Knowledge and Aborigines, Bundoora, Vic. La Trobe University Press in association with the National Centre for Australian Studies, Monash University, pp32-44.

Norman, H. ( 2006) 'A Modern Day Corroborree: Towards a History of the Knockout', Aboriginal History, Vol.30, pp 169-186.

Russell, L. (2001) Australian Modernity, Post-colonialisms and Discourses of Aboriginality, in Savage Imaginings: historical and contemporary constructions of Australian Aboriginalities, pp1-22, Australian Scholarly Publishing, Melbourne.

Ryan, L. (2003) Waterloo Creek: northern New South Wales, 1838, in Bain Attwood and S G Foster, Frontier conflict: the Australian experience, Canberra, National Museum of Australia, pp 33-43.

Schaffer, K. (1995) In the wake of first contact: the Eliza Fraser stories, New York, Cambridge University Press.

Van Toorn, P. (2006) Writing Never Arrives Naked; Early Aboriginal Cultures of writing in Australia, Aboriginal Studies Press, Canberra.