Journal de la Société des

océanistes

The Pragmatics and Politics of Aboriginal Tradition and Identity in

Australia
Robert Tonkinson

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Tonkinson Robert. The Pragmatics and Politics of Aboriginal Tradition and Identity in Australia. In: Journal de la Société des
océanistes, 109, 1999-2. pp. 133-147;

doi : https://doi.org/10.3406/jso.1999.2110

https://www.persee.fr/doc/jso_0300-953x_1999_num_109_2_2110

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The Pragmatics and Politics of Aboriginal Tradition

and Identity in Australia*

par

Robert TONKINSON **

Introduction: Pacific Precedents and Australian indigenous minorities, firmly encapsulated

Diversity within a powerful nation-state 2. Also, in the
south Pacific the achievement of independence
Since the early 1980s, anthropologists took place in most cases without contestation,
working in Oceania have led the way in exploring the whereas in Australia a dispossessed and
ramifications of a universal human propensity mistreated people have had to struggle against a
to reconfigure and reinterpret cultural traditions prejudiced and neglectful dominant society to have
and the past through the lenses of contemporary their pleas for recognition, increased autonomy
perceptions, motivations and needs ! . Their
and social justice heard. Both situations are
interest stems largely from an inevitable focus on the alike, however, in that the ways in which
momentous changes that surrounded the 'tradition' is constructed and employed can be fully
transition to independence, achieved by seven
countries in the south Pacific region between 1970 appreciated only if the impacts of both local
and 1980. As LiPuma (1997:37) notes, for 'cultural' and global capitalist structures are
emerging nation-states such as these, 'invention of a considered.
national culture is the most visible form of objec- The uses of 'tradition' by indigenous
tification; inculcation of an embodied sense of Australians are most prominently manifested in two
national identity becomes central to the very arenas: that of land rights, which has become an
construction of the subject'. In Oceania, appeals important locus of Aboriginal political struggle
to 'tradition' as the foundation for a distinctive and rhetoric; and in a widespread cultural
national identity became prominent rallying revival movement, particularly in those parts of the
cries for pro-independence movements. In continent where the impact of British
Australia, however, the status of indigenous colonisation has been longest and heaviest. Legislation to
traditions may at first sight appear to be quite grant rights in land to indigenous Australians, as
different, because the Aborigines and Torres Strait well as legal measures to protect indigenous
Islanders are both very small and marginalised heritage, date back to the 1970s, when in a period of
* This paper was written early in 1999 during my tenure as a Visiting Fellow of the Department of Anthropology, Research
School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia. I thank the Department and RSPAS
for their support and assistance. For their insightful comments on this paper, I am very grateful to Drs Myrna Tonkinson,
Lamont Lindstrom, Jim Urry and Nancy Williams.
** Professeur à l'University of Western Australia Perth, Australie.
1 . This impetus began with a special issue of the Australian journal, Mankind, entitled 'Reinventing Traditional Culture: The
Politics of Custom in Island Melanesia' (Keesing and Tonkinson, 1982). See also Linnekin, 1992; Jolly and Thomas, 1992; Otto
and Thomas, 1997; and White and Lindstrom, 1993)].
2. The small Torres Strait Island minority (c. 30,000) rarely figures in the national consciousness; in fact, if asked, a majority
of Australians would probably assert that Australia has only one indigenous minority, the Aborigines. Many parallels exist
between the situations of the two minorities, but my focus in this paper is on Aboriginal Australians.
Journal de la Société des Océanistes, 109, 1999-2
134 SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES : LES POLITIQUES DE LA TRADITION

continuing economic prosperity many My main concern in this paper is to explore

Australians became concerned about the rapidly some of the manifestations of diversity in
increasing socio-economic gap between Aboriginal perspectives on 'tradition', identity, and
themselves and the indigenous population. These culture, using examples drawn in part from my
concerns led to major governmental own fieldwork in the Western Desert region to
intervention and, for the first time, a positive policy illustrate one extreme in the huge range of
aimed at greater indigenous self-management. It Aboriginal situations to be found in contemporary
was therefore essential to address the fact that Australian society. I compare the place of
indigenous Australian owned none of what had 'tradition' in the desert region, where cultural
once been their continent. The inception of land continuities abound, with that of 'cultural revival',
rights legislation led to the deep involvement of and then discuss a recent controversy in the state
many anthropologists in the land claims process, of South Australia to illustrate some of the
especially the amassing and synthesis of data on complexities surrounding the nature of 'tradition'.
Aboriginal traditions in order to meet legislative The paper concludes with a brief discussion of
requirements. the issues raised and their implications for the
Although important similarities existed practice of anthropology in Australia.
between the two regions in the dynamics and Since the advent of native title legislation, a
politics of constructing and reporting traditions, disturbing increase in dissension within and
anthropologists working in indigenous Australia amongst indigenous groups claiming land
paid little attention to the burgeoning interest (Edmunds, 1994; Smith and Finlayson, 1997)
taken by their Oceanist colleagues in the politics has alerted anthropologists in Australia to the
of 'tradition' in the Pacific. What emerged from need to understand more fully the ramifications
these studies was a valuable perspective on of processesthatof their
'tradition' re-reading
Oceanist
andcolleagues
reconstructing
have
'tradition', one that views it as a contested field in
which differently positioned groups promote been grappling with for almost two decades. In
their particular symbolic forms and meanings. this paper, the general approach taken is derived
Recent developments in Australia, most notably from a conclusion reached on the basis of my
the judgment of the High Court of Australia in fieldwork in Melanesia and an overview of the
what has become known as 'the Mabo decision', relevant literature I undertook some years ago;
which conceded the existence of native title namely, that 'tradition' is heuristically best
and acknowledgment of prior indigenous conceptualised as a resource — a sometimes
ownership of the continent, have made it potent ideological weapon in contemporary
essential that anthropologists address the topic of political action directed against competing
'tradition' 3. The historic Mabo judgment and groups or the state, and aimed at furthering
the subsequent enabling legislation, The Native sectional interests (Tonkinson, 1993). The emphasis
Title Act 1993, enshrined indigenous traditions, on 'tradition' in the pursuit of indigenous land
in the form of 'laws and customs', as the basis rights post-Mabo is one of a number of factors
for proof of native title {cf. Commonwealth of that perhaps make Australia fruitful a locus as
Australia, 1995). The identification of the Oceania for the examination of a range of
traditions that underpin indigenous land tenure significant issues, including the reconstruction or
systems, and the provision of evidence of 'operationalisation' of tradition, its utility as a
continuity of association with ancestral territories, political resource, the negotiation of identities,
have become major components of the large and manifestations of cultural resistance and
number of land claims lodged under the Native renaissance 4. The Australian scene is large and
Title Act. diverse enough to generate a plethora of dis-
3. Prior to Mabo, Australia was the only former British colony that had failed to recognise in law the prior land ownership of
any of its indigenous inhabitants. On June 3rd, 1992, in Eddie Mabo and others v the State of Queensland, the High Court of
Australia handed down an historic judgment that signalled an important legal as well as symbolic change in relations between
the nation's two indigenous peoples and Australian society at large. For the first time, the Court accepted the argument that,
under common law, the native title of Australia's indigenous inhabitants could be recognised. In so doing, the Court abandoned
a 200 year old legal fiction which held that, at the time of first British settlement, the continent was terra nullius, 'a land without
owners'. This legal doctrine had enabled the British to avoid the obligations entailed when territory was conquered or acquired
by treaty (see Nettheim, 1993; Rowse, 1993). The Native Title Act, 1993, Section 223(1) defines native title as 'the rights and
interests ... possessed under the traditional laws acknowledged, and the traditional customs observed, by the Aboriginal peoples
or Torres Strait Islanders'.
4. The construction and constituents of Aboriginal identity have been a topic of considerable discussion and debate among
social scientists and Aboriginal commentators in the last decade or so. One of the few points of general agreement would be the
belief that the political and cultural strands in Aboriginal identity construction — resistance and persistence — are analytically
separable yet closely intertwined. Heated exchanges have centred on the concept of Aboriginality: how and whether to
PRAGMATICS AND POLITICS OF ABORIGINAL TRADITION 135

courses (and practices) within and about Attempts to dichotomise Aborigines into
indigenous cultures: from culturalist and nationalist 'tribal' versus 'urban', or 'classical' versus 'modern'
claims to the current aesthetisation and commo- or 'traditional' versus 'non-traditional' are
dification of indigenous cultural production, problematic, as Morphy (1998:7) rightly notes; he
and so on. This diversity has its roots in points out, for example, that it would quite
historical and socio-political forces, and reflects an wrong to divide Aboriginal art 'into two
increasing social differentiation among mutually exclusive categories according to the
Aborigines themselves. nature of its colonial history'. Certainly,
Despite a general tendency to talk of important continuities with the 'traditional' past are
Aborigines as if they are a homogeneous group or a discernible everywhere in Aboriginal Australia,
community of interests, there are great contrasts for example in relation to the role of kinship in
in the situations of the c. 260,000 people who structuring social relationships (cf. Keen, 1988;
today identify as Aboriginal. Prior to the British Macdonald, 1998). Yet such continuities are
invasion, Aboriginal identity inhered in local more readily obvious and contrast more
affiliations, dialects, and religious linkages, and strikingly with European elements in the behaviour and
there was little shared sense of mutuality beyond activities of Aboriginal people in remote areas
local or regional arenas. The generic label of central and northern Australia than
Aborigines' is a colonial imposition, and Aboriginal elsewhere. It is also true that the majority of
identities have been shaped in contexts created Aborigines, who are of mixed descent and live in
largely by members of the dominant society ; as towns and cities in 'settled' Australia, have been
M. Tonkinson (1991:215) notes, Aboriginality is alienated by powerful historical and social forces
a label for an emergent reality, part of a political from such direct links to the lives of their hunter-
process, and it still 'does not fully describe gatherer forbears, and the transformative effects
identity as it is perceived by many Aboriginal of these forces are therefore more evident. How
people'. It was not until the late 1960s that a rapid to characterise these differences is a contentious
growth in Aboriginal political consciousness topic, because of a tendency for observers in the
and activism led to concerted attempts to forge a past to focus on 'cultural loss and breakdown' in
pan-Aboriginal identity and a 'common culture' 'settled' Australia, thus failing to appreciate the
(cf. Jones and Hill-Burnett, 1982; Beckett, strength and importance of continuities in
1988b; Tonkinson, 1989). Nevertheless, some traditions (cf. Chase, 1981; Macdonald, 1998). Of
universally shared elements of a distinctive greatest relevance to this paper is that the
'Aboriginal culture' have long been discernible as utilisation of 'tradition' as a strategic resource in
common themes that persist despite regional urban areas, and/or in situations of cultural
variations and historical change (cf. Sutton, renewal, serves ends that may be quite different
1988). To understand the extent of from its use in remote Australia. Before
differentiation within contemporary Aboriginal Australia, considering these kinds of diversity, however, I must first
however, it is essential to keep in mind the very locate them in a broader contemporary political
long duration of the frontier of European context.
expansion, which lasted from 1788 until the
1960s, when the last nomadic groups in the
Western Desert went or were taken into settlements. Current Issues: Reconciliation and the Republic
Thus, well over a century after most southern
Australian cultures disappeared as fully As a multicultural nation increasingly
functioning, integrated hunting-gathering regimes, characterised by a wide diversity of ethnic groups,
there were still groups in the Western Desert, Australia is approaching the centenary of
living 'traditionally' on their ancestral nationhood (2001) at a very interesting stage in its
homelands, who had yet to encounter Whites face to development. In seeking a national identity
face 5. appropriate to their history and geography, and
conceptualise it, the nature and content of resistance and how to problematise it, the legitimacy of various kinds of essentialism
expressed emically and etically, and the role and morality of anthropology in constructing and analysing Aboriginal identity
(see, for example, Beckett 1988b; Cowlishaw 1993; Hollinsworth 1992; Huggins 1998; Langton 1993a; Lattas 1990; 1993; Morris
1988; Morton 1989;1998; Rowse 1990; 1993b; Thiele 1991; M. Tonkinson 1990; Tonkinson and Tonkinson 1998; Trigger 1992).
5. I use the word 'southern' interchangeably with the term 'settled', though the latter is a more accurate referent in making a
contrast with 'remote' Australia, whose indigenous people are typically more 'tradition-oriented'. 'Settled' Australia stretches
in an arc from the coast of north Queensland down and around to Perth in Western Australia; this region contains the six major
cities where more than 80 % of Australians live. Of these two regions it has been said that: 'In a very general sense, the cultural
practices and productions by indigenous Australians. ..are quite different. They are grounded in different cultural bases, histories
and socio-political conditions (Langton 1993b; Commonwealth of Australia 1994).
136 SOCIÉTÉ DES OCEANISTES : LES POLITIQUES DE LA TRADITION
sensitive to both the original inhabitants and the
recent immigrants who have enhanced the
nation's multicultural character, Australians
have been re-reading their traditions to render
them more congruent with contemporary
aspirations of internal harmony and full
independence from a British colonial heritage {cf. Ton-
kinson and Tonkinson, 1994). The process has
engendered many vigorous debates, for, as
Foster (1997:14) notes in an insightful discussion
about 'inventing' Australia, nation-making
'intertwines cultural forms and material interests
in a creative and contested process of identity
formation'. Australia is currently in the midst of
two contested struggles: to achieve a formal and
lasting reconciliation with its indigenous
minorities, and to become a republic, completely free
of the remaining vestiges of the colonial yoke.
These concerns are not unrelated, because any
attempt to forge an appropriate post-colonial
national identity must take into account the fact
that the continent was first peopled by the
ancestors of the Aborigines more than 40,000 years
ago. Also, in spite of a persistent rhetoric that
labelled them a 'dying race', they are here to stay,
as a very small (less than two percent of the total
population) but vibrant and increasingly vocal
and visible minority. Today, attempts to forge an
appropriate national identity likewise cannot
ignore the strengthened claims of indigenous
Australians since the existence of enduring
native title was recognised in the Mabo decision.
The indigenous struggle for land rights
continues, despite lamentably slow progress in
actually granting land under native title, and
recent Federal Government amendments that
have weakened the Native Title Act, making it
more difficult for indigenous groups to mount
claims. The larger battle for social justice for
Australia's indigenous minorities has recently
received a boost from the heavy publicity
surrounding a large-scale enquiry into 'the stolen
generations' of children (mostly of mixed
descent) who were removed, by government fiat,
from their natural parents over a period
spanning several decades. A 1994 Australian Bureau
of Statistics survey revealed that more than 10 %
of indigenous Australians over the age of twenty
five reported being separated and raised in
isolation from their natural families (atsic,
1999:105). Many non-Aboriginal Australians
have now learned how severe, widespread,
painful — and recent — were these government-
6. As I write, the Australian media are giving considerable coverage to a strong reprimand issued against Australia by the
United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination for legislative ill-treatment of its indigenous peoples,
and to the angry response to the criticisms by Federal Government Ministers (see for example, The Sydney Morning Herald,
March 19, 1999, p. 15, 'Rough justice at UN hearing on native title', by Simon Mann).
inflicted traumas and gross violations of human
rights. Despite its high price, the weighty Report
of the National Enquiry (Wilson, 1998) has
become a best seller, which attests to the high
level of interest and concern generated by
evidence given to the National Enquiry by
indigenous people.
This year (1999), public debate has intensified
as plans are made for a referendum concerning
constitutional amendments, including a
Preamble that would acknowledge prior indigenous
occupation, though not ownership, of the
continent. This is another step in the nation's attempt
to come to some accommodation with its
indigenous peoples. The present government knows
that the status and welfare of its indigenous
peoples must have an important bearing on
nation-making activities, so it has continued to
state its support for the goal of reconciliation
between them and other Australians. However,
some of its actions in relation to indigenous
issues belie its official line. Aboriginal leaders
dissatisfied with government initiatives, such as
the recent amendments to the Native Title Act
1993, do not hesitate to take their protests to
international bodies such as the United Nations
Committee on the Elimination of Racial
Discrimination and the World Council of Indigenous
People, knowing that the government is sensitive
to international criticism of its actions in
relation to its indigenous minorities 6.
At both State and Federal government levels,
politicians have not been averse to tapping into
deep currents of racism, particularly that
directed towards Aborigines, secure in the knowledge
that the indigenous vote is politically
insignificant in most of Australia. They are well aware
that, in an era of economic downturn and
growing insecurity about the future, many
Australians increasingly resent the existence of
legislation directed towards improving the severely
disadvantaged status of indigenous Australians.
It is thus disturbingly easy for politicians,
resource developers, and others to expose this
raw nerve of prejudice to their advantage,
especially in relation to land rights and native title
issues. Predictably, then, other Australians
continue to exhibit widely diverse attitudes to their
country's indigenous minorities. There is a
substantial degree of support for reconciliation and
social justice, but a majority expressing
opposition to the use of measures such as
compensatory legislation to assist indigenous Australians
PRAGMATICS AND POLITICS OF ABORIGINAL TRADITION
(cf. Galligan, 1994). In the print media every day,
particularly in letters to editors, it is possible to
see the full range of discourses on Aboriginal
people, from blatantly racist to wholeheartedly
supportive.
In recent times, however, there have also been
some encouraging signs of more positive
attitudes towards Aborigines. Many Aboriginal
people from rural and remote areas have migrated to
urban centres over the past several decades, and
are now a physical and cultural presence in most
major cities, while in the sparsely populated
northern and central regions, they still form a
significant demographic component of local
populations. Aborigines and Aboriginal issues have
become the focus of considerable media
attention, and relative to their numbers they would
receive a far greater amount of publicity than,
say, indigenous minorities in North America. On
both national and international scenes,
Aboriginal cultural achievements, particularly in the
past decade or so, have placed them firmly in the
public eye. Recent Aboriginal successes in
literature, music, art, sport, film, and dance appear to
be seeping into the national consciousness in a
decidedly positive way, increasing the possibility
that the dominant society will consider indige-
neity and its distinctive cultural symbols as
potential components of Australian national
identity (cf. Commonwealth of Australia, 1994;
Morton, 1998; Morphy, 1998; Tatz, 1995).
Elsewhere, I have argued that assertions and
manifestations of Aboriginality defined and
expressed predominantly in terms of a political
rhetoric of resistance are giving way to a more
culture-centred emphasis on Aboriginal
commonalities, continuity and survival, to which
members of the dominant society are likely to
react more favourably (Tonkinson, 1998). These
two closely interwoven dimensions of
Aboriginality, the 'political' and the 'cultural', are dia-
lectically related, and are conjoined in the Mabo
decision and its enabling legislation, which find
native title inhering in indigenous traditions.
Land rights have become a powerful focus of
Aboriginal people's struggle for social justice
throughout Australia, even though large areas
of land in southern and eastern Australia that
have long been alienated under freehold title
cannot be claimed under native title. In fact, at
most only 10-30 % of Aborigines are potential
beneficiaries of the native title claims process. In
the case of already alienated land, no amount of
appeal to 'tradition' by indigenous people could
win them back their lost territories.
By now it should be clear that the political
salience and potential uses of 'tradition' in
137
tralia differ considerably, as does the extent to
which indigenous people are able to perceive and
talk about it in objectified or reified terms. At
one extreme would be the well educated
members of a growing Aboriginal middle class, socio-
economically integrated 'elite', most of whom
work in governmental bureaucracies dealing
largely or exclusively with indigenous affairs or in
organisations controlled by indigenous groups.
For these leaders, commentators and
trendsetters, Aboriginal 'tradition' has both
intellectual and emotional appeal and, as an objectified
concept as well as a 'lived in' reality, is fully
appreciated for its crucial role in underpinning
individual and group identity, and for its
political and economic potential as a resource. Some
have a high public profile nationally, and are
regularly called upon by the various media to
offer opinion and commentary on relevant
issues. They are politically sophisticated and well
versed in the discourses of those who hold and
exercise power in Australia, and are active
participants in public debates on matters affecting the
indigenous population. Most indicate their
respect for 'traditional' values and protocol by
acknowledging local elders and 'traditional owners'
if they are speaking in another group's territory,
and by making it clear to their audience that they
do not purport to speak for all Aboriginal
people.
I now discuss some of the kinds of
differentiation that address, but by no means exhaust, the
range of possibilities surrounding Aboriginal
understandings and constructions of identity
and 'tradition', beginning with a situation that
represents the opposite end of the continuum
from that of the elite just discussed.
Aboriginality and Tradition in the Western Desert
Today
The people of the Western Desert would
undoubtedly be among the most 'tradition-
oriented' of Australia's indigenous minorities.
This term is used by some anthropologists in an
imperfect attempt to typify situations in which
continuities with the 'traditional' past continue
to play a more powerful role than Western
elements in framing Aboriginal worldview,
dominant values, and social structures. In most desert
communities, there are elderly people still alive
who grew up in a 'pre-contact' environment,
experiencing no direct interaction with Whites,
although undoubtedly aware of their presence
along the margins of the desert. Today, they live
in communities that have electricity, television,
138 SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES : LES POLITIQUES DE LA TRADITION

telephones, faxes, supermarkets, workshops, and The identity of these Aborigines is framed in
so on. These settlements are structured along terms of mainly local referents, such as kinship,
Western-oriented administrative lines, social category membership, place of residence,
controlled by elected Aboriginal councils increasingly and totemic and 'tribal' affiliations, though at
preoccupied with bureaucratic dealings with the broader levels of reference, a contrast is made
outside world, and assisted by non- Aboriginal between Aboriginal people' and all others {cf.
staff in positions such as project officer, adviser, M. Tonkinson, 1990). Their children, who are
mechanic, or book-keeper, and with government being educated in a basically Western system and
agents such as nurses and schoolteachers also are growing up with television, no doubt are
living and working in the community. more intensively exposed to alien influences that
must lend to their worldview a more hybrid
To the casual observer, the desert Aborigines character than that of their elders. Still, all youths
might appear simply as impoverished, sedentary continue to be initiated and become increasingly
ex-nomads wearing Western clothes and involved in the religious life, despite its
showing no obvious continuities with their past, attenuation in the face of Westernising pressures. There
except that they communicate largely in their has been no concerted turning away from or
own language rather than English. However, on overt rejection by younger people of the major
further observation some vitally important but cultural values deriving from the Law.
not immediately visible aspects of their society Jigalong, the community of Mardu
emerge: kinship still functions as the central Aborigines in which I have worked on the western edge
organising principle for social behaviour; there is of the desert, has long had a reputation as a
still unquestioning acceptance of the truth and stronghold of tradition, and its elders as staunch
reality of the body of knowledge, activities and upholders of the Law. A notable feature of
prescriptions known as the Dreaming, or 'the Mardu adaptation to settlement life has been the
Law', which continues to underpin adult strenuous efforts they have made to insulate the
Aboriginal worldviews; and the religious life, with its core religious domain from penetration by alien
strong focus on male initiation, is still accorded influences, and most certainly from any
cultural priority over mundane concerns such as pressures to commoditise highly valued elements of
settlement economics and politics 7. Although their culture (Tonkinson, 1974, 1988). A
some members of these communities are now significant indicator of this conservatism in matters of
professed Christians, they typically affirm the religion and practice is the fact that the Mardu
truth of the Dreaming, but attribute it to God's have never joined the 'dot paintings' art
creative hand. Desert people take their Aborigi- movement that has proved so successful and lucrative
nality totally for granted; it is simply not at issue, elsewhere in the Western Desert region {cf. Bar-
being as internalised and unobjectified as their don, 1979/91). Even today, in the face of a
belief in the reality of the Dreaming. This kind plethora of media attention to dot paintings, the
of consciousness has been well captured by Gel- Mardu have not attempted to commercialise this
lner (1998:21): aspect of their culture, although over the years a
few men have been making weapons and other
« The traditional organic way of life is probably mundane artefacts for sale to tourists.
imperceptible to itself. It is lived, it is danced, it is
performed in ritual and celebrated in legend, but it is Like many other indigenous groups
hardly articulated in theory. It is only when the snake throughout Australia, the Mardu are vitally interested
of abstract theory appears in the garden, that the in gaining ownership of their ancestral lands,
garden is suddenly perceived and named Community. and have become involved as claimants in a
Only then does one begin to sing its praises. The real native title claim. This claim is very strong
traditionalist... does not know himself to be such ». because of the Mardu's continuing and close
7. The 'Dreaming' or 'Dreamtime' is the central organising symbol of Aboriginal societies and culture. It is a complex
concept that embraces the creative epoch, when the first ancestral beings travelled the land and created its physical features,
distributed the first humans in their various language-named groupings, and gave them their social structures and rules for
living. Aptly described by Stanner as the 'everywhen', the Dreaming also includes the present and future, because the living are
charged with responsibility for ensuring the reproduction of the founding design; should they fail to perform the obligatory
rituals and obey the ancestral directives, then life on earth will come to an end (Stanner, 1979). 'The Law' is a closely related
concept which connotes the sets of guiding values and behavioural prescriptions that Aboriginal people believe to be derived
from the Dreaming. These imperatives must be faithfully followed and 'the Law' obeyed if society is to be perpetuated, hence the
aptness of the choice by Aborigines of the English word 'law', because both systems are underpinned by the threat of sanctions
(Tonkinson, 1991:22). Equally appropriate is their use of the word 'Dreaming', since it appears that, in most of Aboriginal
Australia, it is mainly during dreams that new religious lore and innovations — so vital to an enriched and vivified religious life
— are transmitted from the spiritual to the human realm via spirit-beings, which act as intermediaries between living Aboriginal
and the withdrawn ancestral creative beings who are 'here, there and everywhere, but nowhere to be seen' (Maddock, 1982: 106).
PRAGMATICS AND POLITICS OF ABORIGINAL TRADITION 139

association with these lands and the massive nial impacts were earliest and most severe,
amount of 'law and customs' that they can Aboriginal identities have been based more in a
readily adduce in support of their attestations of common history of oppression than in shared
ownership. Although the native title process elements of 'traditional' culture {cf. Cowlishaw,
itself stimulates people such as the Mardu to 1993). Since the late 1960s, when Aboriginal
conceptualise and objectify their lived-in and activists became part of the national political
taken-for-granted culture in unprecedented scene, attempts to forge a pan-Aboriginal
ways, it seems clear that they resist such objecti- solidarity and identity have centred on two major
fication. Yet their ongoing struggle to insulate elements: resistance and cultural revival {cf. Keeffe,
their religious domain against penetration by the 1988; Lattas, 1993). Both these vital components
domain of 'whitefella business' has become of identity construction and maintenance entail
increasingly difficult {cf. Tonkinson, 1988). a very much higher level of self-consciousness
When, at a recent public meeting of parties with and objectification of the past and of culture
interests in their native title claim, Mardu had than in remote Aboriginal Australia. While the
the opportunity to outline publicly their reasons full extent of physical resistance to the British as
for claiming the land, their response was very the frontier expanded is still being exposed by
revealing. They simply organised themselves historians {cf. Reynolds, 1982, 1998), many
into groups, each associated with a different part Aboriginal people are insistent that, long after
of the claimed land, identified themselves by frontier violence ended, their forbears were engaging
name and stated that such and such an area in numerous forms of non-violent resistance to
(pointing to a large map) belongs to them. They the intruders {cf. Miller, 1985). Aboriginal
saw no need at all to do more than proclaim ideologies of resistance have their origins in widely
(what is to them) the obvious. Predictably, the shared experiences of racism and oppression,
State Government representative in attendance and are thus framed largely in reaction to such
was not at all satisfied with mere assertions of factors as restrictive legislation, institutionalisa-
ownership, and read out to the meeting a long tion, and negative stereotyping of them by other
list of required information about 'laws and Australians; they also draw strength from the
customs' very fact of survival — 'we are still here' is a
pertaining to the claimed land. The Mardu
realise that such 'whitefella business' is popular catch-cry about persistence. Indigenous
pervasive, to the extent that the state now formally leaders have frequently focused on this shameful
requires from them a detailed account of their history, and for good reason: it would resonate
traditions in return for the granting of what, by strongly with most Aboriginal people, and it also
the very content of these traditions, they know conveys a more powerful moral reminder to non-
to be already theirs 8. Their relationship to their Aborigines than would the invocation of an
culture is so non-objectified that the 'Dreaming', ancient culture and shared traditions. However,
their key cultural symbol, remains the largely it is increasingly clear that many members of the
unstated but unquestionably dominant element dominant society — the current Prime Minister,
of Mardu worldview and is the validating source for example — respond poorly to any suggestion
of their claims to land. that they should feel guilty or responsible for
past atrocities and injustices. They fail to
appreciate the great symbolic power of such a gesture,
Southern Australia: Resistance, Revival, Identity, and are resistant to the idea that the Australian
and the Place of Tradition nation as a whole must face up to its past if it
wishes to achieve a lasting and meaningful
Since the second half of the last century, reconciliation with its indigenous peoples.
Aborigines have been located in Australia's social Not surprisingly, in the face of such negativity
formation as a very small, marginalised and the dominant representations in Aboriginal
powerless minority, largely unseen and rhetoric in recent times appear to have moved away
unheeded by members of the dominant society. In from a defensive, reactive or confrontational
south and south-eastern Australia, where tone to one that is more culture-centred and
8. Like many other Australians, the Mardu do not yet know what gaining native title will mean for them, or how they will
organise themselves to deal with the resources they hope will consequently flow to them. To observers, though, it is clear that the
very process of recognising native title is likely to begin or accelerate an inexorable transformation in which personal possession
or membership in corporate groups that can exert the power of ownership (in the Australian legal sense) will become desirable.
This is already occurring in some parts of the continent, notwithstanding the widespread assertion by Aboriginal people of
values of sharing and egalitarianism. Participation in the capitalist economy will sharpen competition between individuals and
groups and exacerbate inequalities, since resources are unequally distributed across the landscape, and so variations are
inevitable in the capacity and motivation of individuals and groups to exploit material and economic resources.
140 SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES : LES POLITIQUES DE LA TRADITION

conciliatory, and dwells more on continuity and Their interest in cultural revival, with its
triumphant survival. By this I am not suggesting emphasis on attempts to recapture elements of a
that discourses of resistance are disappearing; 'traditional' cultural heritage, appears to be motivated
rather, they are framed less in direct opposition by a strong desire to ground their Aboriginality
to White hegemony and historical abuses and in something more tangible than an inner
more in terms of survival and pride in the essence, hence their interest in discovering
strength of Aboriginal culture as proof of distinctive traditions and deriving spiritual values
successful resistance. Thus cultural renaissance or therefrom. As Griffiths (1996:225) notes, 'The
revival has grown greatly in importance in recent practice of history, particularly local and family
decades, both in southern Australia and in other history, has been at the heart of this cultural
areas where a sense of cultural loss has impelled resurgence, and of the making of Aboriginal
many Aboriginal people to restorative action. identity'. The rapid growth in recent years of
Such movements build on the recognition that local Aboriginal 'keeping places' (museums),
there are elements of cultural continuity which attests to this interest, and to a determination to
persist throughout Australia; and today many restore Aboriginal control of objects and
indigenous people invoke values such as 'caring traditions, and to exhibit and use them as community
and sharing' as fundamental elements of a pan- resources for education and promotion of
Aboriginal identity (cf. Gilbert, 1977:1). So distinctive identity (cf. Griffiths, 1996).
cultural revival is based heavily on notions of a In terms of the main themes of this paper, I
distinctive and universally shared Aboriginal suggest that, in the case of cultural revival, the
'culture', which its proponents objectify as such specific content of 'tradition' may be less
via a focus on 'land, language and law', plus the important than desired outcomes relating to
important fact of survival. These elements are confidence-building and pride in an Aboriginal
the main sources of identity and pride, and the identity, especially since this process may entail
dominant Aboriginal rhetoric surrounding these the borrowing and creative adaptation of
community-based movements tends to centre cultural elements from neighbouring groups or other
more on Aboriginal culture as enduring and parts of the continent — most commonly in
empowering than on oppression and loss. 'settled' areas where very little may be known in
Given their sensitivity to attacks by other detail of local Aboriginal cultures at the time of
Australians on their authenticity as Aborigines, the European invasion. In remote areas, in
many people of mixed descent can and do contrast, the importance of 'laws and customs'
objectify their Aboriginality, which has been that constitute tradition is in the details, as
constructed, inevitably and significantly, groups seek to justify their claims to land,
substantial y in opposition to racism and stereotyping of sometimes in a context of overlapping and competing
the kind that attacks them as 'not real claims. In assessing the eligibility of individuals
Aborigines' and thus assaults the very core of their to assert native title rights as 'traditional
being. In defining themselves, they are unable to owners', Tribunals or courts will pay close
claim as identity markers criteria such as attention to the nature of land tenure systems, and to
language and 'traditional' economic activity and 'ownership' criteria and their relative
skills. Often, their discourse about Aboriginality significance. To draw a parallel with the Melanesian
is framed in essentialist terms, as something 'in situation, the strategic use of 'tradition' in
the blood' (cf. Lattas, 1990; M.Tonkinson, 1991; situations of indigenous cultural renewal in Australia
Morton, 1996; see also Glowczewski, 1998:343). would be more like the kinds of appeal made by
These people, particularly the town and city leaders of independence movements to a
dwellers of 'settled' Australia, have deliberately vague and undifferentiated 'tradition', one
enthusiastically seized upon the Aboriginal flag and its that cannot be specified and so cannot be
colours as symbols of identity, and their claimed as exemplary by one group of people. To
fondness for clothing and ornaments in these colours specify a tradition would upset all the other
advertises their pride in their Aboriginality 9. groups whose traditions have not been chosen as
9. An anthropological critique of similarly popular and oft-repeated indigenous slogans such as 'the land is our mother' or
'the land owns us' would no doubt cite, respectively, the prevalence of patrilineal ideologies and of strong cultural values
according precedence to human agency in the regulation of human relations with the natural world, despite the creative priority
accorded in Aboriginal Australia to spiritual forces {cf. Stanner 1966/1989; Tonkinson, 1991). Yet in these sayings are encoded
beliefs that are held by many of their promulgators to be immutable truths about traditions. They are also symptomatic of the
dynamism inherent in constructions of 'tradition', so it is essential that anthropologists are sensitive to this and remain
open-minded to such pronouncements. Otherwise, they stand guilty of the same intolerance that prevents other Australians
from conceding the wrenching impact of relentless social and historical forces on Aboriginal societies and on indigenous
understandings about 'tradition'.
PRAGMATICS AND POLITICS OF ABORIGINAL TRADITION 141

a national symbol. In land claim contexts, variously with or against miners,

however, the stress on specificity and attention to conservationists, developers, local authorities, state or
detail and content is like local level politics in federal government agencies, and so on. What is
Melanesia, where distinctive kastom ('tradition') important here is not so much the particulars of
is ethnocentrically invoked as a differentiating, the alliances formed or conflicts enjoined as the
boundary-maintaining mechanism. recognition and exercise of influence that has
Nevertheless, with overlapping or otherwise contested been granted by the state to previously
native title claims in 'settled' Australia, there marginalised indigenous Australians, via heritage and
would be strong interest among contending native title legislation aimed at the protection of
parties in the content of claims made about their traditions and in support of their struggle
traditions, and possibly accusations exchanged about for land rights. I now turn to a recent long-
borrowed or 'stolen' elements {cf. Finlayson, running, nationally publicised dispute that
1997; Macdonald, 1997). illustrates well a whole panoply of issues salient to
this discussion: land rights, heritage protection,
I mentioned earlier that, prior to Mabo, the strategic uses of 'tradition', the 'invention' of
several of Australia's states and territories had culture, the role of secrecy and of gender-specific
enacted land rights legislation, which has resulted in knowledge in Aboriginal culture, the role of
large areas of land (mostly desert) in South anthropology, and conflicts both internal to the
Australia and Northern Territory coming under Aboriginal domain and between Aborigines and
Aboriginal ownership. Since the 1970s, the the dominant society. Since a detailed account is
protection of Aboriginal sites of significance has given elsewhere (Tonkinson, 1997), I confine
also generated both state and federal legislation, myself here to a discussion of issues directly
which, although relatively weak, does at least relevant to the themes of this paper.
alert developers, local authorities, and others of
the need to gain clearances prior to disturbing
sites. The significance of such heritage The Hindmarsh Island Bridge Dispute:
legislation is that it allows indigenous people to secure a Case in Point
official acknowledgment of their interests, and
in some cases, of their opposition to planned This controversy, which erupted in the mid-
developments, as well as offering the possibility 1990s, centred on a proposed bridge that would
of affecting outcomes. Aboriginal objections to link a marina on Hindmarsh Island to the
a variety of development activities perceived by mainland in the lower River Murray region in the
them as threatening their cultural heritage have state of South Australia. This region is the
become increasingly common throughout the ancestral territory of the Ngarrindjeri, and some
continent. In the interior and north of Australia, 3,000 people have ties to this group. Like all
conflict between mining interests and Aboriginal other southern Aborigines, they are subject to
bodies (often along with conservationists), in attacks on their Aboriginality by Australians
particular, has attracted considerable media who perceive them as Westernised and divorced
attention. The very powerful mining industry from their traditional cultural roots n. In the
has long exhibited strong antipathy to land past, many of the Aboriginal forbears of people
rights, claiming that they are a serious like the Ngarrindjeri would have been placed in
impediment to wealth creation and therefore are not in institutions and subjected to concerted attempts
the national interest 10. to assimilate them into the dominant Europea-
Land and heritage matters have generated nised society. Today, most embrace their
many lines of tension among different interest Aboriginality, assert strong continuities with their
groups in Australia and, depending on the Aboriginal past, and evince great interest and
circumstances, Aborigines have allied themselves pride in their 'tribal' identity. Although they are
10. Aboriginal spokespersons and organisations have affirmed their right to be involved and consulted. However, their
attitudes to mining, tourism and other development activities have not been homogeneous, and disputes between supporters and
opponents of such activities occur frequently within and between affected communities, as well as between communities and
regional representative bodies (cf. Trigger 1997). Also, sections of the mining industry in the post-Mabo era have preferred direct
negotiations with Aboriginal groups rather than dealing with representative bodies such as Land Councils (see Kauflfman 1998
for details of some of the agreements reached in recent years).
1 1 Members of the dominant society, most of whom would never have encountered an Aboriginal person until relatively
recently, if at all, look to the remote interior regions for their understandings and stereotypes about what constitutes
.

Aboriginality and Aboriginal culture. Their view of who are 'real Aborigines' and of what constitutes 'authentic' cultural
traditions regrettably challenges the Aboriginality of the great majority of Aboriginal people, whose Western-influenced
lifestyles are regarded as disqualifying them from the knowledge and practice of those denning traditions (cf. Beckett, 1988a:6;
Langton, 1993 b; Rowse, 1988; Trigger, 1992).
142 SOCIÉTÉ DES OCEANISTES : LES POLITIQUES DE LA TRADITION

geographically dispersed, and large numbers live tion concerning a group of female Dreaming
in the state capital, Adelaide, Ngarrindjeri creators, but not its connection with Hindmarsh
people engage in much intervisiting, and they Island (Commonwealth of Australia, 1996);
maintain a sense of community through periodic later that year, the Federal Government
gatherings, most often at funerals. As I have introduced special legislation to allow the bridge to be
noted elsewhere (in Berndt and Berndt, built 12.
1993:xvii), contemporary Ngarrindjeri identity A notable underlying theme of the dispute,
is manifest also in shared family histories and especially the initiatives undertaken by and on
beliefs about kinship and spirituality, in the behalf of the proponent faction to stop the
widespread use of a distinctive dialect of bridge, is the exercise of influence by a hitherto
Aboriginal English, and in the active efforts of powerless people. These initiatives appear to
individuals and several representative bodies to have originated principally among Adelaide-
promote cultural awareness (see also Clarke, 1994). based members of the proponent faction, who
The bridge controversy became national news were more experienced in a much larger political
when the media were made aware of a dispute arena than that of the Ngarrindjeri group living
between two factions of Ngarrindjeri people in the homeland region. Their political
over a secret women's tradition being claimed sophistication and awareness were evidenced when they
for Hindmarsh Island. According to the invoked heritage legislation and in launching a
proponents of the tradition, the building of the bridge successful appeal to Federal authorities to
would violate the site in such a way as to bring intervene against the bridge development. If one
about the destruction of their people (see Saun- accepts the fabrication hypothesis, the politicisa-
ders, 1994). Another group of women, of similar tion of the issue of 'tradition' was a strategic
age and status (labelled the 'dissident faction' by element in the playing out of the Hindmarsh
the media), denied all knowledge of such a dispute, and its invocation by the proponent
tradition as being of long standing. They alleged faction was a potent weapon in bringing about a
that it had been recently fabricated in order to halt to the bridge. Yet is also led to the Royal
prevent the bridge being built. This conflict Commission, which deeply divided the
entailed a complex and fraught political Ngarrindjeri (as well as anthropologists and other
situation in which both factions were subject to scholars associated with the Commission's hearings)
considerable pressure from other interested parties. and had wider repercussions: Aboriginal
The Federal Minister for Aboriginal Affairs credibility in relation to land claims has probably
accepted the argument of the supporters of the been eroded, and the existing prejudices of many
tradition and agreed to invoke indigenous members of the dominant society, who suspect
heritage legislation, imposing a twenty five year ban the creation of new 'sacred sites' by indigenous
on construction of the bridge. Soon after, when Australians for political or economic purposes,
the dispute within the Ngarrindjeri group may well have been reinforced 13.
became public, most of the attention of the The Hindmarsh controversy exposed notable
media was focused on the alleged fabrication, deficiencies in both Commonwealth and State
which roused the pro-development State laws relating to Aboriginal heritage, largely
Government to action. A State Royal attributable to 'fundamental differences between the
Commission was established in 1995, to enquire into introduced common law system and the legal
whether or not the secret women's tradition was system of the indigenous oral culture'
genuine, and its protracted hearings generated (Commonwealth of Australia, 1996:1). How to
much national publicity. The Commissioner accommodate dynamic traditions within
concluded that the tradition had been fabricated Western legal frameworks demanding precision and
by the proponent faction in order to stop the closure is one problem, but equally serious is
bridge. A subsequent Federal Government how to define and recognise a 'tradition' when
enquiry, conducted in 1996, affirmed the no time-depth is specified. Anthropologists are
existence of an important (and widespread) fully aware that traditions do not suddenly
12. The second report had no legal status after the appointment of the presiding judge, Justice Mathews, was declared null
and void, yet it was tabled in Federal Parliament by the Minister responsible for Aboriginal matters, seemingly because he
approved of its conclusion that the evidence was insufficient to find that the construction of a bridge would constitute
desecration.
13. The Hindmarsh dispute has also had important implications for the profession and practice of social anthropology in
Australia, particularly in its applied form and where research is normally conducted within short time-frames, and often by
consultants with little or no prior field experience with the people concerned. Anthropologists were placed in the limelight by
their prominent role in the hearings of the Royal Commission, and some who acted as expert witnesses were treated harshly by
both cross-examining lawyers and the media (see Tonkinson 1997).
PRAGMATICS AND POLITICS OF ABORIGINAL TRADITION
spring full-blown from initial event(s) to
structure and institutionalisation. In fact, an
important objective of the 'extended case method',
based on field research conducted over a long
time period, is to distinguish short-term
organisational change (in Firth's 1951 terminology),
which, like fads, could well prove ephemeral,
from those more enduring forms that survive
challenge and testing to become embedded in a
given social formation as structures meriting the
title 'tradition'. Given that the heritage
legislation does not define tradition — and in the event
that the connecting of the women's tradition to
Hindmarsh Island was a recent innovation — it
may have been possible for the proponent
faction to declare the women's tradition to be of
recent origin. The 'traditional' nature of such
innovation is well established in the literature,
which demonstrates that Aboriginal culture
facilitates the addition of new religious lore via
revelations to humans from the withdrawn but still
interested creative powers that inhere in the
spiritual realm {cf. Stanner, 1966/89; Tonkinson,
1970; Maddock, 1982).
The Hindmarsh dispute powerfully polarised
public opinion. On one side were those
prejudiced against southern Aborigines and/or sceptical
about the tradition's longevity, and on the other
those who saw the dispute as yet another
unwarranted and immoral, if not illegal, attack by the
State and capitalist forces on a powerless
Aboriginal group whose religion and fundamental
human rights they were violating. Both sides
tended to ignore the fact that at the centre of this
dispute were two groups of Aboriginal people
from the same community; instead, they focused
on the group that fitted their prejudices and
wishes. A key issue here is the tension between an
anthropological perspective committed to the
notion of traditions as dynamic and responsive
to historical and social forces, and a strong
opinion held by many Australians that any
indigenous tradition bearing the imprint of these
forces after European colonisation is 'tainted' and
therefore inauthentic (cf. Merlan, 1991; Keen,
1992; 1993). What is being thus denied is what
anthropologists know to be a social scientific
fact; namely, a universal characteristic of
traditions, which results from their reinterpretation
and conceptualisation by each generation of
bearers, is that they will include evidence of the
alien impacts that have been transforming the
society. Unlike their neighbours in Oceania,
indigenous Australians' claims about 'tradition'
are constantly subject to appraisal and criticism
14.1 am indebted to Jim Urry for his suggestion about the need to place my discussion of 'tradition' in a broader context and
for his ideas about the bigger picture.
143
from the encapsulating society whose dominant
ideologies define the situation. To reject as
inauthentic a myth that tells of sailing ships or
horses or rifles, as White Australians are wont to
do, is to entrap Aborigines in a timeless past.
This denies them the right to define their
situation, in part at least, via the very processes that
have disenfranchised, marginalised, and
impoverished them {cf. Beckett 1988b; see also
Footnote 8).
Conclusion
'tradition'
Thereisisessentially
a sense in modern
which the
and
rhetoric
exists only
of in
discourses that are originally Eurocentric in
form — though now universal as a result of the
worldwide transformation of societies. As a
conscious construct, 'tradition' (like romantic
versions of community and of nationalism,
which are related aspects of the same
phenomenon) can only be conceived of when rational
thought questions 'non-conscious', or 'unself-
conscious', existence and proposes an
alternative. In this view, the 'tradition' must have a point
of reference, either in space or time or both; but
the point of reference must be other than the
world in which the proposer currently exists, and
believed capable of being made manifest in the
future. The idea of 'rights', individual and
collective, of a past appropriated to a present, and
of a retrospective, unchanging organic
community that must be recaptured and incorporated
into modern life — are all reflections of the
restructuring of modern social life. Here the
nation has replaced the unspoken essence of
lived local experience, and the person moves
towards realisation as an autonomous, universal
individual. Both Aborigines and
anthropologists are trapped in the steel grip of these
concerns 14.
In Australia, the nation-state's demand for
evidence of 'laws and customs' governing
connections to land and protection of
indigenous heritage has far-reaching consequences for
the place of indigenous 'tradition'. Another
important factor is the marketplace (including
the art market, where Aboriginal artists have
achieved strong international recognition and
support), which helps shape pan- Aboriginal
identity and at the same time seeks out
differences to exploit as market niches. On the positive
side, the stimulation of interest in 'traditional
knowledge', when for example it is placed in the
144 SOCIÉTÉ DES OCEANISTES : LES POLITIQUES DELA TRADITION

service of land claims, requires from the gnty, but seeking to underline their moral claims
claimants a certain level of obj edification. to greater autonomy and their legal claims to
Indigenous people are thus likely to develop a greater land. In both cases, appeals must be to an undif-
self-consciousness in their efforts to remember, ferentiated but distinctive 'tradition', as a
reconceptualise, clarify, and retain such cultural powerful symbol of a shared and unifying culture.
knowledge, and also to transmit it to younger What may well merit further anthropological
members of the society. Unfortunately, the exploration is the extent to which the factor of
benefits of an inevitable reinforcement of 'tradition' embeddedness in a powerful nation-state
as a useful resource have been partially offset by operates either to inhibit or to accentuate resort to,
a rapid escalation in intra — and inter-group and exploitation of, 'tradition' for whatever
disputes and overlapping native title claims. purposes 16. In 'settled' Australia, it is at the core
These conflicts demonstrate the other side of the of attempts by Aborigines to ground self-pride
coin of 'tradition', well known from the Pacific and identity in 'cultural revival', a positive
literature: its potential divisiveness when used as affirmation of distinctiveness, persistence and
a resource by disputing groups. As we well know, survival in which the content of 'tradition' is typically
'tradition' can be used just as easily to accentuate less important than its symbolic force as 'culture'
boundaries and authorise difference as it can to writ large. In this case, the kind of largely undif-
dissolve them in the name of local, regional or ferentiated tradition invoked resembles that to
national unity {cf. Lindstrom, 1982). which Pacific leaders appeal as symbolising a
The prominence now accorded to matters of distinctive national identity. Furthermore, in
indigenous 'tradition' in Australia makes it vital both situations the action has occurred not in
for scholars to understand both the principles isolation, but against a backdrop of pervasive
and pragmatics surrounding the influence: in the Pacific, European colonial
conceptualisation by claimant groups of their laws and powers, in Australia the dominant nation-state,
customs, and of how claimants report them to those and beyond them, of course, the global
specialists, such as anthropologists, lawyers, and expansion and development of capitalism (Foster,
historians, who are employed to advance 1998:7). In remote 'tradition-oriented'
indigenous claims to land under native title 15. Australia, however, where 'tradition' is now emerging
Although the motivations underlying a strong from an existential, taken-for-granted status in
anthropological focus on the politics of response to the nation-state's specification of
'tradition' in the Pacific region relate to a situation 'laws and customs' as the foundation of native
that seemingly contrasts with that in Australia, title, the emphasis on content and specificity of
the principles and processes entailed in self- 'tradition' and its powerful boundary
interested constructions of the past are maintaining functions is similar to the politics of
universal, and can therefore be usefully applied 'grassroots' local and regional 'tradition' in Oceania.
anywhere. Also, the general ambience These parallels ought to be sufficient
surrounding appeals to 'tradition' by a colonised people inducement for Australianists, not to mention Africa-
seeking independence and a new national nists and Latin-Americanists, and other scholars
identity is not unlike that of encapsulated minorities of change, to pay closer attention to the valuable
such as the Aborigines and Torres Strait contribution made by the literature on Oceania
Islanders, trapped in a 'Fourth World' situation that to our understanding of the dynamics and
excludes the possibility of indigenous politics of 'tradition'.
15. In an earlier controversy over the alleged fabrication of traditions by Aboriginal people to prevent mining taking place,
industry representatives and conservative critics attacked the anthropologists involved as inherently biased because of their
moral commitment to the indigenous cause (see Brunton, 1991). Thus anthropological or social scientific discourse about the
dynamic nature of 'tradition' runs afoul of public prejudices that resist or reject such views as indicative of a lack of 'objectivity'
on the part of fieldworkers, and attribute a spurious Aboriginality to the Aborigines involved (cf. Sutton, 1996). Given the
intrinsically dynamic nature of tradition, and its centrality to native title claims, anthropologists who work in this research field
have to be mindful of the impact of change on contemporary indigenous accounts of cultural traditions (cf. Ritchie 1999; see
also Rigsby 1996). The profession in Australia will no doubt continue to play a significant role in land claims research and
reporting, but must tread a fine line between lingering indigenous allegations of it as paternalistic and exploitative, and
conservative critiques of it as biased in favour of indigenous people and ideologically driven in directions not favoured by late
capitalism.
16. In calling for a more relational, holistic approach to theories of nation making, LiPuma (1997:35) invokes a similar
notion in suggesting that a comprehensive viewpoint must include an awareness of 'encompassment', which he defines as 'that
sociohistorical process by which "autonomous" societies (or economic sectors) are progressively and sometimes simultaneously
subsumed and enchanted by the political economy of capitalism, internationalized Western culture, and interstate organizations
such as the United Nations.' His point is that we need to acknowledge the existence of an intrinsic relationship between the
nation-state and the encompassing forms, one that is infused with power, highly asymmetrical and mutually dynamic.
PRAGMATICS AND POLITICS OF ABORIGINAL TRADITION
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