No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the author.
Aboriginal Workers in the Australian Agricultural Company, 1824-1857
Abstract
This article documents failed attempts by the an early nineteenth century pastoral enterprise to implement a British factory model of labour relations and traces the emergence of a distinctively Australian work culture which incorporated Aboriginal labour. In a radical departure from earlier work which variously stressed the destructive impact of pastoral capital, Aboriginal resistance to colonisation and coloniser-indigene 'accommodation', it is argued that there was an accord between work rhythms in subsistence economies and the attributes required of pastoral workers in the early colonial period. In a detailed analysis of recruitment, organisation, productivity and remuneration, the author argues that Aboriginal engagement with pastoral capital was purposefully designed to maintain contact with country and that Aboriginal workers were the most productive employees in the corporation.
... 119 The Australian Agricultural Company, founded in 1824, held one million acres between Port Stephens and the Manning River, 549,000 of which were exchanged for lands in the Liverpool Plains. 120 The large-scale presence of European cattle and sheep in the arid or semi-arid areas of Australia did not only constitute a major tweaking of the bio-diversity of this continent, but created a situation in which Aborigines themselves became an endangered group. 121 Because Aborigines had acquired a reputation of threatening the herds, stock farmers attacked them brutally, by denying them access to the land, to the water and to food. ...
This contribution attempts to discuss unintended, neglectful, or willful manipulations of Social Ecological Systems (SESs) by commercial stock farmers as part of an attempt to drive Aboriginal people from their lands into the hinterland thereby accepting or condoning their annihilation or demographic reduction. By displaying the different ways in which commercial stock farmers have engineered changes in the ecological system I will show that traditional definitions of the term genocide fall short of applied techniques of decimation which consist of a combination of micro-practices and quotidian low-level violence. It is doubtful that given the complexity and the resilience of SES, however, a group of commercial stock farmers is able to operate the system (of which, after all, they are an element) in a controlled way. I argue nevertheless that the term ecocide should be applied to the way stock farmers changed the habitat of the Indigenous population, because the settlers had agency without understanding the totality of their actions. SES as coupled complex systems are dependent on the existence of bio-diversity, the intensity of grazing,11. Andrew J. Ash and John G. McIvor, ‘How Season of Grazing and Herbivore Selectivity Influence Monsoon Tall-Grass Communities of Northern Australia’, Journal of Vegetation Science 9, no. 1 (February 1, 1998): 123–32.View all notes defoliation, habitat fragmentation and changes of the soil as a consequence of densification.22. Kimberly A. With and Thomas O. Crist, ‘Critical Thresholds in Species’ Responses to Landscape Structure’, Ecology 76, no. 8 (December 1, 1995): 2446–59. Richard J. Hobbs, ‘Synergisms among Habitat Fragmentation, Livestock Grazing, and Biotic Invasions in Southwestern Australia’, Conservation Biology 15, no. 6 (December 1, 2001): 1522–8.View all notes
This essay examines the significance of Edward Gibbon Wakefield’s theory of ‘systematic colonisation’ within the transition from Caribbean slavery to settler colonisation to reveal the sequential relationship of these two imperial systems. In the context of industrialisation and social unrest, the anti-slavery movement performed an important purpose for Britain’s ruling classes by simultaneously accruing moral authority and sanctioning oppressive new forms of disciplined labour, including the treatment of Australian convicts as slaves. During the ‘ameliorative’ 1820s phase of the anti-slavery movement, experimental colonial schemes combined both abolitionist principles and pro-slavery interests, particularly visible in the form of arguments against free labour and the advocacy of racial, as well as class, labour hierarchies. Wakefield’s theory embodied principles of labour discipline drawn from the plantation, allied to new techniques of land commoditization, offering a solution to the looming problem of abolition. These principles were invoked in debating the emancipation bill introduced in May 1833, as all sides agreed on the need for freed slaves to work for wages; they were subsequently applied in the Caribbean after emancipation by planters attempting to maintain productivity during and beyond the apprenticeship period. After 1833, the abolitionists’ zeal could be turned to other causes, and reformers seeking to end transportation and develop the settler colonies deployed an entwined discourse of anti-slavery and systematic colonisation.
Studies of the impact of European forms of alcohol on Indigenous peoples tend to focus on health and social problems arising from overconsumption. This article takes a new approach by, first, parsing wine from the non-culturally specific treatment of all forms of alcohol in the lives of Aboriginal Australians; and, second, consider- ing Aboriginal employment in Australian wine production since the early nineteenth century alongside these peoples’ exclusion from the late-twentieth century rise of an Australian “good life” of demo- cratized wine drinking practices. By re-entangling these elements of Aboriginal lives in settler colonial society, we reveal an unknown facet of Aboriginal economic contribution, highlight relationships between Aboriginal- and Italian-Australians, and challenge negative stereotypes that Aboriginal Australians are unable to control them- selves in the presence of alcohol.
PUBLISHED in Global Food History.
FULL TEXT available https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/6xQWXbNMjXPTTsb85J3T/full?target=10.1080/20549547.2019.1569442
Objective:
To describe the design and implementation of a culturally mediated case management model at Winnunga Nimmityjah Aboriginal Health Service (Winnunga) for Indigenous clients who consume alcohol at problematic levels.
Methods:
Our research took place from March 2008 to March 2010 in the Australian Capital Territory and built on previous research partnerships between Winnunga and The Australian National University's National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health. We conducted a review of existing models to determine elements for consideration in the community controlled setting, and conducted staff surveys to assess current levels of skill and confidence around alcohol screening, brief intervention and care planning. Using the information from the review and staff surveys, we then undertook staff capacity building to build confidence and skills in conducting alcohol screening, brief intervention and care planning. This process was driven by Winnunga's social health team. To meet Medicare benefits schedule requirements, and frame the study within the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Chronic Disease Package framework, we included team care arrangements, care planning and health checks.
Results:
Elements of case management were suggested by staff and incorporated into the final model. Forty staff in the health service participated in identifying training needs for the development of the case management model and undertook a range of training before the model was implemented. Staff working within the social health team decided that the focus of the case management was to build a stronger future for their clients, hence the name of the case management model 'Walan Girri' (Wiradjuri language for strong future). The model included a package of screening instruments and brief intervention, related polices and discussion of 'mob' and 'country.' Changes in Winnunga management and staff, the composition of the research team and the way Walan Girri evolved led to protracted development and implementation.
Conclusions:
This project highlights considerations for implementing a case management model in a dynamic health service environment. Capacity building for Winnunga staff and for an Indigenous PhD scholar were part of the process and were integral in maintaining momentum in the project.
ResearchGate has not been able to resolve any references for this publication.