Why were Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children taken from their families? The forcible removal of First Nations children from their families was based on assimilation policies, which claimed that the lives of First Nations people would be improved if they became part of white society.
In NSW, under the Aborigines Protection Act 1909, the NSW Aborigines Welfare Board had wide ranging control over the lives of Aboriginal people, including the power to remove Aboriginal children from their families under a policy of 'assimilation'.
The NSW Aborigines Protection Board loses its power to remove Indigenous children. The Board is renamed the Aborigines Welfare Board and is finally abolished in 1969. By 1969, all states have repealed the legislation allowing for the removal of Aboriginal children under the policy of 'protection'.
Boys were flogged for wetting their bed or chained to a tree all alone overnight. The children were told that they weren't Aboriginal, that their mothers didn't want them or were dead. Boys were sent "down the line" to be punched by each of their fellow inmates, from the oldest to the youngest, as many as 60.
We say sorry to those Aboriginal people forcibly removed from their families through the first seven decades of the 20th century. In doing so, we reach from within ourselves to our past, those whose lives connect us to it, and in deep understanding of its importance to our future.
Since the colonisation of Australia by European settlers, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians have experienced extreme hardships, ranging from the loss of traditional culture and homelands to the forced removal of children and denial of citizenship rights.
The Bringing Them Home report (produced by the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families in 1987), says that "at least 100,000" children were removed from their parents.
Cultural. Loss of cultural affiliation. Since they were often denied any traditional knowledge, many Stolen Generations members find it difficult to take a role in the cultural and spiritual life of their Aboriginal communities.
Why were Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children taken from their families? The forcible removal of First Nations children from their families was based on assimilation policies, which claimed that the lives of First Nations people would be improved if they became part of white society.
It's a story that has been repeated for generations of Aboriginal families in Australia, and it's still happening today. In 2019/20, 952 Aboriginal children across NSW were removed from their families, a 2.6% increase on the year prior.
By 1969, all states had repealed the legislation allowing for the removal of Aboriginal children under the policy of 'protection'.
After European settlers arrived in 1788, thousand of aborigines died from diseases; colonists systematically killed many others. At first contact, there were over 250,000 aborigines in Australia. The massacres ended in the 1920 leaving no more than 60,000.
The English settlers and their descendants expropriated native land and removed the indigenous people by cutting them from their food resources, and engaged in genocidal massacres.
There is no one Aboriginal word that all Aborigines use for Australia; however, today they call Australia, ""Australia"" because that is what it is called today. There are more than 250 aboriginal tribes in Australia. Most of them didn't have a word for ""Australia""; they just named places around them.
Because of colonial genocidal actions like state-sanctioned massacres, the First Nations population went from an estimated 1-1.5 million before invasion to less than 100,000 by the early 1900s (4).
Some Europeans imagined the Indigenous communities as an ideal primitive society, living freely in a simpler and more peaceful state than in Europe. Other Europeans also described them as barbaric, a term the Greeks and Romans used to describe people who did not speak their language or share their culture.
'Aborigine' is generally perceived as insensitive, because it has racist connotations from Australia's colonial past, and lumps people with diverse backgrounds into a single group. You're more likely to make friends by saying 'Aboriginal person', 'Aboriginal' or 'Torres Strait Islander'.
A new genomic study has revealed that Aboriginal Australians are the oldest known civilization on Earth, with ancestries stretching back roughly 75,000 years.
The islands were settled by different seafaring Melanesian cultures such as the Torres Strait Islanders over 2500 years ago, and cultural interactions continued via this route with the Aboriginal people of northeast Australia.
Aboriginal people have been in Australia for at least 60,000 years (Torres Strait Islanders at least 2500 years).
For example, British colonialism with its eugenic character did not only export white “stock” to extend the racial reach of Empire, it also stole aboriginal children and placed them in white Christian families in a process of cultural genocide.
Barriers include inappropriate teaching materials and a lack of Aboriginal role models. Aboriginal education requires connection to communities and informed parents.
It is estimated some 16,000 on-reserve children were removed from their homes by Ontario's child welfare services between 1965, when the federal government signed an agreement with the province to extend its welfare programs to reserves and 1984, when the provincial government incorporated protections regarding ...
These children were forcibly removed from their families and communities through race-based policies set up by both State and Federal Governments. They were either put in to homes, adopted or fostered out to non-Indigenous families.
In NSW and wider Australia, there is a history of First Nations people fighting for land rights. However, while there have been successes, there are a significant number of unprocessed claims in NSW.