History UsefulNotes / AboriginalAustralians

* "WesternAnimation/TotalDrama" has Jasmine, who is Aboriginal, but is closer to being a parody of Bindi Irwin rather than anything else.

* "Western animation/TotalDrama" has Jasmine, who is Aboriginal, but is closer to being a parody of Bindi Irwin rather than anything else.

Australia's First Peoples have the oldest continuing culture in the world. While there are varying estimates as to how long they have lived on the continent, current research shows that they have occupied mainland Australia for at least 65,000 years. This page should not be considered a reliable source of information about Australia's First Peoples and may include inaccuracies and possibly even harmful narratives. For reliable information you should seek sources managed by First Peoples themselves. There is a significant amount of harmful misinformation spread by non-Aboriginal people, even inadvertently.

Australia's First Peoples have the oldest continuous culture in the world. While there are varying estimates as to how long they have lived on the continent, current research shows that they have occupied mainland Australia for at least 65,000 years, indicating that their ancestors were among the earliest groups to leave Africa. As a result, they have an older claim to the land they currently inhabit than any other population known.

Since colonisation, there have been sixty-seven definitions of Aboriginality. In the past, [[https://aiatsis.gov.au/explore/australias-first-peoples definitions]] were based on racialised categories called blood quantums and laws affecting Aboriginal peoples' daily lives were applied according to the relative colour of individuals' skin and 'degree of Aboriginal blood'. This included policies of child removal between the 1900s and 1970s, in which Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children of mixed descent were taken from their families with the objective of integrating them into white society and 'breeding out' their Aboriginality. The intergenerational trauma experienced by these Stolen Generations, their families and communities continues to be felt to this day.

Referring to Aboriginal people by degrees of blood thus remains highly offensive. While each community has their own means of community identification, for government purposes the current definition of an Aboriginal person is somebody who is
* of Aboriginal descent,
* identifies as a Aboriginal, and
* is accepted as such by the community in which they lives or have lived.

Aboriginal peoples are are a well-known fixture of [[LandDownUnder the world's perspective of Australia]].

Australian Aboriginals are also often an awkward subject for Aussies, due to a long history of white-dominated government actively discriminating against them. Students studying Australian history have been known to describe it as "200+ years of Aboriginals getting fucked over", when confronted with the fact Aboriginals have been disregarded, feared, abused, exploited, and generally treated with hostility by European colonists. The popular European conception of Aboriginals tells enough of a story: Starting as [[NobleSavage noble savages]] during the early years of colonisation, then shifting to [[TheSavageIndian uneducatable barbarians]] as the colonists started wanting more land and outright supplanting them. By the time of the late 1800s, where colonial power was consolidated, Aboriginals were pretty much completely absent in all depictions of the Outback, including the legendary poems of Creator/BanjoPaterson and contemporaries, and the official attitude was that they were a 'dying race' and whites could only 'smooth the deathbed pillow'.

During the 20th century, the government policy towards them was, effectively, ''[[https://australian.museum/learn/first-nations/genocide-in-australia/ genocide]]'' up to the 1960s [[note]] Children were still being taken from their parents in the ''1970s''[[/note]] (see the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_Generations Stolen Generations]]), with efforts made to eradicate their culture, language, history, heritage, and general assimilation into a supposedly more 'enlightened' (read: white) way of living - on top of, of course, [[SarcasmMode good old fashioned]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_massacres_of_Indigenous_Australians massacres]]. In the 60s, Aboriginal activists became increasingly associated with the 'Black Power' movement in the United States of America. One activist, Charles Perkins, was even dubbed 'Australia's Martin Luther King' by a US commentator. Aboriginals slowly gained many of the rights and recognition they fought for, and have become recognised as an inseparable part of Australia as a culture, a nation and a place, but many, ''many'' problems still remain to be solved.

Today, the subject and issues of Australian Aboriginals continue to be a difficult, sensitive and touchy issue amongst Australians, especially white ones, which still urgently needs discussion. Aboriginals have, on average, a life expectancy twenty years shorter than that of the many other races in Australia, being particularly afflicted with heart and liver problems linked to rife alcoholism in the community. In 2008, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd officially gave a national apology to the Stolen Generations (mostly likely encouraged by the previous Prime Minister's well-known refusal to do so) meant to indicate a change in national policy towards Aboriginals. Since then there has been a concentrated effort in regards to racism (notably centered on former AFL player and Australian of the Year Adam Goodes) as well as varying degrees of acceptance from both races.

At last count, according to government statistics, there are estimated to be about half a million Australian Aboriginals living in the country. This accounts for less than 3% of Australia's population. Many live in remote communities. [[UsefulNotes/AustralianStatesAndTerritories The Northern Territory]] has the biggest population of Australian Aboriginals on the continent (around 30%). The first Indigenous leader of a state or territory, Adam Giles, became Chief Minister[[note]]which is the equivalent of an American state Governor[[/note]] of the Northern Territory in March of 2013. Many Australian Aboriginals are of mixed White and Aboriginal descent to varying degrees, but this is rarer in the more northern and central populations. Aboriginals in media are somewhat rare, although more common than other non-White Australians.[[note]] Asian Australians comprise 12% of Australia's population for example, but are less likely to have appearances or central roles in fiction[[/note]] [[LandDownUnder Foreign-written portrayals of Australia]] tend to consider them interchangeable with the standard MagicalNativeAmerican, which some Australian works are also prone to. Others range from the NobleSavage take to attempts at more nuanced and realistic representations of native Australians.

It's notable to point out that most of the films mentioned star [[MagicalNegro David Gulpilil]] in some capacity or another.

Recently, Budj Bim [[https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-07-06/indigenous-site-joins-pyramids-stonehenge-world-heritage-list/11271804 became recognised as a world wonder]]. It is one of the oldest built structures, a series of artificial lakes and channels that Indigenous South Australians used to capture, harvest, and store eels, and even had relatively large villages around.

!!Depictions of Australian Aboriginals in fiction:

* A particularly embarrassing portrayal occurs in an episode of ''Anime/{{Gigantor}}'', where they look and act like stereotypical Native Americans. This is because in the original Japanese anime version, ''Tetsujin 28'', they ''were'' stereotypical Native Americans, since the episode involved the cast traveling from Japan to America, but since the English version was already (ostensibly) set in America...

* ''Anime/TheSwissFamilyRobinsonFloneOfTheMysteriousIsland'' introduces Tom-Tom, a native Australian boy, halfway through the series. It is mentioned that his parents were killed by white settlers, which why he is initially distrustful of the Robinsons, but later he opens up with them and teaches them how to survive more effectively on the island.

* ''Comicbook/{{Elektra}}'' (2014) by W. Haden Blackman and Michael Del Mundo features an Aboriginal villain named Bloody Lips. A superhuman capable of absorbing the powers, skills and memories of others through [[CannibalismSuperpower cannibalism]], he is presented as an [[HollywoodNatives animalistic character]] who shuns modern society, dresses in animal skins, fights with spears and worships a mystical serpent (seemingly a perversion of the Rainbow Serpent, a benevolent creator spirit significant to many Aboriginal cultures) who encourages him to kill. The portrayal, perhaps unwittingly, taps into racist characterisations of traditional Aboriginal cultures as savage and cannibalistic, ideas which date back to early colonialism and persist in the present day. Pauline Hanson, a current member of the Australian Parliament, made [[https://www.murdoch.edu.au/elaw/issues/v7n1/mcglade71_text.html false claims]] in 1997 that Aboriginal peoples historically ate their babies and elderly, and in 2010 former AFL footballer Mal Brown was [[https://www.abc.net.au/news/2010-06-17/afl-figure-sorry-for-cannibal-remark/870512 decried]] for referring to Aboriginal players as "cannibals".

* '''Goorie''' in South East Queensland and some parts of northern New South Wales
* '''Koori''' (or Koorie) in New South Wales and Victoria

Aboriginal peoples have the oldest continuous culture in the world. While there are varying estimates as to how long they have lived on the continent, current research shows that they have occupied mainland Australia for at least 65,000 years, indicating that their ancestors were among the earliest groups to leave Africa. As a result, they have an older claim to the land they currently inhabit than any other population known.

'''Aboriginal Australians''' refers the various Indigenous peoples of UsefulNotes/{{Australia}}, covering the Australian mainland and many of its islands, such as Tasmania, Fraser Island, Hinchinbrook Island, the Tiwi Islands, and Groote Eylandt, but excluding the Torres Strait Islands. Collectively, Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders are known as ''Indigenous Australians'', or ''UsefulNotes/FirstAustralians''. The term "Aborigine" was used historically but is now widely regarded as offensive.

* DarkSkinnedRedHead (at least in the anime), cyborgized supercop Kiddy Phenil from ''Manga/SilentMobius''.

* From ''ComicBook/XMen'' there's Gateway (an Aboriginal shaman who associated with the team during their stay in Australia) and his time-travelling great-grand children, siblings Lucas Bishop (a former member who was revealed to be Aboriginal rather than African-American as previously assumed) and DarkSkinnedBlonde Shard (who was transformed into a sentient hologram after getting killed in the line of duty before getting killed for good a second time).

* In season 2 of ''Anime/PacificRimTheBlack'' the "Bunyip-Man" (no real name given) is all but outright stated to be Aboriginal. He fulfills a MagicalNative-like narrative niche as being closer to nature and able to tame the Kaju, [[spoiler:and then he's proven wrong and dies horribly]]. He's also voiced by a white voice actor.

* Modern Australian kids shows tend to feature Aboriginal kids as more-or-less average Aussie kids, e.g. Fiona from ''Series/RoundTheTwist'' (Season 2 only), Egg from ''Lockie Leonard''.

* While its a furry work, ''VisualNovel/LandsOfFire'' extensively details the cultures and lifestyles of precolonial ABoriginal peoples in Australia.

* In season 2 of ''Anime/PacificRimTheBlack'' the "Bunyip-Man" (no real name given) is all but outright stated to be Aboriginal. He fulfills a MagicalNativeAmerican-like narrative niche as being closer to nature and able to tame the Kaju, [[spoiler:and then he's proven wrong and dies horribly]]. He's also voiced by a white voice actor.

* From ''ComicBook/XMen'' there's Gateway (an Aboriginal shaman who associated with the team during their stay in Australia) and his time-travelling great-grand children, siblings [[ComicBook/{{Bishop}} Lucas Bishop]] (a former member who was revealed to be Aboriginal rather than African-American as previously assumed) and DarkSkinnedBlonde Shard (who was transformed into a sentient hologram after getting killed in the line of duty before getting killed for good a second time).

* Appearing in Marvel's ''ComicBook/ContestOfChampions'', Talisman was an Aboriginal shaman with vaguely defined magical powers. He has had only one subsequent appearance.

* ''Western Animation/Back To The Outback'' features Norine, who is indicated to be Aboriginal by the flag on her backpack and her usage of Aboriginal Australian English. She's the only human in the film who realizes at first glance that they aren’t actually doing anything to try and hurt anyone, shows the main characters kindness, and helps them escape the school bus.

During the 20th century, the government policy towards them was, effectively, ''[[https://australian.museum/learn/first-nations/genocide-in-australia/ genocide]]'' up to the 1960s [[note]] Children were still being taken from their parents in the ''1970s''[[/note]] (see the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_Generations Stolen Generations]]), with efforts made to eradicate their culture, language, history, heritage, and general assimilation into a supposedly more 'enlightened' (read: white) way of living - on top of, of course, [[SarcasmMode good old fashioned]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_massacres_of_Indigenous_Australians massacres]]. During the 60s, Aboriginal activists became increasingly associated with the 'Black Power' movement in the United States of America. One activist, Charles Perkins, was even dubbed 'Australia's Martin Luther King' by a US commentator. Aboriginals slowly gained many of the rights and recognition they fought for, and have become recognised as an inseparable part of Australia as a culture, a nation and a place, but many, ''many'' problems still remain to be solved.

* ''Film/TheNightingale2019'': Set in Tasmania (formerly Van Diemen's Land), but depicts the bloody "Black War" against the Palawa people of Tasmania, while the two protagonists are respectively an Irish convict woman and a young Aboriginal man who bond over the shared suffering at the hands of the British.

* ''Film/Cargo2013'': The feature-length remake focuses greatly on the local Aboriginal community, and their response to the ZombieApocalypse, prospering with their knowledge of the land and skill with melee weapons. At the end of the movie, they, and the refugees they've taken in are doing the best out of the cast.

Aboriginal peoples have lived on the continent for tens of thousands of years, predating British invasion. They are the oldest surviving culture in the world, and [[http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15020799 recent DNA evidence]] has it they were the first group to separate from modern humans, around 70,000 years ago. Even though they look African, the Aboriginal Australians are the people least genetically related to Africans, because they did not intermarry with or become displaced by humans who came from the later migrations from Africa, as everyone else (e.g. Europeans, Asians, Native Americans, etc.) did. As a result, they have an older claim to the land they currently inhabit than any other population known. Interestingly, a later group seems to have [[http://www.smh.com.au/technology/sci-tech/study-shows-gene-flow-from-india-to-australia-4000-years-ago-20130115-2cqpp.html arrived from India around 4,000 years ago]].

The term Aboriginal Australians covers [[https://aiatsis.gov.au/explore/map-indigenous-australia hundreds of nations and groups]] with distinct languages, cultures, customs, beliefs and laws. There are also a number of names used to identify groups based on geography:

* Comicbook/TheNew52 version of the wizard Comicbook/{{Shazam}} was Aboriginal, later revealed in ''Comicbook/DarkseidWar'' to be Mamaragan, an Aboriginal god of lightning.

'''Aboriginal Australians''' refers the various Indigenous peoples of UsefulNotes/{{Australia}}, covering the Australian mainland and many of its islands, such as Tasmania, Fraser Island, Hinchinbrook Island, the Tiwi Islands, and Groote Eylandt, but excluding the Torres Strait Islands. Collectively, Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders are known as ''Indigenous Australians'', or ''UsefulNotes/FirstAustralians''.