Overview
In a broad introductory history this unit examines the invasion and colonisation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples (also known as First Nation Australians) and the role of non-Indigenous Australians in this process. This history is recognised as an important part of national history for all Australians. The unit begins by an investigation into the power of the coloniser to define what is silenced in national history and the impact of the foundational historiography (and the national identity so constructed) in shaping often ‘taken for granted’ views of what was/is referred to as the ‘settlement of Australia’. The unit provides key knowledge on terra nullius; First Nation resistance to colonisation; racism; Stolen Generations; and the formative and ongoing development of First Nation political resistance and advocacy, including the 1967 Referendum and the Uluru Statement from the Heart. As such the unit provides a foundational understanding of Australian history of First Nation and non-Indigenous people. The unit enables a deep critical and ethical understanding of the impact of the past and its endurances into the present while fostering capacities to consider a more equitable national future enabling citizens and future professionals .
Details
Pre-requisites or Co-requisites
There are no requisites for this unit.
Important note: Students enrolled in a subsequent unit who failed their pre-requisite unit, should drop the subsequent unit before the census date or within 10 working days of Fail grade notification. Students who do not drop the unit in this timeframe cannot later drop the unit without academic and financial liability. See details in the Assessment Policy and Procedure (Higher Education Coursework).
Offerings For Term 2 - 2020
Attendance Requirements
All on-campus students are expected to attend scheduled classes – in some units, these classes are identified as a mandatory (pass/fail) component and attendance is compulsory. International students, on a student visa, must maintain a full time study load and meet both attendance and academic progress requirements in each study period (satisfactory attendance for International students is defined as maintaining at least an 80% attendance record).
Recommended Student Time Commitment
Each 6-credit Undergraduate unit at CQUniversity requires an overall time commitment of an average of 12.5 hours of study per week, making a total of 150 hours for the unit.
Class Timetable
Assessment Overview
Assessment Grading
This is a graded unit: your overall grade will be calculated from the marks or grades for each assessment task, based on the relative weightings shown in the table above. You must obtain an overall mark for the unit of at least 50%, or an overall grade of ‘pass’ in order to pass the unit. If any ‘pass/fail’ tasks are shown in the table above they must also be completed successfully (‘pass’ grade). You must also meet any minimum mark requirements specified for a particular assessment task, as detailed in the ‘assessment task’ section (note that in some instances, the minimum mark for a task may be greater than 50%). Consult the University’s Grades and Results Policy for more details of interim results and final grades.
All University policies are available on the CQUniversity Policy site.
You may wish to view these policies:
- Grades and Results Policy
- Assessment Policy and Procedure (Higher Education Coursework)
- Review of Grade Procedure
- Student Academic Integrity Policy and Procedure
- Monitoring Academic Progress (MAP) Policy and Procedure – Domestic Students
- Monitoring Academic Progress (MAP) Policy and Procedure – International Students
- Student Refund and Credit Balance Policy and Procedure
- Student Feedback – Compliments and Complaints Policy and Procedure
- Information and Communications Technology Acceptable Use Policy and Procedure
This list is not an exhaustive list of all University policies. The full list of University policies are available on the CQUniversity Policy site.
- Evidence a broad knowledge of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history and its interface with non-Indigenous history
- Critically & ethically engage in reflecting on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history and how it was silenced in the interface with the formative nationalist history
- Discuss and critically reflect on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history in the context of colonialism and settler nationalism
- Explain and critically and ethically reflect on the implications of the past for the present and future.
Not applicable
Alignment of Assessment Tasks to Learning Outcomes
| Assessment Tasks | Learning Outcomes | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | |
| 1 - Written Assessment - 50% | ||||
| 2 - Written Assessment - 50% | ||||
Alignment of Graduate Attributes to Learning Outcomes
| Graduate Attributes | Learning Outcomes | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | |
| 1 - Communication | ||||
| 2 - Problem Solving | ||||
| 3 - Critical Thinking | ||||
| 4 - Information Literacy | ||||
| 5 - Team Work | ||||
| 6 - Information Technology Competence | ||||
| 7 - Cross Cultural Competence | ||||
| 8 - Ethical practice | ||||
| 9 - Social Innovation | ||||
| 10 - Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultures | ||||
Alignment of Assessment Tasks to Graduate Attributes
| Assessment Tasks | Graduate Attributes | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | |
| 1 - Written Assessment - 50% | ||||||||||
| 2 - Written Assessment - 50% | ||||||||||
Textbooks
Aboriginal Australians A History Since 1788
4th Edition (2010)
Authors: Richard Broome
Allen & Unwin
Sydney Sydney , NSW , Aust
ISBN: 9781742370514
Binding: Paperback
Additional Textbook Information
If you prefer to study with a paper copy, they are available at the CQUni Bookshop here: http://bookshop.cqu.edu.au (search on the Unit code). eBooks are available at the publisher's website.
IT Resources
- CQUniversity Student Email
- Internet
- Unit Website (Moodle)
All submissions for this unit must use the referencing style: American Psychological Association 7th Edition (APA 7th edition)
For further information, see the Assessment Tasks.
v.pascoe@cqu.edu.au
Module/Topic
Week 1: Non-Indigenous Australia's Silenced History: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians
Introduction: Why Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history?
The Great Australian Silence: a Cult of Forgetfulness
From Silence to History Wars
1788 +: The non-silence Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voice and memory outside the national imagining
Chapter
Unit readings
Chapter 3 Broome
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
Week 2: Beginning: knowledges of the origins of Australia and Aboriginal people
• The age of the beginning: Aboriginal Peoples in Country
• Ways of knowing: Western sciences knowledges and Aboriginal and Torres Strait knowledges
Chapter
Broome, chapter 1
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
Ethics and History: your ethical reflection on understanding what 'Australian history' meant and means:
Reflecting on silence: invasion- colonisation- settlement
Reflecting on what should constitutes a national history: the good and the bad- the ethical and unethical?
Re-visioning history to beyond a binary; your ethical reflections.
Chapter
Prologue to Broome: Endings and Beginnings
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
Week 4: Power, Authority and Justice: British law and the cultural interface with sovereign Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people
- history and perspective
- 'language of concealment': language/discourse and knowing history
- reflecting on your developing perspective, including the role of discourse (the use of language) as power and the implications for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history & justice
Chapter
Chapter 5 Broome: Radical hope quashed
Events and Submissions/Topic
Reminder: assignment 1 due Weds 21 August
Module/Topic
British law vs First Nation Law: colonisation as a systemic process & First Nation Resistance
First Nation Law and British law: terra nullius vs Law- the Yolgnu Law as a case study
British law & culpability: Colonisation, dispossession & systemic use of Native police.
Coloniser power as discourse: covert and overt
Chapter
Broome chapter 4: cultural resistance amid destruction
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
No class: have a good vacation
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
Behind the Frontiers: Racism and its impact on colonial actions against Aboriginal people 1850- 1901
1850s- 1901
1901 White Australia policy foregrounding assimilation policies and Stolen Generations
Chapter
review chapter 3 Broome re how racism impacted on actions of colonisers. Read Chapter 6 on race and exploitation.
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
Colonial history from missions & protectionism to assimilation and Stolen Generations: ethical reflection on perspective
Missionaries & a man called Gribble
Protectionism & Assimilation the government policies & law leading to the Stolen Generations
Chapter
Broome on missionaries chapter 8 pp149+
Broome on protectionism pp.51- 53- overview & re Qldland pp. 118- 119 & its endurance pp 223 -225
Broome on assimilation & its impact pp. 201- 217
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
Torres Strait Islanders and Colonial Occupation: another history
Colonial occupation: Administrators, traders & maritime history
Missionaries on Torres Strait: significant impact
Protectionism in the Torres Strait Islands
Differences & similarities to colonisation on mainland Australia
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
20th Century- Against the Odds: First Nation Peoples' Struggle for Justice
Boards, castes and other barriers
Toward some civil rights: from the White Australia Policy to the the 1967 Referendum.
Chapter
Broome Chapter 9 and chapter 10:
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
Week 10: Civil to Human Rights: Land Rights - UN Rights - to the Uluru Statement- an evolving discourse toward NI ethical cultural understanding; from Yirrkala to Uluru Statement
Yirrkala Yolgnu people 1963; Yolgnu & Justice Blackburn, 1971; Aboriginal Land Rights (NT) Act, 1976 Bill; Mabo 1992
1971 Aboriginal Flag; Tent Embassy 1972; Keating's Redfern Speech to .... non-Indigenous obligations
Chapter
Broome chapter 11 pp.227- 247 & Chapter 13 The Mabo Case pp. 283- 291; Wik 296- 302; Land claims issue 302- 306
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
With knowledge comes responsibility: restorative Justice & making reconciliation possible - your ethical exploration
This week you critically and ethically reflect on restorative justice in the context of the discourse of reconciliation: consider your role individually and systemically arising from your engagement with history
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
Week 12: Your reflections on the journey and role of historiography in understanding the nation
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
1 Written Assessment
This assignment requires you to demonstrate your engagement with weeks 1- 5 of the unit.
Essay Question
What was the ‘Great Australian Silence’ (as defined by Stanner, 1968) in Australia's history? Is the concept still relevant to Australia today?
Word Length: 2000 words.
Due Date: Monday 24 August 2020.
Reference your essay to scholarly literature, using the APA Referencing style.
The following is a guide for this essay:
- Introduction to the question and description of the Great Australian Silence will be about 200 words. It will state how you will approach this question. It will state what the Great Australian Silence refers to (using scholarly literature), and you can posit your position of whether or not you argue the concept is still relevant to Australia today.
- Body of the essay will be about 1400 words. It should explain the impact of the silence on how Australian history was written: e.g. what was included, the perspective presented, what was omitted, the impact of those omissions. You should illustrate this with key examples. Explain how the history constructed and imagined the national Australian identity and how this impacted on First Nation Australians. You should also explain whether or not you think the concept is still relevant to Australia today.
- Your conclusion is where you reflect critically and ethically on your understandings of the ethical impact of the Great Australian Silence and the formative Australian national identity. You should consider how it has impacted on justice and human rights for First Nation people and how it has impacted on non-Indigenous people. In this you consider the impact of the inclusion and exclusion. You may ethically reflect on your experiences of history and identity in education, politics, media and/or socially (family, friends, social attitudes) as part of this. Your conclusion should be about 400 words.
Weight: 40%
Week 6 Monday (24 Aug 2020) 11:45 pm AEST
Week 8 Monday (7 Sept 2020)
Moodle
* Demonstrated capacity to use AND intellectually engage with relevant quality academic peer reviewed articles/books to support your answer to the topic
* Evidenced engagement & intellectual engagement demonstrated with unit content, unit readings & unit lectures/tuts as appropriate to the question
* Demonstrated clear critical /ethical reflection that is coherent, considered & informed in the essay
* Clarity: e.g. Introduction: states aims, purpose and approach to question. Body: clear, logical and developed scholarly argument. Conclusion: A coherent final position that reflects arguments of essay
* Writing is grammatical, logical with a scholarly (use of references), and at a university standard. The question is addressed fully (regard depth & word length), and have correctly used the APA referencing style.
- Evidence a broad knowledge of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history
- Critically engage in reflecting on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history and how it was silenced
- Discuss Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history in the context of settler nationalism
- Explain and critically and ethically reflect •i. on the significance of historical events and processes relevant to period; •ii. on historiography of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history; and •iii. by producing an historical argument (locating, retrieving, organising, analysing and synthesising the argument using required referencing methods) as per the assessment.
- Communication
- Critical Thinking
- Information Literacy
- Cross Cultural Competence
- Ethical practice
2 Written Assessment
Word length: 2000 words.
Select two topics (or sub topics) from different weeks in this unit between weeks 6 & 11.
Drawing on scholarly literature research and describe the two historical (sub)-topics.
Then, using understandings drawn from your study of the unit as a whole, provide your reasoned critical & ethical reflection on the impact of one (or both) of the events/topics you have selected on First Nation people at the time; and, following that, more briefly, on the impact on non-Indigenous people at that time.
You then move your reasoned critical and ethical reflection from the past into contemporary times.
You briefly reflect on why and how the past does or does not continue to impact into contemporary situations with First Nation and non-Indigenous people. At the end of these critical and ethical reflections you are asked to provide your reasoned ethical perspective on if, arising from the legacies of the history you have studied, non-Indigenous people living today have obligations to be engaged in fostering restorative justice (with a view toward reconciliation) with First Nation people.
The following is a guide for this essay:
* Introduction: state the two topics or aspects of the topics you have selected and how you will approach these (Topics must be from different weeks between 6- 11). This will be about 300 words.
* Body: Drawing on scholarly literature research and describe each (sub) topic. (About 700 words for each (sub) topic = 1400 words). The next part of the question requires your imagination and critical and ethical reflection on the impact of the history at that time firstly on First Nation people. You might choose to select some/all/other of the following: First Nation health (psychological & physical); First Nation views on the treatment on expectations of freedom and justice in the nation-state; First Nation impressions passed on to their younger generation about non-Indigenous people/power (social and political) and law; First Nation peoples views on the struggle post invasion. You then have to continue your critical and ethical reflection but now focus on how the history you have studied might have impacted on non-Indigenous people at that time (as per suggestions above and/or sense of entitlement/rights). Next you are also asked to think of the impact of the history you have studied throughout this unit in contemporary times. If or why the past history you have studied may continue to impact into contemporary situations (enduring views, trust, attitudes, beliefs) with First Nation and non-Indigenous people.
* Conclusion: Your final summary is a critical and ethical reflection on if, or why, or why not, non-Indigenous Australians have obligations to seek to foster restorative justice in order to contribute toward reconciliation (about 300 words).
APA referencing style.
Due Date: Friday 9 October 2020.
Week 12 Friday (9 Oct 2020) 11:45 pm AEST
In moodle
Exam Week Friday (23 Oct 2020)
In Moodle
* Demonstrated capacity to use AND intellectually engage with relevant quality academic peer reviewed articles/books to support your answer to the topic
* Evidenced engagement & intellectual engagement demonstrated with unit content, unit readings & unit lectures/tuts as appropriate to question
* Demonstrated clear critical /ethical reflection that is coherent, considered & informed in the essay
* Clarity: e.g. Introduction: states aims, purpose and approach to question. Body: clear, logical and developed scholarly argument. Conclusion: A coherent final position that reflects arguments of essay
* Writing is grammatical, logical with a scholarly (use of references), and at a university standard. The question is addressed fully (regard depth & word length), and have correctly used the APA referencing style.
- Critically engage in reflecting on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history and how it was silenced
- Discuss Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history in the context of settler nationalism
- Explain and critically and ethically reflect •i. on the significance of historical events and processes relevant to period; •ii. on historiography of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history; and •iii. by producing an historical argument (locating, retrieving, organising, analysing and synthesising the argument using required referencing methods) as per the assessment.
- Communication
- Critical Thinking
- Information Literacy
- Cross Cultural Competence
- Ethical practice
As a CQUniversity student you are expected to act honestly in all aspects of your academic work.
Any assessable work undertaken or submitted for review or assessment must be your own work. Assessable work is any type of work you do to meet the assessment requirements in the unit, including draft work submitted for review and feedback and final work to be assessed.
When you use the ideas, words or data of others in your assessment, you must thoroughly and clearly acknowledge the source of this information by using the correct referencing style for your unit. Using others’ work without proper acknowledgement may be considered a form of intellectual dishonesty.
Participating honestly, respectfully, responsibly, and fairly in your university study ensures the CQUniversity qualification you earn will be valued as a true indication of your individual academic achievement and will continue to receive the respect and recognition it deserves.
As a student, you are responsible for reading and following CQUniversity’s policies, including the Student Academic Integrity Policy and Procedure. This policy sets out CQUniversity’s expectations of you to act with integrity, examples of academic integrity breaches to avoid, the processes used to address alleged breaches of academic integrity, and potential penalties.
What is a breach of academic integrity?
A breach of academic integrity includes but is not limited to plagiarism, self-plagiarism, collusion, cheating, contract cheating, and academic misconduct. The Student Academic Integrity Policy and Procedure defines what these terms mean and gives examples.
Why is academic integrity important?
A breach of academic integrity may result in one or more penalties, including suspension or even expulsion from the University. It can also have negative implications for student visas and future enrolment at CQUniversity or elsewhere. Students who engage in contract cheating also risk being blackmailed by contract cheating services.
Where can I get assistance?
For academic advice and guidance, the Academic Learning Centre (ALC) can support you in becoming confident in completing assessments with integrity and of high standard.
What can you do to act with integrity?
