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 - 2021
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.
Feedback, Recommendations and Responses
Every unit is reviewed for enhancement each year. At the most recent review, the following staff and student feedback items were identified and recommendations were made.
Feedback from Student feedback re Moodle
Too many readings
It is recommended to reduce readings and create an e-readings list to align with CQU Renew.
Feedback from Student evaluation
Assessment instructions unclear and wordy
It is recommended to refine assessment instructions.
Feedback from Student evaluation
Moodle page cluttered
It is recommended to tidy up Moodle as part of the Renew curriculum refresh.
- 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
There are no required textbooks.
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
Week 1: Introduction: Why Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history?
The Great Australian Silence: a Cult of Forgetfulness
From Silence to History Wars
1788 +: The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voice and memory outside the national imagining
Chapter
Frontier: Australia's Forgotten War - episode 1
Events and Submissions/Topic
Post your contribution on discussion forum
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
Frontier: Australia's Forgotten War - episode 2
Events and Submissions/Topic
Post your contribution on discussion forum
Module/Topic
Week 3: Ethics and History: your ethical reflection on understanding what 'Australian history' meant and means:
Reflecting on silence: invasion- colonisation- settlement
Reflecting on what should constitute a national history: the good and the bad- the ethical and unethical?
Re-visioning history to beyond a binary; your ethical reflections.
Chapter
Frontier: Australia's Forgotten War - episode 3
Events and Submissions/Topic
Post your contribution on discussion forum
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
Events and Submissions/Topic
Post your contribution to discussion forum
Module/Topic
British law vs First Nation Law: colonisation as a systemic process & First Nation Week 5: Resistance
First Nation Law and British law: terra nullius
British law & culpability: Colonisation
Coloniser power as discourse: covert and overt
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Post your contribution to discussion forum
Module/Topic
No class
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Module/Topic
Behind the Frontiers: Racism and its impact on colonial actions against First Nation peoples
1901 White Australia policy foregrounding assimilation policies and Stolen Generations
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Post your contribution to discussion forum
Assessment 1 due: Monday 23rd August
Analysis and Critical, Ethical Reflection: The Great Australian Silence Due: Week 6 Monday (23 Aug 2021) 11:45 pm AEST
Module/Topic
Week 7: Colonial history from missions & protectionism to assimilation and Stolen Generations: ethical reflection on perspective
Missionaries
Protectionism & Assimilation the government policies & law leading to the Stolen Generations
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Post your contribution to discussion forum
Module/Topic
Week 8: Torres Strait Islanders and Colonial Occupation: another history
Colonial occupation: Administrators, traders & maritime history
Missionaries on Torres Strait: significant impact
South Sea Islanders in Australia
Slavery and the South Sea Islander contribution to Australia's sugar industry
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Post your contribution to discussion forum
Module/Topic
Week 9: 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
Events and Submissions/Topic
Post your contribution to discussion forum
Module/Topic
Week 10: Civil to Human Rights: Land Rights - UN Rights - to the Uluru Statement-
an evolving discourse toward ethical cultural understanding.
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Post your contribution to discussion forum
Module/Topic
Week 11: With knowledge comes responsibility: restorative Justice & making reconciliation possible - your ethical exploration
critical and ethical reflection on restorative justice in the context of the discourse on reconciliation
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Post your contribution to discussion forum
Module/Topic
Reflections on the journey and the role of historiography in understanding the nation
Chapter
Events and Submissions/Topic
Post your contribution to discussion forum
Assessment 2 due: Friday 8th October
A Research Study Due: Week 12 Friday (8 Oct 2021) 11:45 pm AEST
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 23 August 2021 11.45pm
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 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 history constructed and imagined the national Australian identity and how this impacted on First Nation Australians.
- Your conclusion (about 400 words) is where you demonstrate your understandings of the impact of the Great Australian Silence and the formative Australian national identity. Consider the impacts on First Nation people and on non-Indigenous people.
- Finally, attach as an appendix, a discussion forum post where you have demonstrated your ethical reflections on the Great Australian Silence.
Weight: 50%
SUBMISSION: submit via Moodle
Week 6 Monday (23 Aug 2021) 11:45 pm AEST
Submit via Moodle
Week 8 Monday (6 Sept 2021)
Return via 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
Clarity: e.g. intro: 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 (re depth & word length =/-10%),
A forum post demonstrating reflection on topic attached as an appendix.
APA referencing; Font size 12, 1.5 spacing
- 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.
- Communication
- Critical Thinking
- Information Literacy
- Cross Cultural Competence
- Ethical practice
2 Written Assessment
Word length: 2000 words.
Select two topics (or sub topics) in this unit between weeks 6 & 11.
Drawing on scholarly literature and research, describe the two historical topics (or sub topics).
Then, using understandings drawn from your study of the unit as a whole, discuss the impact of one (or both) of the topics (sub-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.
Briefly discuss why and how the past does or does not continue to impact into contemporary situations with First Nation and non-Indigenous people.
The following is a guide for this essay:
* Introduction: State the two topics or (sub-topics) you have selected. (Topics or (sub-topics) must be selected from weeks 6-11). This will be about 300 words.
* Body: Drawing on scholarly literature and research describe each topic or (sub-topic). (About 700 words for each topic or sub-topic = 1400 words). Discuss the impact of history at that time firstly on First Nation people. Next, focus on how the history you have studied might have impacted on non-Indigenous people at that time. Next, discuss 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 (about 300 words).
Finally, attach as an appendix a discussion forum post which demonstrates your critical and ethical reflection.
APA referencing style.
Due Date: Friday 8 October 2021. Word length: 2000 words.
weight 50%
SUBMISSION: Submit via Moodle
Week 12 Friday (8 Oct 2021) 11:45 pm AEST
Submit via Moodle
Exam Week Friday (22 Oct 2021)
Return via 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 essay & forum post.
Clarity: e.g. intro: 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.
A forum posting demonstrating reflections attached as an appendix.
The question is addressed fully (re depth & word length =/-10%),
APA referencing; Font size 12, 1.5 spacing
- 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.
- 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?
