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Welcome to country ... not.

Article Excerpt
INTRODUCTION

What does it mean when Australian institutions include Indigenous representations of identity and ownership in official ceremonies which are also claims to national identity and ownership? Are local councils, state and federal governments, and private enterprise finally acknowledging what native title hearings, especially in urban contexts, usually deny: that specific Aboriginal Australians are the prior owners of the land on which all now live? I do not think so. But what does it mean when Australian state officials of various kinds including organisers of public and private meetings, functions, conferences, art exhibitions, sporting events and even the opening of federal Parliament, not only invite and appear to appreciate what amount to symbolic land claims, but participate in the ceremonial aspects of the claims by acknowledging those who make them? Perhaps a clue is that this occurs even (and perhaps especially) where the nation's legal system does not recognise Indigenous ownership per se. However, if state officials think that the legal restrictions to the recognition of native title completely protect them from the moral claims of traditional Aboriginal owners they are mistaken as I will demonstrate.

I consider these issues in this paper using ethnographic examples of interactions between representatives of various Australian Institutions and a group of Aboriginal people who claim traditional Aboriginal ownership of a large part of what is now modern Sydney. The people concerned are today called Darug and have only emerged in the last thirty years or so as 'a people'. This paper is inspired by events surrounding welcome to country as performed in a number of contexts by Darug people. It is also inspired by responses to these events as they were communicated to me by participating Darug individuals.

It might be argued that Darug 'ethnogenesis' was initially in response to land rights, native title, and other seemingly benevolent state policies concerning Indigenous Australians. Yet there are also other forces at work. People who claim Darug heritage and identity today do so largely because of the genealogical research of biologist, Dr. James Kohen in the early 1980s. Prior to Kohen's work some of these people lived lives as either unspecified Aboriginal people living on the fringes of Sydney suburban life, or some may have considered themselves members of the 'Richmond Road Tribe', or another post-contact group of 'Sydney Aboriginal people'. The vast majority of the approximately 6000 people identified as Darug descendants by Kohen, however, did not identify as Aboriginal at all before and choose not to since his research.

Two or three hundred people have now identified as Darug and continue to develop various ideas, values and philosophies about and expressions of their identity. For these people recent disappointments regarding access to remediation for past injustices such as native title have not resulted in the demise of the various types of cultural renaissance that characterise Darug (re)emergence. It seems that the expressions of group identity they have developed over some decades have now become such values in themselves that they cannot and will not be relinquished. Welcome to country ceremonies are one of these articulations.

Darug descendants have been unsuccessful in claiming native title rights in courts. They incorporated Darug Custodian Aboriginal Corporation under the Aboriginal Councils and Associations Act 1976 in the mid 1980s and have used this organization to help cement social relations between Darug descendants, their spouses and supporters. They have, in short, become a community and a legal entity and have subsequently instigated three land claims under the Commonwealth Native Title Act 1993. The process of becoming an Aboriginal community has not, however, been without its share of sweat, blood and tears. Over the last thirty years Darug people have been experimenting with various ideas about how to be Aboriginal. These have ranged from using archaeological, linguistic and historical academic research to learn about Darug ancestors to some people actually behaving in ways that they imagine Darug ancestors behaved. These practices include forms of 'primitive' dance, engaging in certain kinds of ceremonies and speaking a version of what is claimed to be Darug language. Those appealing to scholarly knowledge to cement their claims conflicted with those who developed more cultural and behavioural forms of expression. This resulted in the original group separating into two organisations, the Darug Tribal Aboriginal Corporation and the Darug Custodian Aboriginal Corporation. The two groups have always joined when making land claims and have often participated jointly in ventures related to land such as archaeological digs even though relations between them have sometimes been acrimonious. In the last two years or so the two Darug groups have become much more inclusive of each other in social activities and are developing more harmonious relations.

Darug descendants were not successful in their land claims not only because their claims were denied by the Australian state, but also because they are refuted by other, competing Aboriginal groups. In New South Wales and other long colonised parts of Australia, the Australian state acknowledges the fragmentation of traditional Aboriginal ownership and the rights of Aboriginal peoples from other places who now have long associations with land in New South Wales. This is done through the Land Rights Act (NSW) 1986. Aboriginal Land Councils administer land won under the Land Rights' Act (NSW) 1986 on behalf of Aboriginal people and act as official representatives of local Aboriginal peoples. Clearly, native title claims from groups asserting traditional Aboriginal ownership of the same land that Land Councils seek to administer create competition and tension.

However, the fact that Darug people have not been recognised as native title holders does not prevent them from being invited by local councils, schools, and state and federal government bodies to make welcome to country speeches. In fact, senior members of the Darug community have performed welcome to country in front of large audiences at high profile state occasions including the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games, the 2006 Commonwealth Games torch relay and the 2001 centennial of Federation, not to mention many and frequent opening ceremonies of various kinds, flag raising ceremonies and conferences. The reasons for invitations to Darug to perform welcome to country are stated in official documents. The Guidelines and Protocols document for the New South Wales Public Schools and TAFE New South Wales Institutes, for example, states that:

The process of 'Welcome to Country' and 'Acknowledgement of Country' recognises the unique position of Aboriginal people in Australian history. Aboriginal people are the Original Custodians of the Land. It is important this unique position is recognised and incorporated as part of official protocol and events to enable the wider community to share Aboriginal Culture and Heritage, facilitating better relationships between Aboriginal people and the wider community....

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