Indigenous Australians
Indigenous Australians are the various Aboriginal Australian peoples of Australia, and the ethnically distinct people of the Torres Strait Islands. The terms Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, First Nations of Australia, First Peoples of Australia, and First Australians are also common. Many Indigenous Australians prefer to identify with their specific cultural group.
Estimates from the 2021 census show there were 983,700 Indigenous Australians, representing 3.8% of the Australian populations. Of these Indigenous Australians, 92% identified as Aboriginal, 4% identified as Torres Strait Islander, and 4% identified with both groups. About 84% spoke English at home and 9% spoke an Australian Indigenous language at home. Just over half hold secular or other spiritual beliefs or no religious affiliation; about 40% are Christian; and about 1% adhere to a traditional Aboriginal religion.
The ancestors of Aboriginal Australians moved into what is now the Australian continent about 50,000 to 65,000 years ago, during the last glacial period, arriving by land bridges and short sea crossings from what is now Southeast Asia. The ancestors of today's Torres Strait Islanders arrived from what is now Papua New Guinea around 2,500 years ago, and settled the islands on the northern tip of the Australian landmass.
Aboriginal Australians were complex hunter-gatherers with diverse economies and societies. There were about 600 tribes or nations and 250 languages with various dialects. Certain groups engaged in fire-stick farming and fish farming, and built semi-permanent shelters. The extent to which some groups engaged in agriculture is controversial. Torres Strait Islanders were seafarers and obtained their livelihood from seasonal horticulture and the resources of their reefs and seas. They also developed agriculture on some of their islands. Villages had appeared in their areas by the 14th century.
The Indigenous population prior to British settlement in 1788 has been estimated from 318,000 to more than 3,000,000. A population collapse, principally from new infectious diseases, followed British colonisation in 1788. Massacres, frontier armed conflicts and competition over resources with British settlers also contributed to the decline of the Aboriginal population.
From the 1930s, the Indigenous population began to recover and Indigenous communities founded organisations to advocate for their rights. From the 1960s, Indigenous people won the right to vote in federal and state elections, and some won the return of parts of their traditional lands. In 1992, the High Court of Australia, in the Mabo Case, found that Indigenous native title rights existed in common law. By 2021, Indigenous Australians had exclusive or shared title to about 54% of the Australian land mass. Since 1995, the Australian Aboriginal flag and the Torres Strait Islander flag have been official flags of Australia.
From the 19th to the mid-20th century, government policy removed many mixed heritage children from Aboriginal communities, with the intent to assimilate them to what had become the majority white culture. In 1997 the Australian Human Rights Commission found that the policy constituted genocide.
Terminology
Variations
There are a number of contemporary appropriate terms to use when referring to Indigenous peoples of Australia. In contrast to when settlers referred to them by various terms, in the 21st century there is consensus that it is important to respect the "preferences of individuals, families, or communities, and allow them to define what they are most comfortable with" when referring to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.The word aboriginal has been in the English language since at least the 16th century to mean "first or earliest known, indigenous". It comes from the Latin ab and origo. The term was used in Australia as early as 1789 to describe its Aboriginal peoples. It became capitalised and was used as the common term to refer to both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. Today, the latter peoples are not included in this term. The term "Aborigine" is often disfavoured, as it is regarded as having colonialist connotations.
While the term "Indigenous Australians" has grown in popularity since the 1980s, many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples dislike it. They feel that it is too generic and removes their distinct clan and people identity. However, many people think that the term is useful and convenient, and can be used where appropriate.
In recent years, terms such as "First Nations", "First Peoples" and "First Australians" have become more common.
Being as specific as possible, for example naming the language group, or demonym relating to geographic area, is preferred as a way to affirm and maintain a sense of identity.
Terms "Black" and "Blackfella"
British colonists from their early settlement used the term "Black" to refer to Aboriginal Australians and later Torres Strait Islanders. While the term originally related to skin colour and was often used pejoratively, today the term is used to indicate Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander heritage or culture in general. It refers to any people of such heritage regardless of their level of skin pigmentation.In the 1970s, with a rise in Aboriginal activism, leaders such as Gary Foley proudly embraced the term "Black". For example, writer Kevin Gilbert's book of that time was entitled Living Black. The book included interviews with several members of the Aboriginal community, including Robert Jabanungga, who reflected on contemporary Aboriginal culture. Living Black is also the name of an Australian TV news and current affairs program covering "issues affecting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians". It is presented and produced by Karla Grant, an Arrernte woman.
Use of the term "Black" varies depending on context, and its use may be deemed inappropriate. Furthermore, the term sometimes causes confusion as it can refer to Indigenous Australians, other groups such as African Australians and Melanesian Australians or all Black people.
A significant number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people use the term "Blackfella" and its associated forms to refer to Aboriginal Australians.
"Blak"
The term blak is sometimes used as part of a wider social movement. The term was coined in 1991 by photographer and multimedia artist Destiny Deacon, in an exhibition entitled Blak lik mi. For Deacon's 2004 exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art, blak was defined in a museum guide as: "a term used by some Aboriginal people to reclaim historical, representational, symbolical, stereotypical and romanticised notions of Black or Blackness. Often used as ammunition or inspiration." Deacon said that removing the c from black to "de-weaponise the term 'black cunt was "taking on the 'colonisers' language and flipping it on its head".Contemporary Aboriginal arts in the 21st century are sometimes referred to as a "Blak" arts movement, expressed in names such as BlakDance, BlakLash Collective, and the title of Thelma Plum's song and album, Better in Blak. Melbourne has an annual Blak & Bright literary festival, Blak Dot Gallery, Blak Markets, and Blak Cabaret.
Aboriginal Australians
"Aboriginal Australians" refers to the various peoples indigenous to mainland Australia and associated islands, excluding the Torres Strait Islands.The term Aboriginal Australians includes many regional groups that may be identified under names based on local language, locality, or what they are called by neighbouring groups. Groups can overlap, contain sub-groups. Groups can also evolve over time, and significant changes have occurred since colonisation. The word "community" is often used to describe groups identifying by kinship, language, or belonging to a particular place or "country". An individual community may identify itself by many names, each of which can have alternative English spellings.
Throughout the history of the continent, there have been many different Aboriginal groups, each with its own individual language, culture, and belief structure. At the time of British settlement, there were over 200 distinct languages.
Torres Strait Islanders
Torres Strait Islanders are the Indigenous Melanesian people of the Torres Strait Islands, which are part of the state of Queensland. They are ethnically distinct from the Aboriginal peoples of the rest of Australia. Six percent of Indigenous Australians identify fully as Torres Strait Islanders. A further 4% of Indigenous Australians identify as having both Torres Strait Islander and Aboriginal heritage.The Torres Strait Islands comprise over 100 islands, which were annexed by Queensland in 1879.
Other groupings
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people also sometimes refer to themselves by descriptions that relate to their ecological environment, such as saltwater people for coast-dwellers, freshwater people, rainforest people, desert people, or spinifex people,.History
Migration to Mainland Australia and Torres Strait Islands
The ancestors of Aboriginal Australians moved into what is now the Australian continent about 50,000 to 65,000 years ago, during the last glacial period, arriving by land bridges and short sea crossings from what is now Southeast Asia.The first phase of occupation of the Torres Strait Islands began about 4,000 years ago. By 2,500 years ago more of the islands were occupied and a distinctive Torres Strait Islander maritime culture emerged. Agriculture also developed on some islands and by 700 years ago villages appeared.
Several settlements of humans in Australia have been dated around 49,000 years ago. Luminescence dating of sediments surrounding stone artefacts at Madjedbebe, a rock shelter in northern Australia, indicates human activity as early as 65,000 years BP. Genomic studies, however, suggest that the main wave of modern humans into Australia ancestral to Aboriginal Australians happened as recently as 37,000 to 50,000 years ago. Accordingly, earlier groups either went extinct or contributed around ~2% ancestry to modern Aboriginal Australians. Indigenous Australians and other Oceanians were probably part of the same southern route dispersal as the ancestors of Ancient Ancestral South Indians, Andamanese, and East Asians.
The earliest anatomically modern human remains found in Australia are those of Mungo Man; they have been dated at 42,000 years old. The initial comparison of the mitochondrial DNA from the skeleton known as Lake Mungo 3 with that of ancient and modern Aboriginal peoples indicated that Mungo Man is not related to Australian Aboriginal peoples. The sequence has been criticised as there has been no independent testing, and it has been suggested that the results may be due to posthumous modification and thermal degradation of the DNA. Although the contested results seem to indicate that Mungo Man may have been an extinct subspecies that diverged before the most recent common ancestor of contemporary humans, the administrative body for the Mungo National Park believes that present-day local Aboriginal peoples are descended from the Lake Mungo remains.
It is generally believed that Aboriginal people are the descendants of a single migration into the continent, a people that split from the ancestors of East Asians.
Recent work with mitochondrial DNA suggests a founder population of between 1,000 and 3,000 women to produce the genetic diversity observed, which suggests that "initial colonisation of the continent would have required deliberate organised sea travel, involving hundreds of people". Aboriginal people seem to have lived a long time in the same environment as the now extinct Australian megafauna.