Historicising Silence: An Introduction to Australian Aboriginal Poetry

Authors

  • Ravichandra P Chittampalli University of Mysore, Mysore, Karnataka, India.

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.12724/ajss.46.1

Keywords:

Aboriginal, Colonisation, Empire, Historicisation, Poetry, Silence

Abstract

The paper looks at texts selected from the Anthology of Australian Aboriginal Literature edited by Anita Heiss and Peter Minter as well as poets chosen from the website Creative Spirits from Oodgeroo (Kath Walker) to Zelda Quakawoot to understand how gaze invents and reinvents people and their culture. The metaphor of the museum is used to question the Empire‟s attempt at erasing and archeologically reinventing ancient societies, while interrogating how dispossession leads to silencing of communities. The second part analytically delineates the evolution from a victim position to, consciousness raising, resistance, recovering and reconstruction of one‟s cultural heritage and voice. The third section of the paper conclusively argues how modern aboriginal poetry has attempted at non-choral, esoteric as well as representational identity formulations as a prelude to dehusking the valance of prejudice and civilisational arrogance, which continue to indent the First Citizen in cultural spaces.

Author Biography

Ravichandra P Chittampalli, University of Mysore, Mysore, Karnataka, India.

University of Mysore, Mysore, Karnataka, India.

References

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Kolig, E. (1995). A sense of History and the reconstitution of cosmology in Australian Aboriginal Society. The case of myth versus History. Anthropos, 90(1/3), 49-67. Retrieved from http:// www.jstor.org/ stable/40463104 Munn, N. D. (1996). Excluded spaces: The figure in the Australian Aboriginal landscape. Critical Inquiry, 22(3), 446-465. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/1344017. Accessed: 28/09/2014 00:40

Strehlow, T. G. H. (1955). Australian aboriginal songs. Journal of the International Folk Music Council, 7, 37-40. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/834-535 . Accessed: 27/09/2014 21:45

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Published

2018-07-01