Australian Aboriginal Music
Back into history...
The
indigenous people of Australia are thought to have arrived between 40,000 and
100,000 years ago. In 1770 English explorer James Cook claimed the continent
for Britain, which he justified by the legal concept of “no man’s land”, which
was distinctly European idea defined as “an absence of civilization”.
From
1788, the indigenous people were driven off their ancestral lands and
resettled, or hunted and killed like animals. Such brutal practices persisted
until well into the twentieth century, and discrimination has continued, with
the recognition of Aboriginal rights a relatively recent development. European
settlement also meant the suppression of traditional culture, the importation
of diseases and the forced removal of Aboriginal children from their families.
There are currently over 450,000 people in Australia who identify themselves as
indigenous and some two hundred surviving languages.
Beliefs
In
traditional Aboriginal belief systems, nature and landscape are comparable in
importance to the bible in Christian culture. Prominent rocks, canyons, rivers,
waterfalls, islands, beaches and other natural features - as well as sun, moon,
visible stars and animals - have their own stories of creation and
inter-connectedness. To the traditional Aborigine they are all sacred:
environment is the essence of Australian Aboriginal godliness.
Languages
The
250-plus Aboriginal languages are now in danger of becoming obsolete, with only
around 15 still in use. Each tribe, or settlement, had their own local language
for thousands of years, but many Aborigines now speak a common tongue known as
Australian Aboriginal English: a form of English littered with Aboriginal phrases
and words.
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