Tue, 7 February 2006
8.2Mb 17Mins.30seconds. Michael Anderson at the Aboriginal Tent Embassy. 3rd Speaker. Michael, one of the original 4, who sat up under a Beach Umbrella in front of the old Parliament House of Australia in 1972. They triggered a political panic when they declared it the Australian Aboriginal Tent Embassy. This Embassy became the focus for the aboriginal land rights movement. Michael delivers an awesome history lesson. How did these four callow, and apparently shy, aboriginal people (among the first to gain University degrees)do it? By setting up the Tent Embassy, they started a movement that brought to Australia recognition that it was the only British Colonial nation that did not afford legal recognition to the original inhabitants. Until 1967, Australian aboriginals did not have the vote. As a non-people, they were 'wards of the state' who had no land rights. In the early 1970s these young activists claimed rights to a continent from which they had been dispossessed. Only in the 1990s was there a legal recognition that Australia had been inhabited before the Europeans arrived. According to Michael, it wasn't easy for these early activists to make the first move. They were, as young activists, negotiating a space between aboriginal law and respect for their elders, and the anglo-white legal and political system that is still a minefield for many. A fascinating, ego-free, history lesson for us all.
Direct download: MikeAnderson03_-_Artist_-_Track_03.mp3
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