This description is derived from notes taken during class, the university’s recording of the lecture and my memories of the session.

L1 begins this week’s class on leadership and activism by pointing out that ABC will be screening a documentary on Aboriginal activist John Maynard in November. After giving some general information about the discourse on Aboriginal activism, she describes the way in which a particular governor treated Aboriginal people and how an Aboriginal woman named Barrangaroo reacted to this behaviour. In order to tell the story of Barrangaroo, L1 refers to a particular marine about whom she also gives some information. {Click here for analysis} After talking about an argument Barrangaroo had with her husband, L1 compares their relationship to her own. She also notes that a site near Sydney harbour will soon be called Barrangaroo.

L1 then gives some more general information about Aboriginal activism, before turning to the story of Yagan, an Aboriginal man from the colonial past. As Barrangaroo as well as Yagan were already part of earlier lectures, L1 refers back to those sessions, reminding the students of the aspects which were already discussed. She then shows a video about the repatriation of Yagan’s remains which also introduces the discourse of Yagan as a hero. For a long time, L1 says, it was impossible to see him as a martyr because there officially never was an invasion. She then reads out a poem which connects Yagan to a recent topic in order to depict the attempt to bring colonial freedom fighter’s into contemporary life. {Click here for analysis}

She also again mentions William Cooper and his activism against Kristallnacht, showing a different video this time, before moving on to another campaign Cooper was part of. Again, she stresses the significance this has today. She then presents a number of other popular Aboriginal people from diverse backgrounds and from the past as well as the present. She talks about their actions and the criticism they had to face which was often linked to very common debates and issues.

Before ending the lecture, L1 says that she is happy to give short extensions for the essay which is due soon in cases of emergency.

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This description is derived from notes taken during class, the university’s recording of the lecture and my memories of the session.

L1 opens this week’s lecture by talking about the upcoming assignments for the class. As the staff involved in this course felt that an exam does not reflect the type of learning they want to convey, the final assessment will be a reflective one. Thus, personal interests and life experiences can be included in the assignment. {Click here for analysis} “You won’t often be asked to this in the university”, L1 says. The creator of this model of assignment is then introduced and presents the marking criteria. When L1 takes over again she stresses that the students can contact the creator at any time with questions.

After searching for the right file for a moment, L1 is ready to start the actual lecture on the topic of Aboriginal housing. While outlining the structure of today’s lecture, L1 mentions that she will show more audio-visual footage than she normally does in order to give the students a sense of the diversity of Aboriginal voices. She first gives some information about ideas of housing and the Aboriginal housing situation. Then she shows two videos presenting different opinions on a particular housing project. After every video L1 gives some more information underlining the view which was presented. She also uses the situation of her grand-parents as an example for the significance of this specific project.

The next aspect L1 discusses is the government’s plan to close remote communities. As she is running out of time, she tells the students to watch the two videos presenting opinions about this topic at home and moves on to putting the issues discussed into context. To do so, she gives a detailed description of an Aboriginal campaign which led to the first land being given back to Aboriginal people. As the lecture took a few minutes longer today, L1 thanks the students for their patience before she leaves.

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This description is derived from notes taken during class, the university’s recording of the lecture and my memories of the session.

This week’s lecture has the topic “Education is political!!”. After noticing that there are considerably fewer students present today, L1 quotes Oodgeroo Noonucaal and Freire in order to stress that education is indeed political. She then talks about her own experience while working for the Department of School Education and gives examples of opinions of some of the teachers she met in this frame. Afterwards she reads out some statements from the slides, adding further explanations about the current and former situation in schools.

When talking about education influenced by prejudices, L1 tells the students about an incident, which happened to her daughter when she was in high school. After describing how her daughter argued with the teacher about the terms ‘invasion’, ‘settlement’ and ‘propaganda’, she explains that it was a good situation for her daughter because she had the character and skills to be able to debate about the topic. However, in L1’s opinion, this is not the case for most Aboriginal children. This shows how teachers even if they are very concerned about not being racist might still be unable to teach in an inclusive way, L1 says.

She then explains that teachers often use Aboriginal students as a resource. While again this was good for her daughter who had the knowledge, it can lower the self-esteem of those students who do not know the answer. She was able to witness such a situation herself when participating in a NAIDOC week event at her daughter’s school.

L1 interrupts the lecture briefly to answer a question which has come up although it does not directly relate to the topic. She again uses her own experience to explain the situation in depth. Afterwards, she returns to the actual topic and gives another personal example. When she was in primary school she was asked by the teacher which her favourite traditional bush food was and answered that it was a particular kind of worm. Although the teacher tried to calm down the class, she was picked on for a long time for eating worms. When asked the same question again years later, she answered “fish” and was this time told that this did not count as traditional Aboriginal food. In conclusion, teachers have to be really careful how they treat Aboriginal students in class, L1 says. {Click here for analysis}

L1 now returns to the slides, reading out another statement and explaining it. She then shows a Youtube video explaining why it is important that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture is included in the school curriculum and how this should be done. Afterwards, she explains the curriculum in more detail, before presenting a model of Aboriginal learning. While doing so, she often uses the phrase “you know”. The next point L1 addresses is again linked to an example from her own experience. While working at the Department of School Education, she was often told that texts which include Aboriginal English should not be used because it is important to use a variety of English the students can later use in the workplace, although this is not the case for Shakespearean English either. L1 then uses another example from her daughter’s education to underline that what can be learned from a story is not connected to how old the story is or how well it reflects reality.

Next, L1 picks up the holocaust and the question “Why didn’t anyone say anything” as an example from the Australian curriculum. Australia, she says, had the only private protest against Kristallnacht which was organised by an Aboriginal man named William Cooper. This highlights the nationally and globally significant contributions Aboriginal people have made in the past. L1 shows a Youtube video about William Cooper before moving on to the next point.

She reads out a statement saying that old mathematical methods are not useful anymore today. Well, she jokes, that would make her happy because it would mean that “Pythagoras must go” as well. After outlining the steps of the scientific method of problem solving, L1 tells the students about a particular problem her son has solved in kindergarten using his tracking skills.

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This description is derived from notes taken during class, the university’s recording of the lecture and my memories of the session.

Today’s lecture is concerned with Aboriginal policy making. In the beginning, the lecturer (L1) apologises for her weak her voice caused by a cold and expresses her hope that she will nonetheless be able to hold the lecture. In the first part of the lecture, she mostly reads out the notes on the lecture slides, making small changes in sentence structures and adding short explanations and clarifications. After finishing her explanations, she frequently asks “ok?”. In order to explain the term ‘policy’, L1 does not only give official definitions but also includes people’s common perception, using phrases like “You know, sometimes we believe that…”.

L1 then introduces the representation of Aboriginal people in art as a helpful source to understand the impact of policies. She shows several examples, describes them, points out aspects she sees as particularly interesting, draws conclusions and asks the students to be critical. Afterwards L1 switches to the present, more precisely to names of electorates and routes still existing today. She talks in detail about an incident of oppression surrounding the mapping-out of Western Australia. {Click here for analysis}This is a good example to see how a hero discourse can stand against legal evidence of discrimination, she says. It also shows that many claims to change names often have a very profound reason behind them. L1 also adds an example from the local area of the university. She then asks if the students have ever watched the film The Tracker, using it as a starting point to talk about images of Aboriginal people in chains.

To show how colonial and Aboriginal histories are intertwined, L1 talks about marriage rules in the past, showing the hierarchy the British brought with them. She reads out a politician’s speech on a play, which was based on a real relationship between a British man and an Aboriginal woman, to address the aspect of people with mixed heritage and then gives more examples. Afterwards, she plays a song by an Aboriginal singer talking about Christian rules to underline that one should not generalise. She then presents the view of three people from public life on Aboriginal policies by quoting them directly.

To conclude the lecture, L1 gives an overview of steps to be taken to achieve a more just policy making, again quoting a number of people and playing another song. In the end, she gives the students guidelines for researching a policy, stressing the importance of always going back to the original source by comparing interpretation to a game of Chinese whispers. Before whishing everyone a good week, L1 cheers because her voice lasted for the entire lecture.

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This description is derived from a participant observation conducted in Lecture 1 on the 27^th October.

Today’s lecture is treating the topic of reconciliation. After a short introduction outlining the history of reconciliation, L1 asks the question: What is reconciliation? She does not answer it right away, however, but first talks about the picture which is included on the slide. It is an artwork done by school children, she explains, and what she loves about it is that the people on it have really weird feet and no noses. She laughs about this before returning to the question.

To explain the history of the term ‘reconciliation’, L1 first tells the students what can be found online if one is looking for images about reconciliation the way she has in preparation for this session. The fact that the first images which come up had to do with Christianity made her think about how many Human Rights related topics come from a background of faith. After talking about the role of Christian churches in the recent past as opposed to the colonial past, she addresses the issue of the separation of church and state. For this, she refers to the judges on the panel of the Mabo case and presents two of them in detail. When someone asks a question, L1 repeats it for those listening to the recording before answering it. The student asks again and L1 answers, adding her own assumptions where she is not sure. A different student then adds an idea to this on which L1 comments.

Turning back to the slides, L1 lists the members of the first Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation and briefly outlines their background and contribution. She then reads out the preamble of the Act of Legislation for reconciliation before giving additional information. She proceeds with the next slides in the same way. While talking about Reconciliation Australia, L1 opens their website which she describes as “really worth having a look at”. She opens the tab about the RAP (Reconciliation Action Plan) when she reaches this topic and reads out the definition of the project, which can be found on the page. She then explains it in more detail and gives examples of actions taken in the frame of the RAP.

L1 now shows a video about the extent of reconciliation and gives some more information about the work Reconciliation Australia has done connected to the curriculum. Something else which is worth noticing, she says, is that Reconciliation Australia was really good at using social media in order to reach people. That made it more public and accountable.

L1 now turns to the RAP of the university in order to explain the process and structure of RAPs. She opens the document, reads out some lines, scrolls through the pages and gives extra information. She then explains how the knowledge about reconciliation and RAPs can help the students when they are applying for a job. They could find out whether the company they want to work with has an RAP and then address this topic in a job interview. As an example for other institutions’ RAPs, L1 shows a video made by a company to present their RAP.

Afterwards, L1 presents Close the Gap as another campaign. She points out a video by Oxfam about this topic for which the link can be found on the slide. L1’s further explanations on Close the Gap also include the criticism which is often expressed by Aboriginal people. When she notices that the time is almost up, she comes to an end very quickly, simply inviting the students again to look at the Oxfam video and the Reconciliation Australia website.

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This description is derived from notes taken during class and my memories of the session.

After this week’s Talking Circle presentations, L3 praises one of the students for creating slides which were visually strong. That was very good for visual learners, he says. Consequently, a student asks for a visual representation of the UN bodies so that the connections between them become clearer. L3 tries to draw a diagram on the board but immediately admits that this will probably not be very helpful as the UN’s structure is simply too complex.

Some more questions about NGOs and the UN are asked. As L3 refers to a certain reference in his answer, he also talks about the author’s background. Afterwards he picks up the reflection questions from the lecture and asks us to discuss them in groups. Although discussions are lively across the room, no one wants to share his or her opinion with the whole class afterwards. Thus, L3 who has been walking around during the group discussions mentions some aspects he heard earlier and, hence, makes people talk eventually.

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This description is derived from notes taken during class and my memories of the session.

As today’s lecture treats Indigenous experiences defending Human Rights, L3 begins with a revision of the definition of Human Rights. When stating that everyone is entitled to them, he tells us that his father used to say that even the blackbird outside the window had Human Rights. Throughout the lecture he often asks the students whether they remember a certain detail and sometimes gets help from one of them. After approximately one third of the lecture, L3 asks a reflection question to think about while he goes on.

When he talks about a certain UN body he tells the class that he has been to one of its meetings. He describes the atmosphere as very friendly and open-minded but also points out that it is very competitive and difficult to get one’s voice heard. He has also attended a different meeting on UN level which he repeatedly calls “very interesting”. He explains the seating order of the different countries’ governments and indigenous representatives to show their different attitudes.

When the topic of NGOs comes up, L3 tells the class about a friend who created an NGO to underline how much work and luck it includes and how difficult it can be to gain status with the UN. He finally finishes the lecture with another reflection question.

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