Why review a 5 year old history book?
Well, apart from the fact it's a wonderfully exciting book, it contains material essential to an understanding of several current race relation issues in Australia. If non-First Australians don't get on top of the information in this book, the outcomes will continue to be appallingly bad, especially for the First Australians.
And why should you care? Apart from humanitarian reasons, of course? Because negative outcomes for the First Australians will continue to bite non-First Australian society on the arse. Savagely.
So, why review it now? Because it's initial impact seems to have fizzled out. There have been several rather dismissive opinions published, from several quarters, and I don't hear anything about the school text books changing to present an alternative view of pre-white Australia and its people.
Even if some of Bill Gammage's opinions are questionable, or require more consideration, his overall picture of pre-white Australia provides a stunningly different image to that of the primitive hunter gatherer taught to many generations of non-First Australian kids, and sadly to many First Australian kids. That image, largely negative and patronisingly ignorant, has coloured equal generations of government policy, and still is.
This needs to change. Urgently.
And why should you care? Apart from humanitarian reasons, of course? Because negative outcomes for the First Australians will continue to bite non-First Australian society on the arse. Savagely.
So, why review it now? Because it's initial impact seems to have fizzled out. There have been several rather dismissive opinions published, from several quarters, and I don't hear anything about the school text books changing to present an alternative view of pre-white Australia and its people.
Even if some of Bill Gammage's opinions are questionable, or require more consideration, his overall picture of pre-white Australia provides a stunningly different image to that of the primitive hunter gatherer taught to many generations of non-First Australian kids, and sadly to many First Australian kids. That image, largely negative and patronisingly ignorant, has coloured equal generations of government policy, and still is.
This needs to change. Urgently.
