A pedagogy of liberation
Teaching in a remote Aboriginal community alerts one's senses to the true nature of injustice that is hidden beneath our nation's facade of 'a fair go for all'.
The indicators leap out with alarming clarity: weeping sores on the arms and legs of students, dilapidated houses that frown on the side of the unkempt roads and an overarching sense of neglect that pulses in complete contrast to the natural beauty that abounds.
Apart from the failure to provide adequate housing and health care, the delivery of substandard, culturally insensitive education to the children of these remote schools is a major concern that urgently needs to be addressed.
This essay is a critique of current educational practices in isolated Aboriginal communities as well as a manifesto for positive change. Having taught in such a community I have experienced first hand the daunting challenge of uniting two vastly different cultures. After offering a detailed analysis of the inappropriate framework currently in place I will outline a series of suggestions that may improve the situation.
What will surface is the necessity to collaborate with individual communities to create an educational framework that thoroughly incorporates the distinctive cultures of different regions. Providing comprehensive and culturally relevant education to these remote schools is a central way to combat the cyclical oppression that has become the horrific norm.
Australia has an obligation to right this grave wrong because of the intrinsic humanity that binds all its citizens. The development of a collaborative approach to remote education may in fact plant the seeds for revolution so that finally Australia might embody the ideals it shouts so loud.
The Prime Minister's historic apology and last year's 40th anniversary of the 1967 referendum has sparked public interest and goodwill towards the plight of Aboriginal Australians.
However it seems the majority of citizens are unable to realise the relationship between Aboriginal disadvantage and their everyday lives. The endemic oppression of Aborigines reflects the spiritual oppression of society at large, thereby degrading the ideal of democracy and sentencing citizens to exist in a vacuum of social injustice.
The policies of paternalism remain entrenched because it is believed Aborigines can only contribute to society if they assimilate. This well-worn ideology has failed all Australians who cling to the dream of a reconciled continent.
The time has come to invert this warped viewpoint. We must have the humility to