"Australian Aboriginals. The First Farmers. A New History!" Topic

"It seems that what we have been taught about the Indigenous Australians is not true, & this puts a whole new perspective on our history & the resultant Living History in Australia.

"Gammage argues, the first Australians worked a complex system of land management, with fire their biggest ally, and drew on the life cycles of plants and the natural flow of water to ensure plentiful wildlife and plant foods throughout the year. They managed, he says, the biggest estate on Earth"…"
Main page

link

Amicalement
Armand

Knowledge of the extent and complexity of aboriginal land management has been around for decades, although there is no doubt new information coming to light. An extraordinary eel and fish farming system in western Victoria dating back 6500 years was recently added to the World Heritage list. Do recognise that Australia is a very big place, so generalisations based on what was going on in one particular area are absurd. Land management may have been going on all over the continent, but it took different forms. Life in what is now the Northern Territory must inevitably have been very different to life in what is now Tasmania for a whole variety of geographic and climatic reasons. I would also suggest that you bear in mind that there are various agendas in play in this field and take some of the claims with a grain of salt.

Sounds exactly the same as what I was taught in primary school "back in the day".
The aborigines killed the megafauna including the mega drop bears. The real reason the aborigines used fire was to burn down the trees so the mega drop bears couldn't drop on them.

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Thanks for the link.

Amicalement
Armand

Hey, how are we going to terrify visitors to Oz if you give away our secrets?

Re-education is a wearisome process.

(smile)

Amicalement
Armand

They're called first nation people now. Even though they had no concept of nations or borders. Deal with it!

Of course there was no concept of nations in the sense of the modern nation state. There were, however, clearly tribes (that word used to be used, but I don't know if it is still ok) and tribal lands, with, in some areas, pretty much constant warfare. I understand "first nations" to be a Canadian term, so perhaps there is a bit of irony in it being culturally appropriated.

I don't believe Australian Aboriginals had defined "nations" or even tribal areas in the same way Native North Americans did. I was always taught in school Aboriginals were nomads who would use an area until the resources were depleted and then move on randomly.

I have a strong suspicion the concept of nations and defending your territory from invasion is a concept being pushed onto Aboriginal people by todays white left wing. And yes they stole the idea and wording from Canada, a darling of the left here.

Case in point Uluru was never considered sacred until a few years ago when white activists told the Aboriginals living in the area to get angry about tourists "desacrating" it. Their are lots of stories of early white campers in the '50s and '60s camping there and being welcomed by the local Aboriginals who just called it "big rock." There were no ceremonies there or special meaning to them apparantly.