Fighting Hard

 Fighting Hard

Reviewed By  Janet Mawdesley       July 12, 2015

 

Author  Richard Broome

Distributor:     
ISBN:                 9781922059864
Publisher:         Aboriginal Studies Press
Release Date:    

Website:    http://www.aiatsis.gov.au 

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The evolution of the Australian society we live in today is as fascinating and as rich as any history or tapestry. Particularly so when you take a look at our history and culture and the long term effect it has had on the country we call Australia, and the people we now call Australians.

Fighting Hard is a second written exploration into the Victorian Aboriginal Advancement League (VAAL) and gives a wonderful insight into the fight for Aboriginal rights over the past 100 years.

This revisiting by Richard Broome has been given sanction by the board of the League and presents more detail on the rights and issues faced by many Aboriginal people as they have struggled and occasionally succeed, to settle into the ‘white man’s’ Australia and to have equal rights.The first book published in 1985 did not draw on the archives of the VAAL and while admirable, needed a fresh new look taken at the history and struggles of this group.

In May 1835, Billibellary and his brother Borrunuptom signed a treaty to ensure that the adventurer John Batman could have traditional and temporary rights of access to their traditional lands and exchange of goods.

Billebellary, an Elder of the Woiworrung people decided he would learn about these invaders and while he watched, listened and understood what was going on, he also realised that his traditional way of life had changed forever.

He was he a true visionary. In 1843 he and his great friend William Thomas created an ‘audacious plan’ that would see some of the land taken by the new arrivals returned to his people so they could take part in agriculture and not have to leave their traditional lands.

It was audacious, it was incredible and it was also the very beginnings of the Victorian Aboriginal Advancement League and their ongoing fight to retain and regain a standard of living that would see the Aboriginal people as active and positive members of the community; not a marginalised group of people being forever taken advantage of in today’s world.  Sadly as it transpired, this has not always been the case.

Broome has researched his subject extensively presenting a comprehensive look at the slow and complex journey the Aboriginal people have taken to move ever so slowly to become a recognisable force and voice in the politics of modern Australia.

With a referendum being currently sought to recognise and include Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in the Australian Constitution this work by Richard Broome makes intelligent and sound reason for this constitutional change to take place.

Non Fiction