Research Topic 6: Personal Perspectives

Research Topic 6: Personal Perspectives

Try to discover various perspectives on what it might be like for an Aboriginal elder living in Redfern

Year:2
Group: Doreen Khun (305 142 100), Melissa Koronel (305 142 119), Michelle Lan (305 125 494)

Executive summary of key issues

We decided to conduct our analysis through primary means, as we thought this to be most relevant; all secondary informationresearched weregeneralizations unspecific to Redfern. We went to Redfern on several occasions to interview elders on their differing perspectives.

Through our research we came across two vital concepts.

Firstly,elders in Redfern are not the mysterious body paint adorning, campfire making, bush tucker hunting Aborigines of popular media. They are quite simply only the grandmothers and grandfathers of the community who keep an eye out for everyone. We must think of them as how we think of our own grandparents, that is, older, wiser, akin to some greater spiritual knowledge, and most importantly, with respect. The only difference beingAboriginal children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren do not singularly respect their own forebears. It is a much larger family community.

Secondly, we discovered that there is a difference between the elders, that is, the elderly generation, and elders, community leaders, henceforth to be denoted as Elders. The elders are the grandparents in the community who pass on history, and cultural identity through nurturing, the most prominent example of this being story telling. The Elders also have similar roles of nurturing, but are distinguished as the leaders of the Redfern Aboriginal social ‘hierarchy’through their significant contribution to the community at large, spiritually and moralistically (see Perspective 3 below). Age does not make you an Elder.

Through analysis, we concluded that:

-A comfortable, healthy environment needs to be established for interaction between the older and younger generations of Redfern, to allow the strengthening of Aboriginal history, culture, and identity.

-Both public and private counsel with Elders feature as important parts of community life.

-The separation of men and women’s business results in thriving of women’s social activities (e.g. Grandmother’s Basket), and lack of enthusiasm from their counterpart(see Perspective 2 below). Men increasingly need to be reengaged in the community.

These issues will impact on the design of the Elders’ Centre. Following are three sets of interviews and analysis which further explain how we came to the above deductions. In no way were these interviews intrusive upon the interviewee.

Perspective 1:Meryl, an elderly grandmother who came from the country to live in Redfern.

From Meryl’s perspective, we gained insight into what grandmothers in Redfern may experience –most importantly, that they are the conveyers of history, culture, and Aboriginal identity. An imperative medium for doing this is storytelling. However, many of the contemporary younger generation are unwilling to listen to ‘fiction stories’. An environment needs to be established to engage young Aborigines and encourage the transmittance of culture.

As an elder, Meryl also feels the amount of deference young Aborigines give to elders has diminished since her time of youth, for example, when everyone would contribute as one family to tend an ailing grandparent. These days, the elderly are not so well waited upon. This may be due to the lack of opportunity for elders and the younger generation to interact, in turn resulting in the loss of respect. The next summary delves more deeply into this.

Perspective 2: Brenda, a very much respected Auntie who is an important member of a Christian committee.

Brenda also relates the loss of respect to the lack of opportunity for interaction between the old and the young in the Aboriginal community. Story telling is again mentioned as an important way of passing on Aboriginal culture. However, many of the elderlyare tied under domestic pressure,caring for grandchildren whose mothers are either in jail or on drugs. If an appropriate environment exists to bring elders and children together, it would help strengthen Aboriginal culture and values in the younger generation, as well as encourage better lifestyles for misguided youths.

Another issue Brenda brings to light is the disempowerment of elderly male role models in the community. Men have lost their traditional warrior status since they have not been provided with any alternative role in the modern world. But women are still able to perform nurturing roles which has led to dominance in roles of community leadership. Brenda introduces the idea that the men “need to be needed”, that is, reengaged in community activities. Traditionally men’s and women’s business has been separate –our brief suggests the design of two separate areas for men and women, however, Brenda’s perspective proposes the idea that activities should be done together as a “family”.

Perspective 3: Vicky, another respected Auntie,from the committee called “Outreach”.

Vicky’s perspective was crucial in allowing us to arrive out our multilayered insight into this topic.

Vicky defines an Elder as someone who becomes respected and renowned due to their contribution to the community. It is what the Elders “do” for the community, e.g. organising healing groups and being spokespersons for Aboriginal Rights,that makes them who they are; the title of elder has no relation with age.Elders are also available to talk to for private issues, you simply go to them, and they are willing to help you, anything conversed is completely confidential. Concurrently, there are unspoken protocols for behavior around Elders. Everyone in the community knows who the Elders are without asking. If an Aboriginal person was to go to another community, they would immediately know who the Elders were due to these protocols. From this we can see that Elders living in Redfern are highly respected individuals, as Vicky says, “You disrespect, you disrespect the whole community”.