Indigenous Disadvantage Issues

The indigenous society of Australia has been estimated to be around for tens of thousands of years. The contrast between non-indigenous and Indigenous society across all aspects of social and economical structures has been widely debated, reported, monitored and theorized. Indigenous Australians are significantly more disadvantaged then non-indigenous people in various social aspects such as health, education, employment, and income. This case study looks at the Indigenous disadvantages from both a post-colonial perspective and post-modern perspective through the portrayal of Australian media. An overview of the Indigenous disadvantages will be provided using statistics and media coverage. There will be an outline of Fanon’s post-colonial perspective on colonization. Furthermore, Foucault’s post-modern theory will be outlined, in which he argues that certain social and politically communities manipulate by using power disguised for their own gain. Essentially this paper will identify the apparent neutral intervention by government bodies to ‘close the gap’ of the disadvantages Indigenous Australians face and how this has failed due to their own culture bias. The Indigenous people are the original residents and owners of Australia at the time of colonisation. Today the indigenous population is estimated at around 517, 000 making up 2.5% of the Australian population (Ranzijn, McConnochie, & Nolan, 2009). The following statistics identifies the social situations of the Indigenous population on a whole. The 2006 census showed Indigenous Australians’ life expectantly to be lower than non-Indigenous, a gap of 11.5 years for male and 9.7 years for females (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2006). Only a small proportion of indigenous Australians in year 7 met the National minimum standards for reading, writing and numeracy and only 36% obtained a year 12 certificate as opposed to 74% for non-indigenous in the 2006 census (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2006).

References: Bennett, A., (2011 May 18) Aboriginal disadvantages ‘still prevalent’. The Age p.1 Retrieved from: http://www.theage.com.au Carson, B., Dunbar, T., Chenhall, R. D., & Bailie, R., (2007) Social determinants of Indigenous Health N.S.W, Australia: Menzies School of Health Research. Gordon, C., (1980) Power/Knowledge Selected Interviews and Other writings 1972-1977 (Eds.) Britain, England: The Harvester Press, Limited. Holmes, D., Hughes, K., & Julian, R., (2007) Australian Sociology A Changing Society NSW Australia: Pearson Education Australia. Jonas, W., (2002 August 31) Recognising Aboriginal sovereignty - implications for the treaty process Retrieved from: Http://www.hreoc.gov.au Kivisto, P., (2003) Social Theory Roots and Branches (2nd ed.) Los Angeles, USA: Roxbury Korff, J., (2002) Creative Spirits Indigenous Australian Aboriginal Culture and Timeline. Retrieved from: Http://www.creativespirits.com.au Packham, B., (2012 February 15) More work needed to meet targets to close the gap on Protest group went too far. (2012 January 31) Northern Territory News p.1. Retrieved from: Http://www.ntnews.com.au Ranzijn, R., McConnochie, K., & Nolan, W., (2009) Psychology and Indigenous Australians Foundations of Culture Competence South Yarra, Australia: Palgrave Macmillan. Sardar, Z., & Bhabha, H.K., (2008) Fanon black skin White Mask (ed.) London, UK: Pluto Press. The Australian Bureau of Statistics. Retrieved from: Http://www.abs.gov.au Wilson, L., (2011 August, 26) Gillard holds hope for change on indigenous disadvantages The