Talk:Aboriginal Tasmanians/Archive 2

Semi-protected edit request on 18 January 2018
The beginning of this entry is misleading. It states that "the Tasmanian Aboriginal people were widely, and erroneously, thought of as being an extinct cultural and ethnic group" and links to an article that actually states evidence to the contrary (here: http://www.utas.edu.au/library/companion_to_tasmanian_history/P/Palawa%20Voice.htm). The article actually begins by saying "How might Aboriginal identity manifest itself in Palawa people, when we have been officially pronounced as extinct?" and goes on to talk about the decimation of the Tasmania Aboriginals and extinction of its full-blooded members.

I believe the original text in this Wikipedia entry was meant to link to this article which uses similar wording: https://www.sydneycriminallawyers.com.au/blog/the-attempted-genocide-in-tasmania/

The issue is that that article provides no references (the census link is broken) and it itself links to another article (here: http://www.tasmanianaboriginal.com.au/liapootah/whomakes.htm) that indeed confirms "being Tasmanian Aboriginal today means that we have a female Aboriginal ancestor and a non Aboriginal male ancestor."

I believe this Wikipedia entry should begin by referencing that fact that there are no full-blooded Tasmanian Aboriginals left today (as detailed in the articles above), although census data does show an Aboriginal population does exist there today, and that the Tasmania Aboriginal languages known as the Palawa languages are extinct, the last speaker being Fanny Cochrane Smith (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fanny_Cochrane_Smith) who died in 1905.

To that end I propose the following changes:

Please replace, "In the 20th century the Tasmanian Aboriginal people were widely, and erroneously, thought of as being an extinct cultural and ethnic group. The 2016 Australian census reported that 23,572 people (4.6% of the Tasmanian population) identify as Indigenous in Tasmania, the second-highest percentage of all states or territories after the Northern Territory's at 25.5%."

With, "In the 20th century it was widely reported that the Tasmanian Aboriginal people were thought of as being an extinct cultural and ethnic group. Whilst the 2016 Australian census reported that 23,572 people (4.6% of the Tasmanian population) identify as Indigenous in Tasmania, no fluent speakers of Tasmanian Aboriginal dialects remain and all Tasmanian Aboriginals today are descended from only a female Aboriginal ancestor. "

— Preceding unsigned comment added by YeOldDan (talk • contribs)


 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the template. This request is well-supported but implementing it is not in the scope of a simple edit request. A larger discussion is needed to establish a consensus among interested editors.  I suggest adding a new section offering your potential improvements and requesting opinions as to whether the improvements should be implemented or not. Thank you for your contributions.  Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 20:23, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Response to proposed edit

The article cited (and in dispute) states ‘Tasmanian authorities attempted to use the death of a woman named Truganini to assert the extinction of Palawa.’ Which supports the assertion of the sentence that it cites. There is ample documentary evidence in the historical record of Tasmanian Aboriginal people being thought of as an extinct cultural group but I see that the article cited does not elaborate to that extent.

The edit suggested above by ‘YeoDan’ includes the clauses: ‘no fluent speakers of Tasmania Aboriginal dialects remain’ and ‘...all Tasmanian Aboriginals today are descended only from a female Aboriginal ancestor’.

What is the point of these suggestions? They imply, or can be inferred to imply, that Tasmanian Aboriginal people have less right to assert themselves as a distinct and authentic cultural group because ‘there are no fluent speakers’ and ‘only a female ancestor’.

Moreover, the suggested edit makes reference to the concept of‘fullbloodedness’ a concept that is offensive, outmoded and technically incorrect.

This appears to reinforce the very problem that Tasmanian Aboriginal people have been fighting in the last few decades: the assertion of their presence as a continuous cultural group, not one that has been diluted by loss of language or quantity of ‘Aboriginal Blood’.

Tasmanian Aboriginal people meet the definition of Aboriginality as specified by the Australian Government - this is not the subject of dispute. No qualification ought to be made as to their degree of Aboriginality on wikipedia as it is not a qualification that can be made by people outside the cultural group. I would resist the adoption of the edit based upon those grounds. Sean Parker (talk) 11:05, 26 May 2018 (UTC)

Addit: the sentence in question above can be supported by addition of the following citation: Ryan (1982) The Aboriginal Tasmanians. QUP:St Lucia p.255. This chapter discusses the view of Aboriginal Tasmanians as an extinct people because of the popular misapprehension that Truganini was the last Tasmanian Aboriginal person. This came to a head in Tasmania after the film 'The Last Tasmanian' featuring the archeologist Rhys Jones. It states that the Tasmanian population, in general, sought to regard the Tasmanian Aboriginal population as a 'dead people' despite appearing in the census of 1971.

In respect to how Aboriginal people ought to be referred to (in reference to the 'full-blooded' question posed above) I refer readers to the following reference: Flinders University: Appropriate Terminology. This gives a precis of appropriate terminology and the offensiveness of the concept of quanta of blood.--Sean Parker (talk) 11:32, 26 May 2018 (UTC)

In case someone introduces the bodysnatcher tale
(available at DarwinOnline) examines how falsehoods put about by creationists were traced back to a sensationalist 1991 article by the Australian journalist David Monaghan, which was inventive rather than accurate. It touches briefly on some historical aspects, but is mainly about the spurious claims. . . dave souza, talk 19:18, 15 December 2017 (UTC) As a regular editor of this page I will be on the lookout for edits citing this spurious claim. Thank you for the heads-up.Sean Parker (talk) 11:45, 26 May 2018 (UTC)