The Aboriginal Children's History of Australia

The Aboriginal Children’s History of Australia	Rigby Publishers Limited
Compiled by Wandjuk Marika	1977
Fiction	147 pages
Reading Level ages 9-12

Summary

This is unique in that this is illustrated and told by the children. This is the entire history of the Aboriginal people from the beginning of the earth to today where they live in homes and attend school. The pictures are very colorful in the backgrounds and simple in the main subjects. It described one of their gods as being without a mouth and different colors that were all the different clouds. Another story described how they used to live. They lived in huts and gathered each night for the storyteller to tell tales. The older men taught the younger children to hunt turtles and fish in canoes and stalk kangaroos, goannas, emus and porcupine. The women were in charge of harvesting the wild vegetables like: yams, potatoes, and plums. Each family had a separate place that only they could hunt in. Other families visited but could not hunt there. There are pictures of the mining. This created a lot of dispute since some wanted mining for work and others did not want the mining. A large amount of families moved into camps and cities close to the mines to get work and the children expressed desire to work there to get money and have a home for their future families. Some of the interesting stories told were about how many whitefella explorers wanted to traverse across the desert, so some Aborigines became guides and took them from one watering hole to the next. The British were one of the first to settle there and had a fort that they eventually abandoned until the war started and some of the fighting happened over Australia. Now the children, instead of hunting and learning how to make bark and wallaby clothes, they usually go to school at the church in the town and live in a house and wear a uniform. Their fathers work at the mines or in town with the whitefellas and sometimes drink too much. They described their home country as dry, with sand hills and lots of animals running around. They knew a lot of their history and conveyed the importance of the land and their traditions and culture that had been passed down to them from their parents and grandparents.

Response

I enjoyed reading this and seeing the different pictures drawn and painted by the children. It was very intriguing and made me keep reading. It told about the history and traditions that I didn’t know or understand. I was able to get a glimpse of their culture and what events influenced them the most. It was easy to read and had interesting pictures that helped interpret some of the stories.

Potential Problems

There were several sections on tribal wars and skirmishes between the native people and the British, also the war against the Japanese. There were some graphic depictions of these events.

Recommendations

I would recommend this book to students who enjoy learning about histories of different people or countries. This would be interesting to parallel with Native Americans, there are similarities and there could be a unit on the differences.