The Media and Indigenous Australia

Dot West's 1993 ABC Boyer Lecture

WE SAT IN THE RIVER BED
ME MATES AND I,
WE HEARD WHAT YOU SAID
ABOUT OUR PEOPLE, AND OH WHAT LIES

YOU SPREAD YOUR WORD
AND IMAGES TOO
AROUND THE WORLD
FOR ALL TO VIEW

BUT ONE THING YOU FORGOT
WAS THE TRUTH OF THE MATTER
THE FORGOTTEN LOT
IN A LAND OF CHATTER

YOU TOLD OF OUR FIGHTING
OUR DRUNK AND ROAMING WAYS
ALL THE WHITE SIGHTINGS
WHICH ONLY, YOUR EYES CAN PORTRAY

YOU DIDN'T KNOW US
OR EVEN UNDERSTAND
WHEN YOU TOOK A GUESS
AND REPORTED, ABOUT THE ORIGINAL INHABITANTS, OF THIS LAND

SO BACK IN THAT RIVERBED
WE PLOTTED AND PLANNED
FOR OUR VOICE TO BE HEARD
IN THIS RACIST LAND

WE'RE HERE NOW
WITH OUR OWN SOUND WAVES
TO TELL OF HOW
WE BECAME YOUR SLAVES

THE STORIES ARE RICH
AND CULTURES STRONG
WE WILL TEACH
OF THE RIGHT AND THE WRONG

SO WATCH YOUR VOICE
YOUNG WHITE ONE
WE NOW HAVE A CHOICE
TO CORRECT YOUR TONGUE

Non-Indigenous Australians have held the power of the media for over 70 years portraying various images of Australia including the negative portrayal of its Indigenous population. We are now in a position to change the thinking of non-aboriginal people and enlighten them as to who we are, what we do and to take a look at the history of Australia from an Aboriginal viewpoint. Looking at the history of Australia in itself is certainly an education process for non-aboriginal people who have been educated from a white perspective. Just consider this point alone, when did you become aware that Aboriginal children were being taken away from their families and being raised in missions and institutions, and more importantly when did you find out how Aboriginal people felt about this genocidal treatment. I bet you didn't learn about it in your text books. We learnt about this along with the massacres, poisonings, rapes, the stealing of our country and many more sad and shameful crimes from our own people. We grew up with this history, our parents, grandparents, great-grandparents and even our great-great grandparents grew up knowing this history, we had to, we lived it, we are the victim's of Australia's white history. Many of us had the opportunity to go to school and we did. But when school finished for the day we went home for an education about family, about land, about spirituality, about attitude, about respect. School formed only part of our education.

So on our radio stations, in our newspapers, in our books, on stage and through television we tell of the history of Indigenous Australia, a history that white Australia cannot divorce itself from. But it's not all gloom and doom, we also tell of our rich and diverse culture, the relationship between the land and its people, of how the land and our people are one. We also tell of our achievements in white society, our doctors, university graduates, medical and legal services, our writers, musicians and so on, but most importantly we tell of how we have survived with our principles and culture intact.

The media has enormous power to determine what issues are important and to set the public agenda. It has enormous power to shape the meaning of these issues and as a result strongly influence people's ideas and values, including their ideas about Aboriginality. For instance the racist murder of Louis Johnson in Perth, Western Australia. 19 year Louis was deliberately driven over by white youths in early January 1992 on his birthday. The killers later admitted that they committed this horrendous deed because Louis was black. However it appears that the racism did not end there, the ambulance attendants took the fatally injured Louis home instead of to the hospital apparently without examining him and apparently assuming he was intoxicated. Many people think that the kind of racist attitudes towards Aboriginal people that lead to Louis Johnson's death were being reinforced and circulated with great intensity within the news and current affairs media in Western Australia leading up to the murder. From early 1990 the media constructed juvenile delinquency and youth crime as having reached the proportions of a major social crisis. This appeared to coincide with the industrial and public relations interests of the police and was supported across the political spectrum. Most of the crimes large or small were directly attributed to young Aboriginal people. Such that any youth related crime is now almost automatically assumed to involve Aboriginal people. The sensationalized treatment of juvenile crime including car chases and the tragic deaths they caused gave rise to public outcry to the extent of tens of thousands of people marching to parliament house demanding a judicial and police crack down. The type of sensationalized reporting that led to this rally including comments like 'good riddance to bad rubbish, that's three less car thieves, I think they're dead, and I think that's good', by one radio personality on the death of three Aboriginal children. It was startling that the murder of the Aboriginal youth Louis Johnson by white youths at the time did not rate the same sensational reporting or evoke the same outcry. I'm not denying that many young Aboriginal people are in crisis, how could it be otherwise given their life circumstances. But I am questioning the grossly inflated news values given to youth offences. What good does this do especially considering the difficulties in generating the same degree of popular emotion and community spirit to take action to resolve the social injustices suffered by Indigenous people. What many Aboriginal people are critical of here is the day in day out reporting of much of the news media.

But not all media treatment of Aboriginal affairs is negative and biased and we must recognize the good and conscientious work carried out by many journalists who have brought important issues to public attention and are working to raise the level of understanding. The media is contradictory, and there are areas in which Indigenous Australians have made gains and in which non-Indigenous journalists have been eager to help. There are some examples that come to mind. The recently released movie 'Deadly' which provides a look at Aboriginal deaths in custody in a different light, and the documentary 'Exile in the Kingdom' in which the people at Roebourne WA tell their own story. The music media's embrace of the talent Yothu Yindi is another example. Also the 'National Media and Indigenous Peoples' conference earlier this year gave us all promise as the media recognized they have made blunders and will look to improve the situation of reporting about Australia's Indigenous people.

Just as mainstream media can change attitudes so can Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Media. As an example I'll tell you the story of a Kimberley group which commenced its first broadcast in 1987 on the ABC. The Aboriginal community wanted a way to help maintain their own languages, and portray and inform about their own culture and way of life. And one other major motivation for their own media service was to counteract the bad publicity their people were receiving in the local rag and the consequent low self-esteem the local Aboriginal people had about themselves when dealing with the white community. Interestingly enough, when this group first started broadcasting it was the only other media group apart from the ABC providing a radio service to this region. So the audience was not only the Aboriginal people but also the non-Aboriginal community. They had the capacity to target the whole community and some attitudes certainly changed during this time. You see this group wasn't only able to turn white people's thinking about, it also turned the thinking of the Aboriginal community. It made people proud to be Aboriginal in the eyes of white people, it changed their own attitudes about themselves. The service over time brought about empowerment to a group of people in their own country who once felt powerless in the white dominated community. It instilled pride and self-esteem amongst its young and old. Also another aspect to this media service was that here was an Aboriginal organization providing an essential service not only to its own community but also to the wider community. The media group ensured that the white community was also being serviced by providing a local sports program, and general community information by way of announcements and interviews. The broadcasts were for everyone.

This is just one achievement in the very short time Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have been involved in the Media Industry. We now have 6 Aboriginal radio stations licensed, about another 6 groups aspiring for a license, 180 remote communities licensed to deliver both radio and television services, various newspapers, a television station, many performers in all fields of the arts, authors, playwrights, a publishing house and the list goes on. It all just demonstrates the natural ability of the people and the motivation and drive to be seen, heard and accepted for what we are. No longer can we be portrayed in white media from only a white perspective.

Our role in the media industry is not just to inform our own people but also to educate and inform non Aboriginal people. We would have to be the only media in this country which considers the effect a story may have on community. We would have to be the only media with a conscience. We report on the news and current affairs which is relevant to our people, we tell of what's going on in the languages of our area or in a more easily understood form of english. We try and cut or what we call high English, which is where big words are used. High english is used by mainstream media and more often than not we need the english dictionary at hand to work out what is actually being said, but then so does white Australia. Down to earth language is all that is needed. We are not out to impress people, we are out to inform, to communicate. The dictionary says to communicate is to 'succeed in conveying information'. With high English it's more than likely you will fail to communicate.

Indigenous Media in Australia has a big role in the maintaining of our languages. At the time of invasion there were about 250 different Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander languages, there are now less than 90 languages still in use but not all of them are spoken as first languages. The loss of many of Australia's Indigenous languages is attributed to many factors such as grandparents of today being forbidden to speak their language as young people when they were pushed into missions or into settlements to be assimilated into white culture. The language is then not passed onto their children and their children's children. Also the media has to bear some of the blame for the loss of Australia's Indigenous languages. Just think of the impact it would have on white Australians if they were fed only Aboriginal and Islander languages through the radio, on TV and in the newspapers for over 200 years. The English language would no doubt be dead by now. But of course this wasn't the case and we as Indigenous people and you as white Australians have a responsibility to enhance, nurture and maintain as many of our languages as possible.

There's a funny story I heard about for one region where an Aboriginal media group was taking the European news to our people in the local Aboriginal languages so our people could understand fully what was happening in the world. There was an uproar from the white community because they didn't understand what was being said and felt they were plotting against them or planning something dreadful. They just didn't understand that our communities couldn't fathom their words either and needed them interpreted.

The government directly funds two national media services, the Special Broadcasting Service which is to reflect Australia's multicultural society and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation which is to provide a media service, and both are to entertain, inform and educate all Australians. It's really ironic when you think about the media services that have been provided by government, the ABC for Australians and SBS it's really for the ethnic population. You may think that this is a narrow view but it is a widely believed perception by many Indigenous Australians. Admittedly both services have provided very good programs for and about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people but it hasn't been often enough nor localized enough. The SBS ensures that immigrants to this country are able to maintain and broadcast their own languages and inform Australia about their culture. This alone was certainly a credit to Australia for its insight and appreciation of other cultures but once again it forgot the diverse needs of its own Indigenous culture. The population of Australia's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community is extremely diverse in its culture with many different languages spoken. It was once explained to me about the Kimberley region of WA which is said to be the size of Victoria and Tasmania combined, that if you travel through the Kimberley with its large Aboriginal population base and the diversity of people within this region, it's just like traveling through Europe with its changing cultures and languages. So can you imagine these national media groups trying to service Australia's Indigenous people. Of course SBS and the ABC have their own charters to provide programs for and about Australia's Indigenous people but it is believed that the government of the time were naïve enough to think that this alone would meet our needs. SBS's charter is made even more difficult considering their programs are only broadcast in the capital cities.

The ABC on the other hand realized it couldn't cater to all of Australia's Indigenous peoples and this realization came about through consultation with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. This realization was also formally recognized through the DIX report in 1981/2 a review document on the ABC. The report basically recognized the cultural diversity within the ABC's broadcast responsibility. The Corporation allowed different Aboriginal media groups to have access to the ABC's airwaves. This arrangement commenced in 1981/2 where the ABC purchased programs from CAAMA and they were then broadcast under ABC control. In 1985 the first unsupervised access on the ABC was undertaken by the Torres Strait Islanders and in the same year Aboriginal people of Perth were broadcasting on the ABC. In 1987 and 1988 Aboriginal access extended to the Kimberley region where groups could broadcast within their own regions and in their own languages. This arrangement was not met very favourably by some bureaucrats within the Department for Transport and Communication where one of its senior officers in 1988 said 'I will not have foreign languages go to air on a national broadcast transmitter'. However, this attitude didn't prevail. There are now 4 radio stations in the Kimberley producing and presenting in total 50 hors of Aboriginal programs to the region.

Australians were experimenting with radio as far back as 1905 and the first station 2SB in Sydney began broadcasting in November 1923. But it wasn't until June 1976 when Melbourne Station 3CR broadcast the country's first Aboriginal radio program. One month later 2XX in Canberra transmitted Australia's second Aboriginal radio show. So it actually took 53 years for our voice to be heard in our own programs, and this came about initially through the public radio stations which actually only started operating in 1974. There are now over 100 licensed community radio stations and about 30 of them have some Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander programs. These include 6 stations owned and operated by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander media organizations in Alice Springs, Brisbane, Townsville, Port Augusta, Perth and Kununurra.

We now have over 500 hours a week of Indigenous radio being produced by Indigenous people. If you consider the short amount of time we've been involved and the lack of clear policy and direction from government to cater to our growing needs, you will realize we have achieved against all odds and are still doing so. Unfortunately, TV presents a different story, less than 1% of Australia's television programs are produced by Indigenous people.

We have been able to apply our natural talents to the media industry like a duck takes to water. Indigenous media workers have developed great broadcasting and production skills with very little or no formal training at all. But the Indigenous media industry feel it's essential to provide training opportunities for skilling our people in all tasks related to this industry. It is estimated that over 200 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are involved in community media either as employed staff or volunteers. The ABC currently employ 73 and SBS 16 Indigenous Australians in various fields of their operations. While you can count on one hand the number of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islanders employed in the commercial electronic media, the numbers for the print media are even less. This situation may be assisted shortly as the Department for Employment Education and Training is providing Aboriginal training money for these specific industries to train and employ more Indigenous people.

The Indigenous Media industry has grown even though there's been a lack of progressive policy and direction by government and the major funding bodies and a view by these groups that media, and more accurately, Indigenous media is just a luxury item and something not considered a priority. This is now changing, through much lobbying, various reports and just a basic demonstration of what we do within our communities. ATSIC the major funding body for Indigenous projects is now seeing our industry as an important step in the overall development and enhancement of the Indigenous people of Australia. We have yet to convince this group and government generally that we are an essential service to our people. The signs are there that there is acceptance of Indigenous media. The National Indigenous Media Association of Australia has now been established, that is after much heartache and frustration by Indigenous Media nationally, but I will talk about NIMAA shortly.

The federal government in early 1984 formed a special task force to advise on Aboriginal broadcasting and telecommunications policies. The Task force report, "Out of the Silent Land', was released later that year with the Federal government in 1985 endorsed over fifty of its recommendations. "Out of the Silent Land' addressed the lack of telecommunications and electronic media available to Aboriginal people living in remote Australia. Several very important aspects were raised in this report which then mapped out the development of Indigenous media for the next 8 years. Firstly the report placed a high emphasis on the need to develop Indigenous Media within remote Australia and at the same time stating that city based broadcasting was being catered for through the Public broadcasting sector. Sadly this report did not go far enough to cater to the growing needs of Indigenous media and the eight years were stifling for many groups.

The report also highlighted the need to offset the impact of western television and radio in remote communities, which was brought about by the launch of AUSSAT's first generation of satellites. In the year of the bicentennial some 85 remote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities were given, through the Department for Aboriginal Affairs, a facility called BRACS, Broadcasting for Remote Aboriginal Communities Scheme which included a satellite dish and decoder along with some basic equipment which allowed the community to interrupt the radio or television signal and broadcast their own programs within a 5kn radius. Brilliant idea, fantastic plan, but what was forgotten was three very important factors for the system's success: consultation, training and on-going funding. In many of the 85 communities who received BRACS, there was no consultation by the Department of Aboriginal Affairs about whether they wanted the equipment or not. It was just delivered and installed. It's been reported by many of these communities that were given only a half hour course in how to operate the equipment by the people who were commissioned to install it. They were basically shown how to receive the station of their choice, how to turn the machinery off and on and that really was it until about a year later when the bureaucrats got it together enough to realize training programs were necessary to teach the community members how to interrupt the incoming signal and to present their own community based programs. People needed to be taught how to operate a video camera, produce and present their own radio program, interviewing and editing, and in most cases it wasn't until two years after the installation of BRACS that people received this training which in that time allowed the community to become accustomed to the daily soapies and the general infiltration of western culture. As an Aboriginal person you start to wonder about the motivation behind BRACS and the failure of government to meet the challenge it supposedly set itself: to allow remote Aboriginal and Islander communities to interrupt the televising of western civilization to their communities. Was the delay in providing training and infrastructure a sub-conscious infiltration of white society into Australia's Indigenous communities. Now that we have ATSIC things are looking up for the BRACS communities. Only this year the Commissioners realized the worth of Indigenous media and the importance of BRACS. In their new policy paper they have said they will develop a detailed strategy for the revitalization, over the next three years, of BRACS, and commence its implementation. They plan to pump $1m into the revitalization and another quarter of a million into training. But the use of the word revitalization again makes you wonder because with this word it suggests that BRACS is either dead or dormant and it is being revitalised. Well this is far from the truth. Even though BRACS has been installed in communities for a number of years without clear government policy or assistance, in many parts of Australia BRACS' local programming is part of many community's daily lives. It has been used to bail up government officials and visitors to communities and actually put them on the spot in front of a camera and asked what is the purpose of their visit. This then allows community members who don't attend the council meetings an insight as to why people are visiting. BRACS is also used exclusively to inform their communities of the daily business of council and its workers. The facility also allows for the community schools to access the service and broadcast their own programs and learn about electronic media. But there are still a lot of communities which don't do local programming and allow the satellite feed to just keep broadcasting with white media. With appropriate funding and assistance this situation will no doubt change very shortly by empowering the communities about the use of BRACS and the direction they wish to take.

The development and establishment of our media groups around Australia has been extremely difficult, especially in the absence of progressive government policy for Indigenous media. The Department for Aboriginal and Islander Affairs commenced a policy development process back in 1986 which resulted in many draft reports being written but never made public, unless of course they fell off the back of a truck, which many did. The Indigenous Media Industry, along with its community base, became extremely frustrated when reports were not produced even though the consultation process, in an ad hoc fashion, had been conducted. The development of Indigenous Media was being hampered with the promise of a new policy for over 5 years. It was extremely hard for the broadcasting sector within the Department of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs to attract extra money without a clear policy. There were only a small number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander media groups who were fortunate enough to get on the funding list of the then DAA. The rest were left to fend for themselves or try to acquire the little amount of funding available for Aboriginal broadcasting in the Public broadcasting sector. In some cases the funding arrangements were a matter of who screamed the loudest and knocked at the Department's door the longest. This was certainly no way to develop an industry.

It was not until October, 1991 that the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission along with the Department for Transport and Communication wrote a discussion paper about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander broadcasting policy. After several meetings with people involved in Indigenous media, national media groups and the relevant departments concerned ATSIC produced in January 1993 an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Broadcasting policy review report and draft policy statement. After ATSIC received written responses from the Industry, its regional councils, relevant government departments and community members the commission developed a policy which was endorsed in April at its 22nd Commissioners meeting. But according to the outcome of this meeting the implementation of this new policy is dependent on a number of factors such as NIMAA, the National Indigenous Media Association of Australia becoming fully representative and operational. There would need to be an investigation into transmission options and funding models, a strategy to look at the revitalisation of BRACS, the Australian Broadcasting Authority's planning processes. Also most important is the adoption of a national broadcasting training strategy written specifically for Indigenous Media. Once all these factors are complete ATSIC will prepare and publish its Broadcasting policy and program management guidelines.

The new policy paper is reflective to a certain extent of what is happening within the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Broadcasting industry and what will be developed in the future. However, there are still some areas of concern. The major one being is the use of the word broadcasting when in actual fact we as the industry talk about media to include our newspaper outlets. There are other areas of concern but it is apparent that ATSIC plan to use the newly formed National Indigenous Media Association as a body to consult with and receive advice from. We as the Indigenous Media industry now have a forum to negotiate from.

There is one other important aspect of this new paper that ATSIC, as a long term objective which will seek, in association with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Broadcasters, recognition and appropriate funding of Indigenous broadcasting as a broadcasting sector in its own right within the framework of the government's mainstream broadcasting structure. This is certainly something that we have been saying for many years and its promising that ATSIC should adopt it as one of its objectives.

At the moment media organizations who receive ATSIC grants are required to go to their ATSIC regional councils for funding. This raises a conflict of interest. Our communities expect Indigenous Media to report as truthfully and fairly as possible on all stories we broadcast. But in some instances it becomes extremely difficult for this to happen in relation to ATSIC, our funding body. If there is an adverse story about a regional council or councilor it becomes very difficult that these same people decide on your organisation's funding. It has been described in the past as biting the hand that feeds you. This is a major reason why the funding of Indigenous media needs to be separated from ATSIC. Also within ATSIC we are competing for funds that provide housing, health, education and other services to our people. I feel it's important that if we are going to compete for funding it should be within the communications sector of government.

As Indigenous media groups we have operated for many years in separate arenas. There were the groups who received DAA/ATSIC funding, and the groups who broadcast on Public radio; others who broadcast on the ABC; the print media; the television and video production groups and not forgetting our individual Indigenous media workers in the ABC and the SBS. We all knew that we wanted to form a National body to include all Indigenous media groups and people as a forum to assist the struggle and endeavours of our community within this industry. In May 1992 a meeting was held in Canberra which formed the National body on an interim basis and in May 1993 the National Indigenous Media Association of Australia held its inaugural Annual General Meeting. The Association's major objective is to represent Indigenous media groups individually and collectively on a local, state, national and international basis while maintaining and respecting the uniqueness and authority of every group. As a collective of all Indigenous media in Australia we want to enhance and further develop the industry nationally and assist communities in the establishment, operating and development of their own media.

Like many of my fellow workers I have developed visions for the future in relation to Indigenous Media in Australia. I don't think my vision is very different from that of other people. I would like Australia to recognize there is an Indigenous media sector which does exist and has existed and developed for many years. We currently have the ABC and SBS fully funded and resourced by the Federal government as national media services. Why then not a national Indigenous media service? Why not a national Indigenous television station which can be accessed from anywhere in Australia. The service should have the capacity to not only be televised from a capital city, but also to broadcast from a region such as the Kimberley. And also, Indigenous media should have the capabilities of BRACS by being able to intercept the national broadcast and televising our own appropriate programs locally. This would need to be an important aspect of the service in recognition of our cultural diversity and the language differences within Australia's Indigenous nation. The same approach could also apply to radio on a national scale, which would ensure that communities that don't receive Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander radio can do so. Also the Indigenous media sector could provide support and resources to its member associations by way of providing a national news service, music library, research assistance, technical advice and even administer the funding to its member groups. The possibilities for our future development are endless but we can't do it without community and government support. After all we are an essential service and we see ourselves as providers of a service for all Australians. A service that reflects the cultural diversity of this country.

White Australia is now realizing there is Black Australia and, more importantly, is appreciating us as a people and feeling very proud of its Indigenous culture. This alone is an important is an important achievement , but we do need to reflect this culture more within our media by portraying Indigenous life in all its diversity. With this a greater understanding and awareness will evolve and a healthier Australia will emerge. Indigenous people no longer want to be the forgotten lot in a land of chatter.

I will end with these words from a poem of Jack Davis'.

Let these two worlds combine,
Yours and mine.
The door between us is not locked,
Just ajar.

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