The continuing effect of dispossession on Aboriginal Spiritualties
Impact of dispossession is enormous and overwhelmingly detrimental
The impact of dispossession for Aboriginal people has been enormous and overwhelmingly detrimental. Broadly speaking, the history of dispossession can be divided into three key stages. Firstly, the colonial period of non-recognition, which were marked by the introduction of terminal European diseases, shootings, massacres and poisonings.
This was then secondly followed by the Paternalistic policy of protection, which began in the mid 1880s. This was followed by the equally detrimental Policy of assimilation, which began in the mid-twentieth century. As a part of and spanning across the official Government policies of Protection and Assimilation, are the dark episodes of the Stolen Generation. The term Stolen Generation refers to the mass removal of Australian Aboriginal children from their families by Government agencies and church missions between 1900 and 1972.
Impact of dispossession on Aboriginal spirituality
Two centuries of dispossession have had a devastatingly destructive effect upon Aboriginal Spirituality. Most significantly, the separation from land as a result of dispossession is tantamount to a loss of identity, since the Dreaming, which is central to Aboriginal spirituality, is inextricably connected to the land. The loss of land as a result of dispossession leads to the ever-present burden of not being able to fulfil ritual responsibilities. Separation from kinship groups, results in the loss of language, which effectively means that the ability to pass on beliefs in an authentic way has been destroyed.
Furthermore, separation from kinship groups leads to the destruction of the kinship system, which is a critical component of Aboriginal spirituality as it involves the passing on of Dreaming stories, traditional practices, laws and ritual responsibilities. Dispossessed from their traditional land Aboriginal people feel homeless, displaced and cut off from their spirituality and identity in the Dreaming.
Early colonial and frontier history
Dispossession began with European settlement in Australia. Within the first thirty to forty years of European settlement, the settlers wanted to remove the Aboriginals so that the land could be used for agriculture. European diseases to which Aboriginals had no immunity, wiped out large numbers of their community. However, some European settlers believed that the complete eradication of the Aboriginal people by natural selection was only a matter of time, because they considered Aboriginal people to be sub-human, barely above the chimpanzees on Darwin's scale of evolutionary development. This mentality justified the small-scale violence that rippled across the Australian frontier, as Australia's colonial history was marked with a series of massacres, poisonings, starvation and shootings.
Protection policy
It was not until the mid 1880s, however that the process of dispossession began to be organised on a large scale, as the Government brought in the paternalistic policy of protection. This policy reflects a change in the attitude of European settlers towards the Aboriginal people, as the push to "civilise" the Aboriginal people led to a reversal of the old policy of non-recognition.
The stated aim of the protection policies was to remove Aboriginal people from unsuitable environments and place them in the protection of the state by detaining them in Christian missions and government reserves. The actual intent of this policy was to isolate Aboriginal people from the rest of the community until such a time as their culture died out.
Many Christian missionaries to Aboriginal people worked in the sincere belief that they were assisting the Aboriginal people by providing education, health care, a place to live and work, and by proclaiming the gospel in order to save their souls. Unfortunately, those working for the missions were largely ignorant of the harm done to these people by taking them from their land and traditional communities. Some Christian missions did attempt to understand and work with traditional Aboriginal culture whilst others were brutal in their suppression of it.
Impact of protection policy on Aboriginal spirituality
The policy of protection had a vast and overwhelmingly detrimental affect upon Aboriginal spirituality. Firstly and most importantly, the separation and removal of large numbers of children from their families meant that these children were unable to maintain their cultural identity. This is because the relocation of these children considerable distances from their homes meant that they were unable to learn and maintain tradition beliefs from the Dreaming. The restriction on the practice of the kinship system, totems and ceremonial rituals, all of which are mediums through which the Dreaming is expressed, effectively means that an Aboriginal person's link with their spirituality has been severed. Secondly, the dislocation of Aboriginal people from the land caused a loss of Aboriginal cultural identity as the people of the Dreaming are inextricably connected to the land. In addition, many Aboriginal children also suffered malnutrition as the missions and reserves were often poorly managed and under-resourced. Even though on the whole, the policy of protection was detrimental to the Aboriginal people the mission environment did provide some small benefits, such as education and health care, which would not have been available to Aboriginal people elsewhere.

Assimilation policy and its effect on Aboriginal spirituality
Following on from the protection policy, the policy of assimilation, which began in the mid twentieth century, took Aboriginal people, particularly those who were considered "half caste" (i.e. of mixed Aboriginal and European descent) and tried to assimilate them into the white community. In this way, the Government hoped that Aboriginal people would eventually forget their cultural identity and become part of mainstream Australian society. This policy clearly led to a further degradation of Aboriginal communities.
The separation of Aboriginal children from families meant that they were denied an opportunity to learn and engage in cultural practices. The prohibition of traditional Aboriginal practices such as the totemic system, kinship and ceremonial rituals diminishes the ability to genuinely engage with the concept that lies at the heart of all Aboriginal communities, that is, the Dreaming. Similarly, the ban on the use of traditional Aboriginal languages led to the inability to pass on traditional beliefs in an authentic way. Finally and quite significantly, the dislocation of Aboriginal people from their traditional lands led to the burden of not being able to fulfil ritual responsibilities in relation to the land.
Ongoing social impact of assimilation policy
The Policy of assimilation, even if it was initially well intended, only helped to compound the problems, which arose as a result of living in missionary environments. Aboriginal people were expected to master all types of social skills that White Australians had developed over generations but they were not provided any opportunity to learn such skills. Over time this led to even bigger problems relating to education and employment. Even when Aborigines were provided with the same rights to education and employment as non-Indigenous Australians, the fact remains that due to historical circumstances equality of opportunity is still not provided to Aboriginal people.

Stolen Generation
Definition
The Stolen Generation is a term commonly used to refer to the Aboriginal children who were removed from their homes between 1900 and 1972 by the Government and church missionaries in an attempt to assimilate these children into White Australian society. The underlying motive behind this policy was the idea that the Aboriginal race could be bred out of existence. Consequently, most of the children who were removed from their homes were "half castes", that is, they were children of mixed descent.
Treatment of the Stolen Generation in foster homes
The children were sent to be brought up in foster homes or government institutions. In some cases these children were well cared for and looked after. In other cases, maltreatment, sexual exploitation and humiliation were common.
The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission in 1996 published a report on the Stolen Generation titled "Bringing Them Home", which documents the abuse of many Aboriginal children in their adopted homes. Many Aboriginal children experienced unjust and inhumane working conditions as they were exploited by unscrupulous business people.
It is estimated in the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission report that between one in three and one in ten Aboriginal children were separated from their families between the years of 1900 and 1972, though no one knows exactly how many children were removed from their mothers.

The removal of an entire generation of children from their families clearly had a destructive effect on the ability of these children to retain their cultural identities. Separation from tribal elders and prohibitions from using their traditional languages and practices was an effective way of severing Aboriginal children's ties with the Dreaming. The removal of these children from their traditional lands means that they could no longer learn or fulfil their ritual responsibilities.
To deny indigenous Australians access to their land is effectively to sever their ties with the Dreaming because the Dreaming is inextricably connected to the land