50books_poc | Entries tagged with indigenous australian

zara-capeverde.livejournal.com

The Final Passage by Caryl Phillips

Tells the story of Leila, a young woman from an unspecified Caribbean island, her doomed marriage and later migration to England.

Phillips' style is very poetic. There are some flat-out beautiful descriptions of the sea and the colours of the island, which are later contrasted strongly with the monotone grey of London. The connection between the environment and the state of Leila and Michael's marriage is cleverly intertwined the whole way through - as they cast off to sea it seems their relationship has a breath of futurity, but then the weather and poverty of life in England begin to make it claustrophobic again. Here for instance: The sky hung so low it covered the street like a dark coffin lid. The cars that passed by were just blurry colours, and the people rushed homeward, images of isolation, fighting umbrellas and winds that buffeted their bodies. . The book is much more focussed on tone than plot, however, and it ends quite abruptly. It is intentionally timeless, and it is a good exploration of the trials of emigration, but I think if it was less vague it would possibly have more authenticity and meaning. I enjoyed it though.

A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary For Lovers by Xiaolu Guo

Zhaung flies to the UK to learn English, then falls in love with an English man and discovers that the language of love is even harder to comprehend.

I absolutely loved this book. I loved Z. It's been a while since I read a female protagonist who is as smart, funny and bold as she is. I think this book might annoy some people because of the way it starts with deliberately broken English, but I am a word geek and I adored all the discussions about English vs Chinese words (there's a particularly moving section where Z and her English lover exchange the words for different plants). I am a sucker for romance, and I liked that it felt sort of clumsily natural and that there were problems and miscommunications, because that is real love. This book also had really great descriptions of London (like The Final Passage): The morning wind is washing my brain, and my small body. This is a city with something really heavy and serious in its soul. This is a city which had big wars in the history. And, I feel, this is a city made for mans, and politics, and disciplines. Like Beijing. Highly recommend this novel, I'll be checking out more of her writing asap.

Legacy by Larissa Behrendt

Simone is a young Aboriginal lawyer researching the legal arguments for Indigenous sovereignty. Her father is a prominent Aboriginal activist. The two have a troubled relationship due to his chronic infidelity. The novel explores the dynamics between all the people in Simone's life, as well as the legacy of Aboriginal dispossession. I have a heart that has been quick to fall in love with ideals ... but I’ve never been as willing to love realities

I struggled a little bit to get into this book because I thought some of the literary/historical references were forced in toward the beginning but by the middle, and certainly throughout all of the second part, the story really took off and I couldn't put it down. Again, Simone is a strong and sympathetic leading character, and it was great to see a female lead with such integrity. Behrendt is very talented at writing in more than one voice, she allows every character to have their say on the truth and to redeem themselves. I haven't read a book that was so good at heart for a long while. It is lighter than you might expect given some of the subject matter (not that it shies away from it or anything, just that it is the familial/romantic relationships that are the core of the plot not the political issues) and it is a great book if you just want something uplifting to read.

sweet-adelheid.livejournal.com

50books_poc year ends on January 31, and although I have still been reading, I've gotten slack with posting reviews. So here's an 8-book catchup post.

#40 - Skim, by Mariko Tamaki and Jill Tamaki ( Read more... )

#41 - Tales from Outer Suburbia, by Shaun Tan ( Read more... )

#42 - Papunya School Book of History and Country by the Papunya School community ( Read more... )

#43 - Kampung Boy, by Lat ( Read more... )

#44 - Not Meeting Mr Right, by Anita Heiss ( Read more... )

#45 - The Wheel of Surya, by Jamila Gavin ( Read more... )

#46 - Swallow the Air, by Tara June Winch ( Read more... )

#47 - Love poems and other revolutionary actions, by Roberta (Bobbi) Sykes ( Read more... )

sweet-adelheid.livejournal.com

Digger J Jones by Richard J Frankland (Scholastic, 2007)

Richard Frankland is a well known and highly regarded playwright. This is his first novel: the diary of a Koori boy in 1967, with links to the community at Lake Condah, to the indigenous political organisations centred in Northcote (Melbourne) leading up to the May 27th referendum.

This book does - from my clueless white girl viewpoint - a marvelous job of explaining what was going on in 1967. Vietnam. The referendum. The sheer stupidity of the mere need for the referendum.

The emnity-into-friendship of Digger and Darcy is a highlight of the book: the way that they are forced, again and again, into each other's orbit. I love the involvement of the churches (historically accurate, thank you) in the whole thing: the Catholic church through Sister Ally, and the Aboriginal Evangelical Fellowship (I have to assume) through Digger's family. (I do wish I wasn't constantly wanting to call him "Dumby", though. It's the effect of having every Year Nine in my school studying Deadly, Unna? this year.)

It's at least as good as as Anita Heiss' Who Am I? The Diary of Mary Talance, and it's great to see Frankland writing YA books. While I'm sure this has used a lot of Frankland's own life experience (like Digger, Frankland is a Gunditjmara man with links to Condah), I hope he goes on to write more.

(New tags: a: frankland richard)

sweet-adelheid.livejournal.com

#35 - Michelle Cooper, The Rage of Sheep
YA lit by an author I already loved, but only recently discovered was a POC. Hester (like the author) is Indian-Fijian/Australian, growing up in a country town in NSW. The characters are marvellous, as are both plot and subplots. More here

#36 - Waleed Aly, People Like Us: How Arrogance is Dividing Islam and the West
Thinking a book is fabulous does not necessarily mean that one agrees with every word. This is one of those books. I think I'm more willing to mentally argue with the author because we're so very much of the same generation that we were in the same law school class. More here

#37 - Edna Tantjingu Williams and Eileen Wani Wingfield, illustrated by Kunyi June-Anne McInerney, Down the Hole Up the Tree Across the Sandhills...: ...Running from the State and Daisy Bates
Heart breaking. Heart shattering. Just as it ought to be. A really great, and effective, story of the realities of the Stolen Generations. In English with use of Yankunytjatjara, Kokatha and Matutjara languages (with translations and pronunciation guide). More here

#38 - Mary Malbunka, When I Was Little, Like You
The story of growing up as an indigenous child in a remote community: of moving around, of living as much as they could off the land. Beautiful illustrations, also by Malbunka. Uses Luritja words as well as English: as with Down the Hole the book includes a glossary and pronunciation guide. This is going to be one of those books I automatically buy as presents for every little baby I have a connection with. More here

Tagging - a: malbunka mary, a: williams edna tantjingu, a: wingfield eileen wani, a: cooper michelle, a: aly waleed, i: mcinerney kunyi june-anne, fijian-indian-australian, egyptian-australian

emma-in-oz.livejournal.com

Mudrooroo, Us Mob: History, Culture, Struggle: An Introduction to Indigenous Australia (1995)

This is a series of lectures given by Mudrooroo. I don’t see where they were given in the introduction, but I assume it was to an audience with some background in Indigenous studies because he assumes a reasonable level of knowledge in the reader.

There are lectures on health, education, law, religion, history and culture. What I found most interesting about them was the endnotes, as he calls on a network of Indigenous writers. Almost all the endnotes he references are other writers of colour.

You can find out more about Mudrooroo at: http://mudrooroo.com/

sweet-adelheid.livejournal.com

This gets me totally and completely up to date on posting reviews to

50books_poc. Until I finish my next book, anyway...

Us Mob by Mudrooroo (1995, Angus & Robertson)

This is going on my "want to own" and "Indigenous Australia 101" lists. It does exactly what it says on the cover: provide an introduction to a whole lot of issues relating to Indigenous Australians. It's organised by general topic area, with chapters on health, spirituality, language, education, politics, land rights... It's immediately post-Mabo, so it's about fifteen years old at this point. The concluding chapter looks forward so specifically to 2000 as hopefully being the year of Australia becoming a republic that it hurts. (In fact, when this was published, Howard wasn't in government yet: ain't *that* a sobering thought. Things were about to get a whole lot worse...)

( Highlights/Lowlights )

Fabulous book, well worth time and effort.

Tags needed: a: mudrooroo

sweet-adelheid.livejournal.com

Spirit song: A collection of Aboriginal Poetry by Lorraine Mafi-Williams (Omnibus, 1993)

I enjoyed this one more than Inside Black Australia, although that's likely more because of where I was in my head when I read Spirit Song vs Inside Black Australia. Also, there were a lot more female poets included in this collection, and a female editor. Which I think made a lot of difference.

While I do think my reactions come down at least in part to the changes in my own way of thinking in the interim, this collection has the aim of being a collection for children and young people. IBA had an activist aim.

Which isn't to say the collection goes soft on the politics. But it was put together many years after IBA, and in a different climate, by a different editor.

My favourite poems are both mentioned in the introduction: "Integration" by Jack Davis, and "Visions" by Eva Johnson. They are two of the more positive poems, although neither pulls its punches. I used Davis' poem to round off a recent sermon.

The final stanza of a Barbara Armytage poem ("Survival") near the end of the collection sums up so much for me:

They aimed for extinction
We survived with grace
We gather and teach
The remains of our race.

Tags ed: mafi-williams lorraine

sweet-adelheid.livejournal.com

Black Chicks Talking by Leah Purcell (Hodder Headline, 2002)

This book is going on my personal "learning about Australia 101" list. I'm going to badger all my friends into reading it if they haven't already. Because this book is ... I can't think of any better word: this book is awesome. It fills me with awe.

These ten women - the nine interviewees plus Purcell herself - share so much of themselves in this book, and so openly. And yet also so matter-of-factly. They don't pull punches about the awful parts of life, but what shines through so clearly is the shared humanity of all of us. Which is why it's going to be top of my 101 list.

It's close to impossible to choose a favourite interview or interviewee, or even a 'most influential' one. Cilla Malone (mother of five - I think) left me breathless and amazed by what she does in caring for her children and her community; Tammy Williams has done a staggering amount; Deb Mailman is just so strong and centred, as is Rachel Perkins only in an entirely different way; and Liza Gooda-Frazer in a different way again. Kathryn Hay - who in many ways seems the most fragile of the group - has such grace in letting that fragility show, along with another core of strength that is there as well.

I just love the way this is written (put together), along with the Black Chicks painting (all in shades of pink!) and the portraits of all the women, and Leah's description of their dinner together as the culmination of the project.

Tags needed: a: purcell leah, and I'd love an "interviews" tag or similar, too.

vass

27. Doris Pilkington, Follow the Rabbit-Proof Fence
This was a surprisingly easy read for something so heartbreaking. I could probably give it to my seven-year-old niece - there wasn't anything there too old for her to comprehend. The parts that are truly hard to comprehend are hard for me too at age 28: how did we (white Australians) do that. How are we still doing it? I liked that this was a realistic book about Indigenous Australians' agency, not about passive victims. But it excuses nothing.

28. Amin Maalouf, Balthasar's Odyssey
This book was traumatic in a totally silly way that I'm sure the author didn't intend: it's about a man who gets hold of a book that he really really wants to read... and then it's taken out of his hands before he can read it. As a bookworm, I find this distressing. And it gets worse from there as he goes from country to country looking for his lost book.

29. Tobias Buckell, Crystal Rain
30. Tobias Buckell, Ragamuffin
31. Tobias Buckell, Sly Mongoose
I'll take these three together, as they're a trilogy. I'm glad I read them in order - some people had said it doesn't matter which order you read them in, but I think it does. This is space opera/military SF, but it's also very definitely postcolonial literature. But you can enjoy it purely as space opera if that's what you prefer. I liked it both ways. I also enjoyed in Sly Mongoose, after two books about alien overlords and space pirates and airships, the sudden SURPRISE ZOMBIES. I would like to add a trigger warning for Sly Mongoose. Folks with eating disorders: there is a bulimic character, and this is described in detail.

Finally, a question: who else is trying to read 50 books by POC this year? Are you running out of time? Are you getting edgy about it? I started late, and I've got 19 books to go, and there are 17 weeks left of the year. That's cutting it a little fine for my taste.

sweet-adelheid.livejournal.com

This is the book that has held up my other reviews. Which is probably a good thing, because my initial opinion of it is certainly a little different now than it was when I first read the book about six weeks ago.

Summary: Deep beneath the land is the Rainbow Spirit or the Rainbow Snake, the eternal source of life and spiritual power. [The authors] identify God the Creator with the Rainbow Spirit and they see in Christ the incarnation of the Rainbow Spirit in human form, which for them is Aboriginal Australian.

My first comment is related to authorship. I puzzled initially over whether this book "counted", even though my gut feeling is that it does. The people who physically wrote the words down are white: Rob Bos and Norman Habel. But the group who came up with the words, whose work is behind this, and who have (as the introduction states) approved the final version of the words, are all Indigenous Australians: George Rosendale, Nola Archie, Dennis Corowa, William Coolburra, Eddie Law and James Leftwich. Jasmine Corowa was the group's artist. (I know Dennis and James a little, and hugely respect both them and George - of whom I've heard - and have been on a committee with Rob for the past three years.) In the end, I think saying that this *doesn't* count would be infantilising the Rainbow Spirit Elders; essentially saying that they didn't "really" participate in this work.

( Comments on content )

Ultimately - this book is a way that I can listen to the Elders, and I need to view it in that light. I will benefit greatly from re-reading this book and contemplating it further. Of that I am absolutely certain.

sweet-adelheid.livejournal.com

Quick-version reviews:

#22 - Infidel: My Life by Ayaan Hirsi Ali
Hirsi Ali grew up in Somalia, Saudi Arabia and Kenya. Her experiences of Islam cross a spectrum from her (mostly-absent) father's approach, which in some ways allowed interpretation and debate but in other ways was highly traditional, through to devotion to the calls for the renewal of Islam by the Muslim Brotherhood. She's now become in/famous for her calls to consider ways in which Islam may be problematic.

#23 - The Dreaming, Vol 1-3 by Queenie Chan
Although manga is enough of a departure from my regular type of reading that I feel justified in posting it here, I couldn't count the three volumes as separate books. Only the third volume took more than an afternoon/evening to read. In the end, I can't recommend this book, because of what I (ymmv) see as a very problematic treatment of Indigenous Australian cultures and traditions. More info at my LJ.

#24 - Inside Black Australia: An Anthology of Aboriginal Poetry, edited by Kevin Gilbert.
Published in 1988 as a "Bicentennial" year protest, this collection is full of anger, and I found most of it very hard to cope with. I did persevere through to the end though, and I'm glad I did, as Gilbert's own poetry is last in the collection, and despite the fact that his introductions both to other poets and himself had angered and alienated me, I found that some of his poems were *beautiful*, and that they portrayed their anger in a way that allowed me to process it, rather than just putting up a wall. Note: many readers of this comm may find my review difficult or potentially offensive, particularly on "tone argument" grounds.

#25 - The Audacity of Hope by Barack Obama
I started reading this before the election, but only just finished it, for the simple reason that I own it, and thus it wasn't subject to library due dates. It is a great book, and I'll have to boost Dreams from my Father further up my To Read list.

violent-rabbit.livejournal.com

3rd book: Persepolis by Maejane Satrapi

Everyone has read it and if you haven't you should. A wonderful, exquisitely wrought piece on growing up Iranian. It has beautiful evocative illustrations without the uncanny valley of realism.

4th book: Walking the Boundaries by Jackie French, illustrated by Bronwyn Bancroft

I'm being a little cheeky here as Jackie French is a white lady, albeit grown up in the bush. However the illustrator, Bronwyn Bancroft is a descendant of the Bunjalung people of New South Wales. If this book doesn't fit into the criteria of this challenge (as it is a POC authors challenge) I will be happy to delete it.

It is a beautiful book, time and space. It has that lovely clarity that young adult books sometimes possess and is wonderful moving in an understated way. I do recommend it if only for your own and young person of your acquaintance.

5th Book: Emily Kame Kngwarreye: Utopia: the Genius of Emily Kame Kngwarreye

Exhibition Catalouge. Details of the exhibition can be found here:http://www.nma.gov.au/exhibitions/utopia_the_genius_of_emily_kame_kngwarreye/catalogue/

This catalogue was an inclusive look at her history as well as insightful essay that do not get too bogged down in art speak. Also includes a biography, history time line, and pictures of Utopia. Margo Neale's essay is featured here and as I had the very good fortune to hear her speak on this exhibition it is well worth the read. great for anyone interested in Indigenous Australian art, contemporary or no as it provides a certain sort of Rosetta stone for anyone uninitiated in a kind of indigenous world view.

violent-rabbit.livejournal.com

Second Book: Stradbroke Dreamtime by Oodgeroo aka Kath Walker

The first half details stories from her childhood, growing up in the traditional Aboriginal manner and the second half is a collection of Dreamtime stories.

This is primarily a children's book, but do not let that turn you off! There is a beautiful rich imagery to all though this and the simplistic writing only serves to further the wonderful visuals. There is a wistful and loving tone that creates a lovely warmth throughout the entire recollections. It is a a nice gentle introduction to what life was like in her childhood as an aborigine near the bush (for a clueless suburbanite like myself).

I was struck, personally, at how sad most of the Dreamtime stories were. I am of the opinion that one purpose they served was as warnings coded into tales- don't wander off or the bunyip will turn you into a vine- which it a tradition throughout all cultures with active children.

Well worth the read.

sweet-adelheid.livejournal.com

Books #16-19

16. The Trouble with Islam, by Irshad Manji
Manji is a Canadian of Indian ancestry whose early life was in Uganda before Idi Amin expelled the Asian population. The book (which I read in an original edition - it was later renamed as The Trouble with Islam Today, although I don't know if that involved any changes to the text) was first published in 2003. I liked it, and found a lot in it to make me think, and that I admired. However, I also know that this book is *not* highly thought of in many quarters. (It was, therefore, refreshing to find Randa Abdel-Fattah saying pretty much the same main argument in The Age newspaper on the weekend.) More here.

17. Stradbroke Dreamtime, by Oodgeroo Noonuccal and Bronwyn Bancroft
A beautiful book - part memoir of Oodgeroo's childhood, and part collection of stories from the Dreaming. Bronwyn Bancroft's artwork is an absolute highlight and, for me, really makes this book something special. More here.

18. Secrets of the Red Lantern: Stories and Recipes from the Heart, by Pauline Nguyen
Far more than a cookbook. A memoir of Nguyen's family, a beautifully produced book, mouthwatering food photography... I can't recommend this highly enough. More here.

19. Daisy Kutter: The Last Train, by Kazu Kibuishi
My first ever comic book/manga! Set in a world that's pretty much Firefly crossed with Star Wars, Daisy is a retired gunslinger lured out of retirement for a Train Job. There's clearly a lot of backstory, but I'm fairly sure that this is the first (currently only, unfortunately) Daisy Kutter comic. As I think both Daisy and her unfortunate sidekick Tom are fabulous characters (very white, though, for those who would find that a problem), I rather hope there are more to come. More here.

vass

I'm taking the opportunity, while doing this challenge, of reading some books for young readers, and planning on buying them and giving them to my seven-year-old niece for Christmas and her birthday. I'm definitely going to give her Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni's The Conch-Bearer, which I read a few weeks ago and loved, and Madhur Jaffrey's Seasons of Splendor, which my parents gave me when I was about her age.

Anyway, it occurred to me that I should be giving her books by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander authors, since we're Australian, and it's their land. The only books I'm familiar with are either too old for her (My Place, which I'm embarassed to admit I haven't read myself yet - that's definitely on my list) or too young (picture books of Dreamtime stories.) So, does anyone have some recommendations for me and Niece? Any Aboriginal Australian authors would be great, but Wurundjeri authors would be particularly meaningful, because we live on Wurundjeri land.