Documenting Aboriginal Australia: A Study of Jack Davis’ Poetry

Abstract

Australian Aboriginal culture is regarded as the oldest continuous culture of the world by many critics. However, this culture came to the brink of extinction due to colonialism. The White people who colonised Australia not only massacred the Aborigines, but also took the children away from their parents, which stopped the transmission of the culture. Australian Aboriginal literature is an attempt to revive the Aboriginal culture. Australian Aboriginal culture not only documents the culture, but it also makes clear that the Aborigines were not stone-age people as depicted by the colonial narratives. This paper studies how Australian Aboriginal poetry depicts the relationship between land and people.