Revitalization of Indigenous Culture in Child Care Centre.

Contemporary Australians are trying to redress the negative effects of the country's colonial past. The current effort for reconciliation is commonly understood as "creating a new relationship between settler Australia and its Indigenous people" (Merlan, 2005, p. 485), while decolonization is understood as "an attempt to reflect critically on the nature, scope, and process of colonialism, particularly its impact on colonized people and their environments" (Thaman, 2003, p. 1). Consequently, Aboriginal culture and ideas of Aboriginality are in a continuous process of adaptation and change. Various authors (Cowlishaw, 1993; Creamer, 1988; Kolig, 2005; Maddock, 2002; Merlan, 2005; Morton, 1998; Sutton, 1988) present different theories of cultural revitalization in rural and urban Australia today. Reay (1964), Maddock, and Morton reject the idea of creating the contemporary Aboriginal culture by transmission of cultural elements derived from the pre-contact period. However, authors such as Sutton, Cowlishaw, and Kolig (2002, 2005), argue for reflexivity, inventiveness, or adaptation of the emerging culture. This includes "revitalization," or a "voluntary act of adopting certain historical cultural practices and investing them with a new meaning by staging an event of certain elements of what is perceived to be traditional culture, as well as interaction with the contemporary western society" (Chevallier, 2005, p. 120). (2) Every revival of this kind, "represents the creation of tradition . production of a new narrative, invoking the past and demonstrating its present" (Chevallier, p. 120). Besides defining this terminology, I also explain the usage of the word, indigenous, so crucial for the whole study. When talking about the natives of Australia, I refer to Aboriginal people or Indigenous people, but when talking about native people in general, I refer to indigenous people. This is a common practice for dealing with the indigenous category (e.g., Kolig, 2002 or Niezen, 2003). The revitalization of indigenous cultures takes place in different areas and always reflects its actors-be they indigenous intellectuals, activists, men, or women. Most of the existing research is focused on the functioning of the remote communities in an effort to trace the remaining culture; however, there has not been much research within the urban context. At the same time, as Merlan (1988) depicts, there is a lack of knowledge on how men and women are positioned today within the Australian Aboriginal society. Gender separation in ceremonial and social life that used to be crucial for Aboriginal ways of living must be reflected even in today's workings of their community. However, there are few studies on revitalization of indigenous culture in both male and female domains. Those available are Ralstone (1993) and Yamada (2001). It also needs to be mentioned that, globally, the existing gender discussion has arisen through research stimulated by European concerns about the nature of women's involvement in society. Partly due to western orientation of these discussions, the specific problems of the modern Aboriginal communities have not been tackled. This led me to focus on the workings of an urban family care centre run by a community of Aboriginal women in Brisbane. The way this centre deals with child care, educational programmes for youth, and maternal issues carries many aspects of revitalizing the old culture. I will attempt to provide a thorough description of the functioning of the organization, its members, and its programmes and show how the particular activities of the centre are designed in order to uplift the contemporary Aboriginal family care by remodelling the old cultural patterns. The findings in the study may be a contribution to the current discourse on cultural revival and decolonization in the Pacific, but also another little step toward the gender issues within the contemporary indigenous communities. When exploring the field, I drew on a vast literature base, concerning two larger bodies of work: cultural revitalization in the Pacific and the traditional women's culture. …