Views from the outer and inner suburbs. This article presents current trends in divorce in Australia. It covers the number of divorces, the divorce rate, reasons for divorcing and numbers of children involved. This article presents a collection of papers on family life amongst Torres Strait Islanders. It begins with a paper by Paul Ban, a consultant engaged by the Torres Strait community, reviewing the traditional adoption practice of the Islanders, followed by a discussion of the legal recognition of customary adoption.
Adoption involves the permanent transfer of a child from one extended family member to another.
The next paper briefly describes the history of Torres Strait Islanders since European contact, their traditional culture and languages and the geography of the Torres Strait Islands. The final paper by Steve Mam, McRose Elu, Ivy Trevallion, and Allan Reid, uses the coconut palm tree as a metaphor for Islander family life. Each part of the tree is used to describe a principle such as the roots of the tree signify the foundation and heritage of family life and the leaves of the tree depict the extended family. This paper on Aboriginal families and kinship begins by briefly discussing what Aboriginal life was like before 'British invasion' in 1788. The author then examines current Aboriginal family life and how Aborigines have retained their Aboriginal identity.