http://www.abc.net.au
ABC: Art, Reconciliation and the National Identity
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/01/08/1813623.htm
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) is one of the two government-funded, national public broadcasters in Australia (the other one being the SBS). In addition to the radio and television broadcasts, the ABC runs a vast website with online TV, radio, podcasts, blogs, news and other resources of information on a huge range of topics.
In 2007, Stephen Sewell (Australian playwright and script writer, for example for the movie “The Long Way Home”) wrote a news story on abc.net.au, titled “Art, Reconciliation and the National Identity“. The article starts with George Miller’s (famous Australian filmmaker, like The Mad Max Trilogy, Happy Feet, Babe), who) comments on Australian film, and national identity.
Sewell quickly describes the Mabo decision of the High Court and the importance of the annulment of the Terra Nullis concept, and he further goes on complaining about the (then current) government for not using that chance to create a totally new identity, instead of maintaining and reassuring an old, flawed identity in the first place. Art (movies, theatre, music, novels…) can be one way of overcoming differences between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians – a unresolved conflict that will remain until there is a way to include both under one term: Australian.
