Acts of Ongoing Repression? Aboriginal Cultural Heritage and Landscape Protection in Postcolonial Australia

The colonisation of Australia was achieved through the diminishment of Aboriginal culture and their displacement from Country. Colonial processes silenced Aboriginal voices, subsuming them into supposedly science based knowledge structures that underpinned European legislation. Europeans spoke for and acted on the behalf of Aboriginal people. Progress has been made to redress the injustices of colonisation in postcolonial Australia. Significant government attention has been devoted to the issue of Aboriginal land rights and the recognition of Aboriginal cultural heritage. Several key Commonwealth Acts serving to restore Aboriginal people to Country and preserve Aboriginal cultural heritage landscapes and artefacts attest to this. However, much work needs to be done. Adopting an interpretive policy analysis approach, this chapter considers the extent to which government Acts provide an equitable framework for Aboriginal people to reclaim Country and their cultural heritage or whether these documents remain entrenched in colonial modes of thinking/acting that continue to disempower Aboriginal people, denying them restitution of Country and cultural heritage.