The idea that we are what we do

One of the ways westerners introduce themselves or reveal themselves to strangers is by explaining what they ‘do’ – presumably for a living. We might have a calling, or a career, or a passion, a job, or a Centrelink number. To traditional Aboriginals, this would have all been meaningless.

When people gathered food or ate this was not a living, it was living.

If we could travel back in time and ask a pre-contact Aboriginal what they did all day, they might look at us like we are idiots. Their answer would be they ate food or drank water where it was available, and fulfilled social and religious duties. This is not a job description, but a list of functions like breathing. These are things you do without thinking or questioning because the point of life is to live.

In the west, a large number of us tend to think of those receiving government benefits – whether Aboriginals or whitefellas – as bludgers.

From a traditional Aboriginal’s perspective, government benefits might be thought of in this way:

·         we used to travel, and gather or hunt food.

·         we are no longer able to travel, and gather or hunt food.

·         we no longer have access to our place.

·         we are now expected to go away, sit down and do nothing.

·         we call these benefits ‘sit-down’ money because that is what it represents.

·         this is a strange new idea but it’s the way we must live now.

There is no doubt that for some non-traditional Aboriginals and whitefellas alike the expression ‘sit-down-money’ has something of an ironic ring to it. This is another ‘jobs’ issue we shall return to later.