History of The Australian Aboriginal People Essay

History of The Australian Aboriginal People - Essay Example However, what appears to be clear is that the first Aboriginal settlers colonized what is now Australia between 30,000 and 80,000 years ago via what is now Papua New Guinea or what is now Indonesia (Australian Aboriginal History, 2002; Siasoco, 2006). In 2001 the population of aborigines and Torres Straits Islanders was 366,429, approximately 1.9% of the Australian population as a whole and slightly more than the estimated aboriginal population of 350,000 at the time of European colonization in the late 18th century. At the time of the European invasion, there were 500-600 distinct groups of aborigines speaking about 200 different languages or dialects [at least 50 of which are now extinct] (Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 2006). Although culturally diverse, these groups were not political and economic entities and lacked class hierarchies and chiefs. These aboriginal people were hunter-gatherers who lived in small family groups of 15or 30, called bands. Bands were the basic residential and economic unit (Siasoco, 2006; Arrernte Culture, 2006). Despite their variety and differences, the aboriginal people possess several unifying factors. ... People within these social networks frequently co-operated to exploit abundant resources during good seasons or to share scarce resources during drought or flood (Siasoco, 2006). The aboriginal people are a culturally and religiously rich people. Their social structure, family ties and classification system is almost as complex as the people. However, spiritually, unlike other religions, aboriginal belief does not place the human species apart from or on a higher level than nature. Their spirituality involves a close relationship between humans and nature. Aborigines believe some of their Ancestors metamorphosed into nature (as in rock formations or rivers), where they remain spiritually alive. In the oral tradition of storytelling, aborigines refer to the beginning of the world as "Dreaming," or "Dreamtime. In the "Dreaming", or the Alchera of the Aranda, the aborigines believed that their ancestors who rose from below the earth wandered on a featureless world and gave the world its present shape and form; they believe that their ancestors metamorphosed to form different various parts of nature including animal species, bodies of water, and the sky (Arrernte Culture, 2006; Australian Aboriginal History, 2002). The aborigines have an intricate classification system that defines kinship relations and regulates marriages. The Kariera, for example, are divided into hordes, or local groups of about 30 people, which are divided into four classes, or sections. Membership in a section determines ritual and territorial claims. In half of the hordes the men are divided among the Karimera and Burung sections; in the other half they are divided among the Palyeri and Banaka sections. These sections are exogamous, and rules of marriage, descent, and residence