From the initial unit in 2017, Deakin now offer 4 Aboriginal Studies elective units with more in development. Developed and taught by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander academics from NIKERI Institute, the elective units are available to all Deakin students across all campuses and courses.
IND101: Introduction to Aboriginal Studies
This unit will introduce you to Australia’s First Nation Peoples in a comprehensive and engaging exploration of both traditional and contemporary experience and expression of Australian Aboriginal culture, Knowledges, histories and identities from an Indigenous standpoint, and through a number of interdisciplinary perspectives. The unit will cover three clear movements of investigation from traditional modality and Australian Indigenous Knowledges; colonisation and its impact; and reclamation and reconciliation with a focus on Indigenous cultural forms and representation. You will learn about the complexities of spirituality, lore and traditional philosophy, to then understand the devastating impact of colonisation and its aftermath. The final portion of the unit will then address contemporary Indigenous culture and expression including language, story, art and creative expression allowing students to consider and explore self-representation as a method of expanding understandings of the diversity of Aboriginalities.
IND101 Introduction to Aboriginal Studies presents a thought provoking, dynamic and challenging cultural experience of Indigenous Australian history, culture and worldview and provides a foundation for developing sociocultural literacy and global application. This unit will compliment your choice of course or major, and can be taken as a discrete foundational unit or provide scaffolding into IND201 Aboriginal Knowledges and Experiences: Historical Journeys – Contemporary Perspectives as a second year elective.
IND102 Aboriginal Stories and Songlines
Aboriginal Stories and Songlines is a first year level unit. The unit examines Aboriginal Australian storytelling methods across a variety of historical and contemporary mediums: oral storytelling, paintings and artwork, film, television music, dance, literature, and online spaces. Indigenous people continue to actively re/produce and recite stories that explore Indigenous histories in time, the relationship between stories, songlines and Country, the impact of colonisation on storytelling and cultural production, and how stories act as forms of resistance and resilience. This first year elective unit is available to all students. Learn about Indigenous storytelling, the importance of preserving history through a variety of mediums and how the past can challenge modern perspectives.
IND201: Aboriginal Knowledges and Experiences: Histirial Journeys – Contemporary Perspectives
This unit will assist students to become change managers in their workplace and society overall whether they enter teaching, law, health, social work, development or any other profession. Australia is facing increasing scrutiny of the relationship between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal People. The future requires knowledge and understanding to ensure all people are able to participate wholesomely in a transforming global society. It provides in depth knowledge of historical and contemporary Aboriginal cultures
in Australia and gives an overview of social, educational, economic, health, policy and political issues. The aim is to empower students to understand current circumstances and develop appropriate skills and strategies that may be applied in a workplace or in liaison with Aboriginal Peoples or organisations.
This unit will compliment your choice of course or major as it examines: the complexity and diversity of pre-invasion societies, relationships between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal societies, the impacts of policy since invasion, community consultation and communication protocols and sensitive issues concerning appropriate terminology, employment strategies, social and political movements and more.
IND301 Politics of Resistance in Indigenous Australia
The unit will discuss the different forms that Indigenous resistance has taken since European occupation of the continent and explore why Indigenous peoples have and continue to resist. Students will critically engage and analyse Indigenous people’s struggle in the face of changing government administrative regimes and persistent social, economic and political discrimination. This unit is available for any students with electives available within their course. Learn Indigenous history and movements within Australia and the complexities Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples face in a colonised world.