In black & white: Australians All at the Crossroads

Next Wednesday, 5 June, Jonny Samengo, Director of Scots College’s Indigenous Program, will launch In black & white: Australians All at the Crossroads at Oscar and Friends Bookshop, Cross Street, Double Bay (6.00pm Wednesday 5 June). Mr Samengo wrote a chapter, ‘Whatever the Problem, Education is the Answer: The Scots College Experience’. Also speaking will be Aboriginal scholarship boy Curtley Oakley, a charmer who has ‘adopted’ Scots, one of two boys who also wrote for the book.

Same morning at Curtin University in Perth, the book will be launched by WA Shadow Treasurer the Hon. Ben Wyatt. Other launches will be by: Professor Marcia Langton, Celtic Club, Melbourne; Chief Minister Adam Giles, Alice Springs; Professor Mick Dodson, University of Canberra; and Chancellor Professor Peter Shergold, UWS Penrith.

In black & white is published by Connor Court this week, Reconciliation Week. The aim is to engender a fresh, working-together approach to Aboriginal affairs: to ‘illuminate the issues through perspectives of concerned blackfellas and whitefellas, both, on root causes, how issues play out on the ground, and what needs to be done. It is the hope of the editors that experiences and ideas, from the community base to the heights of policy, may reveal the common ground that is sine-qua-non to working out real answers and practical programs that will make a difference.’

In black & white: Australians All at the Crossroads was generated at the University’s Centre for Positive Psychology and Education. Its co-editors, Professor Rhonda Craven, Director, Dr Anthony Dillon, Research Fellow, and Nigel Parbury (Survival), have brought together a range of Aboriginal and other-Australian thinkers and policy-makers, educators and community, diverse and at times diametric viewpoints, to conceive a new paradigm to supplant the ‘trench warfare’ that has bedevilled this crucial area far too long. In his Foreword, Chancellor Professor Peter Shergold distills his experience:

‘… after two decades, the scale of relative disadvantage suffered by Indigenous Australians remained as intractable as ever. I can think of no failure in public policy that has had such profound consequences … That is why it is important to bring fresh eyes, sharp minds, a range of experience and a no-holds-barred honesty to debates on Aboriginal Affairs …

In contrast to the angst or anger of most Aboriginal affairs discourse, In black & white is positive, with a confident focus on how we can make a difference, and, in particular, how the talents of Aboriginal Australians can be realized to make Australia what we always should have been:

‘As the subtitle’s reference to our National Anthem suggests, all Australians - that’s all of us – must put an end ‘one-time’ (right now, once and for all) to the wastage of Aboriginal talent and the denial of the real Australia that has diminished our nation far too long.’

As Professor Shergold writes:

I commend the editors … They have taken on a task that is difficult and potentially thankless, but their efforts are critically important. They have done a great job … I am proud that this important volume has been conceived and brought to fruition at the University of Western Sydney, of which I am honoured to be Chancellor.’

Available from Connor Court and select bookshops.

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