Courting Blakness

A lack of knowledge of various religious and cultural beliefs can be argued to be a leading factor towards violence and discrimination. According to Foster (2014: 256), ignorance ‘is a primary source of and impetus of violence.’ Cross-cultural and cross-faith understanding is therefore crucial to modern society. This is especially relevant when considering the history of violent and discriminatory acts directed at Indigenous Australians. Henceforth, doing something towards building peace, acceptance and tolerance for Aboriginal people is of upmost importance. The Courting Blakness art exhibition does just this.

This month, the University of Queensland’s Great Court was filled with artworks for the Courting Blakness Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University public exhibition. Three visually astounding, abstractly challenging and thought stimulating artworks were placed at various points throughout the Great Court.

The chosen location for this public exhibition was significant in itself. The selected university environment represents a particular history. The Great Court describes a meeting place of different academic disciplines, artists and thinkers throughout the ages. The carvings on the sandstone buildings describe this specific history of intellectuals. So, this exhibition invites the academic university community, and therefore the future people, thinkers and leaders of the world, to reflect on relevant history and engage with the Great Court through new conversations about issues that matter to both Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.

In an increasingly digital age, by getting students to stop and think, art in the unique space of a university campus can act as social activism. This aforementioned exhibition takes advantage of a potential university space to interact with issues to do with Aboriginality in contemporary society. Courting Blakness approaches the university sphere to address Indigenous discrimination and difference. It confronts ideas about humanity through the space of public art.

This exhibition does not specifically aim to teach the audience anything in particular, but rather gets people to think and feel. This is especially the case with Debt by Ryan Presley. This particular piece presents a range of revised Australian bank notes on the face of large-scale text. It readdresses the visual iconography of colonial Australia by substituting Indigenous leaders as the notes’ character theme. This gets the audience thinking about racial difference and the violence that has been directed at Indigenous Australians throughout history. It can be interpreted as a reflection or a mirror of today’s society. The images of important, yet somewhat forgotten, Indigenous Australians take over white Australia’s dollar bills just like the Europeans took over and colonised Australia. It reinstates and causes reflection on the rightful and true owners of the land. It reminds viewers of the ongoing devastation and pain that colonialism brought to Aboriginal people.

By bringing this exhibition into the Great Court, it consequently reinterprets the space and reshapes the way people think about Australian identity. It inspires students to think about their contemporary society in conjunction with Aboriginal politics. By changing this intellectual space, it encourages persons to think about an idea they may not have thought about before. It thus presses the current population of the university to enter into a new dialogue. It therefore actively creates awareness of Indigeneity in a modern Australia, removing any chance of ignorance.

Reference

Foster, C. (2014). Learning Violence and Unviolence in Religious Education. Religious Education: The official journal of the Religious Education Association 109 (3), 251-257.

Christianity and Evangelicalism

Harpviken and Roislien (2008:351) recognise that religion is an integral dimension within many armed conflicts. The religion of Christianity is no exception to this. Like any other religion, Christianity has been involved in instances of both peace and violence throughout history.

In their essay, Ehrenhaus and Owen (2007:276) reflect on the performance of ritual lynching within the white Christian evangelical worldview that predominated among members of the white supremacist community responsible for lynching African-Americans. They state that, through a fusion of cultures with faith centred on the violent death of Christ on the cross, this practice of lynching can be read as a ritual re-enactment of blood sacrifice, or “propitiation for the sin of blackness and expiation for the white supremacist community” (Ehrenhaus & Own 2007: 276).

Between the 1880s and 1930s, Evangelicalism was the dominant religious perspective worldwide, serving as a foundational pillar of a national white supremacist culture (Ehrenhaus & Owen 2007: 278). It affirmed the primacy of emotion over intellect and rationalism. Within this worldview, sacrificial lynching reaffirmed a sacred covenant among the members of the white Christian community and between that community and their God (Ehrenhaus & Owen 2007: 278). Especially for white Southern Evangelicals, that covenantal social order had been violated by the Reconstruction Era, by the federally mandated intrusion of blackness into the now defiled sacred public space of the white community (Ehrenhaus & Owen 2007: 278). This commonly resulted in sadistic torture and the burning (often alive) of victims. According to Ehrenhaus & Owen (2007: 281), “by lynching African Americans accused of breaching social boundaries, the white community produced and reproduced the sacrificial act of blood sacrifice that was at the centre of their faith.”

Salvation from sin is the central tenet of Evangelical faith (Ehrenhaus & Own 2007: 1278). As Christ was sacrificed for humanity’s salvation, Evangelical adherents concurrently believe sacrifice, as a symbol of torture and death, is at the heart of salvation. This logic permeated the moral susceptibilities of the white community and served as a legitimating rationale for a culture of violence (Ehrenhaus & Own 2007: 278). How could such obscene acts of human immortality take place in what were understood to be the most devoutly Christian portions of the nation? How could these adherents engage in these unimaginable communal acts of brutality that were so clearly un-Christian?

The explanation for such bloodletting is not found in a retreat from Christian doctrine and scripture, but in its embrace. Public ritual lynching was a performative affirmation of fundamentalist Christian faith in a white supremacist national community (Ehrenhaus & Own 2007: 277). It functioned, for the dominant white Christian community, as acts of devotion, as blood sacrifices to a God whose covenant with the white Christian community had been “violated by the intrusion of blackness” into the sacred spaces of that covenant (Ehrenhaus & Own 2007: 277).

It is interesting to think that this religion, being Christianity, can be responsible for both sides of this war. Whilst Evangelicalism followers see the religion as a source of violence and an explanation for the violent sacrifice of black people, the African American community used the faith as a source of endurance and resistance (Ehrenhaus & Own 2007: 280). Additionally, other religious institutions and white ministers expressed their collective opposition to lynching by drawing upon scripture, the same scripture that began the violent acts in the first place (Ehrenhaus & Own 2007: 280). So, this occurrence perfectly exemplifies that religions have been involved in both violent and peaceful acts throughout history. Religious adherents can take scripture out of context to commend violence, or read it in its entirety and act towards peace and justice.

References

Ehrenhaus, P. & A. Owen. (2004). Race Lynching and Christian Evangelism: Performances of Faith. Text and Performance Quarterly 24(3/4): 276-301.

Harpviken, K. & H. Roislien. (2008). Faithful Brokers? Potentials and Pitfalls of Religion in Peacemaking. Conflict Resolution Quarterly 25(3): 351-373.

Judaism and Peacebuilding

It is universally recognised that Judaism is a religion which has experienced religious violence first-hand. In terms of the Holocaust, as well as in the pre-Holocaust and post-Holocaust eras, Jewish adherents have had to deal with intense violence and the loss of generations of their culture. However, although it must be acknowledged that this religion has undergone a history of anti-Jewish hostility, Judaism, like any other religion, is not necessarily simply an innocent victim of religious violence.

Firstly, in his paper titled Judaism and Peacebuilding, Marc Gopin (2004: 113) discusses how it is possible to point a significant numbers of religious Jews in the direction of peace-making. He recognises that, in light of the Holocaust and traditionally second-class citizenship endured in the Middle Eastern communities of Islam, peacebuilding and peacemaking as vocations will be dismissed by the section of the Jewish community that has the longest memory (Gopin 2004: 113). However, he goes on to say that it is this part of the religion’s population that needs religiously and culturally rooted conflict resolution the most (Gopin 2004: 113).

Gopin contends that the first stage of Jewish peacebuilding, for some followers, is mourning (2004: 114). He says, “mourning is a healthy evolution out of rage over the past” (Gopin 2004: 114). More often than not, what is mourned is mourned in ways that create violence. Therefore, a peacemaking mourning process must speak to the deepest identity needs of a group. Gopin (2004: 114) says, “there is no conflict, especially deadly conflict, that does not involve loss. These losses, often unacknowledged, are the fuel of conflict.” Some Jewish adherents thus need to acknowledge loss, accept it and begin rebuilding their people’s lives without the need for conflict. In other words, one must indulge in memory and accept the past for a more peaceful future.

Although the events of the Holocaust can be blamed for acts of violence and conflict throughout history, the roots of Judaism can also be argued to cause religious violence. To certain Jewish adherents, other religions’ views are deemed unacceptable (Gopin 2004: 116). This ideology in itself is inherently violent. According to Gopin (2004: 116), the Jewish tradition “tends to operate in a theological and moral construct as if no other systems exist.” This ideology arises from the belief that the Jews are the ‘chosen people,’ chosen to be in a covenant with God. This is the most important and foundational root of Judaism. However, in classical Judaism, “the religious psyche is meant to be self-loving in order to be loving in an other-directed sense” (Gopin 2004: 116). The classical basis of this is the Golden Rule, which comes in its earliest form from the Torah in Leviticus 19:18: “Do not take vengeance, or bear a grudge. And you must love your neighbour as yourself, I am the Eternal God” (Gopin 2004: 116). This rule needs to be recognised in terms of peacebuilding.

The most important issue facing the integration of religion and peacebuilding is the multi-cultural, multi-religious and secular nature of most contemporary social settings. Nowadays, society must be prepared to creatively integrate religious traditions with secular constructs, as well as with constructs from other religious and cultural traditions. Judaism must therefore adapt to the contemporary world, put the past behind them and adopt the Golden Rule in an effort to build a world of peace and acceptance. History cannot be changed but the future can be.

Reference

Gopin, M. (2004). Judaism and Peacebuilding. In H. Coward and G.S. Smith. Eds. Religion and Peacebuilding. Albany: State University of New York Press.

Indigenous Worldviews and Experiences

It is a well-known fact that the European conquest of Australia resulted in the dispossession of its Indigenous people, forcing them onto the fringes of colonial society (Attwood 1989: 1). According to Attwood (1989: 1), this apparent belief in cultural superiority is a “violent approach.” From the mid-1830s, the coming of European settlers brought a wave of violence and disease and the number of Aborigines declined markedly (Attwood 1989: 2).

Attwood (1989: 7) especially highlights a Christian mission settlement called Ramahyuck. He states that the main aim of this mission was to civilise and Christianise the Indigenous Australian people (Attwood 1989: 7). Christian missionaries held the firm idea that they had to transform ‘blacks’ into men and women in their own image. They believed they could only succeed if the Aborigines’ cultural order was fundamentally destroyed. They felt that they had to settle the Aborigines because their wandering and unsettled habits were diametrically opposed to the civilised life they so much wanted to inculcate.

In other words, missions like Ramahyuck were “changing Aborigines’ sense of themselves” (Attwoord 1989: 16). Over time, the Aboriginal people became culturally and economically dependent on the mission. This amounted to a severe narrowing in their opportunity to choose and meant they had to accommodate themselves more and more to the missionary order. This was therefore a violent approach towards the Aborigines, removing their identity. Aboriginal spiritualism is based on a connection with the land. And, one of the key things with colonialism was removal from the land. As a result, Aboriginal identity was lost. The removal of identity can have a monumental impact on a culture and is therefore a violent approach.

Although the majority of the Australian population recognise this dispossession of Aborigines, unfortunately, this idea has continued through to today’s society. The situation for Aboriginal people living in contemporary Australian society can be said to link to the legacy of colonial contact. In an interview with Murray Paterson, an Indigenous Coordinator at a Brisbane high school, Palm Island was exemplified. He stated:

“People from seven different language groups were placed here. These people were put on Palm Island because, based on social Darwinism, they were going to die. But they did not die, they are still there today. However, the seven different language groups are dysfunctional, such as issues of ‘who is in charge.’ Some of the social stigmas and issues are to do with these language groups, but they were just put there as missions as such. So, colonialism has had a massive impact on these people” (M. Paterson, personal communication, September 5, 2014). 

So, it is no lie that colonialism impacted on Aboriginal people in a massive way. However, we cannot change the past. We have to acknowledge it and have an understanding of it, but we can only go forward from it. There is no sense pretending that it did not happen. However, there is also no sense in pretending that Western education and Western science is a negative thing either. So, the pros and cons of colonialism cannot really be discussed. Pesantubbe (2004: 40) explains that to assuage suffering and growing into healing, we need to undertake a decolonisation of our minds. We need to acknowledge the past and look at the present. What we do here and now can make a difference. We need to keep moving on.

Reference

Attwood, B. (1989). And God said… let them have dominion. In The Making of the Aborigines. Sydney, London & Boston: Allen & Unwin.

Pesantubbee, M. (2004). In search of the White Path: American Indian peacebuilding. In H. Coward and G.S. Smith. Eds. Religion and peacebuilding. Albany: State University of New York Press.