School of Social and Political Sciences - Theses
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ItemWaiting to be heard: a discussion of feminism, criminology and Aboriginal women offenders( 1998)This thesis evaluates studies which have been carried out with women offenders, and in particular it focuses on the apparent silence in these studies of Aboriginal women offenders about their treatment by the criminal justice system. Aboriginal women are in a significantly disadvantaged position in society compared with non-indigenous women including, in particular, the level of incarceration. However, there has been no direct interviewing with Aboriginal women about their experiences of prosecution and sentencing practice in Australia. It has therefore been very difficult to determine the effect of race on the arrest and sentencing of Aboriginal women. I begin by considering a specific case example. In 1988, an Aboriginal woman, Robyn Kina, was sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of her de-facto husband after a four hour trial in which she was discouraged from giving evidence in her defence. Kina's silence led to a great miscarriage of justice. I argue that Aboriginal women offenders like Kina should be allowed to voice their experiences to assist police and judges in understanding their disadvantage in the criminal justice system. Feminist criminology has been concerned with advancing the research about women and crime, however it has only recently considered many issues concerning black women and crime. I argue that this is possibly because of the emphasis given by the predominantly white women's movement to advancing women's position as a whole, rather than taking account of issues effecting black women. I point out that theorising about gender and race has methodological implications for a white woman researcher who seeks to understand the matrix of oppression which black women experience. Having explored the theoretical debates about race, gender and crime, I turn to empirical studies. Given the paucity of research into Aboriginal women and crime, I examine overseas research. This research is inconsistent about the unequal treatment of black and white offenders. What we do know is that women of colour will have a very different experience of the criminal justice system than white women. They may also have different experiences from each other. This thesis concludes by suggesting that the lack of theoretical and empirical work in Australia results in the continuation of gender and race typifications being imposed on Aboriginal women by the criminal justice system. In trying to speak for all women, feminist criminology is in danger of silencing Aboriginal women unless it seeks out their views and enables them to speak.
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ItemIntellectual and cultural property rights for indigenous Australians( 1998)The issue of intellectual and cultural property rights for Indigenous Australians was raised in 1974 when the late Wandjuk Marika, walked into a shop in Cairns and found his own sacred design on a tea towel that had been manufactured in Holland. He said “I was shocked when I walked into that shop, and when I saw it I was shocked and break my heart”. To add to his anger and humiliation, Mr Marika was charged $10 for the tea towel. He believed he should have been charged $2 for the cloth as the design belonged to him. He expressed outrage that those people who had stolen and copied his designs would consider his work to be purely pleasure paintings rather than the expressions of power and knowledge of important cultural symbols. Mr Marika’s devastation was apparent when he stated “[a]fter I found my own designs on the tea towels I was shocked and I loose [sic] my power to paint, lose my power for a number of years. Mr Marika passed away in 1987 and sadly the issues he raised are yet to be resolved. Mr Marika’s desire to obtain legal protection of the art and culture of Aboriginal people lives on in the minds of many Australians including a number of Indigenous scholars and academics, like myself. The issues that Mr Marika raised back in 1974 are the basis of my thesis on intellectual and cultural property rights for Indigenous peoples. It is the struggle for control of the identity and culture of Indigenous Australians; their continual marginalisation within the colonial nation-state; and the role that colonial institutions play in maintaining and reinforcing the dominant ideology which provides the foundation for this thesis.