Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people hold a specific identity as original residents of the land in Australia. Many communities and individuals around the world, maintain a strong relationship with their language, traditional lands, and culture along with contributing to economic development, environmental management and cultural identity of Australia. In international law, distinctive rights are held by the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander as Australia's first people(Anon., 2018). This Reflection Writing Assignment is related with analyzing the aboriginal community of Australia by analyzing their sociology-demographic characteristics in brief manner. Further, the differences between the broader Australian community and aboriginals, have been also been made which helps in identifying the reason behind the specific identify given to aboriginals. The aboriginals have to face a number of social and personal issues. This Reflection Writing Assignment reflects the one of such main issue in a critical manner. At the end of this Reflection Writing Assignment, a conclusion has been drawn to provide an overview of the main findings of the study.
Description of Aboriginals
The indigenous community of Australia is known as Australian Aboriginals. They came around 50,000 years ago from Asia to Australia and before 20,000 years that, came from Africa to Asia. A number of aboriginal tribes scattered around the globe at the time of settlement of white people in Australia. These tribes used to speak around 250 different languages. The culture of aboriginals was rich and expressive in symbols. In 1788, the British had bought different languages.t a lot of bacteria and viruses with them. Thousands of aboriginal people suffered from smallpox and other major diseases and died. The tribes were forced to drive off their lands to the ground of other tribes. The aboriginal population was at its lowest at 93,000 in 1900. At present, the total number of aboriginals are supposed to exceed more than half a million out of the total 23 million Australian population(Commission, 2018).
The main socioeconomic characteristics of the Australian Aboriginal Community as discussed in this Reflection Writing Assignment are as follows:
Belief Systems: The oral tradition of Aboriginal Australians is based on the reverence for the land and on the trust in Dream time. Such communities consider death as an evolution to another good life which is not necessarily different from the one they had. Some people tend to believe in having more than one soul or spirit in a single person.
Comparison between Aboriginals and South Australians
Social Issue
Karl Max has given a social theory named as classic sociological theory which is mainly based on social conflict and critiques. AS per this theory discussed above in this Reflection Writing Assignment, social issues can be defined as the problems and challenges which are caused by the arrangements and behaviors of the society and its members towards a particular community or an individual person. The aboriginal community is one of such communities which are still living as per their old traditions and are not compatible to accept the common culture accepted by the other Australians. Thus, such communities have to face a number of issues to survive in the present world and education is one of them. The aboriginals did not use to go to schools as they used to learn hunting (boys) and cooking food (girls). They also did not know about the common English language. Their way of talking, traditions, language, culture, and way of thinking is still not developed and this is the main reason that they have to face problems at the time of going schools for education(Hudec, 2013).
The Aboriginal children are found unhealthy and suffering from a number of diseases due to their poor living conditions. Thus, the other Australian students do not prefer to talk with them and to help them out in learning.Along with this, aboriginal children are unable to find their own environment in the schools and thus do not tend to feel comfortable with others.
The society also treats them in a very bad manner and thinks that they are not capable to perform well in the academic carrier. Thus, aboriginal students do not get proper opportunities to show their skills and talent. Most of the aboriginals are found black and thus they are always neglected and disrespected by the society on the basis of their skin color.
The lack of education in aboriginals has become a social issue as the lack of education results in a lack of development and growth. They are not able to compete with the fast changing advancements and technologies of the world. They are also not aware of well-being and living a healthy life. However. The Australian government is trying to take corrective actions to improve this situation but the viewpoint and perception of the society are required to be changed so that aboriginals can also get the rights and respect they deserve (Byard and Simpson, 2005).
Critical Reflection
Australian education system is not equal for the children of all communities. The engagement of student informal educational setting and the rate of retention of schools for aboriginal children is lower as compared to the other Australians. As per the social theory given by Durkheim, which is based on the social factors, there are a number of social factors which may become the reason behind this inequality. The theory above in this Reflection Writing Assignment propose that the languages barriers and conflicts can be faced by the students as the aboriginal children are not able to understand the normal English and vice versa. Most of the aboriginal children are found to speak aboriginal English in classrooms which is strongly similar to Standard Australian English. The differences between both are considered in a negative manner at the time making use in classrooms. Denouncing such differences with the confirmation of the validity of language shows a lack of respect and understanding about the culture of aboriginals. Which can highly affect the sense of identity of an Aboriginal student? This racism is often being presented within the policies of Australia which are related to the education system as well (Anon., 2018). As per the theory given by Karl Marx, in order to move forward, the society or a community has to face social issues and critiques from members of society. The theory of Karl Marx given above in this Reflection Writing Assignment elucidate that the cultural issues resulted by the mistreatment and inter generational trauma can often be seen in the ideologies and thinking of the children which can affect the atmosphere and learning of the overall classroom. In addition to this, there are many cultural factors which can influence the mobility of the family, can result in the absence of the students and time intervals in their schooling. Through factors of cultural identity and culture nor being understood and accepted by the schooling system of Australia, aboriginal students are being denied adequate and appropriate education (Santoro et al, 2011).
The main problem barriers faced by the aboriginal community in education can be distinguished in the categories as given in the following section of this Reflection Writing Assignment:
The textbook of 21 The absence of aboriginal history: st century shows the aboriginals as "appear only momentarily". On the other hand, the textbooks cover the history and development of non-aboriginals, their experiences, and learning's in a detailed manner. Thus, the students are not able to relate themselves to the learning's and are not able to get the knowledge in a proper way.
Thus, the aboriginals have to face a number of the issue at the time of learning and getting knowledge according to the present time.
Conclusion
On the basis of the above study in this Reflection Writing Assignment, it can be concluded that the Australian government and society is regularly trying to increase the participation of aboriginals in the social activities so that their community can get its identification. The article briefs about the aboriginal communities along with its features and differences with the non-aboriginals. It also describes the main issues faced by them. However, there are a number of social issues discussed in this Reflection Writing Assignment that are to be faced by the aboriginals and education is most important among them as education provides a base to grow and develop. This issue is directed by the personal thinking of aboriginals as well as by the education system and social services run by the Australian government to develop the lives of such communities. The main sub-issues are being discussed in a critical manner in order to explain the topic. All the information is derived from the authenticated sources like government publications and journal articles published on the development of aboriginal communities.
