Marriageability and Indigenous Representation in the White Mainstream Media in Australia

PhD Thesis 2007

Andrew King BA (Hons)

Supervisor: Associate Professor Alan McKee

Creative Industries, Queensland University of Technology

Abstract

By means of a historical analysis of representations, this thesis argues that an increasing sexualisation of Indigenous personalities in popular culture contributes to the reconciliation of non-Indigenous and Indigenous Australia. It considers how sexualised images and narratives of Indigenous people, as they are produced across a range of film, television, advertising, sport and pornographic texts, are connected to a broader politics of liberty and justice in the present postmodern and postcolonial context. By addressing this objective the thesis will identify and evaluate the significance of ‘banal’ or everyday representations of Aboriginal sexuality, which may range from advertising images of kissing, television soap episodes of weddings, sultry film romances through to more evocatively oiled-up representations of the pin- up-calendar variety. This project seeks to explore how such images offer possibilities for creating informal narratives of reconciliation, and engendering understandings of

Aboriginality in the media beyond predominant academic concerns for exceptional or fatalistic versions.

i Keywords

Aboriginality Indigenous Marriageability Reconciliation Popular Culture Sexuality Relationships Interracial Public Sphere Mediasphere Celebrity

ii Table of Contents

Introduction ………………………………………………………………………….. 1 Chapter One A History of Aboriginal Marriageability in the Australian Public Sphere……………………………………………………………………..…..….37 Chapter Two Deep Meanings, Hidden Racism: Previous Academic Analyses of Indigenous Representation ...…………………..…………………….………………………. 69 Chapter Three Unspeakable Desires: The Emergence of Indigenous Sexiness in non-Indigenous Media ……………………………………………..………………….…………103 Chapter Four The Mainstreaming of Indigenous Sexiness: Indigenous Authorship of Sexy Images ………….………………………………….…………………………... 139 Chapter Five Romancing Reconciliation: Making Sex Ordinary on Television ………...…... 173 Chapter Six Ordinary Lives: Indigenous Parenting in the Media …………………..…..…... 211

Conclusion ………………………………………………………………………….251

Appendix 1 List of Persons Interviewed and Consulted .……………………………………261 Appendix 2 Interviewee Questions………………………………..…………………………262

References …………………………………………………………………………. 263

Tele/Filmography ...……………………………………………………………….. 277

iii List of Illustrations

Figure 1, pg 13 Kyle Vander Kuyp publicity photograph.

Figure 2, pg 19 Cathy Freeman and Joel Edgerton (2003 AFI awards).

Figure 3, pg 59 Newspaper report about the marriage of Mick Daly and Gladys Namagu (1960).

Figure 4, pg 60 Ernie Dingo’s marriage to his wife Sally (TV Week , 1989).

Figure 5, pg 92 Arnhem Land photograph of two topless Indigenous women (1920’s).

Figure 6, pg 92 Christine Anu posing for the photography magazine Black and White (1996).

Figure 7, pg 107 Publicity poster for the film Australian Rules (2002).

Figure 8, pg 114 Indigenous actor Nicci Lane as Wendy in the pornographic production Arigato Baby (1991).

Figure 9, pg 127 Indigenous mysticism in the pornographic title Australian Grand Prix (1992).

Figure 10, pg 127 Nioka, a non-Indigenous actress, playing the role of the Aboriginal sex interest in Outback Assignment (1991).

Figure 11, pg 154 Cover image of Shakaya’s debut single ‘Stop Calling Me’.

Figure 12, pg 158 Christine Anu performing at the 2000 Sydney Olympics.

Figure 13, pg 159 Indigenous models posing for a publicity photograph for the release of the 2003 ‘Jinnali: Women on Fire’ calendar.

Figure 14, pg 189 Justine Saunders’ Rhonda Jackson in Number 96 (1976).

Figure 15, pg 189 Kylie Belling as Sharon in th e Flying Doctors (1986).

Figure 16, pg 195 Heath Bergersen as Rueben in the teen drama Breakers (1999).

Figure 17, pg 196 Publicity photograph of Aaron Pedersen.

Figure 18, pg 201 HQ magazine profile of Deborah Mailman (2003).

Figure 19, pg 221 Ernie Dingo, his mother and aunt featured in the Sunday Times (19/01/2003).

Figure 20, pg 224 Nova Peris’ family featured on This is Your Life (Channel Nine).

Figure 21, pg 245 Ernie Dingo and Cate Blanchett in the ABC drama Heartland (1994).

Figure 22, pg 246 Photograph of Nova Peris, her baby and family.

v Acknowledgements

Thank you to Alan McKee, the model supervisor. Not a day has gone by when I haven’t learnt from your intelligence, professionalism and enthusiasm. Thanks to

Helen Yeates, Vivienne Muller and Terry Flew for your advice in the final stages of the thesis, and to Harvey May for being so interested in Breakers . Thanks also to

Laknath for the great conversations, and the STD telephone bills. Finally, thank you to Aboo for putting up with me for so long, and for being there when the final series of Secret Life eventually aired.

vi The work contained in this thesis has not been previously submitted to meet requirements for an award at this or any other higher education institution. To the best of my knowledge and belief, the thesis contains no material previously published or written by another person except where due reference is made.

Signature

Date

vii Introduction

‘I went to an institution full of kids who all had stories: “Aren’t you supposed to be blacker than that?” “You are too pretty.”’

- Christine Anu (quoted in Albert, 2005).

‘Aborigines, indigenous people, are not sexy as a media issue; Aborigines don't sell.’

- Vox pop radio interviewee (Coulloupas, 1997).

These quotes might be suggestive of the ways Indigenous people and issues are seen in the mainstream media. The first quote is from Christine Anu, one of

Australia’s most successful mainstream Indigenous artists. She is speaking about her experiences visiting schools and teaching kids about her Torres Straight Islander background. Anu goes on to suggest that many people fail to distinguish her Islander identity, and misrecognise her ‘modern’ appearance as being non-Indigenous. She points out that for white people Aboriginal art tends to be associated with more

‘traditional’ motifs such as ‘bare bodies’, ‘chanting’ and ‘didgeridoos’. An over- emphasis on these elements may limit the ways in which Indigeneity is seen in the mainstream. For Anu non-Indigenous people’s reactions to her Indigeneity are

1 marked in other, more personal ways – she remarks of being considered ‘too pretty’ to be identified as Indigenous.

The second quote speaks about attractiveness in a more metaphorical sense. It expresses pessimism about the way issues like Aboriginal reconciliation are represented in the mainstream media, because they are not judged to be commercially sound. ‘Aborigines don’t sell’. This criticism emphasises concern over the incompatibility of Indigenous representation with mainstream perspectives. Such a criticism has a long popular and academic history. It is tied to the belief that

Indigenous issues and themes in the mainstream are marked by absences, and where they are present they do not engage audiences in any meaningful or lasting way.

Aboriginality is seen as an issue, representative of a separate political cause that white

Australians do not want to deal with. A sense of guilt might be operative in this type of appraisal. Not being seen as ‘sexy’ in this statement implies that Indigenous content does not entertain or connect with ordinary people.

This thesis argues that sexiness in popular culture is an important way of representing relationships. In the above quotes, both speakers are worried that

Indigenous content might not be seen as sexy in mainstream society. The latter quote is more concerned with the way political issues are unfavourably dealt with in the media, and that Indigenous issues are inevitably caught up in a more unattractive form of political debate. Speaking from personal experience, Christine Anu suggests that

Indigenous people might not be seen as attractive and good looking in the media.

This may well be related to the ways in which Aboriginal ‘issues’ occupy considerable air-time, caught up in abstract political debate and news stories. Both quotes suggest that Indigenous people and issues are not seen to be desirable within the non-Indigenous public sphere. The use of the term ‘sexy’ in these instances

2 evokes a sense of Indigenous people not being represented in the media as ordinary.

Not recognised as sexy might suggest that Indigenous people are not seen to be available for meaningful, long term relationships with non-Indigenous people.

This thesis looks at the ways Indigenous people are seen as attractive and good looking in the Australian mainstream media. It argues that an increasing sexualisation of Indigenous Australians in popular culture has occurred over the past ten years.

Such a process has developed alongside of, and can be seen as contributing to, a broader process of reconciliation between non-Indigenous and Indigenous Australia.

In doing so the thesis will examine the significance of ‘banal’ and everyday embodiments of Indigenous sexuality in the contemporary mediasphere – films, television programs, soaps and dramas, magazines and music are the central foci. By looking at these kinds of texts, the thesis argues that sexualised images of Indigenous personalities provide a means of representing meaningful interaction between

Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities. To argue this, this thesis develops a theoretical model for describing the reconciliatory significance of these relationships

– ‘marriageability’. Marriageability in this thesis means being publicly represented as suitable for a long term physical and emotional relationship. It involves two aspects: sexiness and ordinariness.

Sexiness

The overarching idea developed throughout the thesis is that of ‘Aboriginal marriageability’. It is a term which comes from Hartley and McKee’s book The

Indigenous Public Sphere (2000), which explores the representation of Aboriginality through a range of different popular genres and media. The book also recounts

3 Aboriginal people’s stories and experiences about television programming, community-based television and radio ventures as well as how mainstream news coverage of ‘Aboriginal’ stories affect their daily lives. This last point is important, as the authors insist, not only for understanding how Aboriginal people have become so ‘over-represented’ in contemporary media practice, in terms of their pervasive

‘TASK FORCE REPORT’ status, but also to engender new meanings about the nature of ‘media’ reporting and its reception as a forum for public debate. They go on to demonstrate how seemingly ‘apolitical’ fictional texts, such as television dramas and magazine stories are connected to broader ‘political’ events and ideas, such as reconciliation. As evidence of this, they identify a powerful cultural signifier of reconciliation that has been traditionally overlooked by political advocates: sexiness.

Aboriginal sexiness in particular. Sexiness in the media, they argue, is an innovative way of making Aboriginality a very personal and ‘marriageable’ public commodity.

‘Marriageability’, or ‘publicly acknowledged attractiveness’, might be used to make images of Indigenous people, and Indigenous people’s ideas, more desirable, creating a more urgent need for the inclusion of distinctive Aboriginal-related material within a predominantly non-Aboriginal body politic. In this sense, to represent sexiness as

Aboriginal can imply a sense of familiarity, respect, trust and companionship, as

it places Indigenous people in the category of ‘neighbour’, and it incorporates

their image into a communicative regime by means of which meanings are

circulated among people who don’t know each other, and whose relations with

their community are textualized (250).

Aboriginal sexiness in the media offers the possibility for re-establishing community boundaries. Hartley and McKee cite a few recent examples where

Indigenous celebrities have appeared as sexy: Cathy Freeman’s ‘little black bum’

4 proclaimed as proudly ‘Australian’ in Cosmopolitan (253); Aaron Pedersen listed in

Juice magazine’s 1995 top twenty sexy celebrities (229); and, finally, the kiss between Ernie Dingo and Cate Blanchett in the ABC television series Heartland (91-

93). These images of ‘publicly acknowledged attractiveness’ stand in sharp contrast to predominant media representations of Aboriginality as being newsworthy, as a social and governmental ‘problem for whites’ (150). Adversarial reporting of

Indigenous issues in the news – from land rights to crime rates – often implicates

Indigenous communities as being outside of the imagined community. The sense of familiarity that sexy bodies and personalities engender, when they are Indigenous, implies a more personally engaged relationship than that offered through news genres.

That these images are publicly acknowledged forms of attractiveness is a key point.

Sexy bodies and personalities are those with whom community attitudes and feelings of intimacy are encouraged to develop.

The importance of public representations of sexuality to the cultural citizenship of particular groups in society has been highlighted through feminist and queer theory. Feminism gained women important social and political rights by showing how the public/private binary is itself a sexualised, male construction. In this way, some writers show how past characterisations of ‘the social’ as an outwardly unemotional and rational sphere have favoured an outdated male-modelled gendering of modern politics (Pateman, 1988), modern nationhood (Mosse, 1985; Anthias et al.,

1992) and even modernity itself (Felski, 1995). Other writers similarly point to how social relationships develop across all aspects of daily life, particularly within the domestic realm where notions of sex and intimacy are aligned with a particularly heterosexual, somewhat ‘sacred’ femininity (Berlant, 2000). Representations of sexuality are an important part of mainstream media representation, and convey

5 information about who we, as a community, find desirable; sexy and sexualised identities are those we are likely accept into our personal lives, those we can trust, respect and build meaningful relationships with. From a sexual citizenship perspective, intimate representations such as those of kissing convey important information about how we imagine our virtual communities, as well as partners. This very personal aspect of sexual citizenship has been taken up elsewhere by Lauren

Berlant who, among other things, describes how public debates over pornography, birth-control and childrearing are almost inevitably forged over heterosexual notions of family, marriage and friendship. Such issues circumscribe ‘a world of public intimacy’ where childhood and infancy evoke the sanctity of American citizenship; paradoxically, children symbolise the non-threatening and non-sexual ideal of citizenship, one which ‘all patriots must gallantly defend’ (Berlant, 1997). Sexual representations can form a basis upon which to exclude particular identities from public visibility, and social policy.

In its examination of popular representations of Aboriginality, this thesis attempts to look at some of the few instances where Indigenous people are publicly acknowledged as attractive. Hartley and McKee’s notion of ‘marriageability’ offers a useful model for theorising inter-cultural relationships, as they become visible in the public domain. In this thesis, it is used to illustrate how emerging inter-cultural relationships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities have been imagined, in their most informal and everyday moments. Representations of sexy

Indigenous celebrities, such as Cathy Freeman and Aaron Pedersen for instance, emerge relatively recently in the mediasphere – within the past ten years. This thesis argues that such images of publicly acknowledged attractiveness have appeared as part of, and alongside, a growing public desire for reconciliation. In its focus on

6 popular representations of Aboriginality in particular, it examines how sexiness in the mainstream often implies inclusivity. The term ‘marriageability’ is particularly useful in this sense. At the heart of the term lies one of the most privileged forms of sexual relationships within contemporary society – marriage.

Sex and Marriage

Marriage is the public avowal of approved sexual relationships. In what is considered the founding anthropological account of the ‘elementary structures’ of kinship, Levi-Strauss (1969) characterises marriage as a process which mediates an individual’s relationship to the rest of the community. Sexual relations then are a vital part of a community’s sense of self-identity. For Levi-Strauss marriage is more than a formal or ceremonial occasion, though its ritualised nature invests the marriage as a moment of symbolic exchange between different families and communities.

Marriage is a social process, and operates according to different rules among different cultures – marriages often fail, but marriageability entails a relationship based upon respect and reciprocity flowing from the marriage system. In fact, each person’s identity within the community extends outwards from these particular marriage systems. Social universes are hierarchical and structured around categories of people ordered according to their proximity to the central kinship. For example, husbands and wives, friends and lovers may comprise a first level of intimate relationships. A secondary category typically includes more distant relations, and may comprise of neighbours and acquaintances; these people constitute a ‘marriageable community’ – they are identities with whom the individual is familiar enough to choose their sexual partner from, though not too familiar as to violate kinship taboos. Rules of

7 marriageability are thus tied to a community’s sexual taboos (be that of age, race or sex) and ‘prescribe which category or categories of relative can be married and which can not’ (Keen, 2004: 174). Through the act of marriage families are reproduced and as they grow into larger community units are thus transformed into newer, more heterogeneous relations.

Little work has been written about marriage from a cultural and media studies perspective, though previous work concerns itself with issues of gender and power through analyses of legal and juridical institutions, rather than representations. Some feminist studies, for instance, explore the patriarchal nature of marriage through

Western legal contexts, and the historical and economic conditions which underpin the marriage contract (see, for instance, Pateman, 1988; Lewis Bredenner, 1998).

Queer theorists also express concern over the ‘heterosexual’ history and enactment of marriage, and examine particular legal or constitutional precedents (see Morgan,

1995; Warner, 1999; Gerstmann, 2003). These analyses draw attention to how particular acts of marriage are tied to national, legal and constitutional histories and, in doing so, tend to examine ‘marriage’ as something of an abstract entity – a thing in itself that has far-reaching personal consequences because of inherent legal and legislative biases. Literature on marriage and Aboriginality is written from a different perspective, but often highlights historical contexts in which marriage acts and laws have prohibited Indigenous relationships with Europeans and other non-Aboriginal people (see, for instance, Brook, 1997; Ellinghaus, 2001; 2003; McGrath and

Stevenson, 1996; McGrath, 2003). Another interconnected branch of study examines the outlawing of tribal marriages through different phases of Australian jurisprudence

(Anderson, 2004; Sutton, 1985; Wilkinson, 1995). The focus on the legalities of marriage in these texts is an important one, and helps to establish the intersection of

8 abstract political policies with intimately personal lives within twentieth century – and by extension – contemporary Australia.

By contrast to this research, my study aims to reverse the established analytical imperative by looking at marriageability, first and foremost, as a system of popular representation. The approach provides a more ‘everyday’ perspective on issues of Aboriginality, sexuality, marriage and citizenship in the Australian public sphere. The representations of marriageability studied reveal how social differences are understood, produced, reproduced and maintained; they become indices of family relations, and show how particular sexual relations are consecrated in the public sphere. Representations of marriageability, I will argue, are about being seen as part of, and contributing to, the community. Marriageable identities, as they are allowed to come together to form new relations, form a basis for the recognition of social change within society. It is in this sense that representations of marriage are useful sites for understanding not only how communities imagine themselves but also, more importantly, how they imagine their relations with other communities.

In The Indigenous Public Sphere Hartley and McKee provide a brief definition of the term ‘Aboriginal marriageability’. Of the few examples identified, they foreground sexiness as a means of making images of Aboriginal people

‘marriageable’ to predominantly Anglo-Celtic audiences. In this thesis I will argue that marriageability involves more than being seen as sexy; it consists necessarily of sexualisation (there is an implication of sex being involved in marriage, even – or perhaps, particularly – in contract marriages that are aimed at cementing family allegiances and creating offspring). But the thesis also argues that marriageable relationships are increasingly understood to include more than simply sex. Through meaningful, long term engagement it is also expected that there will be a meeting of

9 minds, and feelings as well. Whilst images of Australian Football League calendar pin-up ‘hunks’ or fashion models initially engage public attention, such libidinal interest may be fleeting. Within the mediasphere these kinds of sexual representations become significant to the marriageable community as they take on more subjective dimensions, allowing greater levels of interpersonal identification to develop. Trust and companionship are implied when personalities become marriageable, engendering characteristics which form the basis for long-term commitment and co-operation. Taken together, these elements constitute what is meant by marriageability in this thesis.

I would like to emphasise at this point that in discussing ‘marriageability’ throughout this thesis, I am using the term more in a cultural than a legal sense. I am not referring only to relationships which are sanctioned by the state or church.

Rather, I am using the term to mean long term, committed relationships – including common law or de facto relationships as much as official ones. The importance of marriage, for the argument of this thesis, is in the everyday and long lasting nature of such relationships – differentiated from more casual sexual encounters. This is not a moral judgment – I explicitly do not believe that marriageable relationships are superior to purely sexual ones. Feminist and queer writing in particular has shown that marriage as an institution is far from ideal; and that other kinds of sexual relationship can provide important forms of kinship. My point is merely this: that long term committed sexual relationships can function in different ways from casual sexual encounters; and vice versa. I am particularly interested in the symbolic potential of long term, committed sexual relationships with regard to a reconciliatory politics in Australia.

10 Ordinariness

Publicly acknowledged attractiveness is an important aspect of marriageability in the mediasphere, as it presents images of desirable partners to the community. By itself sexiness is not sufficient enough to ensure marriageability, though it often entails eligibility for concubinage or marriage-like relations. In my theorisation of marriageability, I argue that sexy personalities become marriageable as they are increasingly seen as ‘ordinary’ in the public sphere. Sexiness can be an important attribute in itself – it can be used to assert new forms of agency and identity. Images of sexualised bodies can be found in a range of popular media – calendars, football or sports promotions, music videos, film, television drama and advertising, for instance.

While the thesis looks at such media in their mainstream form, it seeks to highlight the various ways Indigenous actors, sports people, musicians and producers are increasingly seen to author their own sexy images. Over the past ten years events like

The Deadlys have gained mainstream attention, publicising Indigenous achievement and diversity in the media and community; throughout the media Christine Anu and

Shakaya are marketed as attractive Indigenous musicians; Indigenous-ownership also extends to sexy calendars, modelling and casting agencies. In the overall context of

Indigenous representation, such publicly acknowledged forms of attractiveness have only recently occurred in mainstream media. Many Indigenous producers and celebrities are aware of the significance of these changes. Kyle Vander Kuyp (see figure 1), for instance, suggests that the emergence of such recognition needs to extend towards more commercial forms of public representation:

When I look back upon my ancestors you see old photos and see them dressed

well and groomed well, and wearing Western clothes for the first time, and

11 they still wore them well, and you think well that’s up to me to do the same . .

. It is a new wave that’s coming. There’s been Aaron Pedersen and myself in

the Bachelor of the Year , and Mundine was on Big Brother . We’ve still got a

long way to go, but there’s Aboriginal dance groups, there’s more actors

getting on the big screen, so I’d think you’d see it growing in the next decade.

You know there should be more ads with young Aboriginal kids, and vegemite

ads, and there should be milk ads and juice ads but they still… advertising and

marketing … isn’t looking like using it at quite that level yet (Vander Kuyp,

2006).

As a highly successful international athlete, whose media profile entails regular television interviews and guest appearances, Vander Kuyp’s comments suggest the important role the media can play in recognising previously unacknowledged elements of Indigenous culture and history. An overwhelming majority of Indigenous performers and producers interviewed for this thesis expressed the concern that there are not enough ordinary representations of Indigeneity in the mainstream media. Interviewees were uneasy about not seeing regular Indigenous identities in roles otherwise deemed as ordinary in soap operas, reality television, and lifestyle programming – performing activities such as working, socialising, shopping, gardening or losing weight, for instance. A brief survey of commercial television undertaken during the period of my PhD research bears out some of these concerns.

Only a handful of television advertisements featured Indigenous actors/celebrities in what might be considered familial, everyday contexts – Luke Carroll appeared in a

‘Dominoes’ pizza commercial; Deborah Mailman for ‘Macleans’ toothpaste; an

Indigenous model starred in a ‘Libra Fleur’ tampons ad; and, more recently, Nova

Peris featured in a short-running campaign screened during the Commonwealth

12 Games for ‘Panadol’. These instances of commercial visibility are rare, and underlie the argument for greater, and perhaps more dignified forms of, Indigenous representation in the mainstream.

Figure 1 – A shirtless Kyle Vander Kuyp in a publicity photo.

The concern for ‘ordinariness’ in this thesis proceeds from a political interest in Indigenous issues, and the way those issues are presented in public debate. My own use and understanding of the term is underpinned by Steve Mickler’s valuable study of Indigenous citizenship in his book The Myth of Privilege (Mickler, 1998).

Mickler’s book examines the role of journalism in the mainstream media, particularly its governmental ability to inform and construct debates about citizenship. Before the

1967 referendum, Indigenous people were not considered citizens of this country.

Their lack of social and political rights could be reflected in the slogan that they were

‘our Aborigines’ – dependent as wards of the State, and seen as a strategic and exploitable source of labour. Indigenous representation in the media reflected this

13 sense of proprietorship, as Indigenous issues became a matter of policy and welfare community concern. In the period after the 1967 referendum, as Indigenous communities gained more political visibility (through land rights and the later policy of ‘self-determination’), Indigenous representation in the media changed markedly.

Whereas previously Indigenous people were seen to exist as dependent upon white society, in the post 1967 era they were now seen as being radically separate – in cultural and political terms – from the mainstream. Subsequently, mainstream representations emphasise Indigenous people as representatives of an Indigenous political cause. In the media Indigenous people are not represented as leading identifiably ‘ordinary’ lives.

In the Australian media ‘ordinariness’ may be encapsulated by a range of genres and representations. In political discourse these representations are more often than not taken-for-granted. They may include soap opera romances, lifestyle magazine feature articles on celebrities, reality television, car advertisements, ‘vox pop’ discussions about interest rates, and so on. In this thesis ordinariness is a concern for the quotidian, familial and everyday. Expressed through game, cooking, lifestyle and chat shows – which, in Australia, are all increasingly being taken-up by the sports-variety show format – ordinariness often takes the form of a suburban, middle-brow and middle-class lifestyle. The ‘ordinariness’ of representations in the media are not to be taken as a reflection of pre-existing audiences or populations. The media’s concern for the trivial and mundane, reproduced as the seamless interface between audience and program, provides an environment for audience sociability.

Through continual media coverage of celebrity relationships, drama narratives involving marriages, sexy flirtations or affairs, or advertisements featuring attractive sports personalities; audiences become intimate with those particular bodies and

14 identities. These personalities become available for more meaningful long term relationships as they take on more ordinary characteristics.

Terms of Reference – Ordinariness, Sexiness and Marriageability

The terms ‘ordinariness’, ‘sexiness’ and ‘marriageability’ are not employed as normative value judgements about the appearance of individuals in popular culture; to explain how I have developed their meanings in this thesis, I would like to discuss these terms in more detail. McKee’s (1997) analysis of Aboriginality in film and television introduces a useful taxonomy for examining ‘ordinary’ representations of

Aboriginality (McKee’s argument is explored further in Chapters Two and Three).

Compared to overseas representations of Black Americans, McKee suggests that there are very few ‘banal’ images of Aboriginality in Australian popular culture. McKee identifies an example of Aboriginal banality in the program Sale of the Century , and an Indigenous contestant called Ted. Ted is introduced as ‘the first Aboriginal head teacher in Victoria’ (197). Other guests are also encouraged to speak of their personal lives – Pat talks about lowering his golf handicap, and Amanda tells the host she wants to take her children to Disneyland (ibid). Drawing upon the work of

Baudrillard (1990), McKee suggests that banal representations are those which are undifferentiated, measured as part of the general flow and continuity of everyday life.

They are unremarkable and unspectacular. In Sale of the Century Ted’s Aboriginality is mentioned, but it does not render him any more or less exciting than the other contestants. Aboriginality in this context ‘is no longer really different: rather it becomes part of the game show discourse of trivia’ (ibid). In this popular discourse, it

15 is Ted’s speed on the buzzer and adeptness at answering questions that make him different.

Banal images are structurally opposed to ‘fatal’ ones. McKee remarks that

‘the fatal is meaningful, different and differentiated; it is dangerous and unique, and must somehow standout in the flow of (“everyday”) existence’ (192). Fatality is a dominant trope for representing Aboriginality in Australian films. Many traditional

Indigenous characters in films are represented as being culturally and geographically distanced from white characters; their remoteness is symbolically intensified through their association with death (this theme is explored further in Chapter Three, in relation to representations of sex). McKee suggests that this cultural association between Aboriginality and fatality (quite literally death within these films), denies

Indigenous subjectivity in mainstream, white Australia. Taking this argument further, fatalism can be seen in other areas of mainstream representation, particularly news media which seeks to report upon how Indigenous populations deviate from assumed social or criminal norms (see Chapter Two). The spectacle of news content, which can also be utilised to broadcast items about Indigenous community achievement and success, visualises populations as objects of cultural interest. These images are not in and of themselves destructive. However, without discernable mainstream representations of Indigenous banality, an overabundance of fatal images may serve to exclude Indigenous forms of participation and recognition in white society.

In this thesis I have chosen to modify McKee’s ideas to illustrate my particular use of the term ‘ordinary’. Banal images are part of the everyday, though they can also include representations which do not necessarily entail ‘ordinariness’. Within the everyday, as Chapters Four and Five illustrate, images of Indigeneity might include

Christine Anu performing at the Sydney Olympics opening ceremony (Chapter Four),

16 or soap characters retaliating from racist abuse (Chapter Five). Indigeneity in these contexts can be differentiated from more ‘ordinary’ representations, wherever

Indigeneity is seen to be the differentiating variable. Indigeneity can be embodied as spectacular display (the opening ceremony), yet over time Christine Anu’s own personal image can become much more ‘ordinary’. She can be exceptional as an

Indigenous ambassador in the Olympics and, in a television interview, can also be seen as ordinary, speaking about the event during the dialogue. Indigenous characters may appear ‘ordinary’ within recurring soap narratives, but their Indigeneity may make them vulnerable to themes of racism. In the latter example, Indigeneity renders such characters as exceptional within the ordinary . In this thesis, exceptional representations may be opposed to images of ordinariness; though, unlike the fatal/banal dichotomy, exceptionality can often co-exist alongside, and within, representations of ordinariness. Banal images include those of ordinary people, houses, families and relationships. Ordinariness is understood to comprise a series of value judgements about everyday life, and includes those identities who are permitted to represent the broader community.

Another term used throughout the thesis, which often exists in tension with ordinariness, is ‘sexiness’. Overtly sexy representations in the media – say, within television advertisements, calendars and magazine lift-outs – are exceptional images.

These images can be evocative and eye-catching, and standout as moments that provide titillation and excitement within the everyday. Sexy bodies are commonly deployed in the promotion of special events – calendar launches, concerts, sporting grand finals or new television programs, for instance. These are exceptional images in that they exist in tension with, but also alongside, more everyday, banal and acceptable forms of community interaction. The display of sexy bodies sometimes

17 draws criticism, evoking debates about community standards, taste and decency.

Lines might be drawn by a celebrity, for instance, about her decision to pose for the photography magazine Black & White rather than Playboy or Hustler . Sexy popular images, because they are exceptional displays of the body, provide a means of creating dialogue about personal desires, relationships and power in society – this theme is pursued in relation to the Indigenous authorship of calendars in Chapter

Four, and Indigenous representation in pornography in Chapter Three.

Marriageability is produced when these two kinds of representation – ordinariness and sexiness – converge. Marriageable relationships are based on sexual interaction. But because they are ordinary forms of public representation, marriageable relationships are not represented in their explicitly sexual form. Rather, sexual expression can be photographed as holding hands at a public events (see figure

2); a feature column written about a wedding event, or advice given about relationships in a magazine column. These kind of representations speak about desired forms of partnership within the community, often limited (though not always) to heterosexual unions between attractive young people. This is not to suggest that marriageable representations are any less valuable than sexy images. They represent two different modes of public engagement, interacting with each other in particular ways. The thesis discusses the relationship between sexiness and marriageability, highlighting the significance of marriageability as a more dominant mode of intercultural dialogue.

Figure 2 – Cathy Freeman and her then boyfriend Joel Edgerton at the 2003 AFI awards.

Reconciliation and White Representation

Inescapably, the thesis is written from a white perspective – in dialogue with

Indigenous voices (see Appendix 1). As a non-Indigenous person, I want to clarify that I am not attempting to speak about that which I am not qualified to speak of –

Indigenous people themselves, or their experiences 1. Though the research does include the views of Indigenous practitioners working in the media, the thesis does not claim to speak on behalf of these Indigenous people, neither do I suggest these subjects be considered representative of a more general population. The project is

1 A relevant debate concerning white (radical feminist) authorship over Aboriginal women’s experiences of sexual trauma occurred when Women’s Studies International Forum published Diane Bell and Topsy Napurrula Nelson’s ‘co-authored’ article ‘Speaking about Rape is Everyone’s Business’ (1989). For responses to the article – which illustrate the author’s assumptions of the right to speak ‘for’ Indigenous people in the academic context – see Huggins et al (1991) and Larbalestier (1990).

19 grounded in popular representations. In particular, the object of study throughout the thesis is white culture, and the consumption of images of Aboriginality available to white audiences. I am primarily interested in the forms of engagement these images make possible for white Australians, and the changes that might need to occur for processes like reconciliation to become more meaningful. In its focus on mainstream media, the thesis aims to highlight an important area through which reconciliation can transform key elements of white cultural representation.

My own interest in the media is both personal and academic. In 2001 I wrote an honours thesis about the representation of Nyungah sacred places in Perth, an interest I followed through the media since arriving from the UK in the early nineteen-nineties. As a young Australian citizen, being aware of the injustices white

Australia imposes on Indigenous Australians, my perspectives were informed by both media representations, and also personal perspectives of Indigenous friends growing up in Girrawheen. Whilst attending university I did not meet any fellow students within the media and cultural studies departments who had, through friendships or work, known any Aboriginal people, even though many people expressed strong opinions about the inappropriateness of their existence in mainstream society. A partial motivation for writing this PhD came from this experience of university, and the need to show that there are actually many Indigenous people working in the media, in a variety of roles. For many white people, as academics continually point out, the media performs a pivotal role in informing – even creating – relationships with Indigenous people. Relationships between Indigenous people and the wider community are mediated. Marcia Langton makes precisely this point when arguing that Aboriginality is an ‘intersubjective experience’; as much as it is a lived part of

Indigenous peoples’ own lives, Aboriginality is also something shared by Black and

20 white audiences, through television programs, music, sport, literature and theatre. For most non-Indigenous people in this country, these popular texts form an important template for imagining relationships with Indigenous people.

One of the most visible media embodiments of the relationship between

Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities is expressed through the reconciliation movement. In 1991 the Commonwealth Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation Act was passed, providing the first formal template for recognising the need to change existing relationships. As defined by the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation

(1999), ‘[r]econciliation is about working together to improve relations between

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and the wider community’. These words are enshrined as policy, but of course mean very little without any affiliated personal or emotional commitment. Such statements of policy may be defined as formal acts of reconciliation. 2 By contrast, in its explication of Aboriginal marriageability in the mediasphere, this thesis is more concerned with what might be termed cultural reconciliation . As distinct from the more official process, cultural reconciliation finds expression in more ordinary, everyday representations. Cultural reconciliation broadens the applicability of the formal process, and is signalled by changes to television and other media content and production through the recognition of Indigenous perspectives. Such expressions may include the publicised walk across the Sydney Harbour Bridge in 2000 – in support of ‘reconciliation’ – by over 150,000 people. It is my belief that the reconciliation process is dependent upon both formal and cultural trajectories working together.

It is worth noting that most previous academic accounts of reconciliation have focused on formal politics and policies (for instance, see Cooney, 2000; Behrendt,

2 Although the reconciliation movement has received unprecedented popular support and media coverage over the past decade, the policy of reconciliation remains problematic without first legal and constitutional recognition of Aboriginal Sovereignty rights.

21 2002; Jull, 2004; Luker, 2005; Nicholl, 1998). These articles express anger and frustration with the present conservative government, which has significantly shifted

Indigenous policy away from land rights and Sovereignty issues, to a more practical emphasis on ‘reconciliation’ through reciprocal obligation. The Howard

Government’s refusal to acknowledge the findings of the National Inquiry (1997) into the Stolen Generations, and its recommendations of a formal apology, also signalled a turn away for the government from reconciliation as a movement grounded in symbolic rights. Some sources extend their criticism of the government, and point towards the one-sidedness of the term ‘reconciliation’ as a predominantly ‘white’ construction (see Phelps, 2004; Saxton, 2004). In the overwhelming majority of these articles, very few examples of alternative forms of inter-cultural engagement are offered to counter what are seen as pervasive government attitudes.

Part of the problem identified by critics of reconciliation relates to the term itself. Implied in it is a desire for co-operation, on the parts of both Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities. As some have pointed out, such an obligation places an undue emphasis on Indigenous people who may otherwise wish to refuse this process.

‘Reconciliation’ is a term which evokes responsibility, a coming together to resolve a dispute or wrong-doing. Reconciliation can seem like an unfair obligation for

Indigenous people if they are expected to participate regardless of circumstances or relationships with white Australia. Aaron Pedersen emphasises his concerns about non-Indigenous responsibility this way:

Reconciliation means that someone’s done something wrong and indigenous

Australians have done nothing wrong. All we’ve done is try to survive. And

we’ve done just that. Reconciliation is a job for non-indigenous Australia.

They have to come to terms with what has been done. Non-indigenous

22 Australians must help Australia come to terms with the past, the future and the

present (Pedersen quoted in Tweedie, 2001).

The images and narratives of Aboriginality studied in this thesis are taken from mainstream Australian media. By interpreting marriageable representations through a broader discourse of reconciliation, this thesis seeks to recognise a diversity of Indigenous perspectives in the contemporary non-Indigenous public sphere. It places a particular importance on everyday representations of Aboriginality, in film, television, advertising, sport and pornography. The importance of these representations to a broader project of reconciliation lies in their collective availability. As mainstream texts, the television programs, films and magazines studied in this thesis will be familiar to a large proportion of the non-Indigenous population. By pointing to those few examples of marriageable images of

Aboriginality, it is hoped that the thesis will encourage a greater appreciation of the possibilities that the mainstream media can offer for representing more constructive models of inter-cultural dialogue.

Previous Academic Approaches

Because the thesis is concerned with popular culture, and the possibilities for cultural change and dialogue it promises, the methodologies employed differ significantly from previous academic approaches to the study of Indigenous representation. Over the past twenty years, a dominant mode of reading Indigenous representation in the humanities has been the post-colonial approach. Post- colonialism ‘foregrounds a politics of opposition and struggle, and problematises the key relationship between centre and periphery’ (Mishra and Hodge, 1993: 30). The

23 main structural opposition of post-colonial theory is the relationship between Empire and Colony. Post-colonialism aims to articulate how colonial forms of knowledge are embodied and reproduced, promoted, naturalised or resisted, through literary texts.

The movement gained prominence in the nineteen-eighties, and has developed from writers such as Edward Said (1978), Gayatri Spivak (1988), Homi K. Bhabha (1990) and, even earlier, from Black consciousness writers like Frantz Fanon (1968) and

Eldridge Cleaver (1968). Post-colonialism concerns itself with how colonised, or previously colonised, people are represented within, and in relation to, colonial ideologies. 3 In its attempts to re-configure structures of colonial power, post-colonial writers tend to describe relations of power through binary oppositions – centre/periphery, priviledged/marginal, colonised/coloniser, for instance. As Chapter

Two illustrates in relation to post-colonial criticisms of Indigenous sexiness, such approaches often provide negative formalistic readings which focus mainly on single texts. This approach is inappropriate for the present study, which requires a more nuanced vocabulary for understanding how emerging forms of marriageability are negotiated within the mediasphere.

Another, more recent, academic approach which has examines Indigenous representation is critical whiteness theory. Like post-colonialism, critical whiteness studies seeks to examine how racial identities are socially constructed and the power relations and institutions involved in this. Critical whiteness studies differentiates itself from previous approaches, such as post-colonialism and anti-racist theory, by shifting its object of study – from identifiably ‘oppressed’ groups, to white raced

3 Mishra and Hodge’s article initiated a now famous debate within the discipline. The title, ‘What is post(-)colonialism?’, attempted to draw attention to the importance of syntax in understanding the applicable limitations of the term. Hodge and Mishra argue that the hyphenated term ‘post- colonialism’ falsely evokes an era after colonisation, whereas the unhyphenated term ‘postcolonialism’ more accurately illustrates the way in which notions of language, identity and culture are part of ongoing colonial legacies.

24 privileged subjects. Prominent theorists writing about whiteness and popular culture include Richard Dyer (1997) and Diane Negra (2001). Overall, the field seeks to examine how the concept of ‘race’ is constructed within dominant legal, media and educational discourses, as a means of marginalising non-white subjects. In its engagement with so-called ‘white’ structures of power, critical whiteness studies argues that Western notions of ‘race’ continue to position non-white subjects as racial others, defined against an invisible, non-raced, white norm. Theorists attempt to unmask the ways in which ‘white’ forms of racial privilege are naturalised and reproduced within society. As a thesis which seeks to identify areas of significant change within the mainstream, I believe a critical whiteness studies approach risks underplaying the political significance of non-white forms of ownership in key areas of mainstream production (for instance, see Chapter Four in relation to popular music). During the course of my research, it has also become obvious that similar issues about identity, race and whiteness are actively debated within popular culture itself. Employing an academic theoretical model to explain these debates, I believe implicitly undermines the efficacy of such popular forms of engagement.

Post-colonialism and critical whiteness studies are academic disciplines which theorise local, more everyday, forms of knowledge through elaborate and universalised models of power. As Chapter Two illustrates, these approaches have been developed by media and film critics in analyses of Indigenous representation within popular culture. I argue that these approaches are limited in their engagement with popular culture, as they accentuate negative elements of Indigenous representation, without offering or identifying desirable alternatives. Post-colonial theories illustrate how texts are related to colonial relations and institutions of power; critical whiteness theories show how texts privilege or resist white racial attitudes and

25 beliefs. In common with the methodologies explored in Chapter Two, these approaches tend to argue that popular texts encapsulate essential, underlying racist or exploitative meanings which lay audiences cannot understand. Compared to the dominant mode of inquiry exemplified by these frameworks, the thesis seeks to identify and theorise the presence of Indigenous representation in the mainstream, rather than speculating about general absences . In comparison to previous work in the field, the thesis illustrates how Indigenous people are presented in popular culture in very specific ways, and not inevitably as stereotypes, token blackfellas or victims of white society.

Methodologies

The methodological approach taken by this thesis necessarily requires some degree of flexibility to account for the shades of meaning that transpire from the relationship between multiple texts and genres. The thesis is an exegesis of popular ideas about Aboriginal marriageability, and so the central methodology provides a way of theorising texts in relation to possible audience readings. The theoretical framework of this thesis is Thomas McLaughlin’s ‘vernacular theory’, as it is developed in his book Street Smarts and Critical Theory (1996). McLaughlin seeks to articulate ‘the practices of those who lack cultural power and who speak a language grounded in local concerns’. In doing this McLaughlin affirms how theory is a pervasive everyday practice, not an activity limited to the academy or ‘academic knowledge-elites’ (5-6). The theorisation of power in society, for instance, might occur within everyday situations – conversations at shopping centres, chat shows, women’s magazines or gossip columns. Not always eloquently expressed, popular

26 texts nevertheless do articulate ideas about issues in society. Not necessarily always progressive either, critical texts also ‘remind us that that ideological power isn’t total’

(29). They do not speak the formal language of institutions, but their local and contextual concerns illustrate that theory really happens everywhere.

The term ‘vernacular’ is taken from Houston Baker’s Blues, Ideology, and

Afro-American Literature: A Vernacular Theory (1984). Baker’s usage refers specifically to his descriptions of African American people’s relationships to the blues. Rather than an abstract model of explanation, Baker shows how the blues express certain ideas of ‘vernacular theorists’ – singers, musicians, story tellers and lyricists – in the context of segregationist America. From its informal, slang and everyday beginnings, Baker argues that the vernacular language of the blues has grown to be integral to America’s sense of itself. The usefulness of Baker’s application is that it demonstrates how ordinary people theorise the world with the same thoroughness and intensity as academics. Actors, producers, celebrities, musicians and sportspeople – as they communicate different desires and beliefs about their work – can all be considered vernacular theorists. In this sense vernacular theory might present a challenge to conventional academic thinking, in its suggestion that popular cultural texts – can and do – articulate interesting intellectual ideas.

The work of Michel Foucault provides the groundwork for both Baker and

McLaughlin’s sense of the term. McLaughlin draws the parallel between vernacular theory and Foucault’s ‘subjugated knowledges’ – ‘an autonomous, non-centralized kind of theoretical production … whose validity is not dependent on approval of the established regimes of thought’ (Foucault quoted in McLaughlin: 7). It may be the knowledge that a nurse or a patient has of a hospital – a provincial knowledge, not considered adequate or worthy enough to speak directly to the knowledge held by a

27 doctor or hospital administrator. A ‘non-centralised’ form of communication, vernacular texts are never thoroughly co-ordinated enough to exert dominance.

Though they may be produced by powerful media institutions, their local and tactical meanings reverberate across a spectrum of forums – reality TV, websites, feedback columns or top-10 lists. By studying media texts in relation to each other, the thesis seeks to highlight the vernacular expressions of marriageability that have occurred through the Australian mediasphere.

Vernacular theory is not used in this thesis to study audiences. Audience studies, as a particular branch of reception theory, aims to identify discrete audiences, and study their behaviours and attitudes towards media texts – usually while they are watching them. Neither should vernacular theory be confused with fan studies, which examines the behaviours and attitudes of fandom communities – be they online chat room participants, or avid comic book or science fiction fans (see, for instance, Hills,

2002; Jenkins, 1992). The foci of such studies are usually television fans, seen as exercising personal creativity in how they engage and read their favourite programs.

Rather than studying audiences per se , either via interviews or surveys, my particular use of vernacular theory examines popular texts as repositories of cultural ideas, both currently and over time. It seeks to interpret the meanings of individual texts based upon their intertextual setting, paying attention to how those texts are marketed and accessed within the broader culture. Vernacular theory does not ignore the attitudes of particular audiences, but rather seeks to interpret possible meanings at a textual level, drawing upon pre-existing understandings of generic patterns and popular forms of communication.

The first method of data-gathering in this thesis is closely interconnected with vernacular theory – textual analysis. In its intertextual approach, the thesis develops

28 the mode of textual analysis elaborated by McKee (2003). McKee’s approach differs markedly from the formalistic style adopted by previous writers; it endeavours to

‘mak[e] an educated guess at some of the most likely interpretations that might be made of a text’. Meanings may be multiple, but they are always contingent upon how they are taken up by members of ‘a certain sense-making community’ (McKee, 2003:

70). Rather than conducting audience research, McKee’s textual analysis overlaps significantly with McLaughlin’s methodology, as it is sensitive to the broader contextual field individual texts find themselves in. For instance, Ernie Dingo’s comments about playing the ‘didgeridoo like a vacuum cleaner’ mentioned in the following chapter, are understood as comedy if we already know who Ernie Dingo is

– an Aboriginal comic who performs on the television program Fast Forward . In another context, Dingo might be known as a Yamatji man from Geraldton in Western

Australia, who was born on a cattle station ( Queensland Weekender , 14/1/06). Both of these profiles are compatible, but they exist in different contexts for different audiences. The first finds its place in the early nineteen-nineties, when Dingo was making his name in television as a comedian. The latter occurs on a regional holiday program in 2006, after Dingo’s many years of presenting lifestyle television. Through knowledge of the numerous intertexts which construct Dingo’s image a more detailed profile of him emerges, one which now acknowledges a more specific, local

Indigenous identity. It is from knowing this contextual background, that likely interpretations about Dingo’s role in particular texts can be offered.

In vernacular terms, for instance, the image of Ernie Dingo can be as central to the representation of reconciliation in the mainstream media throughout the nineteen- nineties. In the examples mentioned above, Dingo’s Aboriginality is made available to white audiences in highly familiar terms. In the first instance, his Indigeneity can

29 be read as subverting a white middle-class sense of domesticity, using a familiar home icon through which to proclaim and celebrate his Aboriginality. In doing so, Dingo brings together two worlds previously not seen to co-habit the same representative cultural space. In the ABC television series Heartland (discussed further in chapters five and six) Dingo’s Indigeneity again draws non-Indigenous and Indigenous elements together, but this time through his character’s romance with a white woman, played by Cate Blanchet. Such depictions of marriagebility become acceptable, as expressions of reconciliation, if they exist in a range of other texts and genres, enabling them to become representations of the everyday. Thus, extra-textual knowledge of Dingo’s marriage to Sally Butler in the late nineteen-eighties reaffirms a vernacular reading of Dingo’s character in the Heartland series, for instance, as a figure of reconciliation (see, for instance, McKee, 1999). These readings exist, and can only be understood, in a cultural context – in relation to other celebrities and images of Indigenous people. Hence to claim that Ernie Dingo theorises a sense of reconciliation through the vernacular, during the early nineteen-nineties, is also to acknowledge the distinct lack of other Indigenous personalities who occupy similar cultural terrain. In that sense, an understanding of the intertextual milieu to which particular images belong, and are made sense of, is central to my use of vernacular theory in this thesis.

Together, McLaughin’s vernacular theory and McKee’s textual analysis provide the main methodologies in this thesis for its textual engagement with popular culture. Without having to resort to exhaustive audience research, these methodologies provide a practical means of gauging popular interpretations of narratives and images of Indigenous marriageability. These approaches have been selected as they enable a balanced engagement with popular culture; without either

30 nullifying the political reach of everyday texts by subjecting them to overriding theories of power, or by exaggerating their potential as a source of meaningful historical change.

In its use of vernacular theory, the thesis does not simply claim that

Indigenous marriageability provides the only solution to Indigenous social justice, that the proliferation of marriageable images inevitably leads to, or is the direct cause of, dramatic changes in society, such as improvements to Indigenous social and economic wellbeing. Such a claim places an undue level of importance upon the power of popular texts, as an influence upon peoples’ behaviours. But over time, images do change and become an impetus for broader changes in attitudes, making ideas such as reconciliation more imaginable as a social reality. My use of vernacular theory shows how important debates about these issues are – as they circulate within the white mediasphere through images of Indigenous marriageability – to the process of Aboriginal reconciliation in twenty-first century Australian society. Without these debates, it becomes less likely that ordinary white people actually participate in the reconciliation process, seeing themselves implicated in its history.

Interviews

The second method of data-gathering is the interview. Interviews provide a valuable means of gaining feedback from Indigenous people working in, or profiled by, the media. A variety of Indigenous people involved in the mainstream media, including producers, directors, actors, media events managers, celebrities, journalists, sports stars, musicians, modelling and acting agents, were interviewed for the project.

I believe interviewing these workers is important for two reasons. Firstly, the

31 opinions of Indigenous professionals working in the media are significant and need to be heard. To date very few academic inquiries into the media which have given much attention to Aboriginal practitioners or producers – either from other published material, or through conversation. Though personal interviews are useful for gaining information, the thesis also pays attention to publicly available material – such as interviews conducted through chat shows, newspaper columns or magazine articles.

Secondly, as a non-Indigenous person I consider it useful to gain a sense of

Indigenous perspective throughout the thesis. As a thesis concerned with reconciliation, these perspectives have been sought to establish a dialogue with

Indigenous voices throughout my work.

Specifically, the ‘active interview’ has been employed as a collaborative means of seeking feedback from Indigenous people working in the mainstream media. This methodology is a style of interview that ‘considers the interviewer and interviewee as equal partners in constructing meaning around an interview event’ (Holstein and

Gubrium, 1995: 2), and will enable the thesis to reflect upon ideas through ongoing engagement with Indigenous persons. The ‘active interview’ differs from the traditional ‘positivist’ approach which assumes that questionnaires – and the delivery of its questions – are always politically neutral, and free from any contextual interference. In the active interview exchanges occur between the interviewer and interviewee, leading to the creation of knowledge through a ‘contextually bound and mutually crated story – the interview’ (Fontana and Frey, 2005: 696). For an academic project seeking to gain knowledge about Indigenous people’s ideas, such a method encourages a greater sense of dialogue, allowing room for introductory remarks, clarification and follow-up questions. These kinds of interactions are

32 essential to ensure interviewees are aware of my own background, the thesis topic, and to certify that all remarks will be treated with confidentiality wherever requested.

Interviews were semi-structured, each containing a set number of questions about the following subjects: reconciliation and the media; Indigenous sexiness in the media; gender and Indigeneity in the media; representations of Indigenous families; and representations of Indigenous ‘ordinariness’ in the media (see Appendix 2).

Interviewees were also asked questions which related specifically to their careers – for instance, actors were asked about particular roles; agents about modelling or casting trends; and producers about individual projects. Questions were first emailed to agents or interviewees, and included a brief overview of the thesis. A final question in each interview was posed: ‘Is there anything you would like to ask me about my research or the thesis?’ During the preparation of the thesis, I have provided writing to my interviewees, to ensure they are satisfied with how their ideas have been presented, as well as to gain additional feedback about the overall thesis research.

The Thesis

In exploring the concept of ‘Aboriginal marriageability’ in the Australian mediasphere, the thesis is divided into two main sections. The opening two chapters of the thesis introduce and explore the concept of marriageability, in both historical and academic terms. Chapter One, for instance, explores the history of documented marriageable relationships between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people in the

Australian mediasphere. It shows that until recently Indigenous people were not seen as being marriageable to white Australians. The chapter suggests that this fact is important in considering the overall lack of any optimistic public models for

33 relationships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. Chapter Two explores the concept of marriageability in relation to previous academic writing on popular representations of Aboriginality in popular culture. It illustrates that previous writing tends to seek out negative interpretations by focusing on ‘fatal’ genres only, such as film and journalism. The chapter argues that if we look at other – more ordinary, banal, everyday, media – then we find representations of Aboriginal sexiness (publicly acknowledged attractiveness) that contribute to Aboriginal people being seen as more everyday citizens.

The concepts of sexiness and ordinariness are explored in more detail throughout the rest of the thesis. Chapter Three, for instance, illustrates how sexualised representations of Aboriginality first emerge through marginal forms of media production – art and pornography. Primarily, it shows how until the late nineteen- eighties and early nineties it was not possible to represent sexual or marriageable relationships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians in mainstream media. As representations of Indigenous sexiness have slowly moved into the mainstream, Chapter Four argues that Indigenous Australians have increasingly taken responsibility for authoring them. By looking at popular music in particular, the chapter will discuss the importance of authorship to the representation of sexiness and marriageability in the mainstream media. Chapter Five looks at more ordinary representations of Aboriginal marriageability in the mediapshere, through television drama serials, which provide the greatest possibilities for depicting interpersonal relationships over time. The chapter highlights how recent TV drama serials – starring actors like Aaron Pedersen and Deborah Mailman – have, for the first time, enabled Indigenous characters to be seen as both sexy and ordinary. In representing the ordinariness and sexiness of marriageable Indigenous Australians, the concluding

34 chapter of the thesis examines a key image which brings these elements together – the

Indigenous family. Emergent depictions of Aboriginal families – for example, those of Ernie Dingo and Nova Peris – illustrate how such representations of family life provide a new basis for imagining Aboriginal futures in the mediasphere. These narratives contrast to a history of deep mistrust and suspicion of Aboriginal family life in white society, embodied most destructively in the policies affecting the ‘Stolen

Generations’.

The focus on history in the opening and concluding chapters is an important one. It illustrates the context of race relations in which images of Indigenous relationships with the broader community are made available to white Australians.

As a site of public identification, the mediasphere is itself a significant part of that history. The contemporary mainstream media are not only merely a source of playfulness and light entertainment; they are also – at the same time – channels of seriousness and learning. They produce endless streams of images of community, and these provide reference points for imagining ourselves, each other – whether we perceive ourselves, and others, as insiders or outsiders. Indeed, the media teaches us the ‘critical literacy’ through which readers act as citizens (Hartley and McKee, 2000:

22). The media – as this thesis will argue – also teaches us the importance of relationships.

36 Chapter One – A History of Aboriginal Marriageability in the Australian Public Sphere

In 1959 a white man (Mick Daly) was arrested and charged with the crime of cohabiting with an Aboriginal woman (Gladys Namagu). Although at that time the arrest was not particularly sensational or newsworthy, Mick’s marriage proposal to

Gladys during the court proceedings did stir unprecedented interest in this white man’s romance with an Aboriginal girlfriend. While not completely out of touch with previous Northern Territory laws (1911-1939) which directly forbade cohabitation with Black women, 1 the decision to deny Gladys and Mick’s marriage created most controversy. Outdated marriage laws were not the issue, but the case provided a context that enabled the press to develop an intense curiosity over the details of Mick and Gladys’ interracial coupling. The case became reportable for its novelty value as a story about a white man who ‘courageously married a black girl’ (Lockwood, 1960:

2); and the story also broke because of Daly’s very open and public declaration of love for an Aboriginal woman – in, of all places, a courtroom! When the refusal was first brought to public attention, newspaper articles were strongly supportive of Mick and Gladys. As the case drew on, journalists became critical of the administrative processes, and started blaming the solitary civil servant, an Aboriginal Welfare

Ordinance officer, who stood in Gladys’ and Mick’s way. The Director’s refusal to allow their marriage made headlines nationally, and the case was even presented to the United Nations. Very much a story of its era, of nineteen fifties white mainstream

Australia, Gladys and Mick’s marriage raises important questions about how interracial relationships are imagined in the Australian public sphere.

1 A raft of laws against cohabitation with Black women was first introduced under the 1910 Act for the Aboriginal Inhabitants of the Northern Territory .

37 Why did this very ordinary act of heterosexual marriage create such controversy and media focus? Why did it get unprecedented newspaper coverage in nineteen-fifties Australia? In answering these questions, the chapter will explain why marriageability matters so much. Drawing upon queer models of ‘sexual citizenship’, the chapter argues for the importance of dignified public representations of one’s sexuality as integral to being seen – and treated – as an equal citizen. In relation to

Aboriginal-white marriages, sexual citizenship can be seen as part of broader right to be seen as ordinary, everyday citizens in the mediasphere. The chapter provides a particular history of representations of Aboriginal marriageability as they appear in the Australian mediasphere, from eighteenth century European invasion and settlement, from the trial of Mick and Gladys through to the more recent marriage of

Ernie and Sally Dingo. In terms of the later media relationship, the chapter shows how depictions of Aboriginal-white marriages have become more ordinary in today’s context. Compared with earlier times, where marriages were controversial and newsworthy, the chapter argues that today such marriages provide a valuable model for establishing meaningful interpersonal relationships between members of different communities.

‘Settling-down’ – Civil Marriages on the Frontier

In view of the violent history of settlement in Australia, it is not surprising to find that the institution of marriage has played a significant role in the process of colonisation. Many historians argue that marriage, and the differences between

European and Aboriginal marriage systems, became a major source of conflict between settlers and Indigenous communities (see, for instance, Evans, R., 1982;

38 Ganter, 1999; Jebb and Haebich, 1992; Saunders and Evans, 1992; Ellinghaus, 2003).

Relationships between male settlers and Aboriginal women were not uncommon at this time, but could hardly be considered marriageable. Despite their polygamous and extended nature, Aboriginal marriage systems were conducted through strict contracts of exchange with outsiders. It seems that white settlers failed to understand such agreements, or otherwise arrogantly rejected tribal requests for access to (the few) settler women in the colonies (Evans, R., 1982). In this early period white women simply were not permitted any relations of their own choosing with Aboriginal men, or women for that matter. Such willing misapprehensions on the part of male settlers often led to spiteful acts of vengeance between the two communities. According to

Ray Evans, the breaking of a sexual contract was a greater source of conflict than land and resources, as ‘[i]nter-racial sexual relations of frontier and post-frontier existence

[fell] mainly into the patterns of outright capture and rape, prostitution and concubinage’ (12).

Nakedness and their seemingly candid sexual customs fitted with settler definitions of Aboriginal women as prostitutes. For their willingness to engage in sexual relations with settlers, Indigenous women were frequently regarded as morally and intellectually deficient, and so could be blamed for their own sexual

‘misfortunes’. Throughout the eighteen-hundreds as incidences of venereal disease began affecting Aboriginal populations living in close proximity to white settlements, leading community figures, from missionaries, pastors and Governors, began advocating for the protection of Aboriginal women. Venereal disease was embarrassing for dignitaries, yet as ‘prostitutes’ Aboriginal women were targeted as its cause, and on this pretext could be co-opted into more ‘official’ bonds of employment within white society. Surveying the Western region of Port Phillip in

39 1841, one observer speaks of syphilis as the disease ‘civilized man spreads from shore to shore’, yet complains back to Charles La Trobe (the Lieutenant Governor at the time) how ‘the awful depraved habits of [Kooris] adds much to put a barrier to arrest its progress’ (Thomas quoted in Grimshaw and May, 1994: 99). Considered the wellspring of prostitution and sexual vice blamed for exacerbating the problem, traditional polygamous marriages were the main object of reform by early missionaries. It was the ‘work of the devil’ to have more than one wife – one missionary in far North Queensland even rewarding a ‘tin roof and a small farming allotment’ to any Aboriginal adoptee of the wholesome Christian version (Ganter,

1999: 278). The protectionist tendency in general worked to further ensure the secrecy of white-Aboriginal sexual relations of all kinds, and entrenched the sense of shame the white community would feel towards marriageable relationships with

Indigenous people.

However, in spite of this history, there are some surprising details of early settlers pursuing Indigenous women romantically – though these were written as private, rather than public, accounts. It is worth stating at this point that sexual attractiveness in these contexts could not translate into marriageability, for any accounts of sexual relationships were never made public. There was no suggestion of

Indigenous partners being publicly acknowledged as attractive, let alone considered suitable for a long term romance. Ann McGrath (1990) examines the diaries of

Governor Arthur Phillip and other prominent dignitaries as they first arrived at Port

Jackson in 1788, and describes how the appearance of some naked Indigenous women provoked courtship rituals, flirtation and even ‘playful decoration and ornamentation’ of women’s bodies (197). Lieutenant William Bradley explains one moment when

‘we ornamented this naked beauty with strings of beads and buttons around their arms

40 and wrists. . . they were straight limbed and well featured, their voices a pleasing softness’ (quoted in McGrath: 197-98). These descriptions are perhaps starry-eyed and, in retrospect, humorously combine a sexual curiosity with a distinctive upper- class restraint. George Worgan, a surgeon by profession, was enthused at the sight of an Aboriginal woman because she had a ‘Proportion, a softness, a roundness and plumpness in [her] limbs and bod[y] that would excite tender and amorous

Sensations’ (quoted in McGrath: 198). These descriptions are unusual in that they aestheticise Aboriginal bodies in a classical language not documented in early explorer travel logs or newspapers, for instance. Seen as sexual playthings,

Aboriginal women in these diaries could be romanticised outside of the existing social constraints of other Victorian Britons who otherwise would have scorned their perverse interests for the unseen, ‘forbidden’ Black women.

As the colony burgeoned, a Victorian moral code reestablished itself, and settlers developed a much harsher attitude towards Indigenous sexuality, and

Indigenous people generally. A clue to the marriageable status of Indigenous people could be found in early newspapers, which yearned for the importation of more marriageable white women. The Morton Bay Courier , for instance, described the

‘equalisation of the sexes’ as a strategy for installing lost values:

The free and freed adult males are already in excess in the colony and unless

females are introduced contemporaneously with males, no system for their

reformation can be ultimately successful. If a due proportion of free women,

of good character, could be sent out, so much the better, as their humanising

influence would be of the greatest benefit in restraining such of the convicts as

became entitled to marry, from recurring to vicious courses (Editor, 1845: 2).

41 Here, white women were valued as the prime civilising agents of the colony.

Without them, men would become corrupt and indulgent, free to fraternise and interbreed with the ‘primitive’ and ‘available’ Aboriginal women.

According to Kathleen Ellinghaus (2002), class was fundamental to how

Indigenous marriages were viewed within colonial Australia. Compared with North

American First Nations, Ellinghaus suggests that throughout the nineteenth century

Indigenous Australians were regarded as uncivilised, and in need of protection from assimilation to white society. In the North American context, however, Indigenous people could be differentiated from ‘certain classes of negroes and whites’

(Ellinghaus, 2002: 56). Their status within middle class America could be secured through marriages to white partners, on the pretext that they were educated and could speak to whites about the ‘Indian situation’. Such prospective partners often formed associations, such as the Society of American Indians, sometimes speaking at conferences and meetings about the prospect of assimilation. In Australia, on the other hand, Aborigines were strictly forbidden from ‘white’ educational institutions, many were instead separated from their families and forced into missionary schools, white properties, farms or stations. They were either expected to take up ‘low-paid labor to white employers (when they could get work)’, or were completely segregated and worked ‘on reserves, receiving minimal government support’ (64). Under this system of governance, the heaviest of restrictions were placed on Aboriginal people, curfews prevented workers from leaving properties or work stations for any length of time. Ellinghaus attributes these attitudes as inherited from the British class system, whereas American ideals of ‘equality, opportunity and social mobility’ worked to encourage the acceptance of more middle-class Indian lifestyles (ibid). However, a cursory examination of labour relations in Australia, where indentured Indigenous

42 employment in many parts of Australia was termed ‘black-birding’, suggests that race played a more significant role. In the United States ‘Jim Crow’ 2 laws promoted segregation of Black and white populations, punishing Blacks for entering white designated public and private areas – restaurants, bars, parks, hospitals and buses.

Until the nineteen-fifties, ‘Jim Crow’ laws strictly forbade Black-white cohabitation and marriage. Being Indigenous and Black counted against Aboriginal inclusion within working-class – let alone middle-class – Australian communities.

The institution of marriageability, in the early years of European colonisation, excluded everything Aboriginal people were seen to represent. Marriage was an institution for reproducing modern identities, and this idea became the prime rationale for outlawing Indigenous-non-Indigenous marriages throughout the following century. Race, in this context, was to become a more central focus of public legislation forbidding intimate relations between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people.

Marriages on the Quiet – Ethel and Jimmy, Selina and Davy

Instances of romance and marriage between Indigenous and non-Indigenous men and women are difficult to find in the Australian public sphere. They are even more exceptional in the colonial context. Mainly due to the shameful and secretive nature of these relationships, and also partly due to a lack of press interest in many other domestic issues, there is little research on Aboriginal interracial romances of nineteenth century Australia. The two instances documented here were both seen and reported as serious transgressions of colonial racial taboos.

2 So named after a character in the minstrel shows, popular amongst white audiences in the early part of the century.

43 Liz Reed uncovers a little known relationship documented in 1861 between an

Aboriginal man and a white woman, Selina and Davy Johnson. According to Reed, government correspondences from officials at the Acheron River settlement in rural

Victoria first reported the unusual case of a ‘‘White Girl’ who had ‘Gone off with the

Blacks’’ (Hickson: 9, quoted in Reed). Since running away from her father’s house to reunite with her partner, most in the rural community were aware of Davy and

Selina’s intentions to marry. Rumors of Selina’s pregnancy caused the greatest consternation, particularly amongst members of the ‘Central Board Appointed to

Watch Over the Interests of Aborigines’. But the baby died of ‘Inflamation’ (sic) at just two weeks of age, and Selina called the marriage off. Not surprisingly the death of Selina’s ‘half-caste’ child sparked little sympathy from government advocates, despite the child’s birth being reported as ‘the first instance of the kind in this or any of the neighbouring colonies’ (quoted in Reed, 2002: 10). The family even tried to hide evidence of the birth and disguised Davy’s Aboriginal identity on the birth certificate. Yet as the first documented mixed-race birth in the colony, nothing of the relationship appeared in the newspapers. A self-imposed public silence pervaded the moment.

Perhaps the most well known marriage of an Aboriginal man to a non-

Aboriginal woman in colonial Australia is the marriage between Ethel Page and

Jimmy Governor in 1898. In the burgeoning colony of New South Wales, their union could hardly be less of a historical template for Aboriginal marriageability. Theirs was a short marriage, and the tragic events that immediately followed became iconic of Australian race relations for the colonial era. Jimmy, angered over the ridicule his wife received after she gave birth to his ‘half-caste’ child, reacted badly and clobbered a family friend (Mrs. Mawbey) in the mouth with a nulla nulla (a hefty throwing

44 stick). Jimmy and his two brothers – Jackie and Joe – became outlaws after the event, killing up to 10 more people over a two-year period. The story has been commemorated in Thomas Keneally’s book, and the film based on the book, The

Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith . More a story of frontier lawlessness and Aboriginal resistance than a tale of unrequited love, the myth has much contemporary resonance.

According to one critic, the film still ‘carr[ies] the baggage and the legacy of frontier and colonial power relations’ (Behrendt, 2000: 365). For others the violence in the film has rendered it ‘a serious depiction of the black-white conflict in Australia’

(Matheou, 2002: 17). The fatal outcome of Ethel and Jimmy’s romance, as a popular myth, is suggestive of glaring tensions in the history of relations between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal bodies.

So far little historical material discusses the main source of the conflict – the marriage between a black man and a white woman in nineteenth century Australia.

Reynolds contextualises the drama as part of a series of Aboriginal retaliations on the frontier (1979: 14-18), and helpfully indicates how Jimmy and Ethel’s relationship would have been seen ‘as exceptional, and to contemporary public opinion, horrifying’ (19). Though never publicly proclaimed, sexual relationships between

Indigenous women and non-Indigenous men were commonplace throughout the nineteenth century (see, for instance, Evans, R., 1982; Robert, 2001; Grimshaw and

May, 1994; Austin and Parry, 1998; Ganter, 1999), yet relations between Aboriginal men and white women were seen as the most threatening incursions into white society. During the course of Jimmy’s lifetime, anxiety about interracial sex began to express itself in legislation for the first time. Towards the end of the century, a nation-wide fear of the so-called ‘half-caste problem’ lead to the establishment of official Boards of Protection. In New South Wales, to cite the most relevant example

45 here, the Aborigines Protection Board established itself in 1883 (-1940). The Board was ambitiously set up to manage the lives of all Indigenous inhabitants in the state – its measures included the indenturing of young Aboriginal girls into domestic labor within ‘respectable’ white homes (Haskins, 2003: 106),3 which effectively entailed separating Indigenous men from women, parents from children, individuals from their families. As a ‘half-caste’ young man who worked within many white communities,

Jimmy’s mixed-race heritage became a reportable problem for newspapers.

Characterised as ‘half-caste’ in practically every public account of his life, his

Aboriginal race inflected accounts of his questionable love for a white woman. One source, for example, discusses Ethel’s mother’s attempts to save her daughter’s reputation:

…though how that [her reputation] could be brought about by marriage with a

savage aboriginal it is hard to understand. Jimmy Governor is a three-quarter

bred aboriginal [sic]. His wife is 18 years old, and has a weak and childish

face (The Breelong Massacre: A Pathetic Story, 1900).

Outrage at marrying a murderous bushranger is one thing, but Ellen’s character becomes unredeemable after marrying the ‘savage aboriginal’. The preciseness of Jimmy’s ‘three-quarter bred’ identity also indicates the Darwinistic discourse of the day which constituted Aboriginality as a genetic, ‘natural’ problem.

By emotional association, Ellen takes on the ward-like status of ‘problem-child’, described as having a ‘weak and childish face’. Fears of miscegenation in the colonial period override any possibility of seeing Aboriginal people in this way as marriageable.

3 Across the border in Victoria the Coranderrk mission was set up three years later with the same aims of recruiting young women for domestic labour. Whilst protection boards in both states did not outlaw relations with married white men it did not look kindly upon them, yet marriages of girls to Aboriginal men of full descent were strictly prohibited. Also discouraged were requests to visit or spend time with family members (Grimshaw and Nelson 301).

46 Henry Reynolds illustrates that throughout Australia during this period, authorities focused their energies mainly on relations of cohabitation and marriage rather than violence or sexual abuse (Reynolds, 1990: 111-27). Every effort was made to curb interracial sexual contact of every kind and, as these two instances highlight, when cases of romance were reported they were very much silenced and played down in newspapers. The institution of marriageability was very conservative at that time, and white feelings towards Indigenous people as marriage partners showed considerable strain when confronted with prospects of populating white households with ‘half-caste’ children.

Gladys and Mick – A Marriage of Assimilation

In 1959, the formal, legal and legislative barriers which stood against

Indigenous and non-Indigenous couples seeking to get married came into question.

Mick Daly a white drover sought to marry his long term Aboriginal girlfriend,

Gladys, but was arrested before the couple could consummate their relationship. The couple later appeared in the local court of Katherine, defending their right to continue the relationship into its married phase. During the proceedings Mick approached

Gladys, and the court witnessed the following dialogue:

‘Gladys, did I ask you to be my girl?’

‘Yes’.

‘Did I say to you that if you wanted to go to Arthur [her tribal husband] I

would not stop you?’

‘Yes’.

47 ‘Gladys, I asked you to marry me before, didn’t I? I still want to marry you …

Will you marry me, Gladys?’

‘Yes’ (quoted in Hughes, 1965: 305).

The proposal gained publicity from numerous newspapers, and the embattled couple gained public sympathy. The then liberal approach of allowing interracial marriage, in nineteen-fifties white Australia, loomed large in the public consciousness for the first time. But closer analysis of the controversy shows that the first publicised

Aboriginal/non-Aboriginal marriage in Australia was far from an exercise in marriageability; on the contrary, it became a meaningful public event in 1960 because it was orchestrated under the service of assimilation.

This line of thinking was reported in the Canberra Times , when Richard Ward

(Daly’s barrister) ‘said the only way the Federal Government’s policy of assimilation would work was to allow white men to marry aboriginal women’ (Permission for

Mixed Marriage Refused, 1959: 11). As a ‘full-blood’ Aboriginal woman Gladys was considered a ward of the state, and this proved a major sticking point in the case.

Along with many Indigenous people at that time, Gladys was not allowed basic legal or social rights and, as happened after the Mick’s ‘cohabitation’ hearing, could be placed under strict protection in an Aboriginal settlement 4. Yet, as the defence for the marriage stressed Mick’s ‘paternal’ abilities to assimilate his wife into white society, the case against the marriage also presented its argument in terms of assimilation.

According to Heather Brook, the case against was built upon, among other things 5,

Mick’s doubtful character as a caring and loving person. Complaints of ‘drunkenness

4 In this case Gladys was placed in watch at the Warrabri native settlement, across the border from her home in the Northern Territory. 5 A line of argument pursued early by the prosecution was to discredit Gladys’ eligibility for monogamy by drawing attention to her tribal affiliation. Surprisingly the argument involved proving that laws of arranged marriage should be observed in Gladys’ tribe, an unlikely move because it would have entailed some legal recognition of existing tribal laws.

48 and violence’ from the prosecution, portrayed Mick as a reckless man, which implied that he would be incapable of elevating his wife beyond her juvenility as an

Aboriginal denizen (1997: 432-33). It was an argument which flew in the face public opinion, and was finally rejected by the court (ibid: 33). However, popular representations of a marriageable Aboriginal person – and a woman at that – had very real limitations. Conceptualising the power dynamics in their relationship, one newspaper described Gladys as:

the tiny black girl with a husky voice [who] was the only fullblood aboriginal

[sic] in the camp. As such, in other camps, she would have been a menial.

But in Mick Daly’s droving outfit she has no set tasks.

She is the Boss’s Wife – in capital letters (Lockwood, 1960: 2).

What little power the capitalisation of her matrimonial title affords, Gladys is still ‘the tiny black girl’. The tone invites pity and sorrow for her, as a child, whose marriage to a goodly whitefella should automatically entail a happy ending.

Popular representations of an Aboriginal woman in a romantic relationship with a white man, in 1959 assimilationist Australia, did not show Gladys as a mature, intelligent – let alone ‘equal’ – partner in the relationship. Yet newspapers did give a glimpse of Gladys as a familial figure:

‘I’m very happy now.’ She produced a pink wedding dress, white hat and

gloves and showed them to Daly. ‘I’ll get married in these,’ she said (Drover

Can Now Marry Aboriginal Girl, 1960: 1).

Unusually, Gladys is allowed to speak. And as she does, she speaks of very ordinary wedding regalia – ‘a pink wedding dress, white hat and gloves’. Other sources show an almost obsessive interest in these virtues of her ‘ordinariness’:

49 Gladys Namagu’s house has no walls. There are no chairs, no tables, no

lights, no beds, and no other furniture. Certainly no refrigerator….

Her home moves ten miles every day. Tonight she may sleep on a blackspoil

plain scattered with a few coolabahs and a lot of death adders.

Tomorrow night she may be at a water bore where she can bathe and wash

clothes – her bathroom and her laundry.

The beef she eats walks in front of her as part of the mob of 1350 cattle her

husband is droving across the heartland….

Her life, by any suburban standard, is hard and ugly (Lockwood, 1960: 2).

These quite bitter descriptions of her life make Gladys less than a marriageable partner in the eyes of the contemporary readership. Analogies between her life and that of the modern housewife are explicit, written from a distancing anthropological coldness. Snuggling-up to the ‘death adders’ at night certainly works against the idea that Gladys is the envy of all bridesmaids. The tone extends a perspective of assimilation towards her ‘hard and ugly’ lifestyle, evoking a need for white protection. In fact, not uncommon to this phase of ‘assimilation’, a public policy officially introduced in 1937, was the interference in Aboriginal sexual lives on the premise of protectionism. Up until the nineteen-seventies, Aboriginal children could be taken away from their mothers. Ministers and police even had the authority to inspect missions, stations and private homes, and to remove children if they weren’t being brought up to the expectations of the white community (Council for

Aboriginal Reconciliation, 2005), bearing enormous consequences for the survival and maintenance of Indigenous family life (see Chapter Six). At this time it could be hard to imagine any Black-white marriage that would not fall under such harsh scrutiny from white authorities.

50 Mick and Gladys did get married on New Years Day, 1960. They continued their marriage and, for all we know, may have lived ‘happily ever after’. But as an interracial couple once in the limelight their lives have not commanded much historical interest since. Though their marriage stirred a public furore in 1960, it symbolised little as an opportunity for dialogue between black and white Australia.

On the contrary, Gladys was known as ‘the pampered wife of a white man . . . caught in the war of assimilation between black and white cultures’ (Lockwood, 1960: 2).

Gladys was not seen as a marriageable Indigenous woman, desirable, sexy or – for that matter – even fully a woman. Conditions that would allow a marriageable form of Aboriginality in the media were scarcely present in the nineteen-fifties, nor would they appear in Australia for some 40 years.

Marriageability and Citizenship

Few everyday representations in post-nineteen-sixties popular culture evoke the political gains Indigenous people were making over the decade. The 1967 referendum resulted in the bequeathal of ‘equal’ Indigenous citizenship rights and, three years later, the federal government implemented the policy of ‘Aboriginal self- determination’. Although there were significant changes to media coverage of

Indigenous ‘issues’ at this time, only a few images of Aboriginal marriageability appear in the media. Jimmy Little was perhaps the most noteworthy media figure of this era, and is considered ‘the first Indigenous pop star’ (Pedersen, 2004). Little is vocal about issues of Aboriginal justice, and became a famous supporter of the Wave

Hill pastoral workers’ strike. He was the first regular Aboriginal celebrity on television. Lionel Rose became bantamweight world champion in 1968, though

51 briefly became a pop star in 1970 with an album and the single ‘I thank you’, which reached number two in the Australian charts.

Evonne Goolagong (as she was then known) became a notable marriageable personality when she rose to fame during the early nineteen-seventies through her tennis career. As part of that success, her sex appeal is publicly acknowledged in some newspapers – described as ‘new Miss World’ in one headline, and ‘the babe from the bush’ in another (Goolagong and Jarratt, 1993). In 1975 her marriage to long term love interest, Roger Cawley, was also publicised in the international press.

Although many stories celebrate the event, most retain a central interest in her marriage as a cause for the falling-out with her manager, Vic Edwards. 6 Interestingly, though Goolagong’s career was celebrated in Australia, extended interest in her marriage only appears in international print media. Goolagong-Cawley (1993: 208-

210) complains of a story from the ABC’s current affairs program This Day Tonight in 1971, which focused on her homecoming to Barellan, a country town in NSW. She mentions how the crew were intent on covering the issue of poverty in the town, and portraying her family as outsiders. In a letter to the ABC, Cawley expressed her concern that the story ‘emphasised the fact that they were part aboriginal (sic) and as such could be inferior’, rather than being equal to the white townsfolk (209). These images fit with persistent news stereotypes of Indigenous degeneration, ‘deprivation and social pathology’ which feed into white desires for social control (Langton,

1993a). In the nineteen-seventies and early nineteen-eighties (as Chapter Five also

6 In her autobiography, Goolagong-Cawley cites the following account of their engagement, in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette : ‘Tennis is the only game in the world where love meant absolutely nothing – until yesterday, when Evonne Goolagong and Roger Cawley met the press to confirm they will indeed marry … One of the reasons Cawley showed up, in fact, was to debunk earlier reports out of London that he was about to assume Edward’s role in arranging Evonne’s affairs. Cawley … wanted it made perfectly clear that the only thing he has usurped is Goolagong’s heart’.

52 demonstrates with fictional television drama representations), Indigenous Australians were still denied marriageable representation in the mediasphere.

Anna Cole (1994) raises some useful questions about this era through her analysis of ‘banal’, mainstream enactments of sexuality – Aboriginal debutante balls.

According to Cole, debutante balls were popular amongst many young Aboriginal men and women living in the outer districts of Sydney, providing for women opportunities of ‘‘coming out’ into the heterosexual marriage market’ (22), and helping confirm their Aboriginality alongside other urban Indigenous people. But they were also events of imperial patronage, such as the Queen’s Birthday Ball at the

Trocadero Club, where women were ‘shown off’ as exotic exemplars, dressed in exquisite boomerang patterned dresses, coloured with traditional ochres and dots.

Aboriginal design motifs were mirrored in the room’s decorations – a huge boomerang arch stood at the foot of the hall, and the room was patterned in traditional orange, white and black colouring. These events can be seen as vehicles for assimilation, seemingly innocuous social institutions where Indigenous women perform the shallow role of exotic fashion accessory for the white colonist. But to over-accentuate the input of government and community organisation in these events is to risk lessening the active participation of Aboriginal women (and men) in these contexts. For Cole, her Aboriginal interviewees’ fond recollections of debutante balls provokes her to question of the role of ‘mainstream’ institutions in Indigenous lives:

The difficult questions here are whether the balls represent a radical resistance

to a prevailing public display of the successful colonisation of these women’s

sexuality or whether they represent a public display of the successful

colonisation of these young women, now safely incorporated into the white

world ( 26).

53 According to Mickler (1998a), media representations of Aboriginality changed significantly after the 1967 referendum by focussing more explicitly on the ‘political’ dimensions of Aboriginal policy and rights discourses rather than ‘everyday’ images of Aboriginality. Images of attractive Aboriginal women attending lavish dinner dances become oddities in this media environment, as they did not align with the prevailing political discourse of Aboriginal rights. The outcome of the referendum, according to Mickler, transformed public opinion on matters concerning Aboriginal citizenship, though it also affected government policy formation through an increase in media coverage on its deliveries and outcomes. While the referendum proved for the first time that non-Indigenous people had a relation to Aboriginality, in a similar way, Aboriginality had a relationship to other newsworthy issues such as conscription, foreign policy or the maintenance of aged health care facilities in hospitals. It was not a relationship forged with ordinary fellow citizens, who could be seen as ‘ordinary’ in the conventional ways of acquiring cars or houses, pursuing relationships and building families. Non-Indigenous people could access

Aboriginality as a political issue, through a newly created domestic sphere:

The news media could now address their readerships as active agents whose

‘will’ with respect to Aboriginal policy is knowable through the usual

mainstream methods of visualising and calculating democratic opinion. Here

was a public with a position on Aboriginal policy that not only was

independent of the state (Aboriginal affairs now ceases to be an internal matter

of the state for which the public has little interest or competency), but now

instructed the state (79).

Indigenous people were not presented as participants of public debate on issues other than those identified as ‘Aboriginal’. ‘Vox pop’ items on conscription or

54 industrial relations, for instance, excluded Indigenous voices because Aboriginal people could only be imagined in relation to issues affecting their own political aspirations (80). Though officially marriages between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people were now legal, representations of ordinary marriages could not occur within this media environment. Indigenous people were construed as a problem within white society, and their un marriageable status reflected this. Without full citizenship rights

– in society, politics and in the media – it was difficult to see how Indigenous people in this era could be seen as ordinary, let alone participating in ordinary relationships.

Returning to the Aboriginal patrons attending debutante balls of the nineteen- sixties – can these images be viewed as desirable images of ‘ordinariness’ in the public sphere? Cole mentions hearing Aboriginal historian Jackie Huggins speaking about her mother’s experiences of these events in Queensland, saying it was ‘first time she felt accepted as an equal by whites’ (quoted in Cole, 1994: 23). Though debutante balls could be – and often still are – viewed as ‘the white man’s ceremony’

(Kam Yan, 1995), debutantes of the nineteen-sixties were imagined quite differently by the broader society. Cole cites the following complaint made by Churinga , a newsletter published by the Aboriginal Progressive Association, against media perceptions of attendees at the time:

The popular press of Australia makes jokes of us by presenting silly and out of

date drawings and jokes of ‘Jacky’ and ‘Binghi’ which have educated city

dwellers and young Australians looking down on us as sub-human (quoted in

Cole, 1994).

The balls themselves may have been a source of pleasure and empowerment for many young Indigenous men and women. However, the reporting of these events suggests that they were not seen as occasions when white society viewed Indigenous

55 people as equals, let alone desirable or marriageable citizens. According to Cole, most reports in the Sydney Morning Herald emphasised the participants as curiosities to whites, subjects with whom readers could marvel over; stories, for instance, mused over the pure whiteness of Black women’s teeth, allegedly caused from eating dirt; or how they have adapted to survive freezing conditions in the bush, as naked and uncivilised people (24-25). Indigenous people, though participating in an event that would conventionally view them as sexy in white society, were not recognised as such within the mainstream media. On the contrary, ‘they’ were valued for being radically different from ‘us’, the white, informed reader. There could be no recognition of

Indigenous peoples’ feelings, as desiring subjects within the public sphere – ‘they’ were not seen to be marriageable subjects.

Aboriginality and Sexual Citizenship

At this stage it is important to acknowledge relevant writing on queer citizenship, which illustrates the importance of public representations of sexuality to particular citizens’ rights. These debates illustrate that the right to be seen as a fully desiring subject often entails a concomitant expression of one’s ability to sexually objectify others – to enunciate publicly, very private sexual desires (Califia, 2000).

This is a central element of Aboriginal marriageability in the mediasphere – if

Indigenous personalities are to be seen as marriageable in white Australia, there must be a recognition and respect for personal desires and wishes. The capacity to express those desires, and to articulate identity through sex, can also be seen as part of a wider call for recognition of more diverse forms of ‘intimacy’ (Berlant, 2000) and ‘sexual citizenship’ rights in the cultural domain (Plummer, 1995). Speaking predominantly

56 about gay and lesbian rights, Evans uses the term ‘sexual citizenship’ (1993) to explore how sexual minority groups assert their rights as ‘consumers of sexual and sexualised commodities’ (2). 7 He further goes on to assert that all social groups – from transsexuals to children – can be thought of as sexual citizens. The point is subsequently echoed by Bell and Binnie (2000) when they proclaim: ‘ all citizenship is sexual citizenship ’ – the ‘foundational tenets of being a citizen are all inflected by sexualities’ (10). These writers stress the importance of equal sexual representations of queers – alongside heterosexuals – within society, as a means of de-stigmatise gay and lesbian lifestyles. They suggest that acceptance and acknowledgement as a member of the political community is often closely linked to how social identities are sexually perceived by others.

In terms of the sexual citizenship status of Indigenous people in white

Australia, Indigenous forms of sexuality (however closely they may be align with white norms and institutions) are seldom imagined as being normal, let alone desirable. Relationships with white people were never formally permitted until the marriage of Mick and Gladys. The fact that, until this time, white people actually required licenses to marry Indigenous partners suggests that Aboriginal sexuality was obviously perceived as threatening, dangerous to the white community. This perceived sense of danger meant that particular restrictions were placed on Indigenous bodies and communities, rendering them unequal to whites in many areas – maternity allowances and pensions; access to educational and health-care institutions; wages and employment benefits, for instance. Included with these equal rights , of course, is

7 Evans’ book is handy for its discussion of how sex and sexuality, in the present context, have become marketable objects of social identities. This consumer focus significantly expanded the notion of citizenship to show how gay and lesbian rights are increasingly embodied through ‘partial, private, and primarily leisure and lifestyle membership’ (64). It appears a little dated, however, in its post-Marxist targeting of capitalism, defined as an overriding system which divorces the (authentic) desires of individuals from their true ‘material conditions’ (2).

57 the right to marry the partner of one’s choice. Writing on sexual citizenship shows how inequality of marriage rights are linked to other forms of discrimination – health- care funding, access to fertility technologies; counseling services; death wills; superannuation and pension claims; as well as access to one’s children (Richardson,

1996: 88-89). In these terms, the refusal of the right to marry underpins the denial of other important social rights – forming the basis for refusal of full participation within society as a fully fledged citizen. Though the 1967 referendum gave Indigenous people the right to vote at a federal level, in many areas of white society they have remained what Chesterman and Galligan have termed ‘citizens without rights’ (1997).

These equal rights are important; however for the purposes of the thesis I am more interested in the symbolic politics of representing Aboriginal marriageability, as an element of sexual citizenship in the public sphere. Why does it matter that

Indigenous-non-Indigenous marriages are represented in the media? Why is it important that Indigenous citizenship be represented through particular images and narratives based around sexuality? In answering these questions, it is worth turning towards more recent images of Aboriginal marriageability in the mediasphere – where

Indigenous people begin to be seen as marriageable for the first time.

Figure 3 – A marriage of assimilation. Mick Daly and Gladys Namagu’s relationship created a national controversy in 1959.

Figure 4 – The first marriageable Indigenous celebrity in the white mediasphere, Ernie and his wife Sally Dingo.

‘Fast Forward Into Marriage’ – Marriageability in the Nineteen-Eighties

In October, 1989 a photo of Aboriginal comedian Ernie Dingo was published in TV Week – along with the headline: ‘Fast Forward into Marriage: Ernie finds time to tie the knot’. He is pictured wearing a thin black tie, a pin-striped suite, and his characteristic Akubra hat. Dingo appears next to his wife, Sally Dingo, who is wearing a white bridal gown, flowers garnered in her hair, as she holds a huge

60 bouquet for the cameras. Both of them display gleaming smiles. This modest image represents the first instance of an Indigenous person being seen as marriageable to the non-Indigenous public sphere.

Unlike the marriage of Mick and Gladys, just thirty years earlier, the story of

Sally and Ernie’s relationship is decidedly non-controversial. The opening pages of

TV Week are commonly filled with photos and stories of celebrity marriages. In these stories personal lives and career commitments are discussed in relation to married life, as too are particular details of the ceremony. The article introduces Ernie’s media career to date – film appearances in Fringe Dwellers , Crocodile Dundee II , and his latest role in Channel Seven’s comedy series Fast Forward . In this context, knowledge of his career over the past five years affirms a particular sense of familiarity about Ernie Dingo. It should not come as a surprise, then, to find that the article provokes an interest in the star’s work life, and details, for instance, his postponing the wedding to allow for television shooting. These are quite trivial facts, but establish Ernie Dingo as an ‘ordinary’ personality in the mediasphere. There is no discussion of Dingo’s suitability as a partner, and no appeal to the reader’s sense of justice that this Aboriginal man should be allowed to marry a white woman. As opposed to the nineteen-sixties marriage of Gladys Namagu and Mick Daly, the media event of Dingo’s marriage is not predicated on knowledge that audiences would or should find such a relationship unusual. Ernie Dingo’s marriage is radically different – he appears as an integral part of the community, unmistakably Aboriginal and unexceptionally ordinary. And like all marriages ceremonies – for those who are invited at least (which includes ‘us’ in this instance) – Ernie and Sally’s marriage is an occasion to celebrate. Public endorsement is an encouraging sign of Dingo’s marriageable status in the late nineteen-eighties and early nineteen-nineties.

61 Before Ernie and Sally Dingo’s marriage it was possible to read about other

Indigenous marriages in the nineteen-eighties, though these were not nearly as highly profiled, neither were they particularly well celebrated. From the mid nineteen- seventies to the late nineteen-eighties Justine Saunders was considered ‘Australia’s leading black actress’ (see Brown, 1986), yet her marriage to boyfriend Lee Clayton in 1986 receives only a column alongside a ‘Sugar Babies’ candy advertisement in TV

Week . The story is accompanied with a much smaller black and white industry photo

(to show who she is). There is not even a photograph of the groom. Although she does speak about her career in film, and the importance of representations of

Aboriginality in Fringe Dwellers (1986), she is not given any space to speak about her personal relationship. Dingo, on the other hand even speaks about his wife’s decision to marry him – ‘What woman in her right mind would want Dingo as a surname? . . . I’m a crazy “black fella” who plays a vacuum cleaner instead of a didgeridoo’. It is with this particular sense of comedy that the first marriageable

Indigenous personality speaks about his career, his life and his marriage to a white woman.

As a point of comparison, it is worth noting that before Ernie and Sally’s marriage other interracial marriages were seen – even celebrated in the mediasphere.

The first Black-white marriage occurred in 1976, between the African-American actress Chelsea Brown ( Number 96 , and most recently E-Street ) with her white

Australian husband, Kel Hirst. The announcement of her marriage is discussed at great length in a feature article in TV Week (24/1/1976), complete with an entire two page photo shoot. Her picture also appears on the magazine’s front cover, with the headline ‘Chelsea Brown – a Mum to hundreds’. In the article Brown is described as sexy – ‘vivacious, lissome’ (8). The accompanying photos show her posing in

62 different sections of her house, smelling roses in the garden and putting on make-up in the bedroom, for instance. In one photo she is ‘wearing an unbleached muslin blouse edged in hand-crocheted lace’ (11). The article discusses more of her feelings about marriage and the honeymoon, her family back in Los Angeles, and her ambitions for looking after underprivileged children. The ordinariness of their marriage can also be identified in a later article, which describes her ‘renovating the nine-roomed sandstone and brick house which is surrounded with trees and shrubs’

(Chelsea to Wed, 1976: 19). Domestic, suburban and very ordinary – interracial marriageability could be seen in nineteen-seventies Australia, between Black and white, but not Indigenous and non Indigenous Australians. 8 Black partnerships were acceptable, so long as the Black partner was not Indigenous.

Aboriginal marriageability, then, is quite distinct from other kinds of interracial marriageability in the Australian mediasphere. It is significant that a Black

American woman could be represented as marriageable to nineteen-seventies white

Australia, but not an Indigenous woman, nor even a man. Representations of

Aboriginal marriageability in Australia carry with them a particular symbolism not transferable to other communities. As a history characterised by violence and sexual abuse, it is not difficult to see why Indigenous people have not been seen as sexy

(publicly acknowledged as attractive), desirable for long term relationships, and thus marriageable within white society. Marriage ceremonies are often idealised in popular culture, the contract itself seen to fortify feelings of trust between partners, families, and different communities. Such feelings are considered more valuable if they are seen to develop over time. These ideas of friendship, family and community are mediated experiences – they are established, contested and confirmed through

8 Another African-American migrant to Australia, Marcia Hines is also a prominent marriageable Black woman of this era.

63 public representation. Seeing Indigenous people such as Ernie Dingo in relationships creates a sense of ordinariness for white people about the desirability of interaction.

Rather than making personal, emotional relations secretive and shameful, it is my contention that these representations of Aboriginal marriageability make the possibility of co-existence and co-operation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people more publicly imaginable, even desirable. As recent as they are, images of

Aboriginal marriageability may be seen as reflecting changes in the history of relations between Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities. It is a shameful history which, from a white perspective, is only just beginning to be acknowledged and addressed in certain areas of media representation.

Dingo’s marriage, then, occurs at a moment in the history of Aboriginal marriageability, when Indigenous actors, musicians and celebrities first begin to appear as familiar to white audiences. The profile of Ernie Dingo is often associated with reconciliation in fictional narrative (see McKee, 1999). Two years after Ernie and Sally’s marriage the Commonwealth Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation Act

(1991) was passed – formalising a process which recognises the need to change existing relationships between Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders and the wider

Australian community. As the most successful Indigenous presenter on mainstream

TV, Ernie Dingo’s marriage can be seen as promoting reconciliation in the non-

Indigenous mediapshere. It is a more informal sense of relationship building that

Ernie Dingo represents. But such relationships are important as representations within the everyday – they are taken-for-granted, unquestioned expressions of commitment between members of different communities.

64 Contemporary Media Marriageabilities

The history of Aboriginal marriageability in the Australian public sphere outlined in this chapter provides a context for the case studies contained throughout the thesis. Colonial and assimilationist representations of Aboriginality are very different from contemporary ones. Today’s popular images of Aboriginality are also markedly different from those of just ten years ago. Since the early nineteen-nineties several key images of Aboriginal sexiness begin to emerge. In 1993, for instance,

Aaron Pedersen becomes the first Indigenous ‘Cleo Bachelor of the Year’, soon followed by Kyle Vander Kuyp in 1998. Notable Indigenous marriages and break- ups become increasingly familiar to non-Indigenous audiences, and include Stan

Grant’s divorce from his wife of 16 years (2000), Cathy Freeman (2003) and Nova

Peris (2003). Towards the end of the nineteen-nineties celebrities such as Aaron

Pederson and Deb Mailman feature regularly on mainstream television drama programs, as sexy and in relationships with other characters (see Chapter Five). The first Indigenous modelling agency was launched in Brisbane called Jinnali – the 2003 calendar is entitled ‘Jinnali: Women of Fire’, and models featured at the Melbourne grand-prix. In the same year advertisements, including ‘Libra Fleur’ tampons and

‘Dominoes’ pizza, included sexy Indigenous men and women. These instances are relatively new in the history of Aboriginality in the Australian media, and illustrate, quite sporadically, that Aboriginal faces are only now being seen as part of the everyday community, or what could have been described as a purely non-Indigenous public sphere.

Representations of sexuality prove useful for looking at Aboriginal-non-

Aboriginal relations more broadly within the mediasphere. From representations of

65 kissing, hugging, holding-hands through to more full-blown depictions of sex and nudity, in pornography, AFL calendars and television serials, sexual representations provide an insight into the most intimate spaces of public life. As public representations these images and narratives indicate who audiences are adjudged to find desirable; eligible for meaningful personal interaction. From the range of sexy representations examined in the thesis, through their continual exposure and familiarity to white audiences, some celebrities cross-over from being seen as purely sexy, such as Christine Anu, to become rounded, marriageable personalities. Other celebrities, including many AFL footballers, maintain a sexy image but do not incorporate elements which may over time make them marriageable – publicised authorship of their career and image; extended media interest in their personal lives, including their background; and an image which makes them ordinary in non-

Indigenous contexts. As this thesis argues, it is the combination of sexiness and ordinariness that produces marriageable personalities in the non-Indigenous public sphere.

Chapters Three and Four argue that sexualised representations of Aboriginal people are important in changing traditional mainstream media images of

Aboriginality. Chapter Three looks at early developments in non-mainstream films and pornography to show how their everyday representations of sexuality differ markedly from dominant fatal versions found within Australian mainstream productions. In keeping with the focus on sexiness, Chapter Four explores the importance of authorship and agency to prominent sexy personalities. It shows that sexiness provides a useful way to engage audiences, to promote more diverse

Aboriginal perspectives within the mediasphere. The final two chapters explore more ordinary and banal enactments of sexuality, in relation to television drama (Chapter

66 Five) and representations of Indigenous families (Chapter Six). Chapter Five considers representations of sexuality – such as kissing, and sex scenes in particular – as ordinary ingredients of soap drama. The chapter argues that only in the late nineteen-nineties, with actors like Aaron Pederson and Deborah Mailman, have

Indigenous characters been allowed to perform these enactments of intimacy.

Returning to the historical themes explored in this chapter, the concluding chapter looks at those representations of marriageability which are not considered particularly sexy – those of the family. Representations of sexuality are explored in the final chapter through a consideration of Aboriginal family life in the public sphere, particularly policies of child adoption. Through the image of family, the final chapter provides a more rigorous exploration of the term ‘ordinary’, and its implications for the representation of Aboriginality in the Australian mediasphere.

Conclusion

This chapter has argued for the importance of representations of Aboriginal marriageability in the Australian public sphere. In doing so it has drawn attention to the distinct lack of such representations in the history of the Australian media. The history of white Australia has indeed involved sexual relationships between

Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians since its earliest days, but this chapter has shown that the primary public model for representing these relationships has traditionally been one of surreptitious and violent sex. Indigenous Australians have not publicly been represented as suitable for romantic relationships with non-

Indigenous partners. Such a history provides little evidence that any constructive models of personal engagement between Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities

67 have existed in this country. Though there are indeed instances of such relationships, the lack of any public representation of those interactions is a telling condemnation of the way Indigenous people have traditionally been seen in white Australian society.

A small but significant change in this history occurred in 1989 with the first

Indigenous person, in Ernie Dingo, being seen as marriageable with a non-Indigenous woman. I would argue that the recentness of this occurrence is suggestive of a slow but encouraging change in media attitudes towards Indigenous representation.

Through such representations of marriage, ongoing emotional and romantic relationships, the non-Indigenous public is exposed to constructive models of personal inter-cultural engagement.

68 Chapter Two – Deep Meanings, Hidden Racism: Previous Academic Analyses of Indigenous Representation

This chapter examines previous academic writing on popular representations of Aboriginality, paying particular attention to literature dealing with sexual and ordinary representations. As the chapter demonstrates, literature which explicitly discusses notions of Aboriginal sexuality in the Australian media is far and few between. A handful of useful texts does exist, yet within these key sources sexuality is not a primary concern (in relation to tabloid newspaper reporting see Hartley, 1992; in surveying general media practices, including television and magazine industries see

Hartley and McKee, 2000; and, for an evocative textual analysis of the television series Heartland , see Morton, 1996). Commentaries dealing with television, magazine and advertising industries are similarly absent from the academic field.

Outside of these, other sources which focus on sexual representations overwhelmingly view Indigenous sexualisation as a form of exploitation (for instance, Hayward, 1993;

Jennings and Hollinsworth, 1987/88). Such writing ties into a broader field of literature which negatively interprets mainstream ‘Aboriginal’ texts, labelling them as

‘racist’. The chapter seeks to show how these critical portrayals are limited to analyses of mainly two fields of popular representation: film and news media. My approach does not seek out deep structural racism, but instead argues that if we look at other – more ordinary, banal, everyday – media then we find representations of

Aboriginal sexiness (publicly acknowledged attractiveness) that contribute to

Aboriginal people being seen as more everyday citizens.

The approach taken is limited in scope to literature dealing with visual representations, incorporating a variety of disciplinary fields such as media and cultural studies, anthropology and sociology wherein questions of representation,

69 identity politics and Aboriginality have all gained political ascendency over the past two decades. Similarly, because the thesis considers how political aspirations and sexual representations are, in many civil rights contexts, mutually interlinked I have examined a variety of articles, books, reviews and other applicable writing which consider how Aboriginality is both a ‘social thing’ as much as a ‘mediated’ bundle of visual representations and embodiments, as argued by Marcia Langton (1993: 31).

The implications of Langton’s work are explored in more detail towards the end of the chapter, where I draw upon alternative, less dominant, cultural studies approaches to representations of Aboriginality in the media. It is my belief that the models presented at the end of the chapter allow for greater acknowledgement of Indigenous input and contribution across the creative industries.

Representations of ‘Race’ in U.S. and Canada

The politics of Aboriginal representation in the media extends across a range of disciplinary frontiers. As such, studies of race and representation overseas provide a useful, but limited, comparative contextual framework for my investigation.

Particular studies of Black representations in U.S., European and British popular culture, film and advertising (see Bogle, 1973; Gilroy, 1994; Leab, 1975; Nederveen

Pieterse, 1992; Negra, 2001) illustrate that histories of Blackness are very specific, and ultimately reveal that Blackness in U.S. and European popular culture is not only more publicly visible, but more sexualised too (specifically see Negra, 2001; Bogle,

1973; Nederveen Pieterse, 1992). Slavery in the U.S., for instance, has greatly influenced the representation of Black people in popular culture and the dominance of

70 sexualised stereotypes of Black men, in particular, in film and advertising history. 1 In screen culture at least, general points of comparison between Australian Aboriginal and overseas Black populations are difficult to identify given the high visibility of

Black actors and performers in European and U.S. popular cultures. Theorists such as bell hooks (1992; 1995) and Paul Gilroy (1993) also highlight critical perspectives relevant to U.S. and U.K. Black contexts. Gilroy’s The Black Atlantic (1993) offers a postmodern and diasporic characterisation of Blackness that spans across the Atlantic, producing, since the time of slavery exportation in the fifteenth century, a ‘double consciousness’ which refuses a more Eurocentric Place-bound construction of racial identity. Such notions of Place are inimical to public and popular constructions of identity and Aboriginality in Australia, and so diasporic theories of Aboriginal subjectivity are considerably less well accommodated in the field.

This thesis differentiates – in its use of academic and vernacular language – between Australian Indigenous popular representations and those of Black and

Indigenous peoples found in North America. I have made useful comparisons in some chapters, where descriptions of particular industries benefit from details of influential overseas trends and developments. In the chapter about popular music and authorship, for instance, the reader is made aware of an overlap between Black

American and Indigenous artists, who often appropriate Black vernacular and cultural

1 Donald Bogle’s (1973) innovative study describes the contradictory but nevertheless important role Black actors occupied within a racially biased Hollywood film industry. Black characters ranged from the reliable ‘Tom’ slave through to ‘The Brutal Black Buck’, a character first introduced to audiences in D.W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation (1901), who became the most threatening and sexualised popular portrayal of Blackness in Hollywood film history. Bucks were, as Bogle writes ‘big baaddddd niggers, oversexed and savage, violent and frenzied as they lust for white flesh’ (14). As with other stereotypes, ‘The Black Buck’ remained an identifiable Hollywood figure as late as 1969 in such films as Uptight and Putney Swope . Black women characters were defined much differently, yet nevertheless sexually – the two main varieties included ‘The Mammy’ and ‘Aunt Jemima’. In comparison to the buxom Mammy, it was the Black Buck which presented the anxiety embodied by the ‘Code Noir’, a taboo which prohibited sexual relations between Black men and white women – punishment was castration, followed by lynching. For a comparative history of UK, European and American histories of Black popular representation see Nederveen-Pieterse (1992).

71 motifs from America. Of course the term ‘Black’ (as too the term ‘white’) has a complex history, within Australia it has an historical application which is relevant to the final chapter – the treatment of ‘Black’ Indigenous families under past policies of assimilation. These histories can indeed be linked to the treatment of slaves in

America, and supremacist attitudes towards ‘negroes’ in post-fifteenth century

Europe. But it is important not to conflate such representations of Black people and their representations in Australian and American popular culture. The point I would like to reiterate at this point is that, although contemporary representations of popular music have become more fluid in relation to the appropriation of Black American motifs by Indigenous artists (see, for instance, Dunbar-Hall and Gibson, 2004), film, television and advertising representations of Black Americans and Indigenous

Australians continue to remain quite different.

Research into First Nation peoples in Hollywood film and television (George and Sanders, 1995; Gallagher, 1993) or journalism (Meadows, 2001) are of some use in this respect. Although writing on First Nation peoples is significantly less concerned with ‘racist’ representations than Australian literature, Canadian and US work reveals similar analytical concerns for finding ‘authentic’ representations of

‘Indianness’. Much like Australian literature, this writing demonstrates a strong tendency to assess texts by categorising representations of Indigenous peoples into positive/negative binaries. For instance, work written on First Nation peoples in U.S. film and television reveals an inclination to view contemporary representations as extensions of an earlier colonialist moment. Drawing upon the work of Homi K.

Bhabha (1990) and Stuart Hall (1981), George and Sanders mercilessly single out television for its continual popularisation of Indian stereotypes, which they see as following on from a destructive tradition of nineteenth century fictions of the

72 ‘Vanishing Race’. They argue that the (seemingly false) commercial interests of television stations, in conjunction with clothing and record companies, compromise traditional notions of ‘Indianness’ by making images of Indians more ‘palatable’ for non-Indian consumption. Their ‘dominant ideology’ thesis identifies a common target of cultural criticism, namely television. George and Sanders privilege a particular discourse of Indigeneity, that is the pre-colonial or proto-nationalist Indian, and defend their criticism against television through a description of anything popular and Indian as necessarily articulating an antithetical ‘colonial discourse’ (429-34).

Such a reading homogenises popular texts, and sees little room for contradictory meanings, perhaps also overemphasising the formative role of film and TV in

Indigenous people’s own personal lives and histories:

Network television, far from being a trivial pastime in the US, is one of this

country’s primary forms of colonial discourse because, in any post-industrial

society, the media is a powerful tool of ideological containment [. . .] As the

producer, reproducer, and circulator of dominant ideology, the media does

function to contain or normalise the colonial narrative. The medium is, in fact,

one of the primary educators of young people today (431).

George and Sanders continue their critique of television audiences through a study of the popular television programmes Northern Exposure and Twin Peaks .

Non-indigenous audiences of these programmes are subjected to commercialised representations, whereby proper Indigenous interests are supposedly subsumed within a framework of invidious colonial images and ideas. 2 Perceptions of an ‘authentic’

2 George and Sanders interpret the appearance of an ancestral spirit in Northern Exposure , his dress and tribal markings, as evidence of television’s incapacity for distinguishing real Indians from those in Hollywood Westerns. Their explanation distinguishes between the ‘clothing of inland Alaskan Indians’, supposedly identified as an inaccurate alignment of geography and tribal affiliation within the show, with those of ‘familiar buckskins and beads of the plains people’ (433).

73 Indigenous representation are brought into play, where questions of identity, community and agency provide an invisible backdrop through which charges of

‘colonial domination’ are articulated. Without such an explicit focus on issues of

‘race’, these formal readings of Indigenous representation share a similarity with

Australian literature about Aboriginality. In Australia the concept of ‘race’ provides a much stronger critical paradigm.

Australian Issues of ‘Race’ and ‘Aboriginality’ in the media

Surveying the vast amount of literature written on Aboriginal visual representations in Australia, or any other kind of popular Aboriginal representation for that matter, it is difficult to find anything that does not allude to the term ‘racism’.

In titles, headings or in general abstract form the term ‘racism’ captures an overwhelming academic sentiment about how Aboriginal people and cultures are represented within the Australian mainstream media. ‘Racism and the Representation of Aborigines in Film’ (Moore and Muecke, 1984); ‘Racism and the Dominant

Ideology’ (Meadows, 1991); and, perhaps more cheekily, ‘Rednecks, ’Roos and

Racism’ (Morton, 1990), are a few titles located within this genre. It is easy to see why ‘racism’ has such a high profile in this case considering that most available literature concerns itself with two distinct fields of representation: Australian film (see for instance, Langton, 1993; Morton, 1990; Jayamanne, 1992) and particularly film history (Brown, 1998; Hickling-Hudson, 1990; Johnson, 1987; Malone, 1987; Moore and Muecke, 1984; Turner, 1988; to name but a few); and, print and television journalism (Bullimore, 1999; Goodall, 1993; Meadows, 1995; 2001; Mickler, 1998a;

Muir, 1996, etc.). These two genres, as distinct from television and magazines, can be

74 characterised as ‘fatalistic’ in that they present Aboriginality as exceptional, and removed from more ‘banal’ representations (see McKee, 1997a). For many critics, film and news-media industries are two powerful institutional arenas for understanding how ‘racist’ non-indigenous attitudes are interconnected with visual imageries and narratives involving Aboriginality.

Speaking of filmic representation in this vein, Marcia Langton (1993b) demonstrates how ‘Aboriginality’ is not just ‘a label to do with skin colour or the particular ideas a person carries around in his/her head’ but, on the contrary, emerges as a more profound ‘intersubjective experience’ (31). Langton shows that

‘Aboriginality’ constitutes itself as a whole range of images and representations, some of which happen to gain popular notoriety in internationally successful films such as

Crocodile Dundee whilst others remain less accessible to mainstream audiences and may include Aboriginal-owned television programmes for outback communities. In utilising this perspective, and demonstrating the role of all cultural representations as a means of creating knowledge, Langton develops what she describes as an

‘anticolonial’ position. Her criticism addresses three key areas of film and television production where Aboriginal people have traditionally been marginalised or interpellated as subordinate ‘colonial’ subjects. These areas are: the relative invisibility of Aboriginal actors within mainstream productions; the lack of control or consultation sought over productions involving indigenous communities; and, finally, inappropriate air rights and licenses given to Aboriginal people for community television enterprises. Each of these pitfalls, according to Langton, serves to restrict the proliferation of diversified Aboriginal perspectives and world-views from being understood by non-Aboriginal people. An appreciation of how existing images and narratives of Aboriginality are reproduced is crucial, she suggests, for making a clean

75 break with assimilationist ideologies of the past, where Aboriginal invisibility was a prime characteristic of media operation.

The first major article to significantly problematise the idea of ‘race’ and

‘Aboriginality’ within Australian films and, equally importantly, within film criticism itself is Moore and Muecke’s (1984) article ‘Racism and the Representation of

Aborigines in Film’. This influential study warns against ascribing simplistic

‘negative’ or ‘positive’ readings to certain representations, but rather seeks to show how filmic and visual representations ‘are articulated within a field of other signifying objects such as institutions, languages, critical discourses and material artifacts’ (36).

Whilst filmic representations of Aboriginal people, according to Moore and Muecke, can never construct an unquestioned or reliable truth about Aboriginal lifestyles, they can offer a useful means for ‘understanding the process by which Aboriginal subjects are constructed and the conditions of plausibility for such constructions’ (37). They outline a historical tradition of Aboriginal representation within Australian film, showing how phases in governmental and institutional policy-making and intervention have informed three distinct phases of Aboriginalist filmic discourses.

Briefly, these are the assimilationist period (nineteen-fifties and sixties); superseded by the multiculturalist phase (mid nineteen-seventies onwards); and a more contemporary independent configuration which strongly advocates community agency and ‘self-management’. Their study does not consider other popular media, such as television, magazines or newspapers, or the non-Indigenous mediapshere generally outside of film production. Aboriginality as a filmic construction then, rather than existing as a fixed and timeless reflection or embodiment of prevailing racist attitudes, is an object of social, institutional and governmental investment.

Moore and Muecke go on to say that racist tendencies are implicit in any series of

76 ‘singular’ images of Aborigines which, through their repetitiousness and familiarity, often build up and work to obscure other complex political claims and ideas. Racism, wherever it may involve filmic representation, can never simply be identified with or isolated to certain ‘bad’ textual images.

‘Racism’ in Film Criticism

Despite Moore and Muecke’s initial, and surprisingly oft-cited warnings, criticisms of Aboriginal media representation in Australia are still very much bent on finding ‘racism’ within texts. ‘Racism’, in these criticisms, is seen to be ‘covert’ rather than ‘overt’. Jennings (1993), for instance, takes the conventional approach in denying that Australian films featuring Aboriginal characters are explicitly racist, but suggests that, as in Manganinnie , racism is ‘repeatedly inscribed through various contrasting symbols . . . such as fire sticks and table lamps’ (5). Jennings attributes

‘covert racism’ in Australian films to three main representational factors: first, an emphasis on ‘individualised narratives . . . in which a central protagonist is psychologised and privileged’; secondly, ‘a conflation of Aboriginal culture with

Nature’; and, lastly, an emphasis upon ‘blood’ as a marker of biological difference (1-

9). Without suggesting how these narratives can be interpreted in other, non-racist ways, these kinds of criticisms are at risk of ascribing ‘racism’ to all Aboriginal- related texts. For instance, a film which foregrounds an individualised narrative (a criticism which is similarly taken-up by Moore and Muecke) can be in danger of promoting an assimilationist perspective for its de-emphasis of Aboriginal familial or community relations. However, considering Jennings’ subsequent points, suppose a film’s narrative focuses upon an Aboriginal tribe where traditional relations and

77 responsibilities are centred. Doesn’t such a representation risk the ‘conflation of

Aboriginal culture with Nature’? Does a film featuring an Aboriginal-non-Aboriginal sexual relationship necessarily have to discuss the character’s Aboriginality (or non-

Aboriginality), and to what extent?

A film frequently cited in such criticism is Bruce Beresford’s The Fringe

Dwellers (1986), a mainstream film acknowledged as the first to feature an all-

Aboriginal cast. The benefits of this achievement are far outweighed in critical reviews which deride the film for its so-called ‘assimilationist’ perspective (see

Maynard, 1989; Johnson, 1987). Maynard offers perhaps the harshest criticism of the film when he writes:

The fact that some Aborigines like the film need not persuade us to any other

view. . . The message of The Fringe Dwellers , not so much realised and

embedded in the film, but rather just lurking under the surface, is that we

should feel sorry for blacks who are doing their best to live like whites even

when whites won’t let them. It is a very patronising film because its premise

is that blacks can live like whites and want to. It is only whites who prevent

them. In other words it takes for granted the destruction of tribal society and

any other kind of racial consciousness (1989: 224).

‘Lurking under the surface’ indicates the ‘hidden’ nature of ‘racism’ that

Jennings identifies with many other films, a presence which is supposedly only detectable through socially committed criticism. A singular message of

‘assimilationism’ is authoratively stated by Maynard, despite even his own evidence that some Aboriginal people like the film. The idea of ‘assimilation’ in this context is asserted as a self-evident fact, not compromised by Aboriginal or other possible readings that would, for instance, view family relations in the film as an affirmation of

78 ‘tribal society’ rather than its ‘destruction’. The specific claim that ‘blacks can live like whites and want to’ assumes a great deal about how both Blacks and whites actually live. Furthermore, why should ‘tribal society’ be the exclusive benchmark for an (urban) Aboriginal ‘racial consciousness’? In films where Aboriginality figures prominently Maynard urges that representations should necessarily entail an engagement with issues of race and politics, making ‘racial consciousness’ a defining characteristic of popular Aboriginality. This requirement not only places unjustifiable limits upon how Aboriginal people are seen to be involved in the production process itself, but also undervalues their capacities as active readers to identify racism themselves. Again, assertions about Aboriginal authenticity become central to these criticisms as judgements about how Black or white people live serve as unavoidable assertions of truth rather than (of the critic’s own) perspective.

Australian writing on ‘ordinary’ images of Aboriginality shares parallels with

US literature about Black American representation. One of the earliest expressions of this approach – which seeks to ‘uncover’ ‘racism’ as an ontological feature of popular texts – can be found in Jhally and Lewis’ book Enlightened Racism (Jhally and Lewis,

1992) which looks at The Cosby Show and its viewers. Similar to the Australian literature, Jhally and Lewis evoke a particular ‘Black’ experience when they criticise the show for its portrayal of the issue of race in American society. Despite being acknowledged as the first show to appeal to both Black and White audiences Jhally and Lewis believe the program presents an unachievable image of Black success;

‘television envisages class not as a series of barriers but as a series of hurdles that can be overcome’ (73). Drawing upon collected interview material Jhally and Lewis claim that ‘some have argued that the Huxtables’ charmed life is so alienated to the experience of most black people that they are no longer black’; they are, to quote

79 Henry Lois Gates Jr., ‘just like white people’ (2-3). The authors cite Cosby’s soft approach to the subject of racial discrimination in the show as privileging white liberal readings of race (104-105). Jhally and Lewis do not explore what they mean by ‘Black’ or ‘white’ identities in these instances – they do not, for instance, discuss the family’s appreciation of jazz music, maintaining an extended family or listening to

Malcom-X speeches as being racially inflected activities. They argue that such middle class representations of Black America do not adequately challenge the structural causes of racism, which they identify as inequity caused by capitalism.

‘Racism’ in ‘Media’ Criticism

Critical approaches to film, dedicated to uncovering ‘racism’ in texts, can be found in the broader area of media studies. A substantial bulk of this research is concerned with news media. As news items visualise a hefty amount of Aboriginal- related material, many commentators suggest that news journalism supplies a primary social interface where ‘Aboriginality’ becomes known and knowable to the wider non-Aboriginal public, usually, however, in the form of a social or economic problem, or a blighted hindrance to the conduct of the proper citizenry, in the way of crime or unsightly alcoholism (see Goodall, 1993; Mickler, 1998; Sercombe, 1995). As distinct from filmic representations, journalistic discourses operate within certain privileged regimes of truth and objectivity. Through an over-coverage of Aboriginal- related stories and issues, news-journalism often presents Aboriginality as an invariable they -dom existing outside the imagined Australian community (Hartley,

1992), where they are mostly spoken about and spoken for by others, given limited specificity or diversity of interests. News-media provide a central forum through

80 which issues of Aboriginality are not only raised and debated but, more importantly, also created. Covert ‘racism’ manifests itself through processes of informing non- indigenous peoples in accord with pre-existing norms and values which seek to self- evidently establish precisely ‘what and who is seen to be Aboriginal’ [my italics]

(Bullimore: 73).

As with film studies, moreover, charges of underlying ‘racist’ representations sometimes appear difficult to substantiate without accounting for how audiences – both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal – respond to or interpret news texts. Such criticisms misconceive mainstream news reports as expressions of ‘cultural difference’ according to Mickler (1998b), rather than the product of particular community interests, lobbyists and news brokers. Polemic explanations that news reports simply echo the interests of a ‘dominant coloniser’ group underestimate ‘the diversity of media images and messages and the breadth of actors and agents –

Aboriginal and otherwise, who influence, inform, source and produce them’ (ibid).

According to Mickler, previous studies do not account for the ways news media primarily concern themselves with issues of ‘state and societal governance’. The visualisation of deviance in news items, through populations who are made visible through reporting, serves a more general purpose of informing and constructing issues of governance and policy delivery. When Indigenous populations are the focus of news items their presence can be understood in relation to certain areas of governance

– land rights, ATSIC, Indigenous health, or Australia Day protests. Drawing upon

Hartley’s (1992) description of community formation, Mickler urges that news media needs to be aware of Indigenous populations as subjects and consumers of news, rather than simply objects. He encourages journalists to ‘write stories as if Aboriginal people are to read them too, and see how this influences the writing’. The issue for

81 Mickler resides in the textual imagining of the community through the genre, not its endless reproduction of ‘racism’ or ‘colonial’ ideologies.

Jakubowicz et al.’s influential study Racism, Ethnicity and the Media (1994), provides a template for several studies into representations of Aboriginality in journalism (see for instance Augoustinos et al., 1999; Banerjee and Osuri, 2000).

Jakubowicz et al. also examine the connection of news reporting with other television programs. They suggest that historically the media has served as a ‘conduit for ideologies which justify the white invasion and the subsequent decimation of the

Black nations’ (37). They also point out that recent representations have changed to become more ‘self-conscious’, though they nevertheless fail to explore any examples other than negative ones. Contemporary representations of Aboriginality, according to the authors, fall into three categories – ‘Aboriginal as victim, as romantic savage, as the authentic expression of a real Australia’ (ibid). Jakubowicz et al. identify a

United Airlines advertisement featuring David Gulpilil which could be considered

‘positive and sympathetic’, showing the actor in both traditional (the desert) and modern (the Eiffel Tower) settings. Though they read this image as ‘playing with established representations’ the advertisement ‘nevertheless reiterates them’ (57).

Gulpilil is seen as the heart of Australia, a fallacy which becomes apparent when considering the actor’s coastal Arnhem Land background (ibid). Again the notion of an authentic sense of Aboriginality is drawn upon by reference to Gulpilil’s background, knowledge the viewer does not necessarily have, to accentuate the

‘racism’ of the text.

In their study Jakubowicz et al. similarly claim that soap operas have provided some examples of ‘positive and creative images of Aborigines’ (39). They cite A

Country Practice , Prisoner and E Street as examples, but do not provide any textual

82 details of these programs. Instead, they go on to talk about how these texts are produced within the context of the 1988 Bicentennial which, for the first time allowed a more extensive coverage of ‘Aboriginal concerns’, including native title and the

Mabo case (1992). They emphasise that these reports tended to position Indigenous people as ‘outsiders’, a criticism accentuated by their refusal to provide any details about more ‘everyday’ representations – those they themselves identify as ‘positive’.

The analysis portrays many of the shortcomings of the media studies field, which privileges news-journalism over other forms of representation, using this particular genre as a synecdoche for an entire spectrum of representations categorised as ‘the media’ itself.

The criticisms made by Maynard and Jakubowicz et al. in the Australian context, and George and Saunders in the North American, demonstrate a particular disdain for ‘ordinary’ representations. Similar to the Australian material discussed so far, Jhally and Lewis criticise popular representations of Black Americans for their apparent lack of political engagement in issues of race. This approach finds a strong resonance in literature dealing with ordinary representations of Aboriginality in the media, particularly in relation to sexual representations.

Aboriginal Sexuality in Film Criticism

Film criticism provides some commentary about sexual representation and

Aboriginality within popular culture. Given some of the ways in which Aboriginal sexualities have been managed publicly within Australian government policies

(Chesterman and Galligan, 1997), jurisprudence (Reynolds, 1996; Havemann, 1999), and scientific discourses (Anderson, 2002), critics often worry that such histories

83 remain largely silenced by Australian filmmakers – even when sexual or sexualised images are absent. 3 For instance, in a discussion of representations of gender and

Aboriginality in We of the Never Never (1982), Jennings (1993) stresses that

Aboriginal women characters in the film are ‘sketchily represented’, a fact explained by the film’s reluctance to show ‘white men’s sexual irresponsibility regarding [these]

Aboriginal women’ (42). Without such explicit references to sex, sexual violence remains ‘a very deep sub-text’ in the film (ibid). Aboriginal sexuality is not visually overt in this film; it is explained as a necessary absence. According to Jennings, a focus on Jeannie’s sexuality, the white protagonist, deflects attention away from the more ‘political’ sexual concerns of the Aboriginal women:

Although We of the Never Never attempts to address the intersection of

gender, race and class concerns, it does so very tentatively, opting to focus

ethnocentrically on Jeannie’s sexual oppression, to the extent that it seriously

displaces the wider oppression of Aboriginal women (ibid).

Quite rightly, Jennings’ analysis questions the place of sexuality in relation to the representation of the Aboriginal women, but her political reading makes an otherwise absent Aboriginal sexuality into a more visible feature, uncovered through the analysis as a ‘very deep sub-text’. Analysis reaches outside of the text, to a history of Aboriginal-white relations, as a way of critiquing the film’s representations of sexuality. A focus on the politics of ‘oppression’ certainly draws attention to this history, though Jennings also warns that, in a comparable discussion of Jedda (1955),

3 Martin (1993) criticises Australian coffee advertisements – which use overseas Indigenous motifs, such as the Andean pan-pipes – for not including local Aboriginal people in their depictions of the Australian bush. According to Martin, without an Aboriginal presence the depiction is misleading and culturally damaging to Indigenous people. In the ad there is an ‘insidious reliance on a symbolic economy based around the interconnected tropes of (Aboriginal) absence and (White) ownership’ (510). However, when Aboriginal presence is identified, as in the Northern Territory Tourist Bureau ads, which feature the background tones of a didgeridoo, the campaign is seen as an image of ‘territorial invasion’ (ibid).

84 ‘we should not overlook the modes of co-operation and bonds of affection which existed between black ‘insiders’ and whites in the pastoral industry’ (37).

Contemporary US and UK academic writing about popular representations of

‘race’ and sexuality express similar views towards representations of non-white sexualities. Gaines (1999), for instance, provides an evocative reading of ‘black femaleness’ in the film Mahogany (1975) to suggest that ‘a black female is either all woman and tinted black, or mostly black and scarcely woman’ (297). Such negative film images are the result of an overcommercialised cultural image-making system

(297-8). A similar trajectory is emphasised by critics of the film Mona Lisa (1986), who read the relationship between a call girl, Simone (Cathy Tyson), and her manager, George (Bob Hoskins), as ‘a vehicle for the split off aspects of white middle class identity’ (Pajaczowska and Young, 1992: 204). In the film an ‘uncontrolled or deviant sexuality [is combined] with pathological dependency [to] signif[y] Simone’s

Blackness’ (206). Here, the apparent undesirability of being a sex-worker is conflated with a singular Black identity, which is defined in terms of an equally monolithic

‘ideolog[y] of white middle-class masculinity’ (208). These representations of sexuality are read in isolation from other popular representations, and assert a deeply pessimistic view of middle-class interracial sexual relationships. Nevertheless, they do politicise the way in which ‘racialised’ identities are constructed in relation to particular histories of sexual politics. bell hooks’ (1992) description of a scene from

Mona Lisa , where George watches a video of Simone performing fellatio on a black pimp, highlights the extent to which these kinds of readings feed into an idea of

Blackness as an exemplary form of sexual ‘Otherness’:

Both the black man and the black woman are presented as available for the

white male’s sexual consumption. In the context of postmodern sexual

85 practice, the masturbatory voyeuristic technologically-based fulfilment of

desire is more exciting than actually possessing any real Other (hooks, 1992:

74).

Critical discussions of Aboriginal sexuality in film similarly underplay the significance of other popular textual representations which may complicate such readings. Even when instances of Aboriginal sexuality in film are evaluated positively, as in Jennings and Hollinsworth’s (1987/88) discussion of Tracy Moffatt’s

Nice Coloured Girls (1987), popular representations of sexuality are unfavourably described (in relation to Moffatt's Night Cries , see also Rutherford, 1990). According to Hollinsworth and Jennings Girls ‘seeks to counter dominant views of Aboriginal women as either ‘wanton strumpets’ or ‘shy maids’’ (129). The film’s juxtaposition of historical scenes of Aboriginal prostitutes boarding the First Fleet alongside more contemporary images of young Aboriginal women partying in Sydney’s Kings Cross,

Girls is ‘a celebration of the perceptiveness, ingenuity, skills and sexual power of

Aboriginal women in white Australia’ (ibid). As Jennings and Hollinsworth write about Aboriginal (women’s) sexuality they evoke a particular history of black-white sexual relations. This history is divided into: ‘white culture/black culture; the past/the present; predator/prey; exploiter/exploited’ (130). Although such a binarised reading does not detract from the protagonist’s sex appeal, the authors go on to claim that all other Aboriginal women in the film are also part of this framework. Even the old

Aboriginal woman on the beach, who sits silently watching the action pass her by:

She, too has been the exotic object of curiosity and desire, the beneficiary of

paternalistic white charity, and she has learnt her dual role of survival within

the colonial power structure. She has learnt to play the shy maid and the

wanton strumpet (Jennings and Hollinsworth, 1987: 132).

86 Thus, sex is a means of ‘survival’ rather than pleasure, and a tool for political gain. Sex becomes an exceptional characteristic of Aboriginal representation in

Australian film, and bears the loaded histories and politics of colonialism. But these readings can be viewed as reasonable, given the cultural context in which issues of

Aboriginal justice remain unacknowledged.

‘Sexism’ and ‘Racism’ in Music Videos

A comparable debate over what constitutes an acceptably untainted, authentic, popular representation of Aboriginal politics came to the fore in the early nineteen- nineties. It concerned the ordinary and sexualised representation of Aboriginality in music videos. Between 1992 and 1993 the Perfect Beat journal published several articles debating the commercial success and viability of Yothu Yindi, a part white part Yolngu (Aboriginal) band, and in particular the release of their single ‘Treaty’

(1991). The discussion centred on the remix of the original song, and its subsequent success in the Australian and international music charts. The commercial accomplishments of the remixed version of ‘Treaty’, according to Mitchell (1992), were due to a manipulation of the song and video by music industry executives and producers. Unable to consider other equally complex factors in the social and economic circulation of music tastes, such as cross advertising exposures of music tracks on TV or radio, Mitchell asserts that ‘Treaty II’ appeased the disinclined interests of an anti-Aboriginal ‘Anglocentric hegemony’ (13). Unwilling to celebrate the success of the single (it landed a top-20 spot in the Australian charts, a feat not accomplished by an Aboriginal performer for some 16 years), Mitchell describes how the absence of Aboriginal lyrics in the remix helped transform the original into a

87 ‘bland, ambient-styled house track’ (12), whilst the cutting-out of footage of Bob

Hawke signing a treaty with the Yolngu people in the video was nothing less than ‘an exercise in musical ‘colonial discourse’ (12). That is, as certain textual meanings of one song were dropped in favour of others in making the commercially successful remix, these changes were attributed to a necessary diminution of the band’s political agency. Because, it is said, they are Aboriginal. This line of critique necessitates a particular reading of Aboriginality and popular culture which perceives all Aboriginal interests – interests which must be singularised into an explicitly political agenda – as being opposed to ‘popular’ beliefs and practices. These popular beliefs and practices are furthermore controlled in the interests of non-Indigenous people. And popular culture, for this reading, is evoked for its homogenising and normalising effects, just as Aboriginality is assumed to exist as an always partial and repressed political entity.

The need to see Aboriginality from this Left-Marxist perspective drastically reduces how Aboriginal people can be seen to occupy a diversity of other, less politically motivated, cultural spaces within the popular field. This kind of reading seeks to constrain popular Aboriginal forms of representation.

Mitchell’s reading of the industrial and commercial facets associated with the re-released ‘Treaty’ was soon reiterated by Hayward’s (1993) more explicitly racially polemic condemnation. Examining the band’s marketing image around the time of the album launch, Hayward draws upon Mitchell’s ‘dominant ideology’ thesis yet questions the band’s Aboriginality as a mainstream media construct in terms of their commodified ‘blackness’ (37). Hayward’s textual analysis of the video, and its promotion, attempts to point out a seemingly unknown fact: that all the band members are not Aboriginal. Because the band is marketed and therefore known as an

Aboriginal band (a discussion of the band’s name is omitted in this reading) Hayward

88 sees the presence of white band members as compromising this fact. As white members go unacknowledged, Yothu Yindi are marketed as an exotic otherness, located ‘somewhere else’, as the subtitle of the article proclaims. ‘Their blackness and

Aboriginality does not require (racial) dilution. Indeed their ‘authentic’ Aboriginality becomes a major selling point’ (37). And such a selling point is inherently bad.

Racial authenticity, in Hayward’s words, ‘requires a repression of [the band’s] whiteness’ (37). Again, is the marketing of ‘blackness’ – if that is even what is going on here – in the midst of claims of racist exoticism, necessarily always a bad thing?

Hayward and Mitchell do not consider the interests of the band in making these statements; rather they forward a preferred Left-liberal image of Aboriginality, an image seen to be under threat from the predatory interests of the record and advertising industries. When viewed this way Aboriginality and popular culture become incompatible realms of social and cultural interests; Aboriginal people become disempowered victims and anything associated with the production of their image becomes a case in exploitation. Such an emphasis upon racial authenticity ignores the possibility of debate over how Aboriginality can be seen, defined or even experienced as a more intertextual, popular cultural phenomena. Such an idealisation of Aboriginality also constrains Aboriginal people as forever functioning as representatives of their people (Nicol, 1993: 23) rather than being accorded the full range of subject positions which whites are unquestioningly able to occupy. As Lisa

Nicol contributes to this debate, ongoing critical attention to Aboriginal representation

highlight[s] the extent to which Aboriginal acts are subject to a degree of

scrutiny not accorded to mainstream Western musicians and, like many other

black and non-Anglo-Celtic artists, plagued by accusations of their ‘selling-

89 out’ their own cultures and being contaminated by the values of the market

and Western culture in general (23).

For Hayward the area which most epitomises the exploitation of Aboriginality in popular culture is sexuality. At the centre of Hayward’s textual discussion is the re- edited Treaty video which, no longer featuring images of Bob Hawke and Yolngu elders signing a treaty, was re-made in order to foreground a sexualised Aboriginal female dancer:

Clad in a short, tight, black, glossy dress, the camera shoots her from a low

angle, centring on her crotch. This female presence is typical MTV fare,

decorative and sexual, ‘eye candy’ aimed at the notional adolescent male MTV

viewer, the very audience that voted Treaty II as best Australian video of 1991

(38).

Hayward bemoans such an association between Aboriginality and sexiness declaring how ‘such a representation is clearly exploitative but no great surprise’

(ibid). An Aboriginal woman in this context is overlooked as a significant political figure but, on the contrary, is seen as nothing more than a ‘standard model of sexist stereotyping in music videos’ (38). Rather than seeing this new image of an

Aboriginal woman as being exploitative, a case which is difficult to argue without firstly considering how Aboriginal women feel about such representations, it is perhaps more useful to examine this performance of sexiness in relation to other popular images of Aboriginal women. This point is tentatively explored by Hayward:

‘Used as we might be to seeing images of outback Aboriginal women topless’ (39).

The ‘gyrating chick’ in the video though would seem to represent a more modern image of an Aboriginal woman, albeit more sexual. Perhaps. For Hayward, though, the anthropological image of Aboriginal womanhood is too much of a determining

90 factor in how non-indigenous people look at – sexually or otherwise – Aboriginal women. In his reading, it would seem that Aboriginal women cannot escape the anthropological gaze as ‘the fetishistic “covered but exposed” nature of the images surprises’ (39). The female dancer is read in terms of the bare-breasted, anthropological image of the tribal woman (Figure 5), and this association leaves little room for Indigenous sexiness to ‘strut its stuff’. Yet the question remains: how is she to break-out of this mould? If the topless tribal woman is seen as a bad image of the

Western scientific gaze (whether it is sexual or sexualised is another important question to bear in mind here) then how, and in what form, can Aboriginal women appear sexy without confirming such popular stereotypes?

This thesis argues that it is possible for Aboriginal women (and men) to be presented as sexy and not confirm popular stereotypes. Chapter Four, for instance, looks at the career of Christine Anu (Figure 6) to suggest ways in which her sexiness has become very ordinary, taken for granted. That she is seen to author her career makes it difficult to argue she is being manipulated by representative agents of

‘white’ culture. But the kind of analyses presented by Hayward and Mitchell do not allow us to see her image – and the likes of other sexy Indigenous performers and celebrities – as anything other than exploitation. Within this tradition of writing, it is difficult to find any popular image of Aboriginality that does not, somehow, reflect prurient attitudes and interests.

Figure 5 – A picture of topless Arnhem Land women taken in the nineteen-twenties. As unknown anthropological subjects these women aren’t sexy (publicly acknowledged attractiveness) in the same way the Indigenous celebrity Christine Anu is today.

Figure 6 – Christine Anu posing for the photography magazine Black and White , after the birth of her first child Kuiam in 1996.

92 Cultural Studies – Marxist and Psychoanalytical Legacies

In summary, few academic sources examine ‘ordinary’ representations of

Aboriginality in any great textual detail. Restricted to formalistic styles of textual analyses, these approaches share particular normative assumptions about the relationship between texts and audiences. As a consequence of relying too heavily upon this approach, many critics ignore the complex role of the viewer and her/his ability to actively engage and produce meanings with a film text; a negative critique suggests that ‘racist’ texts will necessarily produce/reflect ‘racist’ audiences or cultures. Texts are the expression of inherent ‘white’ cultural values – white directors produce Aboriginal characters who are either too primordial, and thus literally background scenery for the white protagonists (discussing film history see Hickling-

Hudson, 1990: 264); a spiritual impetus, or an indigenising signifier of white spirituality (in relation to Crocodile Dundee see Jennings, 1993b); or, where

Aboriginal characters are centred, critics have pointed to assimilationist impulses, which indicate how traditional values or community standards are eroded or threatened (in relation to Fringe Dwellers see, for instance, Johnson, 1987: 240; and

Maynard, 1989: 224). Whilst these criticisms are to some extent still useful in their illustration as to how a particular set of meanings are produced (say those of the critic), they invariably risk reinforcing simple binary distinctions without engaging with or imagining desirable alternatives – verging on what may be termed academic

‘paternalism’ (Turner, 1988: 135). Textual criticisms which hinge upon reading-off certain visual images against social or historical trends tend to overlook other factors in accounting for how audiences engage with issues of ‘race’ and representation, specifically more personal, political or economic relationships. A reluctance to assess

93 texts as part of a broader social context, and to examine how meanings cross-circulate through a range of other genres and discourses, may simply result in the reproduction of ‘positive’ stereotypes, rather than ‘negative’ ones (Jennings, 1993a: 10). 4 The problem is compounded if we consider that critics tend only to examine single films or advertisements in isolation, rather than representations in context.

These limitations in textual analyses can be traced back through a longer history of criticism within cultural studies – originating in Marxist and psychoanalytical methodologies. As an academic discipline cultural studies developed with British working class interests in mind, with writers like Raymond

Williams and Richard Hoggart remoulding literary studies towards an analysis of popular texts, such as songs and work practices. There was strong democratic ethos behind this move, as it allowed a rethinking of cultural value in humanities curricula, and the class-based privileging of high art rather than popular culture. Much like the more theoretical European models of study, such as semiotics (Ferdinand de Saussure,

Roland Barthes) and psychoanalysis (Jacques Lacan), cultural studies fostered a highly structural approach in its early years. Structuralism took ‘an interest in the systems, the sets of relationships, the formal structures that frame and enable the production of meaning’ (Turner, 1996: 13). Much like literary studies, structuralism insisted that individual representations, such as films and television programs, could be analysed for their underlying social meanings. Drawing upon the feminism and the

‘new social movements’ which rose to prominence in the previous decade, Marxism became the dominant cultural studies paradigm in the nineteen-seventies (Gibson,

2001: 144). It provided the means of understanding social, political, racial and sexual disenfranchisement of particular groups in society.

4 A more considered discussion of stereotypes, however, such as that provided by Dyer (1993) in relation to gay media stereotypes, may indicate that stereotypes provide a less proscriptive function, socially, than is assumed by other film critics.

94 As Mark Gibson’s (2001) history suggests, the turn towards Marxism in cultural studies helped to reify the notion of power as an unquestionable source of meaning within texts. Maintaining its focus upon power relations within capitalism,

Marxist critique viewed popular culture as a means of reproducing bourgeois ideologies, which legitimised the continued ‘exploitation’ of society’s disenfranchised

(working class, women, ethnic and Indigenous minorities). The agency and identity of particular groups could only be theorised in relation to ‘the dominant’ power structure – in terms of its liberation from, or subversion within. Marxism sought its

‘scientific’ credibility through Althusser’s notion of the ‘Ideological State Apparatus’, which identified everyday institutions, such as ‘the family’, schools, universities and the media, as the source of the state’s ideological oppression. Within film studies

Althusser’s notion of ideology was tied to the psychoanalytical concept of ‘the unconscious’ to produce a theory of popular film spectatorship. Articles published in the Screen journal of the nineteen-seventies argued that the viewer is constructed in the instance of viewing the screen text, but is interpellated as a normative heterosexual male voyeur. Critics like Laura Mulvey (1989; 1975), for instance, suggest that Hollywood films institute a patriarchal gaze over and upon the objectified female body. The act of spectatorship reinforces traditional gender relationships, which provide the basis for female subordination within patriarchy. In psychoanalytical terms, the female body operates as a signifier for the male protagonist, representing his loss of integrity and access to power within the narrative

– understood as the threat of castration. The viewer’s identification with patriarchal oppression is subconscious and, like the Marxist reading of ideology within capitalist texts, can only be diffused through the very theory which produces it.

95 Marxism left an imprint upon cultural studies’ conceptualisations of power, characterising its operation through culture as instances of oppression/resistance. The main themes of the post-nineteen-seventies cultural studies era, according to Gibson, were the characterisation of culture as ‘a specific instance within larger social totalities, the appeal for a general account of such totalities to European “theory” and a commitment to oppositional political positions’ (26). Within this framework, ordinary – even dominant – representations lose their specificity as potential harbingers of change. Such theories inform the writing on Aboriginal representation surveyed throughout this chapter. As structuralist methodologies, they assume that particular meanings are inscribed within texts, which become detectable only through socially committed critique. Such analyses do not allow the lay reader any critical space of her/his own. As formalist approaches, Marxism and screen studies analyse single texts, which enables a selective sampling of cultural artefacts. From these sources, readings have tended to seek out ‘negative’ interpretations of popular phenomena or, where they have shown ‘positive’ characteristics, have highlighted

‘resistance’ to ‘the dominant’ power structure. Readings engage with texts through an

‘oppositional’ politics, articulated in the language of ‘Otherness’, ‘Exploitation’,

‘Subordination’, etc. Meaning is essentialised, and possibilities for recognising areas of significant change within the media are lost.

Alternative Approaches

Histories of Aboriginal invasion, dispossession and erasure are very real.

They do not go away, nor do they cease to be of any less significance when representations of them change. In addressing past injustices, as post-colonial politics

96 remind us, aspects of identity, community, agency and politics are everywhere, and so questions of Aboriginal representation carry an important symbolic weight. In addressing these concerns, it is necessary to seek alternative approaches to the study of Indigenous representation, which allow for more practical forms of engagement with popular media. As a thesis concerned with reconciliation within the white mediasphere, such a body of work needs to approach popular culture in a way that does not romanticise or ghettoise Indigenous people, and allows for recognition of

Indigenous specificity within the mainstream. I believe such work can be used to inform media production in Australia and, ultimately, can be utilised to produce a fairer ethics of representation of Indigenous issues and ideas.

Such an ethics of representation will necessarily commit itself to avoiding the misrepresentation of past violence and ensuring a better sense of representation for

Aboriginal people in the nation’s self-imaginings. Yet, an acute awareness of the need to produce ‘progressive’ or ‘constructive’ images of Indigenous Australians, whatever they may look like, leads back to an initial problem: to represent (post- colonial) Aboriginality in popular culture is itself problematic. In the contemporary climate Aboriginality carries with it a burden of representativeness; that is (as mentioned earlier in relation to music videos) Aboriginal representations are expected to bring with them a political dimension that other (‘dominant’) representations are not. Stephen Muecke’s Textual Spaces (1992) provides a good reason why critics might need to pay more attention to ‘ordinary’ representations:

In fact it’s still very hard for Aboriginal groups to get on mainstream TV, just

as it’s very hard to find an Aboriginal model or air stewardess, and you don’t

find tourist brochures selling tropical paradises with the charms of the local

women. As ‘suss’ as they are, these stereotypes are still off-limits for

97 Aboriginal people… So, while some sympathetic white kids sing ill-conceived

songs about their guilt, Yothu Yindi has come along with quite shockingly

assertive statement about really being quite normal and okay (Muecke, 1992:

182).

Textual Spaces addresses some of the problems developed in the earlier critical work on Aboriginal representation. Though much of its criticism is focused on literature, Muecke’s book is the first to seriously consider the issue of representativeness in ‘ordinary’ texts – that is, what it means when an Indigenous person enters the mainstream. Are Aboriginal celebrities seen to represent all

Aboriginal people? Should they – or even can they – be seen as ordinary in the same way non-Indigenous people are assumed to exist? Muecke applies these questions to a hypothetical industrial situation – Ernie Dingo joining the cast of A Country

Practice . If Dingo enters the series as a doctor should the series make an issue of his race? As a character in a position of power in white society, does his job position imply assimilation? Alternatively, can he play a drunk or an unemployed person?

Are these bad stereotypes? In other words, to what extent does knowledge of Dingo’s

Aboriginality limit the kinds of roles he is seen to occupy? As an answer to the question, Muecke advocates two possible solutions to bear in mind. The first is that

Aboriginal people should participate at some level in the script writing process.

Secondly, where issues of practicality may hinder such involvement, script writers need to show ‘what alternatives exist, rather than attempting to fix a particular image in place as a “correct” representation’ (13).

The work of Alan McKee is useful to the thesis as it examines some of the limitations of ‘ordinary’ Aboriginal representation. In a number of articles McKee examines the textual placement of Aboriginality in popular contexts – in an INXS

98 music video (1996); the profile of Ernie Dingo (1999); soap operas (1997b); and within game shows as contestants (1997a). The latter two articles are particularly useful for studying ‘ordinary’ embodiments of Aboriginality. In ‘The Aboriginal

Version of Ken Done’ (1997a), McKee compares banal television images of

Aboriginality on television – those of game show contestants – with those of

Australian film. McKee identifies two dominant tropes by which Aboriginality has traditionally been identified through film – either as fatal, or as a spiritual ‘Other’ to white society. Images of traditional Aboriginality – as outback, and seen to be spiritually removed from white culture or, similarly, destroyed by contact with it – evoke a powerful sense of Aboriginality as Other. Suburban, middle-class Aboriginal identities are not seen to ‘have the currency, or the discursive visibility, of those geographically and culturally-Othered’ (199). ‘Banal’, everyday images provide a way of reconfiguring Aboriginality to be more representative of community values and ideals. The following chapter pursues McKee’s dichotomy between everyday and film representations, as it relates specifically to portrayals of sexuality.

McKee’s work is also useful for its level of textual engagement. In a study of soap opera representations of Aboriginal characters from the early to mid nineteen- nineties McKee illustrates the generic limits of those representations. The article provides a number of descriptions of narrative developments where Aboriginal characters have been central to the textual community. McKee’s analysis shows that characters are frequently allowed to enter the community, but periodically their absence makes them more ‘liminal’ than central. Chapter Five of this thesis adopts a similar level of textual inquiry, but extends its analysis to sexual relationships in drama serials of the nineteen-seventies such as Number 96 (1976) through to more recent programs like the Secret Life of Us (2001-2004). The scope of this chapter

99 provides a way of illustrating the significance of sexuality to soap representations which, in recent years, have started to incorporate greater levels of inclusiveness that

McKee’s work explores.

John Morton’s article ‘Aboriginality, Mabo and the Republic’ (1996) forms a basis from which to explore representations of family in the thesis. Morton examines the ABC television series Heartland (1994) paying attention to the sexual relationship between the two central protagonists – a white woman (Cate Blanchett) and an

Aboriginal man (Ernie Dingo). For Morton this relationship is an important representational ground for symbolising political differences between Black and white

Australians, a persuasive means through which a rebalancing of power in white society can be most potently signified. For Morton it is the possibility of having kids which promises a more ‘Aboriginalised’ relationship. The usefulness of representing sexuality in this case – Morton also mentions Ernie Dingo’s ‘phallic’ appropriation of the vacuum cleaner as a didgeridoo – allows for such dialogues between Black and white to be articulated in ever more intimate and personal terms. Fictional and creative modes of representation are particularly vital in this respect for the ways in which they can merge personal and public ideas about Aboriginality, creating, as they allow Aboriginal voices to emerge, a less serious, hard-edged forum through which reconciliation can become an accessible and familial everyday project. The

Heartland series, in relation to Morton’s comments, is explored in the final two chapters of the thesis – Chapter Five illustrates the importance of the series, as the first to show a romantic kiss between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal actors; whilst the final chapter looks at the series as means of representing the Indigenous family.

Together, these texts form an invaluable reference base for the study of

Aboriginal marriageability in the mediasphere. Muecke’s argument engages the

100 symbolic politics implicated in representations of Indigenous forms of identity.

McKee’s textual studies provide a strong argument for studying ‘ordinary’ representations, and the limitations they present in terms of more traditional media such as film. Likewise, Morton’s article emphasises a particular juncture I am exploring in this thesis – the symbolism of everyday representations of marriage and sexuality. By building upon this collection of work the thesis explores marriageability in a wider range of places – mainstream film, art, advertising, television drama, pornography, sport and music. As distinct from all other studies of media representations of Aboriginality, it shows how these different genres and media interact, to present images of sports stars like Cathy Freeman as celebrities, pop stars like Shakaya as ambassadors, and actors such as Deb Mailman as political spokespeople. Of the instances of marriageability studied, my thesis shows how – as

Indigenous people – all of these personalities have become increasingly more ordinary to today’s mediasphere.

Conclusion

This chapter has proposed the usefulness of examining everyday representations of Aboriginality in the media – through television drama programs, advertisements, sport and music. Such media and genres are most practical for their presentation of Aboriginal marriageability to non-Indigenous audiences. They are available on a mass scale and, as such, tend to present the ordinariness of those relationships. It should be remembered that Aboriginality in these texts is available to both non-Indigenous and Indigenous audiences alike. Traditionally, as this chapter has shown, such representations have been viewed as reflections of white ‘racial’

101 attitudes and perspectives. Such a view does not consider the possibility of

Indigenous readerships, and refuses the possibility of non-Indigenous identification with Indigenous perspectives. In my theorisation of marriageable relationships in this thesis, I suggest that it is through the mass media that these ‘intersubjective’ exchanges are possible. As a mediasphere, it is not feasible to view these popular representations as entirely fixed or composed of singular identities. The media is a place of transition. Through it identities and relationships are mediated .

Taking this view into account, this chapter has suggested that ‘ordinary’ representations provide a means of presenting more diverse images of Aboriginality in popular culture, than those found in news media and film. These images provide a basis upon which meaningful models of inter-cultural exchange might take place.

The following chapter applies this methodological framework to demonstrate the recentness of sexy images of Aboriginality in the mainstream media. Among other things, it presents a case for more images of sexy Indigenous actors and performers to be presented to non-Indigenous audiences. These representations relate to broader historical concerns, of Indigenous people being recognised as full subjects in the

Australian public imagination.

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Chapter Three – Unspeakable Desires: The Emergence of Indigenous Sexiness in non-Indigenous Media

Arigato Baby (1991) is an Australian film about a ménage a trois relationship between an Aboriginal woman, a Japanese woman and an Anglo-Australian man.

The opening scene pictures the main character, Adam (Adrian Wentworth), a tall blonde-haired man, walking solemnly through a cemetery on a drizzly Melbourne day. Hands in pockets, and wearing a sharp suit with a thin black leather tie, Adam is mourning a recent loss. But the voice-over explains that Adam is paying a visit to his father, who was killed in World War II as a Japanese-Prisoner-of-War. We later learn, though, that Adam is visiting the gravesite of an ex-lover, Yoko (Yoko

Atsumi), who suicided over feelings of guilt for their ‘forbidden’ relationship. Their romance forms the main body of the video and is told as a flashback. Wiping a tear away, Adam closes his eyes in reflection and the camera fades to his apartment where the legacy of his father’s life becomes clearer. Eating his breakfast Adam holds up a picture of himself in an army uniform; the tone of the voice-over turns from anguish to anger: ‘I tried to be like you Dad, trying to save the human race from the Asian hordes… but I have to tell you something is missing’. Unsettled over his Father’s xenophobia, Adam begins to blame himself for Yoko’s suicide. Not knowing how to deal with the emotional imbalance, and after hefting it out with the punch-bag,

Adam’s exhorts a maddened cry: ‘When will you get out of my head Dad? When will you get out of my head?’ The scene fades to white, synthesised tones of a

Greensleeves harmony build to a crescendo, and the film begins. Arigato is a useful film in its examination of the interpersonal impact of Australia’s troubled history with

Asia, released at a time before the hysteria over Pauline Hanson’s ‘Asian Hordes’ rhetoric was voiced politically for the first time. Not only for exploring this

103

relationship in a candidly personal way, Arigato is most surprising because it is personal and political in a less conventionally filmic way: Arigato Baby is the first

Australian film to feature an Indigenous porn star, a Koori nightclub dancer, Nicci

Lane.

Yet, as an original form of Indigenous representation, Nicci Lane’s performance in Arigato has attracted no previous academic interest. This is understandable, as the previous chapter suggested current writing on representations of Aboriginal sexuality in the media warn of exploitation at the hands of white cultural producers. Representations of sexuality, in this context, make sense when they are described as ‘neo-colonial power relationships [which] carry the baggage and the legacy of frontier and colonial power relations’ (Behrendt, 2000: 365). Similarly, feminist criticisms of pornography express caution over representations of power within the medium, where our personal ‘fantasies look like dangerous and socially destabilizing incendiary devices’ (Kipnis, 1999: 163). We could assume that the

Aboriginal body in contemporary pornography is suggestive of certain colonial regimes of visibility, which invest the colonised Black body with scientific and moral possessive phantasies; the dangers of its corporeality and sexual excess evocative of past justifications for racially-inspired assimilation.

This chapter takes a different approach by suggesting the usefulness of pornographic narratives to understanding marriageability in the mediasphere. Of the two elements which constitute marriageability in this thesis – sexiness and ordinariness – the chapter considers the importance of sexiness in the mediasphere’s construction of marriageability. Far from suggesting that contemporary sexual/pornographic representations are unproblematically empowering – for

Indigenous or non-Indigenous people – the chapter explores the power dynamics

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involved in articulating those ‘unspeakable’ facets of Australia’s colonial histories, the active desires of Indigenous peoples. In examining this element of Australian cultural history, the chapter highlights how it is only recently that sexualised images of Indigenous Australians emerge in mainstream white media. They first emerge in marginal forms of culture such as art and pornography.

‘The Indigenous Love Machine is Ready’: Unspeakable Sex in Australian Films

He drops his premiership shorts, he stands naked, the ‘best-on-ground’

medallion draped around his neck. ‘Let’s kick some goals, you and me!’ says

Kylie. She reaches-up for the cold, hard metal of his medallion. Dumby

Red’s manhood stirs. The Indigenous love machine is ready. . . is ready. . . is

ready and waiting.

(Blacky, Australian Rules )

Australian Rules (2002) (Figure 7) is a film that, as the above quote suggests, uses sex as one possible way of symbolising Aboriginal reconciliation. In a pre- match pep-talk for the grand final Dumby (Luke Caroll), the main Aboriginal character in film, is ‘sexed-up’ by his best mate in a manner truly befitting the

Australian machismo at the heart of the nation’s sporting homoeroticism. The scene is comical, and ends with an embarrassed Blacky (Nathan Philips) turning to the faces of his team-mates as they listen-in with bemusement to his soul lifting speech. The relationship is symptomatic of the film’s approach to the subject of reconciliation, showing that trust and companionship can develop across racial divisions. It is an approach the film develops towards the finale as the action turns to the romantic

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relationship between Blacky, the non-Aboriginal main character, and Clarence (Lisa

Flanagan), Dumby’s sister. But in order to continue their relationship Blacky and

Clarence are forced to leave their home town, away from the racism of friends and family. But as a film which does not depict sex in these relationships, Australian

Rules ties into a broader history of film representations which refuse to present

Aboriginal characters as sexy.

In the above quote Blacky speaks of his best mate’s footy skills in highly sexual terms. But throughout the film Dumby does not pursue a relationship with

Kylie or anyone else for that matter – be they white or Indigenous. Blacky and

Clarence do develop a sexual relationship, but physical expression of that love is limited to a single kiss in the middle of the film. The scene shows the kiss as a tentative first in their relationship, but it is immediately cutaway to a shot of the couple lying in bed together. The time lapse suggests they have indeed had sex, and so their intimacy is not depicted. This serene moment together is brutally interrupted when Blacky’s father returns home, and screams at him ‘You’re rooting gin!’ He hits his son across the head then turns to Clarence – ‘get out you Black slut!’ The threat of danger follows the couple throughout the film and, in their one moment of sexual intimacy, prevents this Aboriginal character from being seen as sexy. Although

Dumby is called ‘the Indigenous love machine’ by his best mate, his fate in the film is far worse than that of his sister. In a bungled robbery of the town’s pub Dumby, is shot dead by Blacky’s father. Sex between Black and white characters in the film is a violation of racial taboos, and for the only sexualised Indigenous character, his destiny lies in death. Though the ‘Indigenous love machine is ready’, the racist white community does not allow him to venture very far.

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Figure 7 – Publicity poster for the film Australian Rules , showing the potential for the marriageable relationship between an Indigenous and non-Indigenous character.

It must be remembered that Australian Rules is a film which is part of a collection of recent domestic films interested in reconciliation. These films include

The Tracker (2002), about an Indigenous man (David Gulpilil) employed by colonial authorities to track down an Indigenous fugitive; Black and White (2002), dealing with the settler massacres of Aboriginal communities on the frontier; and Rabbit

Proof Fence (2002), which became the first mainstream film to focus on the Stolen

Generations. Other successful films made around the same time include Yolngu Boy

(2000), Beneath Clouds (2001) and Black Chicks Talking (2001). The latter two films

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were directed by Indigenous film makers, Leah Purcell and Ivan Sen. Felicity Collins and Therese Davis (2004) suggest that, in the aftermath of the Mabo land rights decision, such films represent a useful ‘paradigm shift in Australian historical consciousness’ (3). They are connected to a broader range of popular cultural texts, such as the Sydney Olympics opening ceremony, which are increasingly concerned with the nation’s coming of age’ (10). These films question the place of Indigenous histories within the nation’s self-imagining, and are thus important texts for exploring

Indigenous justice in the framework of reconciliation. Because these films do not depict characters in sexual relationships, they are of little interest to the study of

Indigenous marriageability in this thesis.

The most prominent depiction of Indigenous sexuality in an Australian film can be found in the 1955 film Jedda , though its treatment of Indigenous characters, much like Australian Rules , associates sex with a fatal outcome. In this film the more

‘civilised’ Jedda becomes sexually enchanted by a wild native called Marbuk. Jedda and Marbuk are romantically united at the end of the film, yet their lives are nevertheless fated due to the couple’s transgression of a tribal law. The tragedy of the film is that Jedda, a ‘half-caste’ woman, is unable to control her ‘true’ emotions and falls prey to a more instinctive Aboriginal self. Ultimately it is the white paternalistic society of nineteen-fifties Australia which is held responsible for failing to shield

Jedda from her Aboriginal impulses, and the ‘savage’ past that Marbuk represents.

As an Indigenous woman Jedda is certainly not imagined to be part of the nineteen- fifties white Australian community. Though she is sexualised, she is not represented as equal – and sexually appealing – to the white audience.

Outlining a history of sexual representations of Indigenous bodies since Jedda , it is possible to identify a common theme of ‘unspeakable’, even unrepresentable

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pleasures. In films featuring Indigenous characters, enactments of sex are again strongly associated with death. The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith ’s (1977) main character marries a white woman and, after she gives birth to another man’s child, he takes an axe to his boss’s family, triggering his killing spree in the white community; in Dead Heart (1996), Tony, a sceptical Aboriginal man, is killed as tribal punishment for having sex (with a white woman) on a sacred site; whilst staying the night at an abandoned outback farm, Trevor, the hardened cop in Backlash (1986) is killed as part of a mysterious tribal ‘payback’ vendetta, after making-out with Lydia, his

Aboriginal ‘custodian’; in Walkabout (1971), when rescuing two white children lost in the desert the tribal Aboriginal boy hangs himself after the girl panics when he courts her through a ritual dance. To be sure, these are all instances of interracial sex, but even sex scenes between two Indigenous characters show that representations of

Aboriginality in Australian film are also fraught with danger and consequence. In

Blackfellas (1993), as Dougie leaves gaol and meets Polly at the Nyungah camp, his sexual encounter steams with passion but becomes a fleeting promise of freedom before the law catches up with him again; the sex scene in Tudawali (1985) is equally symbolic of the character’s return home, but his wife’s tuberculoid coughing fits make the moment unsavoury, and very far from sexy. Clearly sex does not signify pleasure or liberty in these films, nor a procreative Aboriginal future. On the contrary, sex leads to death.

Historically, then, films in Australia have depicted sexual relationships with

Indigenous characters – but they have not shown Indigenous Australians as sexy for non-Indigenous audiences. Chapter One of the thesis showed that Indigenous marriageable relationships in the mediasphere first started appearing with Ernie

Dingo’s marriage in 1989. Even at that time Indigenous bodies could not be

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presented as sexy to white audiences. It is not until the mid nineteen-nineties, for instance, that Christine Anu begins to gain popular appeal as a sexy Indigenous woman, and likewise Shakaya in the late nineteen-nineties. The earliest examples of

Indigenous bodies appearing as sexy in non-Indigenous media occur in the early nineteen-nineties through pornography, but appear even earlier in the films of the

Indigenous artist Tracey Moffatt.

Sexy Nice Coloured Girls

Nice Coloured Girls (1987) provides the earliest example of a short film in which Indigenous actors are clearly sexualised for a non-Indigenous audience. The film follows a group of three young Koori women in Sydney’s King’s Cross, made-up for the evening wearing alluring dresses and high heels. But the overall story of their night on the town is more complex – added to the visual story of the women’s adventures are two extra narratives layers, one told through subtitles, the other spoken word. The voice-over is spoken by a regal-accented British sea Captain, and describes some of the responses of the First Fleet sailors to the naked Aboriginal women of Botany Bay. It’s clear from these descriptions that sex is a key component in the film, one which links the actions of the women to their ancestors who, at the time of the first voyage to New South Wales, enchanted the British sailors with their sex appeal. Subtitles provide a second narrative layer to the action, and articulate the thoughts of the three women. This particular narrative humorously undermines the authority of the voice-over, describing the events from a more practical, everyday perspective. ‘If we’ve got nothing else to do we usually go up the Cross any night of the week’, accompanies a shot of the women walking down the road, arm in arm.

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When they decide to pick up a drunk, older white man, they explain their motivation –

‘Most of the time we’ve never got any money so we pick up a Captain and make them pay for our good time’. The man stumbles around the footpath as the girls guide him to their intended destination – ‘We take him to the most expensive restaurant we can find’. The voice-over establishes a historical pretext for understanding sexual relations between white men and Indigenous women, yet the subtitles suggest these women are significantly empowered in contemporary interactions. They are able to use their sex appeal to get what they want from an incapacitated white man.

The previous chapter discussed academic responses to Moffatt’s films, and situated critics of Girls within a field of study which tended to view popular representations of Aboriginal (women’s) sexuality as being exploitative. Jennings and Hollinsworth (1987/88), for instance, read the women in Nice Coloured Girls as

‘the beneficiary of paternalistic white charity’, who have learnt the ‘dual role of survival within the colonial power structure’ (132). Their reading contrasts the film’s presentation of sexiness with an unspecified discourse which positions Aboriginal women as ‘wanton strumpets’ or ‘shy maids’ in white society. But if we take into account the representational history of Aboriginal sexuality in popular culture, where

Indigenous bodies have not been sexualised for white audiences, then a different set of readings emerges. In the film the voice over is a powerful indication of white male authority, which often accompanies historical images of Aboriginal women – one shot shows a silhouetted pair of hands grappling over a purse of money. The implication is that the women are prostitutes, using their sexuality for monetary gain. But these women are not merely victims, as the woman’s hand indignantly snatches the money away. Read in relation to the film’s subtitles (which are, of course, silent), the women are shown to be fully in control of their sexuality. They are also aware of how to

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pander to the white man’s vanity – ‘They [white men] like to be seen escorting two black women down the street’, reads one subtitle. The women also explain the social benefits to their scheming – ‘Our friends will also try and kid him up so they’ll get drinks out of him’. The film’s subtitles indicate that Aboriginal sexuality is a form of empowerment in white society for these particular women – ‘It has usually been a good night’, the final caption reads.

Academic readings of the film emphasise the male voice-over in the film – a symbol of white colonial history and dominance. Readings reflect on the ‘traditional’ association of Aboriginal women as ‘shy maid’ or ‘wanton strumpets’, applying these images to contemporary representations. But the subtitles in the film provoke a less condemnatory reading of the film, for they articulate something previously unconsidered in public and academic debate – the thoughts and desires of Aboriginal women themselves. Taking this aspect into account, Girls does indeed comment on the history of sexual relations between white and Black cultures in Australia. But perhaps most striking of all, the film shows these relationships from a contemporary

Aboriginal perspective – one which acknowledges a long history of Aboriginal ingenuity. I would argue that the importance of the film lies in its ability to show

Aboriginal sexuality as a form of agency in white society – not in contrast to pre- existing popular images, but in spite of a total lack of previous sexualised representations. Though such agency may have been passed down through generations of Aboriginal women, it is in this film that they are acknowledged publicly for the first time.

Other Moffatt films also depict aspects of Aboriginal sexuality, though none present characters as sexualised to the extent of Girls . Night Cries: A Rural Tragedy

(1990), for instance, is the story of an Aboriginal woman caring for her ailing white

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mother in an outback town. Bedevil (1993) is a trilogy of ghost stories – the second story shows a young Aboriginal couple, and some extended family members, as they are haunted by a ghost train near their house. But Nice Coloured Girls is the first film to show sexualised Indigenous characters to white audiences, and is an important step in screening what has been – up until this time – publicly unrepresentable.

Arigato Baby

Besides art, pornography is another genre which provides the earliest examples of sexualised images of Aboriginal bodies intended for predominantly non-

Indigenous audiences. The early nineteen-nineties is an important period in the history of domestic pornography production, as legislation still granted tax deductions similar to those given to mainstream films. Many films were co-produced with

American investment, using recognisable elements of Aboriginality to sell these films to the American market. Even though some films attempt to represent ‘Aboriginal’ sexuality, they do so without Aboriginal actors. Some films, for instance, make use of

‘Indigenous’ actors adorned with body paint (Outback Assignment , 1991); use traditional ‘love’ potions as an elixir for the action ( Grand Prix Australia , 1992); or deploy Indigenous motifs such as didgeridoos or clapping sticks to establish setting

(both of the above, but also Jackaroos , 1991; and Manly Beach , 1991). But at this time the most significant film to feature an Aboriginal actress (in Nicci Lane – see

Figure 8) is the Australian production Arigato Baby (1991). Arigato is an important film in this respect, for it not only presents an Aboriginal actress as sexually appealing to white audiences for the first time but, unlike Nice Coloured Girls , it shows sexuality to be integral to her romantic life. Her role in the film is more ambiguous

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than this: she has an open relationship with her boyfriend Adam, yet when she develops an intense love for Yoko, her affection escalates Yoko’s insecurity, possibly causing her suicide. For this reason Arigato is the first XXX-rated production to make Indigenous sexuality a prominent aspect of the film’s narrative.

Figure 8 – Nicci Lane as Wendy in the pornographic production Arigato Baby (1991); as a central character she is one of the first Indigenous actors to be cast in a marriageable role.

Broadly speaking Arigato Baby is about a Vietnam veteran, Adam, who has trouble coming to terms with his anti-Asian feelings, a prejudice which stems from his father’s experiences as a WWII prisoner of war. But as a white Australian character in this Australian film, his feelings of racial hostility are certainly not directed towards

Wendy, his Aboriginal girlfriend. On the contrary, Adam and Wendy are romantic partners. The central conflict in the story is the relationship between Adam and Yoko,

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which begins when Adam stops to help Yoko fix her car. From this encounter

Adam’s xenophobia is very noticeable, yet bizarrely complicated by his willingness to help Yoko. ‘Coy lead’s off!’ he explains. He plugs the stray lead back into its socket, starts the car, and they exchange little more than an apprehensive look and an angry

‘bye!’ They are both wary of each other, yet at the same time intrigued by an awkward mutual attraction. Their feelings intensify through the film, which is complicated by Wendy’s involvement – with both Adam and Yoko. Aboriginality is not made into an ‘issue’ for the other characters, but is not rendered invisible either.

When Adam and Wendy initially make love to the ominous pulse of the didgeridoo, or when Wendy’s presence is felt by Yoko as she looks upon the statue of a tribal elder (again to the sound of the didgeridoo), Nicci Lane’s Aboriginality is brought to the fore. These are very different sex scenes from those found in mainstream films.

For Wendy, sex is an undeniable source of pleasure.

As a main character in the film, Wendy’s sexuality is expressed through the relationships she chooses to have with other characters. She is presented as a sexually desirable woman, whose desirability is treated as normal in all relationships. Arigato

Baby ’s Wendy thus provides the first instance of a romantic relationship between a white man and an Aboriginal woman in an Australian film. As Nice Coloured Girls also indicates, this particular interracial relationship carries with it a strong historical significance. The history of white Australia has involved sexual relationships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians since its earliest days (McGrath,

1987). But as Chapter One demonstrated the primary public model for representing these relationships has traditionally been one of surreptitious and violent sex.

Historically, Indigenous Australians have not publicly been represented as suitable for romantic relationships with non-Indigenous partners. As a pornographic film, Arigato

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differs from mainstream productions in its ability to show what has previously been unspeakable, taboo within white Australia. While I am not suggesting that pornography is inherently more progressive than other genres, its ability to represent what is otherwise publicly unrepresentable – sexual intercourse – enables it to speak about intimate relationships, and how they are viewed within society. Before returning to Nicci Lane’s career, it is worth briefly looking at critical writing on the genre which demonstrates how certain texts articulate powerful cultural silences.

Pornography

Much like the writing on sexual representations of Aboriginality surveyed in the previous chapter, academic writing on pornography also concerns itself with issues of power and sexual embodiment. Focusing strongly on theoretical issues about pornography rather than empirical investigations into its production or content, the first phase began in the late nineteen-seventies and grew out of the second wave feminist movement. Initial commentaries were concerned with representations of women’s sexuality in pornography, identified as a primary cause of misogyny and acts of sexual assault. Susan Brownmiller’s (1975) Against Our Will was the first sustained attempt to contextualise rape as a historically specific and institutionally authorised ‘exercise in power’ (265). The coverage drew much needed attention to the male-sidedness of that power, as it had been naturalised through the nineteenth- and early twentieth century psycho-biological sciences, and as it was exercised every day by sports-stars, soldiers, boyfriends, husbands and other so-called ‘ordinary’ men.

Brownmiller’s brief critique of pornography as ‘anti-female propaganda’ (394-396) described an industry which could maintain male phallic integrity over women’s

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nakedness, supplying men with unrealistic images of female sexual excess and accessibility. Making more explicit the connection between rape and pornography, later writers drew upon Brownmiller’s initial critique. The most prominent work in this field was Andrea Dworkin’s (1981) Pornography: Men Possessing Women which defined pornography literally as ‘the graphic depiction of vile whores, or, in tour language, sluts, cows (as in: sexual cattle, sexual chattel), cunts’ (200). Like

Brownmiller her analysis politicised the configuration of male power under patriarchy, using pornographic magazines to emphasise that the ‘struggle for dignity and self-determination is rooted in the struggle for actual control of one’s own body’; pornography extends ‘control [over] the sexual and reproductive uses of women’s bodies’ (203). For Dworkin, pornography was the ultimate evil of a society which legitimated sexual inequality through other, more acceptable, institutions like health care, religion, marriage and property law. Her ideas were enshrined by Robin

Morgan’s (1980) famous claim that ‘pornography is the theory, and rape the practice’.

Dworkin later gained support from the legal scholar Catherine MacKinnon, and they sought to take their anti-pornography activism to the Minneapolis Ordinances of

1983, enacting the first legal definition of pornography as the portrayal of women as

‘dehumanized sexual objects’ (O'Toole, 1998: 28). Under this approach to pornography, interpretation was unimportant. It did not matter what audiences thought they were seeing – it was the effect it had on their minds, consciously or not, that was paramount.

In a context when cases of rape and domestic violence were scarcely publicised, let alone reported, the first phase of writing on pornography was important

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for highlighting the institutionalised, sexualised nature of male power in society. 1 But many feminists have recently argued that, by reifying pornography as an object beyond interpretation, anti-pornography campaigners like Dworkin and Mackinnon reaffirmed the political Right’s moral evocations of an ‘innate’ female (and opposing male) sexuality (Albury, 2002: 34-38, 112-114). Some stress that the anti- pornography movement restricts other women’s rights to freedom of sexual expression (Albury, 2002: 110-115; Kipnis, 1993: 226), and unfairly dismisses lesbians’ enjoyment of the medium (Lumby, 1997: 103). Nevertheless, formal anti- pornography readings continue to be influential (see, for instance Cowan and

Campbell, 1994; Russell, 1998; Flood, 2003).

The emergence of the second phase of writing on pornography is marked by

Linda Williams’ (1990) Hardcore: Frenzy of the Visible which examines pornography as a genre in its own right. Williams challenged the previous generation of pro- censorship writers, exploring the Foucauldian conception that knowledge of the body, and the body’s sexual pleasures, are discursively produced through ‘configurations of power that put pleasures to particular use’ (3). The power of any pornographic image is not overtly ‘controlling and repressive’ but rather is produced as an ‘inevitable component of increasingly material and fetishized forms of pleasure’ which consumers use ‘to negotiate pleasure with partners’ (172). By emphasising the historical specificities of the genre, Williams’ argument also drew upon the career profiles of women porn-stars such as Candida Royalle and Veronica Vera of ‘Femme’

– a company that claimed to deliver ‘the fantasies that women have been dreaming about all these years’ (Royalle quoted in Williams, 1990: 249). Analysis of genre, and the historical differences between, for example, ‘soft-core’, ‘romance’ and

1 Critics like Plummer (1995) and Squire (1997) argue that, during the nineteen eighties, talk shows such as The Oprah Winfrey Show and Donahue transformed women’s issues, and feminism, enhancing women’s rights to speak out about sexual abuse.

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‘couples’ pornography, enabled Williams to show how female demand for sexually explicit pornography in the early nineteen-eighties was linked to the rise of the Video

Cassette Recorder (231), and traceable through an increase in sales of romance novels which started to focus ‘not only on the woman’s active sexual pleasure but her unashamed knowledge of this pleasure as well’ (219). Exploration of women consumers and producers of pornography, detailed through a brief history of the

‘couples market’ (231-234; and 246-264), also emphasised the intersection of pornography with other parts of popular culture. The contribution marks an important transitional point, signalling a shift away from the censorship debate towards thinking of pornography as a discursively produced object.

A third phase of writing is very much indebted to this insight, and includes authors such as Laura Kipnis (1999; 1993) and Catherine Lumby (1997) who further politicise their personal interest in the medium. These critics also argue more strongly for ‘the compatibility of feminism and alternative sexual practices’ (Kipnis, 1993:

241), focusing on the rise of lesbian pornographic publications such as On Our Backs ,

Curve and Quim (Lumby, 1997: 103), as well as the importance of pornography within gay cultures (Larue, 1997) and other non-mainstream communities (Albury,

2002: 42-63; 170-192). Porn-stars such as Annie Sprinkle (1998), a self-proclaimed

‘post-porn modernist’, can also be included within this phase of pro-feminist writing on pornography. These developments helped to expand the idea of pornography as an inventive genre that, following from Williams, could also be seen to critique prevailing configurations of power. Lumby’s (1997: 94-116) discussion of pornography as a discursively produced object, inseparable from those institutions and discourses (including feminism) which seek to define it, carries Williams’ initial argument further:

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Perhaps pornography can be most usefully understood as a blister – a tender

spot on the social skin which marks a point of friction. Nothing, in these

terms, is inherently universally pornographic – the reference point of porn

becomes an intersecting web of public policy, private desires and beliefs, and

culture. In concrete terms, this disjuncture is arguably what gives

pornography its charge – the fear and excitement it generates flows from the

transgressions of real and imagined boundaries which traverse these categories

(Lumby, 1997: 97).

Both Lumby and Kipnis turn away from defining pornography as a discrete object, but instead look at how particular institutional and regulatory discourses create the social desire for watching, participating in – and importantly – censoring sexual images.

The fourth and final phase of writing must be characterised as a contemporary moment where all the above positions exist simultaneously, none given any greater academic privilege. In this phase writers like Clarrisa Smith (2002), Kath Albury

(1999) and Laura Kipnis (1999) build upon previous writing to contextualise pornography as a class-regulated genre. Historians, too, point out the regulatory significance of defining pornography as a move against political agitation from

‘below’ (see Hunt, 1993; but also Thompson, 1994). Likewise, Kendrick defines pornography as a process which produces its own censorship: ‘pornography is simply whatever representations a particular dominant class or group does not want in the hands of another, less dominant class or group’ (Kendrick quoted in Williams, 1990:

11). Here, an awareness of the discursive production of pornography becomes more important, as does an awareness of the impossibility of explaining pornography’s multifarious avenues and implications through singular methodologies. Lumby

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explains: ‘Every video or magazine is a slippery stream of partial objects; a metonymic chain which mocks the earnest search for meaning as surely as it refuses us the perfect object of desire’ (1997: 94). In this context, as Laura Kipnis (1999: viii-ix) also points out, ‘pornography [...] gets appropriated as a form of speech and deployed around subjects and issues that are the most ‘unspeakable’, but also the most politically and culturally significant’. In viewing porn at this critical intersection, explicit representations of sex(ual intercourse) offer the possibility for examining confronting social issues, those which otherwise indicate ‘how attached to the most pervasive feelings of shame and desire all these unspoken dictates are’ (Kipnis, 1999:

167).

Bound to obscenity laws and regulatory definitions, pornography’s ability to

‘speak the unspeakable’ has been identified by some as the genre’s modus operandi

(Michelson, 1993). As Foucault’s history suggests (1990) such a liberatory view of sexuality is quite a recent phenomena, and emerged alongside modern medical discourses and institutions which, paradoxically, make sex into an ‘unspeakable’ object of inquiry. Rather than a biologically pre-determined expression of sacrosanct individuals, overt sexual behaviour was tied to social deviancy, and could be used to explain the ‘body’s mechanics and the mind’s complacency; it ‘made the flesh into the root of all evil’ (Foucault, 1990: 19). From psychiatry to biology, sexuality in

Victorian society was grounded in a medical truth which demanded people view sex as a fundamental marker of both individual and social minds and bodies – a fixed component of every identity, in other words. Contemporary myths around sexuality were used to buttress evolutionary myths which claimed to ‘ensure the physical vigour and cleanliness of the social body; it promised to eliminate defective individuals. . . it justified the racisms of the state. . . it grounded them in truth’ (Grace

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and McHoul, 1993: 54). Linda Williams’ (1990: 98-119) analysis of Deep Throat 2

(1972) – the first hardcore ‘porno’ to reach a mixed-sexed audience (99) – shows how the pornographic genre is adept at exploiting contemporary public secrecies, like female sexuality in this instance. Pornographic narratives like Deep Throat are organised through certain ‘patterns of meaning that formulate sex as a problem and then try to solve this problem through sexual performance’ (182).

Speaking of Australian Silences…

What kind of ‘unspoken’ cultural desires does Arigato articulate? And how are the cultural tensions in the film resolved, allayed or intensified through sex? The most obvious tension is enunciated at the beginning of the film, when Adam speaks of his father’s xenophobia – Australia’s racist past, its troubled relationship with Asia becomes the source of personal conflict. But this ‘Australian’ conflict is mirrored by

Yoko’s own cultural burdens, as she writes of her parent’s cynicism when hearing of her move to Australia. ‘Are we living in their nightmare?’ she asks. When they fall in love much later in the film, after Adam rescues Yoko from a pub brawl, the film transgresses a more generically based cultural boundary. By combining romance and tragedy with pornographic sex, the film visualises sex as an instance of love. This is where Nicci Lane’s Aboriginality also becomes significant. Wendy has an open relationship with Adam which, in a generically pornographic sense, allows for a greater degree of sexual variation in the film; no one remarks about the arrangement,

2 The film explores the sex-life of Linda Lovelace, a young woman who consults a psychoanalyst to solve the ‘problem’ of her ‘little tingles’ she experiences during sex. Williams’ suggests that the film’s parody of psychotherapeutic practice draws upon the fetish money shot as ‘just one solution offered by hard-core film to the perennial male problem of understanding woman’s difference’ (119). Both hardcore pornography and Freudian psychoanalysis seek to exploit this secretive fetish, but Deep Throat indicates that the desire to visualise female pleasure is much more of an illusory male desire.

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and it enables us to see Wendy having sex with both Adam and Yoko. Yet after

Wendy notices Yoko at the nightclub, Wendy’s sexual involvement in the film becomes more forlorn. Aware of Yoko’s suspicions, Wendy acts on her feelings for

Yoko but unwittingly exacerbates Yoko’s turmoil. At the end of the film Adam and

Wendy are seen comforting each other at Yoko’s graveside, after a scene in which

Adam discovers Yoko’s pale naked body on the floor covered with blood, a Samurai sword plunged into her belly. From this perspective Wendy remains a reliable partner to Adam, a lover and perhaps a jealous rival to Yoko – she is a friend, an enemy and a sexual partner at the same time.

The generic boundary-crossings in Arigato , which connect ‘illicit’ pornographic pleasure with romance and tragedy, link Wendy’s character to a new image of filmic Aboriginality. Unlike mainstream films, Arigato shows that sex within interpersonal relationships for an Aboriginal character can be quite ordinary.

In the convention of romance narratives, where sex symbolically consecrates a relationship, Wendy can even be seen as the first marriageable character in an

Australian film. Her role stands in sharp contrast to those of mainstream characters, whose sexuality is seen to hinder the development of meaningful long term relationships. More than this, Wendy is seen to take control of her sexuality in a way that makes her sexual relationships integral to the narrative, and the development of other characters’ emotions and self-knowledge. This sense of roundedness can only be achieved if the audience accepts her as ordinary, and the public view her as a desirable partner within the broader community.

Arigato was distributed Australia wide in its X- and R-rated versions and was also sold and distributed in Korea. It received the Eros Gold Seal of Approval in

1997. But outside the genre, it must be noted that Nicci Lane’s profile has not

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garnered much media interest. Other ‘appearances’ within the non-Indigenous mediasphere have shown the actress as sexy, including a debut role in Lynch’s earlier film Centrespread (1980). Nicci Lane won the Adelaide Miss Nude Contest in 1988

(before it was renamed to Miss Nude Australia) and, the same year, became newsworthy for streaking at the Australian Football League Grand Final. In these instances Lane may be recognised as sexy, but as a personality nothing has been written or published since about her career as an actress – or even as the first

Indigenous porn star (King, 2005). But because Arigato presents a romantic relationship with an Aboriginal woman, the potential for love and affection within an

Indigenous/non-Indigenous coupling may seem – at least partially – publicly imaginable.

Pornographic Silences

The mainstream films surveyed earlier in the chapter indicated that Aboriginal sexuality is not unrepresentable, but rather that sex is unrepresentable as a source of pleasure, titillation, or procreation. Arigato breaks this tradition by showing the ordinariness of an Aboriginal woman’s sexual relationships, presenting her character, as well as her body, as desirable to a non-Indigenous audience. In a genre unashamedly devoted to arousing sexual pleasure, however, US funded Australian pornographic videos also highlight a similar symbolic problem in representing sexualised Aboriginal bodies. The representation of Aboriginality in Australian porn videos is very different from the representation of Blackness in American videos.

There is a sizeable subindustry in the US devoted to producing sexualised representations of Black Americans and, by contrast, there is almost no history of

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sexualised Aboriginality in the Australian genre. My research has uncovered only three porn videos that include Aboriginal characters. It must be remembered that the

Australian pornographic industry is tiny compared with that of America, but Australia does produce many feature videos for domestic audiences as well as higher budget films that are later exported to the US market. Given these differences, the lack of sexualised Indigenous representation in the Australian industry is remarkable – even in films where Aboriginal characters are present, Aboriginal actors are not.

In Outback Assignment (1991), for instance, ‘Aboriginal’ sex takes place in the opening scene. Featuring the American actor Randy Spears as the main character,

Outback follows the adventures of a US fashion photographer, ‘Tucker’, ‘on assignment’ in Australia. To a predominantly overseas audience the sex scene becomes an introduction to the Australianness of the film. A motivation for coming to Australia, Tucker’s journey is foregrounded by a dream where he has sex with an outback ‘Aboriginal’ woman. In the dream Tucker is seen sitting aside a campfire with his swag and Akubra scattered about behind him, a close-up even showing his trusty horse looking on. He reclines after lighting his cigarette from the fire and pours himself a billy tea. The image is a familiar one: the hardworking bushman of a grandiose Roberts or McCubbin landscape painting, though slightly altered with a digital watch and basketball sneakers. When a rustle from the bush unsettles the serenity we are introduced to the first sexual element of the film, a bare-breasted

‘Aboriginal’ woman who walks directly towards the camera. Tucker’s paranoia noticeably melts away. She continues to walk towards him and the didgeridoo music kicks-in, which is shortly taken-over by the peremptory funk-synthesizer, and they begin the sex. She undresses him, gives him a head job, they have sex in several more positions, then both moan towards a tremendous climax, eyes closed, rutting

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passionately together against a tree, without a cum-shot. But the phone rings and he wakes-up in his New York apartment, frustrated.

In the second film to feature ‘Aboriginal’ sex, Grand Prix Australia (1992),

Aboriginality appears in a totally different, more spectacular guise. Shot on location at Adelaide during the 1992 Grand Prix, the film follows a group of sports journalists, from Australia, France and America, all competing for the best coverage of the Grand

Prix. When the American journalists, Joey (Joey Silvera) and Ashlyn (Ashlyn Gere), arrive in Australia they are persuaded by Sunny (Sunny MacKay), an Australian journalist, to stay on a luxurious cruise boat. The sex scene appears late in the film when Sunny and Joey find themselves lost on a bushwalk. After a tiring day of arguing they eventually stumble across a group of three Aboriginal people, camped- out beside a fire. The Aboriginal man explains to Joey and Sunny they are too far from the city to venture back, and consoles them by offering a place at the fire. The

Aboriginal woman gives Sunny a bowl of ‘traditional bush tea’; a close-up shows the elder man smiling knowingly as they begin sipping. The two strangers thank their hosts but when the Aboriginal trio leave Sunny and Joey begin to panic. The camera blurs focus, and they stumble around making strange wailing noises. They are obviously drugged and start to hallucinate. Out of the fog Aboriginal bodies emerge and disappear, painted head-to-toe in traditional dot motifs. Sunny cries out in despair. But as the fog passes she calms down and they notice a slender Black woman in the distance, painted with traditional striped white patterning, gesturing them over. They are both transfixed and Joey walks slowly towards her. The didgeridoo sounds, and they all have sex.

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Figure 9 – Indigenous mysticism in the pornographic title Australian Grand Prix (1992).

Figure 10 – Nioka, a non-Indigenous actress, playing the role of the Aboriginal sex interest in Outback Assignment (1991)

The use of an Afro-French actress (Charlene in Grand Prix – Figure 9) and an

Italian-Australian actress (Nioka in Outback – Figure 10) in these films suggests that

Aboriginality presents a significant X-rated problem. The reality of visualising an

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Aboriginal porn star is further annulled through the dream motif, which makes

Aboriginal sex a figurative constituent rather than a literal possibility. But even when

‘Aboriginal’ sex does appear Aboriginality becomes unspeakable . In Outback the tribal ‘Aboriginal’ woman is not a real character but functions as a transcendent impetus for the ‘Australian’ sexual content of the film. She does not speak. The

‘Aboriginal’ enchantress in Grand Prix is a character who, in the rest of the film, is a

French journalist who appears much more reserved than the other characters, not wanting to socialise or party, she is aloof and refuses to speak a word of English. As all the other characters are mystically drawn towards her 3, she is also exoticised by her unwillingness – unlike everyone else – to pursue sex. Both films foreground a recognisably ‘traditional’ Aboriginality through non-speaking, non-Aboriginal actors. 4 Much like sex in mainstream Australian film productions, Aboriginal bodies do not experience the real possibility of sexual pleasure, let alone gratification.

Community Silences

The silent, unspeaking Aborigine is a powerful image in the history of

Australian cinema, according to Alan McKee (1997b). By looking into this history,

3 Ashlyn, for instance, wanders into Charlene’s room at night and waves a glass orb (what really looks like a paper-weight) over her sleeping body and whispers: “Dance. Open your arms to me, oh Queen of the Riverboat. I am ready. I am ready.” 4 In Outback such ‘traditional’ references are not so explicitly stated yet are nonetheless central to the presentation of the Aboriginal sex scene. Nioka’s appearance is also conceivably ‘tribal’: She is seen wearing a skimpy cloth wrap, torn slightly and tied above the hips; a bone necklace hangs symmetrically between her breasts; and her hair is tied-over with a black head-band, allowing her huge dangly earrings to swing freely over her shoulders. In one hand she carries a traditional bark preserve. Her torn cloth skirt and bone necklace indicate a tribal look which is quite general, but not particularly Aboriginal. No body paint, tattoos, piercings or other bodily markings place her as any specific Indigenous identity. She does not appear particularly African, Maori, Hawaiian, Melanesian or, for that matter, Australian Aboriginal. Her large earings and headband add to the new-age look, making the other Indigenous references appear less grounded in any given social context. Unlike the dot- painted body of Charlene, and the accompanying Aboriginal dancers in Grand Prix , Outback presents a very general, but nevertheless tribal, image of Aboriginality.

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parallels between the pornographic representations in Grand Prix and Outback and other, mainstream film narratives and images, begin to emerge. Tracing the history back to early twentieth century ethnographic and documentary filmmaking practice, which utilised the cinematic gaze to preserve a scientific knowledge of the Indigenous

‘noble savage’ (Peters-Little, 2001), McKee shows how an enduring image of the silent Aborigine is linked to an overt concern for visualising Aboriginal difference – marked as racial difference through Black skin. Compared with images of Indigenous television personalities such as Ernie Dingo, Stan Grant or Deborah Mailman, who also authorise their celebrity personas through interviews and guest appearances on other television programs, Australian film often emphasises Aboriginality as a bodily quantity – naked, ‘tribal’ or ‘savage’ (McKee, 1997: 170). Such images have a powerful resonance in films like Quigley Down Under (1990), Where the Green Ants

Dream (1984) The Dreaming (1985), Backlash (1986) and Kadaicha (1988). Even in films where Indigenous characters speak, tribal characters are not given a discernable voice – they either communicate through chanting ( Dead Heart , 1986) or have white characters speak for them (a convention humorously exploited in Crocodile Dundee ,

1986). In many cases, then, cinematic Aboriginality exudes a powerful mysteriousness through silence or inchoate cries, making Aboriginal characters even more visibly different from centred white ones. To be sure, these silences are a form of communication, as McKee (1997: 170) mentions, but the ‘meanings they convey are exactly those of Aboriginal objectification’:

It is this combination – intensely visible and yet relentlessly silent – that

forcibly engages relationships of power . . . [which] is part of a process of

denying subjectivity to Aboriginal people; of presenting them as objects;

suggesting that they lack human consciousness or self-knowledge (169).

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To be seen but not heard, the embodied cinematic difference of the Aboriginal body suggests a regime of visibility that may otherwise limit the representation of

Aboriginal subjectivity. ‘The denial of the right to speak’ (McKee, 1997: 169) carries immense implications for community self-definitions – between those who are considered privileged or marginal, between ‘us’ and ‘them’ (166). Knowledge of an actor’s authorship can be an important step in the chain of breaking this mode of silent communication – a theme explored more fully in the following chapter. The ability to extend one’s speaking position through representative elements of one’s community, history and identity entails a relationship which must recognise the legitimacy of a particular subject’s desire (Califia, 2000). Traditionally in the public sphere, this ‘right’ was unquestionably bestowed upon white heterosexual men, by other white heterosexual men. But increasingly over the past fifteen years in

Australia other voices – including Indigenous women – are being recognised as fully desiring subjects. As Chapter One suggested, the capacity to express sexual desire publicly is part of a wider call for recognition of more diverse forms of ‘intimacy’

(Berlant, 2000) and ‘sexual citizenship’ rights in the cultural domain (Plummer,

1995). But the non-speaking characters in Grand Prix and Outback can be linked to other instances of public cultural representation, where silence surrounding

Aboriginal sexuality – in film, and historically – marks a shameful aspect of white community relations.

Historical silences over Aboriginality have been powerful in the Australian community. Aboriginal cultural rights, though not especially concerned with sexuality, are nevertheless implicated within a significantly sexually charged history.

The National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander

Children from Their Families (1997), for instance, brings to public attention the

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personal stories of the ‘stolen generation’, and underlines the intimately invasive nature of past government actions towards Aboriginal citizens. The inquiry describes an evolutionary-minded society which viewed Aborigines as an entirely inferior racial identity, fated to extinction; seen to be in need of protection from a dominant settler culture, twentieth century Native Affairs policies were geared towards corrective strategies of ‘civilizing’ Aborigines and/or reproductive measures aimed at literally

‘breeding-out’ Aboriginality (Anderson, 1995: 35). For white citizens, Aboriginal people were construed as a ‘racial problem’, social and cultural differences reducible to corporeal markers of skin colour – Blackness, in other words. In her wide-ranging history of Aboriginal female domestic labour in Australia, Jackie Huggins points out that many young women were appointed duties hierarchically on the basis of appearance – rougher duties, such as ‘scullery’, required darker women, whilst ‘half-’ or ‘quarter-caste’ women were more likely to be employed as ‘patient and reliable nurses’ (1998: 17). Women were termed ‘black velvet’ and could be placed at the sexual beckoning of white male employers. Sexual relations may have been characterised by violence or even romance, though an ‘obsession with racial purity and prestige made any sexual relations between Black and white horrifying’

(Huggins, 1998: 17). The social and libidinal excesses of this kind of racial segregation, through the unspoken constraints that overshadowed all Aboriginal/white interactions, prevented public discussion from directly addressing issues of sex. Ideas of ‘biological absorption’ overshadowed the treatment of children and families; mixed

‘blood’ children were deemed more desirable than ‘full-bloods’, and so were institutionalised in schools and missions, in the expectation they would gradually lose their Aboriginal identities through exposure to white families and communities

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(Inquiry , Chapter 2: 4-5). Sex is not simply a matter of pleasure; it is about family, community ties, social and personal identities.

Pornographic Marriageabilities – Readers’ Wives and Husbands

Magazines are another principal medium through which bodies become explicitly sexually desirable. Pornographic and mainstream magazines also convey potentially marriageable identities through sexualised profiles. For instance, in a discussion of modern journalistic discourses, Hartley (1992: 183-223) demonstrates the significance of pornographic magazines to public embodiments of ‘we-dom’ and

‘they-dom’. Hartley refers to a Playboy tourism advertisement for the Northern

Territory featuring two Aboriginal women frolicking naked in a lake, one sexualised significantly more than the other. As the topless woman is seen leaping out of the water pushing her breasts towards the camera, the blurb describes her as ‘mixed-race’

– even rejected by her tribal parents at birth. The other woman appears more reserved, submerged under the water, and does not provoke the editor’s interest as much, having no biography written of her. She is also more visibly Black. Hartley relates this image to a broader politics of representation through journalistic reporting, suggesting that the lack of individuality attributed to Indigenous citizens reinforces public perceptions of a ‘“they” identity [only] newsworthy for their economic, security or welfare impact on “our” community’ (Hartley, 1992: 209).

Marriageability in pornographic magazines is often, though not always, suggested through this kind of sexualised profiling.

The most marriageable form of sexualised pornographic representation occurs in the readers’ wives sections of such magazines. It is a format emphasising the

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ordinariness of the women featured and, whilst never disparaging, sexualises readers by combining a snap-shot photo with personal information, such as career ambitions and hobbies as well as favoured sexual interests. Clarissa Smith notes how the genre has attracted the harshest of criticisms, due to the ordinariness of its representations, from uninterested middle-class critics. 5 Although publications like Penthouse Forum rely upon letters sent in from readers discussing various aspects of private sexual lives, more ‘downmarket’ magazines like People and Picture Post provide unknown models and home amateurs a much more visible presence. They necessarily present a variety of different personalities, bodily shapes and sizes and, above all, a relatively racially disparate community. For this reason they are important textual sites for imagining who gets to be seen as publicly desirable. Nevertheless this most ordinary and literally marriageable form of pornographic representation does not seem to include Indigenous wives, or husbands.

People ’s Oz Girls Annual 2002 , which presents some ‘210 Home-grown

Hornbags’, including many non-Caucasian women whose national or ethnic backgrounds are sometimes mentioned, other times not. Non-Caucasian women whose backgrounds are mentioned include, among others, a 21 year old Botswanan student called Thato living in Queensland; Stella, a 26 year old Philipino born actress who likes chess and scuba diving; and a Fijian woman, 18, called Louise who is about to start a course in business management. The ‘feature girl’ from the Northern

Territory who, for this title receives two pages of seven professionally shot photographs, is Alella, a ‘half-Ethiopian’ 18 year old singer. In the featured interview, Alella celebrates a fondness for her black complexion; she also mentions how ‘Territorians are heaps sexier than blokes from down south’ (20). Her profile

5 Smith suggests how ‘only academic, radical feminist or moralist viewers seem able to experience responses other than the “purely” sexual: they can talk of their boredom! “Ordinary” porn users are never disappointed, embarrassed, put off, worried or appalled’ (35).

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suggests that she could be considered as marriageable, acknowledging her own sexual interests (Territorian men) as an important characteristic of her sex appeal.

It is clear from just these few profiles that non-Caucasian and Black women feature prominently, and are highly sexualised at that. But space for Aboriginality is sparse to say the least. There is a 26 year old woman called Allie from Perth who states: ‘I’m North American Indian from the Dene tribe in Canada’ (94). She poses in a dark narrow hall-way, a television screen just visible in the background, pushing her uncovered breasts out, and wearing an unbuttoned pair of cut-off denim shorts. Her interests include reading, studying Tibetan Buddhism, practicing Yoga and listening to Meatloaf (ibid). Her Indigenous body is sexualised as ordinary, yet she is obviously not an Australian Aboriginal woman. In fact nowhere in the 2003 edition can an Australian Aboriginal woman be found. An exception could be made with

Krissy, a 19 year old student from Surfers Paradise who, we are told, in her spare time, is a card-girl for Anthony Mundine (19). Krissy has an olive complexion and curly dark brown hair. If indeed she is Indigenous her Aboriginality is not mentioned anywhere, let alone celebrated. Even though Australia’s multi-ethnic make-up is a major characteristic of these representations, commemorated in the ‘Honorary

Aussies’ pages which feature backpackers and tourists, Aboriginality is notably absent from this sexualised public sphere.

A similar absence can be identified in other, more commercially popular magazines. Ralph and FHM both produce special editions of their ‘top sexiest women’ every year, usually in the form of an additional magazine sold with the regular monthly publication. Over the last two years no Aboriginal woman has made the list. In both publications’ 2003 ‘World’s Sexiest Women’ editions, many Afro-

American and Afro-British women such as Judy Shekoni ( East Enders ) and Beyonce

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Knowles (Destiny’s Child) are included, bestowed with stunning separate page profiles. Prominent Asian-Australian and Latin-American women are also represented, yet not a single Aboriginal woman can be found. Even Christine Anu, who sang at the 1993 Grand Final pre-game build-up, is not mentioned. There have been no shortage of non-Aboriginal celebrities who feature regularly in magazines like Playboy (Elle MacPherson, Naomi Campbell) or Ralph (Kylie, Holly Valance), and even cosy television celebrities like Sophie Monk and Mieke Buchan appear artfully naked, though not pornographic, alongside international stars like Halle Berry and Imogen Bailey ( FHM ). Aboriginal bodies do appear naked – in the Olympic opening ceremony, in magazines like Black and White (photography) and National

Geographic (anthropological). Magazines offer a vital connection to the public through these bodies, yet even as many centrefolds or pinups are given this veneer of a personal life, they are accepted into the public imaginary.

The pleasure of rating sexiness, however subjective this process really is, creates a barometer for gauging how Aboriginality becomes desirable for, and within, a broader Australian public sphere. As discussed throughout the chapter, pornography expresses a peculiar ambivalence about presenting Indigenous sexuality to non-Indigenous audiences. Mainstream video productions share an anxiety with mainstream films in their representation of Indigenous bodies as sexy, within interracial sexual relationships. These productions do not present Aboriginal sex as pleasurable and embodied by Indigenous actors’ themselves. The absence of

Indigenous bodies (in place of Indigenous characters) can be translated into a broader historical refusal to recognise elements of Aboriginal desire and subjectivity, as they relate to representations of intimacy within the white Australian public sphere. But it must be remembered that pornography also provides the first instance of a sexualised

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relationship between a white man and an Indigenous woman, representing each partner as being equal to the other. In Arigato Baby ’s Nicci Lane, an Aboriginal woman is imagined as an intimate member of an Australian community. To non-

Indigenous audiences, her sexiness is even allowed to be seen as marriageable, through her numerous romantic encounters.

Much like Moffatt’s Nice Coloured Girls , Arigato seeks to demonstrate that

Indigenous (women’s) bodies can be seen – and recognised – as sexy. In an historical context of popular representations, Girls does not seek to ‘counter dominant views of

Aboriginal women as either “wanton strumpets” or “shy maids”’ (Jennings and

Hollinsworth, 1987/88: 129). More accurately, I believe it is a film which seeks to alter dominant representations of Indigenous women – not as overtly sexual beings, but rather as non-sexy, non speaking subjects. By presenting Indigenous women as sexual subjects, it is able to articulate a part of Australian history which has – until recently – been rendered silent. With such recognition of Indigenous agency and subjectivity, official recollections of white Australian history also begin to look different. Arigato adds a new narrative to this history – where reconciliation between

Indigenous and non-Indigenous people can be imagined for the first time through more interpersonal relationships, based on feelings of trust, desire and mutual affection. As a pornographic film, it must be acknowledged that sex, sexuality and sexiness form a central element in this public imagining. The following chapter illustrates how such representations have, throughout the nineteen-nineties, begun to appear in more mainstream media. As these sexy Indigenous singers, actors and performers gain greater recognition from non-Indigenous audiences, more diverse embodiments of marriageability – models for personal intercultural dialogue –

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become possible. The present chapter has demonstrated the importance of sexual representations to initiating those dialogues.

Conclusion

In the texts surveyed throughout the chapter, the absence of visualising sexual relations suggests an exclusion of Aboriginal bodies, and personalities, from the intimacy of the ‘we-dom’ community. Arigato is an exception to a history of popular representations of Aboriginality, in that Nicci Lane’s sexuality is taken to be central to the virtual community. In another of her films, Chinatown Lady (1990) – a safe sex film made for Sydney’s Chinese community – Lane again performs in an explicitly sexual role, but this time to promote the virtues of safe sex to a Chinese-speaking audience. Extra-textual knowledge of her Aboriginality in these films must be understood in relation to a history of silences surrounding the Aboriginal body, and an attendant field of post-colonial representations where sexual representations exclude

Aboriginality from very intimate community concerns and desires. Pornography has the ability to sell and affirm cultural desires and the promise of that most private of bodily fulfilments – sexual union. By exploring the relationship between an

Indigenous woman, an Anglo-Australian man and a Japanese woman, Arigato presents Aboriginality as an integral part of an intimate Australian community.

Without suggesting this particular representation is a wholly positive one for transforming Australian public images of Aboriginality, as an original form of sexual representation it is worthy of attention.

In a historical context where sexual relations between Black and white encapsulate the intimate dramas of conquest and domination, where sex itself

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becomes the prime metaphor for the colonial process (Robert, 2001: 69), the public acknowledgement (or disavowal) of Aboriginal sexiness must be seen as pivotal to understanding these relationships. Pornography, in this sense, is another area of cultural representation through which Aboriginal bodies may be seen as desirable within a broader public sphere. Characterisations of Australia as a white, racist nation might begin to look shaky when Aboriginal bodies appear sexually alluring in pornographic narratives, confounding the unspeakable histories that pervade the continual silence over Aboriginal-white relations in Australia.

In its examination of pornographic texts this chapter has argued that sexiness is an important attribute of marriageability in the public sphere. Sexiness is often an initiating characteristic of marriageable relations. Sexual representations are ostensibly visual, and often rely upon fleeting glances for a gaze to be transformed into a more caring, loving or affectionate exchange. To be sure sexual attraction does not necessarily ensure further meaningful, emotional or any long term subjective engagement. Often, however, sexual attractiveness can become meaningful as bodies are attributed personalities, backgrounds, identities and biographies. Through these elements of personality it becomes possible to imagine more long term personal relationships. The following chapter demonstrates more fully the relationship between sexiness and marriageability in the non-Indigenous public sphere, arguing that public knowledge of one’s authorship and agency are vital to being seen as both sexy and marriageable to non-Indigenous audiences.

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Chapter Four – The Mainstreaming of Indigenous Sexiness: Indigenous Authorship of Sexy Images

At last Australian girls have a role model who is valued for something other

than appearing sexy (Devine, 2004: 14).

What is wrong with appearing sexy?

Miranda Devine obviously thinks there’s a problem with it, as she writes about

Casey Donovan’s 2004 Australian Idol victory. In this article, Devine identifies

Donovan as a role model precisely because she is not seen to be sexy. More than this,

Devine argues, Donovan provides relief from ‘the dominant pop culture’ which promotes macho rap images of ‘women as “bitches” and sex-starved “ho’s”’. In making this argument, Devine employs a key popular myth about fame and the use of sexy imagery within the music industry – that sexualised elements of popular culture are disrespectful to women. She suggests that the bodies of young pop singers, such as Britney Spears, Pamela Lee and the Olsen Twins leave ‘little room for young women to project an image of genuine self-respect’. In this conservative critique of popular music, sexualised feminine pop stars are blamed for low levels of ‘self- respect’ amongst Australian women. Devine also attributes misogynistic beliefs in young men to American Rap music, which is criticised for its aggressively sexual content. She sees the industry being dominated by powerful white male executives, who reproduce their own preferred image of sexualised femineity at the cost of hapless young female consumers. According to this sentiment young women exercise little control over what they consume, applying no critical influence on the music industry itself. The music industry is homogenised, and sexualised images of female

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performers produce unrealistic ideals of beauty and body shape. Sexiness is exploitative.

A secondary argument levelled against popular music, which comes from a more leftist ‘indie’ perspective, distinguishes between a performer’s sexiness and her or his politics. Critics such as Fernandes (1997), for example, suggest that the marketing of sexy pop stars such as Christine Anu and the Spice Girls hinder other, more political voices from emerging in the mediasphere – those which may politicise issues like ‘sexual abuse’ or ‘land rights’. Similar arguments can be found in the work of academics such as Hayward (1993) and Mitchell (1992) surveyed in Chapter

Two, who criticised the marketing of Yothu Yindi to an ‘Anglo-centric hegemony’

(Mitchell: 13). In these approaches, sexiness typifies the worst aspects of consumer capitalism, concealing gender and class inequities in the real world. It is an approach which is also prevalent in overseas interpretations of race and music videos (for example see Rich, 1998; Christenson and Roberts, 1998; Johnson, 1995; Brown and

Schulze, 1995; hooks, 1995). As I noted in Chapter Two, such interpretations analyse single texts out of their cultural context, make the worst possible readings, ignore the way that male bodies are represented, and essentialise the meanings of chosen texts.

Constituted through popular music, sexiness in these criticisms is seen to get in the way of higher ‘political’ and ‘cultural’ ideals. Sexiness is not seen to be virtue in and of it self.

Like mainstream pornography, music attracts a great deal of popular and academic criticism for the way it presents highly sexualised bodies to mainstream audiences. The current chapter offers a different interpretation to this phenomenon.

It argues that over time sexualised images provide a means through which celebrities become marriageable within the mediasphere. As profiles like those of Christine Anu

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become more familiar to non-Indigenous audiences, sexy identities become valued, and spoken about, as desirable long-term partners. But before this process occurs, I would suggest that a more important element of public representation is established – authorship. Authorship can be exercised in a number different of ways – through interviews, guest or promotional appearances, in print and on radio or television programs. Importantly, these fora provide opportunities for personalities to exercise agency and control over their own public image. When singers and sports stars are able to speak of their careers in the media, even as objects of desire, a much different public embodiment than those found within Australian film and pornography is suggested. Authorship is a means of challenging allegations of exploitation, but more importantly it is a basis from which previously silenced Indigenous voices can become publicly familiar. Such authorship bestows legitimacy upon sexy performers, enabling them to utilise important vernacular forms – through both words and performance – to articulate a sense of their own Indigeneity within white Australia.

This chapter argues that as representations of Indigenous sexiness have emerged in the mainstream throughout the nineteen-nineties, Indigenous Australians have increasingly taken responsibility for authoring them.

Authorship

The question of authorship is a key consideration for this thesis. If sexy images are known to be authored by Indigenous actors, producers, musicians, celebrities and sports people, a new sense of public voice must be acknowledged. To illustrate this point it is worth briefly returning to Hayward’s argument about the music industry’s ‘exploitation’ of Yothu Yindi. Hayward’s article remarked that the

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female dancer in the Treaty II video clip was ‘clearly exploitative but no great surprise’, and embodied the ‘standard model of sexist stereotyping in music videos’

(38). Before these assertions can be made, I would argue that a central question has been overlooked – are the song and video for ‘Treaty’ public pronouncements by

Indigenous or non-Indigenous Australians? In this example, is the video for ‘Treaty’ authored by Indigenous Australians? By this I do not mean that we should follow the traditional ‘English literature’ model of reading ‘art’, whereby the author, in interviews and commentaries, gets to decide what their art means. However, I do follow Foucault (as his work has been developed by Andy Medhurst and Alan

McKee) in saying that audiences use their knowledge of who is speaking in order to decide how to interpret a text. The example that McKee (1996) gives is ‘The

Messenger’ – the video that was made by Indigenous artist Tracey Moffatt for the band INXS. The video features a parody of ‘blaxploitation’ films, with Indigenous

Australian women in tiny shorts and skirts, being blatantly sexualised. For those audiences who only know ‘The Messenger’ as ‘an INXS video’ – a video made by straight, rich, white men – this image becomes exploitative. But if the video is interpreted as part of Tracey Moffatt’s oeuvre, with all of the intertextual knowledge that brings, then it will rather be seen as a challenge to precisely that kind of exploitation.

Therefore, in the case of the video for ‘Treaty’, my point is simply this. The video features an Aboriginal woman dancing on stage, in a tight fitting, shiny one- piece dress; this image can indeed be seen as a sell-out of political goals for commercial success, or even worse, an exploitation of the Indigenous body. But this interpretation – the one made by most white academics – works on the assumption that the Indigenous members of Yothu Yindi are not the authors of this video. There

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are other interpretations of the text available. In particular, if we interpret this video, instead, as a public comment made by an Indigenous band, then the appearance of this

Indigenous dancer might seem different. In key places Yothu Yindi’s authorship of their own public image is acknowledged – in their Diti Murru compilation, for instance, Mandawuy Yunupingu says of the video: ‘We thought we’ll give you 40,000 years of our culture and mix it with today’s contemporary society’. Rebutting criticism of the band’s patriarchal image, back-up singer Jodie Cockatoo-Creed mentions how her joining the band ‘allow[ed] me to come to the forefront, an urbanised Aboriginal person, giv[ing] us a contemporary side’ (Cockatoo-Creed quoted in Williams, 2000). Knowledge that these statements are spoken by

(Aboriginal) members of the band gives the band a degree of ownership in the face of any public judgement, even (or sometimes especially ) if those voices are seen to be quite disparate or diverse. That Cockatoo-Creed’s image might also create ‘a lot of meaning for young people’ (Yunupingu quoted in ibid) is a possibility that cannot be overlooked either. When authorship of one’s sexiness is asserted and acknowledged publicly, sexiness must also be recognised as a potential resource for asserting agency within the mediasphere.

Authoring the ‘Black is Beautiful’ Message

The question of authorship is a particularly important one to the representation of sexuality in the media. The history of Black American performers within the development of global (and therefore Australian) popular music is an important one for illustrating the significant place authorship has in changing mainstream perceptions of race, and indeed sexuality. Of particular note is the association

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between Blackness with sexuality, which some Indigenous Australians self- consciously draw upon (see, for instance, Anthony Mundine and Shakaya). Usage of the words ‘Black’ and ‘Blackness’ in the chapter does not seek to conflate the differences between representations of specific countries, but rather illustrates a commonality of identification which is achieved through popular music in Australia, the result of being exposed to American artists over the past twenty years. For this reason the following historical account of the ‘Black is Beautiful’ movement not only illustrates the extent to which the global popular music industry is led by ‘Black’ musicians and some producers but, by extension, also shows the appeal for some

Indigenous artists of identifying themselves as ‘Black’ – and, therefore – ‘Black and

Beautiful’ too.

A long history of sexualised representations of African American bodies has existed in US popular culture, particularly in film. Until the nineteen-fifties and early nineteen-sixties these public images were not authored – even seen to be authored – by Black Americans themselves, but were instead produced by whites intended for mass consumption. In the nineteen-seventies film makers like Melvin Van Peebles started to gain attention with the inaugural ‘blaxploitation’ film Sweetback’s Baad

Asssss Song (1971), which impressively draws upon the male Black Buck stereotype so dominant in earlier Hollywood films. Blaxploitation filmmakers of that era railed against the white industry’s portrayal of Black Americans as hyper-sexual, particularly the Black Buck character which represented the strongest threat against white civility through his muscular sexuality. 1 The sexualised Black male protagonist featured in later films like Shaft (1971) and Superfly (1972), though sexuality in these

1 It is worth noting the ways in which Hollywood also represents interracial sex as a threat, seen through the tragic mulatto character in films like Pinky (1949) and Show Boat (1936). The mulatto is a tragic figure because she passes in society as a white woman, but the discovery of her mixed race heritage eventually leads her to alcoholism or suicide. The central conflict in these films is the fear of romantic rejection by her white boyfriend or husband.

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roles is noticeably less politicised. But it was through music that Black artists were first seen to author their own profiles as sexy Black men and women. The Black- owned music label Motown became the biggest independent record company in the mid sixties, with early international successes like The Supremes and The Four Tops, and later Stevie Wonder and Gladys Knight. With the emergence of soul music in the late nineteen-sixties, a new consciousness of Black pride was also emerging. Singers like James Brown and Aretha Franklin helped popularise the ‘natural’ or ‘afro’ cut, instead of the older ironed and straightened styles which were seen to mimic

Caucasian hair. The ‘afro’ became a statement of racial pride, the ‘Black aesthetic’ also registered changes in popular fashion, body language such as hand-shakes, new vernacular expressions of ‘brotha’ and ‘sista’, modelled around a collective understanding of the term ‘Soul’ (Van Deburg, 1992: 194-198). Music was at the centre of this new consciousness, which was undeniably authored by popular Black musicians and producers. Through their music, Black was marketed as hip, cool and iridescently desirable. A recognisable Black ownership made it difficult for whites to claim entry into this new public sphere. James Brown’s lyrics – ‘Say it loud: I’m

Black and I’m Proud’ – became an anthem of change, articulating a new voice of

American racial identity to Black and white audiences.

Though Black music was popular amongst white audiences for decades before the sixties, self-authored popular images of Black sexiness initially gained prominence through Black magazines like Ebony and Jet . Describing the emergence of the ‘Black is Beautiful’ movement, Maxine Leeds Craig (2002) suggests that a

Black American popular consciousness centred on notions of beauty and physical attractiveness first emerged through the conventionally heterosexual institution of beauty contests. Contests organised by and for Black communities had been

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documented in the Black press since as early as the eighteen-nineties (46), Black contestants started to gain recognition in traditionally all-white contests during the early nineteen-sixties. In spite of considerable objection from the white media,

Clintona Jackson won the International Freedom Festival Pageant in 1962 – she became the first Black American to gain recognition in an event in which all previous winners were white. Her victory was enthusiastically publicised in that year’s Ebony magazine – she was pictured wearing a tiger patterned swimsuit and high heels, quoted as saying ‘I didn’t do it for myself but for my people’ (quoted in Craig: 65).

With the backing of advocacy groups like the NAACP, mainstream magazines Jet and

Ebony , as well as Our World , Tan and Sepia , publicised the beauty pageant as a significant civil rights issue. The integrationalist agenda sought to challenge white assumptions of feminine attractiveness in the media, which favoured ‘light skin and long straight hair’ (43). But related to this goal was the task of securing equal rights and recognition across a range of areas within American society. African American women fought documented legal cases for employment opportunities as models, air stewardesses and within other areas of the hospitality and service industries (66-68).2

Throughout the nineteen-seventies, the ‘Black is Beautiful’ movement became significantly more commercialised – initially to Black consumers, then much later to mixed audiences. In the early seventies Ebony and Jet attracted advertisers like Duke

‘Afro’ hair-wax, Pepsi and Chevrolet all featuring sexy Black models. The emergence of a new Black consumer culture can be traced through these aesthetics, which sought to affirm Blackness as a desirable commodity – a Chevy, for instance, offered its Black driver a ‘dignity you can dig’. Soft-core pin-up calendar images of

2 These industries accord with John Hartley’s (1992) notion of the ‘smiling professions’ – ‘jobs where work, preparation, skill and talent are all necessary but hidden, where performance is measured by consumer satisfaction, where self is dedicated to other, success to service, where knowledge is niceness and education is entertainment’ (134-35). These traditionally feminine professions, which emphasise niceness and physical attractiveness, have increasingly become central to post industrial economies.

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Black models were increasingly common in Jet magazine, whilst Ebony deployed more marketable notions of sexiness through the promotion of make-up and hair-care products specifically for Black women. 3 In the mainstream white media, Jane

Hoffman appeared as the first African American model on the cover of Cosmopolitan in June 1969, and the cosmetics company Revlon started employing Black models for their perfume television campaigns of the late nineteen-seventies (Summers, 2001:

74-75). As with Australian representations, it is interesting to note that Black women became more prominent in earlier sexy representations in the American context. In

1984 Vanessa Williams claimed the Miss America title, and slowly Black American women began appearing in other areas of mainstream representation – from film and television acting, advertising, through to fashion and later news presenting. A number of television programs featuring all Black casts began appearing in the nineteen- seventies, but not until the mid nineteen-eighties with the Cosby Show were programs able to reach both white and Black audience.

From the civil rights era until now however, the most prevalent form of mainstream Black sexuality has been authored through music. Sexualised dancing in contemporary popular music, for example, has its origins in Black American popular culture – I mean this in the sense of cultural heritage, not biological imperative.

Every important move in popular dancing has been driven by Black culture, from rock and roll onwards. Disco dancing draws on Black forms of movement, as does hip- hop; it was Michael Jackson who invented modern pop dancing, and Janet who perfected it for choreographed groups. The form of extremely sexualised dancing that focuses on the ‘booty’ also emerged from Black groups such as Destiny’s Child.

3 Ebony (1990) acknowledges the importance of Black fashion models in changing mainstream representations of Black America, since the beginnings of the magazine in 1945. The visibility of Black models, particularly through the founding of Fashion Fair Cosmetics in 1973, was an important step in affirming Black consumer power (See Norment, 1990: 24)

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Forms of Black American sexuality can also be found in Hip Hop music – from its earlier masculinised and urban origins in rap, with artists like Ice-Cube and Public

Enemy, to contemporary artists who have gained middle-class profiles, like Will

Smith, Queen Latifah and Missy Elliot. Over the last ten years the mainstream success of American Hip Hop has created marriageable profiles in Black male stars like Jamie Fox and Will Smith. Smith’s marriageability in the Australia media has developed out of exposure through a long television acting career, but much more recently in films like the romantic comedy Hitch (2005). Hitch was promoted through an extensive television advertising campaign, involving interviews and guest appearances on programs like 60 Minutes and Rove Live . 60 Minutes , for example, ran a feature story on Smith titled ‘The Love Doctor’. The promotion showed Hayes fanning herself to conceal the blushing produced from Smith’s advances. In the interview she says ‘It’s in the lips actually. I’ve gone all flushed. But confidence, I think, is pretty sexy and you’ve got plenty of that’. The lead-in – scripted to emphasise the film’s storyline – significantly plays on the flirtation between interviewee and interviewer. The connection between sexiness and marriageability in this instance is achieved through authorship – it is an interview where Smith talks about his career, even sharing thoughts on the subject of romance.

That contemporary popular music is seen to be authored by Black musicians creates a more distinctive space for Black voices, and the recognition of those voices, in the American public sphere. In a country where popular representations of Black people have historically been controlled by whites, African American authors have increasingly claimed strategic control over images of their own sexuality – in the process transforming sexualised elements of the mainstream. The public recognition of self-authorship entails that those bodies which were previously only sexualised

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(and thus authored by others), now become seen as sexy – publicly acknowledged as attractive. It is the public acknowledgement of authorship of sexuality that is most important to the presentation of sexualised bodies – separating sexiness from more prurient forms of sexual interest. Such acknowledgement provides the basis for the recognition of subjective control and agency, differentiating images from those which may otherwise be described as exploitative.

In the United States many African American musicians are seen to be sexy, by both white and Black audiences. On a global scale pop music has become recognisably Black; it is seen to be self-authored by Black artists, musicians, lyricists, record companies and managers. In Australia this has meant that Black Americans have been recognised as sexy too. Artists like Will Smith are seen to be sexy to white

Australian audiences, and through ongoing favourable publicity in this country his sexiness has translated into marriageability.

Indigenous Pop Music

There is a history of Indigenous music in Australian popular culture, but by contrast with Black America few performers have been presented as sexy. Gavin

Jones is the editor-in-chief of Vibe Australia, an Indigenous publicity, events and communication management organisation, publishing information through its Vibe magazine and websites. Jones founded the organisation via his experience as the producer of the radio program Deadly Sounds in response to the lack of air play fellow Indigenous bands were receiving. As a producer of the Indigenous awards ceremony The Deadlys , Jones suggests the importance of the ‘Black is Beautiful’ message in the company’s promotion of Indigenous identities through the media:

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We try to emphasise that side of things through Vibe – with Indigenous men

and women in the media, it’s often easier to gain positive and lasting publicity

by being seen as sexy. To maintain that interest you often have to be right up

front with how you look, and the ‘Black is beautiful’ idea I believe comes

through in events like the Deadlys (Jones, 2006).

Jones’ comments allude to some of the practical limitations of sustaining a career as a popular media personality. This may be particularly applicable to the field of popular music, which often foregrounds the youthful attractiveness of singers through visual display – album covers, posters and music videos. Jones also expressed concern that there were few Indigenous sex symbols throughout the media, including pop music.

Despite the lack of sexualised Indigenous performers, there is nevertheless a history of successful mainstream Indigenous artists. Jimmy Little, for instance, is regarded as Australia’s first Indigenous pop star (Pedersen et al., 2004), signing a major record contract with Colombia in 1956. In the early years Little featured regularly on the Johnny O’Keefe Show and Bandstand , performing his style of harmonious ballads. Little’s image is suave – he is presented in smart designer suits, and is always impeccably groomed for live appearances, concerts and album shoots.

As an Indigenous singer Little’s career is enduring – he produced several top ten hits throughout the nineteen-sixties, including his 1963 signature tune Royal Telephone .

The following year he was voted by Everybody’s magazine as Australia’s favourite pop star. In 1960 his handsome looks helped secure a role in a Hollywood film,

Shadow of the Boomerang , as an Indigenous Christian worker fighting for justice against a newly arrived American cowboy. Little also sang the theme song for the movie. After a decade of limited record sales, Little recorded a Reggae track in 1983

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called ‘Beautiful Woman’ – a song which attempted to renew his image as a handsome lady’s man. The video features Little dancing in the high street of a country town. Musical footage is inter-cut with close-up shots of many different women’s faces, most of whom are Indigenous. The video clip celebrates the beauty of Indigenous women, authored as it is by this long famous Indigenous pop icon.

Unfortunately Little’s comeback at this stage was ill-timed, and Festival records cancelled his contract when the record failed in the charts. Since the late nineteen- nineties, however, Little’s career has been more successful – touring and releasing top selling albums. Much like other older male celebrities Sean Connery and Pelè, media recognition of Little’s career has incorporated a degree of sexualisation – recently he performed a romantic duet with Kylie Minogue entitled ‘Bury Me Deep in Love’.

The popular success of this single, as a public recognition of his sexy appeal, stands in contrast to the earlier unsuccessful comeback of the nineteen-eighties.

Over the past 20 years a number of Indigenous bands have become successful in the mainstream media, though none are renowned for their sex appeal. In the late nineteen-seventies and early eighties in particular, bands such as No Fixed Address,

Warumpi Band, Us Mob and Scrap Metal came to musical prominence. The

Warumpi Band performed songs in their native Papunya language, and sang about issues that would now be themed ‘reconciliation’ – ‘Black Fella, White Fella’ (1984) being their most famous song in this regard. In the mid nineteen-eighties No Fixed

Address was the first Indigenous band to incorporate the didgeridoo into its pop music

– with this musical addition they successfully toured the UK. In the early nineteen- nineties the didgeridoo gained a more international popular appeal with the release of

Yothu Yindi’s ‘Treaty’. In their use of dance music and numerous music videos, the band significantly changed the way Indigenous music had been seen in the

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mainstream, combining traditional Yolngu lyrics with a contemporary techno sound.

Though these bands have had varying degrees of domestic and international success, none of them are recognised as sexy performers within the mainstream.

Hip Hop represents one of the most recent developments in Aboriginal music

(Dunbar-Hall and Gibson, 2004). Artists include Gumbaynggir rapper MC Wire (aka

Will Jarrett); members of the Sydney’s South West Syndicate, including Brotha Black

(aka Shannon Williams); Perth based band Downsyde; Wilcannia Mob, who take their name from their home town in rural New South Wales; and the Newcastle outfit Local

Knowledge. Unlike American Hip Hop, Indigenous forms are not so sexualised in video narrative or lyrics. It must be acknowledged that Hip Hop is an important part of the Indigenous music sphere, though I do not have the space to discuss it here.

Interestingly the genre does however produce one of the only recognisably sexy images of Indigenous masculinity. Anthony Mundine features in Joel Turner and the

Modern Day Poets’ single ‘Knock U Out’, rapping lyrics and sparing shirtless with

Turner himself. Mundine’s sexy image draws more upon being seen as a sports personality, than it does from any established musical profile.

The Emergence of Indigenous Sexiness in the Mainstream – Christine Anu and

Shakaya

It is not until the mid nineteen-nineties, in 1995 in fact, that the first sexualised

Indigenous singer emerges in the Australian mainstream media. Though she had been performing nationally with Paul Kelly since 1993, the debut album ‘Stylin’ Up’

(1995) established Christine Anu as a successful mainstream Indigenous artist. The most famous song from this album, which Anu sang at the 2000 Sydney Olympics

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Games (Figure 12), is the Warumpi Band’s ‘My Island Home’. In these early days

Anu does not speak of her musical authorship in any great detail, but through interviews it is clear that she is seen to author her own sexy image. In Juice (1995) magazine Anu is listed amongst the top ‘20 sexiest Australians’ and in her profile declares that upon first arriving in Sydney ‘I slutted around a bit’ (quoted in Hartley and McKee, 2000: 250). In more recent years, the R & B duo Shakaya (Figure 11) have also achieved enormous commercial success in the Australian music charts as

Indigenous performers. After releasing their first (self-titled) album in 2002 with

Sony, the band toured Australia with Destiny’s Child and Kylie Minogue. Much like

Christine Anu, Naomi Wenitong and Simone Stacey of Shakaya both speak about their music and their sexy profiles – in interviews and guest appearances, on television, radio and in print. These two artists are markedly different from previous mainstream Indigenous artists, in that they are recognised and promoted – to white and Indigenous audiences – as sexy. Unlike Jimmy Little, whose image conveys the singer as charming and debonair (qualities which are nevertheless seen as desirable by the media) Shakaya and Anu are marketed to mainstream audiences initially through their sexy looks. Anu and Shakaya are key figures in this chapter’s discussion of the authorship of Indigenous sexiness in the Australian mainstream media. Their voices provide an important source of vernacular theorising about Indigeneity in the mainstream

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Figure 11 – Emerging Indigenous sexiness in the early two-thousands – self-authored musicians Shakaya (Simone Stacey and Naomi Wenitong), and their debut single ‘Stop Calling Me’.

In examining the profiles of these artists, it is worth establishing a defining comparison with the previous chapter’s examination of Nicci Lane. Both Anu and

Shakaya are not, as Nicki Lane was, actresses who are directed – they are writers who are, to an important degree, authoring their own words and performances. Unlike

Nicci Lane, whose profile has not gained any recognition in the mainstream, Anu and

Shakaya’s authorship is acknowledged in a number of different places. To a large extent, such authorship is integral to being seen as a successful pop star – being able to articulate one’s image, personal inspirations, influences and the content of certain songs, establishes a more marketable basis for identification between an artist and her or his fan base. On the cable music station Channel V (Matheson, 2002), Shakaya are interviewed about the inspiration for the latest hit ‘Sublime’. Simone speaks about watching boys play basketball in the Cairns heat, describing how they periodically

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expose their muscular abs to wipe the sweat from their brows – ‘the song’s really just based on checking out a guy’ Naomi confirms. The program cuts to a clip from the video, featuring shots of toned and sweaty young Black men jumping for hoops, and the interviewer asks about Naomi’s ‘risque’ bikini in the video. Naomi laughs and says, ‘Oh my goodness I was like can you see through this, and I said my Nanna’s out there and she’ll fully kick my butt’ (ibid). This public demonstration of Shakaya’s authorship, of their music and sexuality, forms an important basis for establishing who Shakaya are, and what their music represents to audiences. In this instance

Shakaya speak about wearing revealing clothing in the music video ‘Sublime’, but comment on being reprimanded by their grandmothers. They are seen to perform their sexuality like a number of other teen idol musicians, such as Britney Spears and

Justin Timberlake; such singers allude to their sexuality, but are seldom permitted to explicitly act it out. In this way Shakaya speak about authoring their music, lyrics, songs and, more importantly, their own sexualised profiles as a successful teen band.

In television, magazine and radio interviews Christine Anu also speaks about her own music and career. On the late night chat show Viewpoint (Mangos, 2000),

Anu speaks to compere John Mangos about writing and producing her own music.

She acknowledges that she does not play any instruments in her songs, though states the importance of working with an arranger to compose the melody of a particular track. She also mentions being quite ‘image conscious’, and asserts the importance of being able to control one’s image as a popular performing artist. After a humorous anecdote about her make-up artist not being able to tame her curly hair, she leads the conversation into a more serious direction when talking of modelling nude for the photography magazine Black & White (see Figure 6, Chapter 2). Confessing to feeling good about her body image, Anu says that volunteering for the magazine was

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motivated by the desire to celebrate her body after child birth – ‘it’s about bowing down to a woman’s body’. She also discriminates about not choosing to pose for

Playboy or Penthouse , and comments that ‘I believe a woman’s body is more sacred than that’. It is clear from this example that Anu is seen to be in control over the way her sexy image is presented in the media – ‘I always think about what I’m doing and why’, she concludes. Though Anu’s sexiness may appear more ‘artistic’ than

Shakaya’s, especially as knowledge of Anu’s background in theatre is known, both performers are nevertheless seen to author their popular sexual appeal in the mediasphere.

Besides music, it is interesting to note that there are a number of emerging

Indigenous performers and producers increasingly choosing this mode of public engagement. Indigenous sports men have featured within Cleo magazine’s famous

Bachelor of the year editions, for instance. Kyle van der Kuyp became the first

Indigenous sportsman to be awarded the prize in 1998; Sydney Swan’s AFL star

Michael O’Loughlin was runner-up in 1999; and 2003’s competition was won via popular SMS vote by Geoff Huegill. Several Indigenous producers have developed this public recognition, choosing to market sexy Indigenous sports men through

‘Indigenous’ themed calendars. The Koori Kids foundation recently produced its

‘League of Their Own Calendar 2006’, which features ’12 of [rugby] league’s hottest players’ – footballers are photographed frontally naked, looking desirably sweaty after workout sessions. According to the calendar’s producer, Larra Busse, the project aims to raise awareness of Indigenous ‘sports role-models’ through rugby league players. Produced by Vibe Australia, the ‘Deadly Dozen 2003 Calendar’ is another which features shirtless, sexy sportsmen – Anthony Mundine, Carl Webb and

Che Cockatoo-Collins. The calendar was used ‘as a way of raising funds to provide

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sporting equipment to rural and remote communities’. In these instances authorship is used to publicise particular needs of Indigenous communities. Through sport, and particularly working class sports like rugby league, Indigenous men are becoming recognised as sexy within the mainstream. 4

Indigenous women have also produced calendars of sexualised Indigenous models as a means of engaging public debate and interest. Jinnali productions was established as a ‘publishing and promotions’ business in 2000, by two Murri women –

Dina Paulson and Liza Fraser-Gooda. In 2003 they released the ‘Jinnali – Women on

Fire’ calendar (see Figure 13), which became an effective promotional platform for the company’s modelling agency. The first Jinnali calendar was produced in 2001, and was prompted by statements made by visiting super model Naomi Campbell that there were no Indigenous models on Australian catwalks. The Jinnali calendars feature Indigenous models wearing bikinis, each posing in different locations significant to that particular model. In each profile, totemic symbols and tribal backgrounds are acknowledged. Since launching their first calendar models have appeared at the ‘Tropicana’ Gold Coast Festival, posed for FHM (For Him

Magazine), modelled at Melbourne’s Fashion Week, as well as the Melbourne Grand

Prix. The stated aim of the company is to change the ways in which Indigenous people have traditionally been seen in the mainstream media:

For too long, Aborigines have been portrayed in society as stereo-typically

uneducated, ugly and poverty stricken. Our calendar breaks down that image,

and portrays Aboriginal women as beautiful, intelligent and confident with

their own Aboriginality (Paulson and Fraser-Gooda, 2002).

4 As the Koori Kids calendar sales suggests, this recognition might also be skewed towards a more rural fan base.

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The producers of recent Indigenous calendars, much like Anu and Shakaya, are increasingly recognised as authors of Indigenous forms of mainstream sexiness.

Moreover, producers like Vibe Australia, Jinnali and Koori Kids actively publicise their authorship – as a means of soliciting public interest and, in the process, seeking recognition in the mainstream in ways which have previously excluded Indigenous voices. It is also worth noting that Cathy Freeman has recently signed a contract with the fashion label Charlie Brown, an event much published throughout the media.

Unlike music and pornography (and until recently television – as the follow chapter demonstrates), it is important to acknowledge that calendars are currently the only form of media where both Indigenous women and men are presented as sexy. But it is through music – and the profiles of Shakaya and Anu specifically – that mainstream audiences have been exposed to sexualised images of Indigenous performers over a continuous and sustained period of time.

Figure 12 – Christine Anu performing at the 2000 Sydney Olympics.

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Figure 13 – Indigenous authorship. Indigenous models posing for a publicity photo for the release of the 2003 ‘Jinnali: Women on Fire’ calendar.

Speaking about … Shopping, Boys and Dating

Shakaya and Anu author their profiles, as popular sexy Indigenous singers, in very different ways. Aside from interviews, both artists can also be seen as embodying different forms of mainstream heterosexual sexuality. In television live appearances, concerts, lyrics and music videos, as popular singers they both speak about relationships, family, culture and Indigeneity. Across this range of inter-texts it becomes possible to gauge the extent to which Shakaya and Anu’s sexiness might start to cross-over into more marriageable forms. In order to assess their overall marriageable status in the mediasphere it is useful to look at the ways both artists speak about, and embody, personal relationships, family and Indigeneity. As I have argued throughout this thesis, marriageability involves initially being seen as sexy

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(publicly acknowledged attractiveness), which sometimes translates into more enduring forms of emotional commitment as personalities are increasingly regarded as ordinary. In attempting to find out whether Anu and Shakaya can be seen as marriageable, it is first necessary to establish if Shakaya and Anu’s sex appeal can be considered ordinary.

The first thing to notice about Shakaya and Anu’s image in the non-

Indigenous public sphere is that their Indigeneity is publicly recognised and celebrated. From the beginning of her commercial career, Anu’s Indigeneity is perhaps more central to her public image, more so than Shakaya. Her first single ‘My

Island Home’ was strongly associated in the media with her Torres Strait Islander heritage, even though it was actually written by the Warrumpi Band. The song provided the soundtrack to a documentary about the singer, Saltwater Soul (Salgo,

1996). In the film Anu speaks about her spiritual connection to her home island, and the importance of an Indigenous identity to a contemporary ‘city’ life of fame. The song was performed at the 2000 Olympics, and on several occasions Anu has performed at other national sporting occasions, such as the Rugby League and AFL grand finals. Before the release of her first album, one reviewer anticipated that

Christine Anu ‘picks up where Yothu Yindi leaves off’ (Casimir, 1994: 13).

Indigeneity is less central to Shakaya’s public image, though it is nevertheless a significant part of their profile. During the National Aboriginal and Islander Day of

Celebration (NAIDOC), Shakaya performed at the South Sydney Leagues Club, alongside the Bangarra Dancers; on what many Australians refer to as ‘Australia

Day’, the 26 th of January, Shakaya featured at the Gadigal Yabun ‘Invasion Day’ concert; with Casey Donovan and Christine Anu, Shakaya featured more recently at

Australia’s first international Indigenous music festival, ‘The Dreaming’, held on

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Queensland’s Sunshine Coast. Indigeneity is not explicitly presented in Shakaya’s songs, but contextual discussions can point to Indigenous content in the form of basketball in the videos. Speaking of the media’s interest in their Aboriginality,

Naomi and Simone comment on their commercial success, and the importance of performing at such events:

People do ask about our background and we were the first Aboriginal chicks to

be seen on the commercial scene . . . Receiving support from our mob

(Aborigines) and recognition like at the Deadly Awards is confidence building.

We are proud of our culture (Shakaya quoted in Gregg, 2005: 16).

As recognisable Indigenous figures in the mediasphere, it is significant to their marriageability that Anu and Shakaya also speak about personal relationships.

Shakaya write and speak about the subject of ‘dating’, for instance. The band’s debut single ‘Stop Calling Me’ is about a relationship, though Shakaya acknowledge the song is not about a particularly marriageable one – ‘We both have like ex-guys and ex-boyfriends and that ringing up afterwards, but it’s mainly just to say “stop calling me”’ (Debbs, 2002). The single ‘Sublime’ is described as a ‘love song’, written about the experience of ‘getting to know a guy, and how nice it could be’ (Matheson, 2002).

In other interviews, Shakaya acknowledge the importance of family relationships. On the cover of their first album the girls mention: ‘To my Grandmothers, “Nanny”

Lorna Wenitong and “Farmor” Desma Sisson, you are both the roots of our family.

I’ll never forget your words of wisdom’. Marriageability might be suggested in such contexts, as the band’s lyrical concerns with dating are balanced with a respect for family.

Much like Destiny’s Child, Shakaya also sing about dating and the importance of showing respect for fellow girlfriends – or, in Black parlance, ‘sistahood’. The

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‘Cinderella’ video, for instance, is cut together with footage of the girls shopping for clothes with clips of Naomi walking hand-in-hand with an uninterested-looking boyfriend, whose attention is continually diverted to a conversation on his mobile phone. Simone walks past and tears her friend away, and together they sing the chorus, ‘I’m not your Cinderella, You’re not my Rockafella’. Later, Naomi angrily revisits her date – she strides into the restaurant, magically leaps into the air at a great height and lands on the table. She starts rapping, ‘Yeah, what yo let me introduce myself, I’m the girl you keep trying to play…’ 5 In comparison to earlier ‘girl power’ groups such as the Spice Girls, Shakaya and Destiny’s Child draw upon a particular notion of ‘sistahood’ as an expression of solidarity with other young Black women.

Central to this construction of heterosexual femineity is a shared sense of style and community, which acknowledges the supportive bonds between young women when negotiating relationships with boys. Authoring this image of female agency suggests the possibility that Naomi Wenitong and Simone Stacey could become potential romantic partners. But as the videos to the singles ‘Are You Ready’, ‘It’s a Party’ and

‘Cinderella’ demonstrate, Shakaya’s interest in relationships is expressed as fun, either through shopping or nightclubbing. To be sure, these are very ordinary pursuits for young men and women. Though Shakaya do enact Indigenous female agency through their youthful sexuality, it remains difficult to see them as marriageable in a wider sense of public representation.

In the dominant discourse, ‘dating’ is seen to be an important but nevertheless transitional phase of life. It is a means of acquiring a life partner. It can be seen as fun, full of unpredictable events and challenges. But on talk-shows and women’s

5 For comparison, Destiny’s Child’s more recent ‘Girl’ shows the trio defiantly walking down the street, arm-in-arm, after one of them breaks up with her boyfriend. To further illustrate the intertextual reach of ‘girl power’, it is worth mentioning that the video is captioned by a Sex in the City title sequence.

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magazines, through continued media coverage of famous people’s ongoing relationships, whether successful or not, suggests a preferred model of continuity between partners. Shakaya are rarely invited to speak about personal relationships in the media, with actual or potential love interests. Their music and profile evoke chic and urban independent young women. Sexuality is central to their image, and provides a means of asserting agency and control as confident Black women in the non-Indigenous public sphere. Shakaya are seen to author this image, but they are not seen to author an image which could be described as marriageable.

‘I fart, I shit, I cry’ – Multidimensionality and Marriageability

Through lyrics, interviews and performances Shakaya speak about boys, dating and shopping. They also speak publicly about the importance of their cultural backgrounds as Indigenous women. They may perform on the Today Show breakfast program to promote a new single, and their music may provide background café atmosphere in Neighbours , but Simone and Naomi are not known outside of their musical careers. The girls’ personal and family relationships are not featured in women’s magazines or general lifestyle programs, for instance. In assessing the ordinariness of their sex appeal, it is worth noting that Shakaya do not appear in the media outside of music videos and press interviews. Though they do appear as sexy in these contexts, their sexuality is not familiar enough to a wider variety of people to make them truly marriageable. I would suggest that as other pop stars have become marriageable, such as Will Smith and Marcia Hines for instance, it is because their sexy profiles also increasingly incorporate images and narratives of a personal nature.

In the case of Naomi Wenitong and Simone Stacey their image remains closely tied to

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that of ‘Shakaya’, their music remains a defining part of who they are. Being seen as marriageable in the mediasphere involves more than just recognition of one’s sexiness

– eligibility for a relationship entails being seen as more complete, more personable than just sexy. Part of this process requires personalities to be able to speak about their own careers, in ways that make them multidimensional. When Christine Anu, for instance, compares her spectacular performance at the Olympics with a new role in the musical Hair , Anu’s relationship with her own image/career is foregrounded.

She insists: ‘I fart, I shit, I cry. I do all of those things, and when I’m hurt, I’ll say it’

(quoted in Benzie, 2004). Multidimensionality – and the authorship of it – must be seen as a key characteristic of Aboriginality marriageability in the mediasphere.

Though she is recognised as sexy, Anu’s Indigeneity was initially represented as getting in the way of her being seen as marriageable. That is her Indigeniety was treated as ab normal. In 1995 Christine Anu was profiled as an upcoming artist in the

Sixty Minutes story ‘Island Girl’. The story’s narration attributes Anu’s talent and good looks through an overtly colonial trope. The voice-over, which ponders the subject of cannibalism in relation to Anu’s heritage, surmises: ‘It’s obvious where

Christine’s talent comes from – it’s in the blood’ (quoted in Hartley and McKee,

2000: 252). In other contexts such an interest in her family background may create a sense of depth, an empathetic personal history which adds to the Anu persona. But in this case the metaphor of ‘blood’ and a ‘savage’ ancestry evokes a distanced interpretation of her Indigeneity. As these elements are directly connected to her sexual appeal, a more stereotyped understanding of her Indigeneity emerges that leaves little room for sexiness to appear even as remotely ordinary.

Tracing her position in the mediasphere further, it would seem that Anu’s sexy appeal has developed during the late nineteen-nineties and early noughties through a

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diversity of media genres, including women’s magazines. Such appearances have helped in the transformation of her image into a more marriageable one. Media fascination with her ‘exotic’ looks, of the Sixty Minutes variety, has shifted to emphasise a more everyday account of her Indigeneity. She has appeared on the late night variety-chat shows The Panel (Channel Ten, 12/5/1999) and Rove [Live]

(Channel Ten, 22/5/2001 and 10/6/2001), which included an interview with Jon

Stevens and Katie Underwood, fellow cast members in the musical production of

Hair . Though nothing was mentioned of her Indigeneity in the interview, in print media she speaks of the challenges of appearing in the production as an Indigenous performer: ‘People see Aboriginal people are out there, fully in the workforce being commercial artists and entertainers’ (quoted in Holder and Casamento, 2001).

Appearing naked in the show alongside 44 other performers is ‘daunting but not it’s not an issue’ (ibid). In a less theatrically sexy capacity, Anu joined the cast of

Popstars Live (2004) as a judge, only to leave after being criticised for being too nice.

Alongside other Australian music figureheads such as John-Paul Young and Molly

Meldrum, Anu is representative of the music industry, not simply her Indigeneity or, as in the case of Shakaya, her own music. Elsewhere, and in contexts where her sexiness is not directly obvious, Anu has guest appeared on Playschool (ABC, 2004) and recorded a traditional Torres Strait Islander song ‘Taba Naba’ on the Wiggles

Album, It’s a Wiggly, Wiggly World (2005). Her Indigeniety in this instance may be signified quite explicitly, if she is also read in connection to Jimmy Little’s appearance on the same album, though in the minds of excitable toddlers, knowledge of her Indigeneity is not immediately guaranteed. This is not to say that her

Indigeneity is actively denied in these instances, but throughout the media Anu is first and foremost seen as an ordinary person.

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A key element to Anu’s marriageable profile is the media’s interest in her personal and family relationships. Anu is often seen speaking about these relationships in the context of her career. An article promoting the stage play

‘Kissing Frogs’ for instance discusses the singer’s marriage to partner Rodger Corser.

The article mentions how the couple met during rehearsals for the play ‘Rent’. In this article the extent to which her profile has even become more ordinary than sexy is reflected in the writer’s praise of Anu as a mother:

Christine Anu smells wonderful, like a combination of sweetened milk and

talcum powder. It's that attractively wholesome ‘new mother’ smell. And,

indeed, she is a new mum: her second child, a daughter this time, was born

just over five months ago. The baby was named after her grandmother,

Zipporah (Rose, 2003).

This coverage of personal relationships is an important public recognition of

Anu’s ordinariness within the non-Indigenous public sphere. As is common to such representations of parenthood in the mediasphere (and particularly motherhood), the ordinariness of parenting is frequently opposed to sexiness (in relation to Anu see, for instance Keenan, 2003) – this perceived opposition between sexiness and family life is explored in more detail in Chapter Six of the thesis.

That Anu is seen as both sexy and ordinary makes her particularly marriageable in the mainstream media. Previously her Indigeneity was seen as hindering marriageability, though now it has become a much more mundane and taken-for-granted part of her profile. Media interest in her personal life, particularly her own domestic family, is also an indication that Christine Anu has become a more rounded publicly desirable person, in terms of both physical attractiveness and her personality. The extent to which her sexiness and ordinariness converge can also be

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identified in more recent media appearances, where Anu speaks on various issues related to lifestyle – she has written her own column in Who Magazine (Noonan,

2004), and appears on breakfast television promoting greater awareness of healthy dieting (Boland, 2005). For Anu this transition from sexy pop star into a sexy and ordinary celebrity has occurred over a period of ten years. Central to this transformation has been the recognition that she is in control of her public image.

Through continuous media coverage, of her career, personal interests and family life,

Anu is also seen as authoring her own marriageable public life.

Christine Anu and Shakaya, then, provide new and interesting vernacular theorisations of Indigeneity and Marriageability in the white public sphere. These women are unmistakably Indigenous. Knowledge of this fact can be derived from a variety of sources. Their Indigeneity is sometimes obvious, but not always significant to understanding the meaning of their performances. In terms of McLaughlin’s

(1996) sense of ‘vernacular theory’, Indigeneity becomes available through a proliferation of ‘non-centralised’ and often unconnected forms of communication (19-

20). As vernacular texts, they cannot simply be thought of as systematic or organized expressions of Western ethnocentrism, capitalism or white patriarchy. The development of Anu’s marriageability has not been orchestrated by the media in a way which makes it appear artificial; significant changes emerge through the media as they have developed in her life, spontaneously and organic. This is important if we are to accept her as a rounded and valued member of the community, rather than a corporate media construct. The issue here is not whether such performers are intricately aware of how their profiles sell records or promote clothing, but how they themselves communicate ideas about being Aboriginal to both white and Black audiences, in a vernacular language available to both communities. Much like

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Shakaya, Anu’s vernacular theorising comes across through both words and actions.

The occasional but explicit comments made by Anu about being recognised as ordinary, in ways which do not hinder or interfere with her Indigeneity, are valuable aspects of her marriageable personae. These artists theorise about living contemporary lives, through the vernacular discourse of pop stardom; they articulate an important sense of empowerment as young women, be that through producing, entertaining, mothering or simply shopping.

Indigenous Marriageability and the Authorship of Celebrity

In many ways, the diversity of roles associated with her career contributes to an image of Christine Anu as a marriageable one. Importantly this marriageable image is one that Anu has created for herself, and is seen to have created for herself.

Shakaya also demonstrate authorship over their public image as two youthful, sexy and independent women. Public recognition of Indigenous authorship, for artists like

Shakaya, Anu, and producers such as Jinnali and Vibe, is an important step in the alleviation of arguments of exploitation. Such recognition can also be useful to the overall acknowledgement of Indigenous contribution within the creative industries.

The importance of self-authorship to images of Aboriginal marriageability can be identified in other areas of the media besides music. Television actors and presenters, such as Deborah Mailman, Ernie Dingo and Aaron Pedersen, do not write their own words and performances but through interviews and guest appearances are seen to exercise a certain control over their careers. By building speaking positions throughout the mediasphere, these personae become more complex and multidimensional – offering different models of marriageability.

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Chapter One of the thesis argued that Ernie Dingo’s marriage in 1989 – as it was covered in TV Week – was the first example of an Aboriginal personality being presented as marriageable in the mainstream media, as both sexy and ordinary at the same time. More recently, sexy Indigenous actors have been presented as marriageable through magazine and television interviews. On the chat show Enough

Rope (ABC), for instance, Nova Peris talks about her relationship with new husband,

Daniel Batman. The host Andrew Denton introduces the couple by foregrounding their differences – ‘when you first met Nova, she couldn't have been more unattainable, ‘cause she was from another race, from the other end of the country, and she was married. How did you know you were gonna get her?’ (Denton, 2003). Her friendship, determination and compassion are qualities that, according to Daniel, drew him to Nova, and they both agree that ‘an openness to be with one another’ nurtured the relationship beyond its initial stage. The serious political and racial inferences in

Denton’s question are radically displaced in the comedy of the next, when he inquires:

‘I don't wish to be personal, and this applies to both of you, but whenever I hear of top-class athletes getting married, I just think, “You must have the most fantastic sex”’. The audience’s laughter shows the acceptability of this thought, perhaps even as a reflection of the host’s own personal fantasising. Peris’ sexiness becomes part of a sociable dialogue – it is not taken to be a distasteful or a leeringly perverse comment. Although Batman and Peris do not provide a verbal response to the question, they both audibly laugh out loud, and exchange smiling looks. Peris’ ability to speak about her life and relationships creates a sense of control and autonomy.

Alongside her desirable physical appearance as an athlete, these are publicly esteemed characteristics of a marriageable partner.

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To point out an obvious fact, such interviews often draw upon material from autobiographies, one of the most literal manifestations of authorship. In the above instance, Peris’ interview coincided with the launch of her autobiography – Nova: My

Story (2003). Many Aboriginal personalities have featured in autobiographical and biographical literature – Sally Dingo’s King of the Kids (2000) and Stan Grant’s Tears of a Stranger (2003), are two recent examples. More recently – and historically – there have been a much greater number of autobiographies published by sportswomen than sportsmen. These autobiographies also incorporate material about marriages, relationships and family – Home: The Evonne Goolagong Story (1993) and Cathy:

Her Own Story (2003). Much of this material becomes public knowledge, especially as selected material is reproduced through magazines and discussed in television interviews. Such fora are instrumental in making Indigenous identities, such as Cathy

Freeman and Nova Peris in this instance, more marriageable to a non-Indigenous readership.

Like Freeman and Peris, Christine Anu’s sexy image has moved towards a profile which has increasingly emphasised her as a person, and someone involved in relationships. Her image incorporates a range of different abilities and talents – singer, actress, and children’s television presenter. Diversity in this sense can be described as a formative characteristic of Indigenous marriageability, as it has also allowed celebrities like Anu, Ernie Dingo and Deborah Mailman, to communicate their Aboriginality in a number of different genres – drama, television promotions, music, advertising and interviews. By authoring their celebrity image, the media presents us with profiles of autonomous individuals, capable of freely choosing their own friends, partners and lovers. That these profiles are Indigenous suggests ways in

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which the public sphere has started to recognise – for the first time – the value and desirability of those Indigenous identities.

Conclusion

As this chapter has demonstrated the question of authorship is an important one to the presentation of marriageable Indigenous personalities in the mediasphere.

Authorship is also important for Indigenous artists and producers seeking to assert sexualised bodies and identities within the mainstream. As sexy personalities like

Christine Anu have become marriageable over time, celebrities claim public authorship over many more facets of their lives, besides their bodily image. Through exposure and publicity, sexy celebrities often gain greater acknowledgement from various parts of the media. Public authorship of one’s career can take many forms – magazine feature articles and television appearances, alongside autobiographies, which offer a range of life-narrative material. These narratives become significant in terms of presenting public identities who are able to assert agency, to speak about their own image to, and within, the media. Subjects speak about families, and personal relationships, as might be expected of fully recognised members of a social community.

Moving towards more fictional narratives of marriageability in the public sphere, the following chapter looks at Indigenous actors in Australian television drama. Building upon this chapter’s concern for sexy Indigenous celebrities, it examines more closely the intersection of marriageability with fictional stories of romance and relationships.

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172 Chapter Five – Romancing Reconciliation: Making Sex Ordinary on Television

The case studies presented so far have examined different aspects of

Aboriginal sexiness (publicly acknowledged attractiveness) in relation to the public sphere’s representations of ordinariness. Chapter Three examined the emergence of narratives of Indigenous sexualities through art and pornography. Contrasting these depictions with those of mainstream film, the chapter suggested that depictions of ordinary Indigenous sexiness in non-Indigenous media only occurred during the late nineteen-eighties and early nineties. By contrast Chapter Four showed that throughout the nineteen-nineties Indigenous celebrities, sports stars and singers began to be recognised as sexy in the public sphere for the first time and, even, as marriageable. Celebrities like Christine Anu and Deborah Mailman illustrate the importance of authorship to their marriageability, which underscores the desire to see such sexy personalities as people, who maintain ongoing family and interpersonal relationships. As the previous chapter also highlighted, sexiness is an important, perhaps initial, ingredient to being seen as marriageable in the public sphere. But by itself, sexiness is not a sufficient attribute to ensure marriageability. As I shall illustrate through soap and drama representations in this chapter, it is the particular combination of sexiness and ordinariness which produces marriageable personalities in the mediaphere.

With the case material studied in the thesis, there is some textual overlap within the last two chapters. Unlike the previous chapter, which was concerned with issues of authorship and sexiness, the last two chapters are more explicitly concerned with the relationship between ordinariness, sexiness and marriageability. In its analysis of emerging forms of Indigenous sexiness in the mediasphere up until the

173 early nineteen-nineties, in the marginal genres of art-film and pornography, Chapter

Three argued that such representations of Indigenous authorship are relatively new to the white mainstream mediasphere. As the previous chapter also showed, Australia’s first sexy Indigenous musician appeared in the mediasphere in the late nineteen- nineties, with Christine Anu, whose authorship helped ensure her marriageability throughout the latter part of the following decade. The final two chapters draw upon these arguments about authorship, as a defining characteristic of marriageability. In their discussion of media celebrities, these final chapters further illustrate the importance of intertexts as a means of building marriageable profiles – beyond just television soap dramas. This chapter argues for the usefulness of the soap genre as a means of presenting the most ordinary form of Indigenous sexuality – and hence marriageability – in the mainstream media today.

Television soaps and dramas explicitly concern themselves with day to day conflicts and challenges, such as romances, marriage breakdowns or raising children.

A concern for everyday and familial elements of social life makes soap operas particularly useful for investigating how both interpersonal and intercultural relationships are imagined. Television’s usefulness in representing marriageable relations derives in its ability to show everyday relationships over a long period of time. In this chapter I chart a particular history of these relationships, detailing the occasional moments of sexual intimacy and romances involving Aboriginal characters on Australian television screens. From the earliest portrayals in Number 96 (Cash

Harmon for Ten Network), through to later serials like The Flying Doctors (1986,

Crawfords for Nine Network), Home and Away (1993, Seven Network) and

Neighbours (1994, Grundy for Ten Network) I will argue that Aboriginal characters are rarely allowed space for their own romantic or sexual storylines. Although

174 characters may appear sexually attractive (in the conventional ways of wearing cut-off shirts or revealing dresses, jewellery and make-up), they rarely engage in sexual relations, be they either ‘romances’, ‘affairs’ or ‘one-night-stands’. However, towards the end of the nineteen-nineties, and as storylines with Aboriginal characters have focused less exclusively on the issue of ‘race’, some serials have explored

Aboriginality in a more everyday relief, using sexuality as integral to those roles. As many of the Aboriginal professionals consulted for this thesis see this as an encouraging development, the chapter goes on to suggest that these television roles present a significant site for reconciling sexiness and ordinariness in the mainstream media.

Points of Reference

Few academic sources discuss representations of Aboriginality within mainstream Australian drama or soap productions, but those that do generally incorporate Aboriginality under more generalised studies of ‘ethnicity’ or ‘race’ (see

Jakubowicz, 1994). An initial exception to the trend is Alan McKee’s article

‘Marking the Liminal’ (1997), which analyses the placement of Aboriginal characters in Australian soap operas up to the early nineteen-nineties. From the days of Bellbird

(1967-1977, ABC) through to Neighbours (1986-, Ten) and A Country Practice

(1981-1993, Seven), McKee’s analysis shows how Aboriginal characters have generically quite specific relationships to their soap communities. McKee observes that even as Aboriginal characters become central in soaps, and are given roles lasting several episodes, characters seldom survive long-term within the community – and are hence not given accreditation in opening title sequences, or allowed involvement in

175 romance narratives, for instance. A contributing factor in their exclusion, according to McKee, is the deployment of Aboriginality towards singular ‘issues’-based episodes. In these narratives Aboriginal characters are ‘outsiders’, and become bearers of issues such as ‘racism’ or ‘assimilation’ (50-52), disrupting assumed community values when their Aboriginality is presented as the explicit focus. McKee stresses that such stories are not in and of themselves limited to simply showing instances of victimisation; Aboriginal-identified traits may surface in one episode – such as being able to identify edible ‘bush tucker’ – whilst in others they may be backgrounded or rendered inconsequential. A predominance of one-off ‘issue’ storylines might suggest reasons why Aboriginality is seen as a limiting attribute for actors in the industry. But as a generic feature, it also designates how often regular characters come to represent little else but the ‘issue’ of their Aboriginality.

The characterisation of Aboriginality as an issue inevitably diminishes the prospect of romantic involvement for Aboriginal characters within the genre (48-50).

Kylie Belling’s Sharon in the Flying Doctors (1986-1991, Crawfords for Nine), to mention a prominent example here, is a ‘liminal’ character within the serial community, signified through her odd romance with Dave, the Flying Doctors’ pilot.

During their 13 episode relationship, as McKee describes it, Sharon’s decision to leave the community to embark on a degree in social work – ‘I’m going to the city to see myself’, she explains, with the long-term aim of repatriating with her tribe – creates an underlying tension that prevents their romance from developing. They argue and fight, which is not unusual for soap characters, but their relationship is never acknowledged by the community, not even ‘signalled by anything as blatant as a kiss’ (ibid.: 50). The issue of ‘Black pride’, as Dave terms it, prevents an implied intimacy from going any further, onscreen. Without such visual signs of romance –

176 such as kissing, hugging or even holding hands – Sharon and Dave’s romance appears

‘textually ambivalent’ (50). McKee cites A Country Practice and Neighbours as other serials which develop romances between Aboriginal and white characters, but in these narratives ‘there is little of the long term interest and extended period of problematic disruption that typically characterises serial romance’ (48). For instance, a love interest for Sally (Brenda Webb) in Neighbours (1996) – the first main Aboriginal character in the program’s ten year history – hastily leads to a marriage, but one outside of the serial community. In the case of Flying Doctors , where Sharon’s romance survives, but without any publicly acknowledged signs of sexual intimacy, she is cautiously refused entry into the more familial realms of the ‘we-dom’ soap community.

Another useful discussion of Aboriginality in Australian drama is Harvey

May’s PhD thesis Australian Multicultural Policy and Television Drama in

Comparative Contexts . May examines the representation of Aboriginal characters within several late nineteen-nineties serials (2003: 203-205), particularly Heath

Bergersen’s Reuben in Breakers (1998-1999, Screen Time for Ten). May identifies developments to drama casting practices during this period as reflecting a more

‘everyday’ multicultural programming agenda, whereby various cultural and linguistically diverse identities ‘are [seen to be more] involved in the transformation of the mainstream’ (13). A sign of this shift can be seen in the casting of Heath

Bergersen in Breakers who, during the series, plays a character whose ‘Aboriginality’ is incidental, rather than defining. Breakers can be considered important for its casting of the first Indigenous actor in a role which does not associate the character solely with his Indigeneity. Paraphrasing Bergersen, the series was important in this respect – alongside others such as Wildside (1997-1999, Gannon Jenkins for ABC)

177 and Water Rats (1996-2001, Southern Star for Nine) (both starring Aaron Pederson) – because it offered an alternative to ‘former portrayals of Indigenous Australians as either “spiritual Blackfellas [or] endangered” exotica’ (Bergersen quoted in May,

205). Additionally, May cites Rueben’s romantic involvement with two white female characters as indicative of changing values within emerging youth demographics, more comfortable with seeing interracial sexual relations as part of their ‘everyday’ experience. 1 Such a turn towards mainstream inclusion does not strip Aboriginality of its social significance, but rather allows:

room for actors and scriptwriters alike, to pursue Indigenous issues from time

to time within the ‘everyday’ without fear of falling prey to a virtuous liberal

sentiment (205).

Within television soap operas, dramas and mini-series, sexual relations and romances between characters are commonplace, expected. Elsewhere, McKee (1996) considers the importance of mainstream representations of ‘men-not-kissing men’ in

American television programmes, demonstrating how popular expressions of gay male sexualities have been limited to avuncular hugs, holding hands and starry-eyed glances. From a queer rights perspective the continued absence of visible male-to- male kissing within the mediasphere insists ‘on the private nature of homosexuality’ – something kept for the bedroom only (70). For Aboriginal actors seeking work in television productions, whether they include romantic storylines or not, a new politics of inclusion is brought to the fore. Kissing, as with most other generic expressions of television soap and drama relationships, is an important attribute of being seen as

‘ordinary’ within the public sphere.

1 According to executive feedback cited by May, not a single letter or phone call was registered in complaint concerning Reuben’s interracial kissing.

178 Early History

Although a considerable amount of Aboriginal-related material can be found in the early years of Australian television, there are certainly no representations of sexy or even marriageable characters in dramatic productions. An early program like

Alcheringa (1962, ABC), for instance, depicted traditional Aboriginal lives through a

‘voice of god’ anthropological narration. Episodes sought to explain activities such as

‘Tracking’, ‘Food Gathering’ and ‘Fishing’ and, although actors were frequently naked, sexualised elements of their lives such as marriage rites were not represented

(Healy, 2005). A fictional narrative like Whiplash (1961, Seven) could show

Aboriginal characters with speaking roles, but only as informants to the white

(American) protagonist (Atkinson, 2005). Later, Skippy (1967-70, Nine) also presented peripheral Aboriginal characters, but in the same paternalistic mould. A little known series called Woobinda (1968, ABC) starred an Aboriginal character called Kevin (Bindi Stevens), who is adopted by the series’ main character, a white veterinarian endeared to the local Aborigines. Kevin’s adoption occurs when his biological parents are killed in a stampede, making his familial relationship to the white family problematic. 2 For these early representations, even where Aboriginal characters are central, roles are severely limited by the motivations of white characters.

A major barrier Aboriginal actors faced in finding sexy, marriageable, or even ordinary roles, was the widespread refusal by white producers to acknowledge existing Aboriginal acting talents. In fact, Aboriginal actors were overlooked in a number of film and television productions featuring ‘Aboriginal’ characters – The

2 In this show Sonia Hofmann, a white girl who plays Kevin’s sister, became the glamour character – her sex appeal is recognised in advertisements for the show, with the character wearing a bikini.

179 Battlers (1968, ABC) and Journey out of Darkness (1967) are two early examples. A founding member of the Black Theatre group in Redfern and the Aborigines

Advancement League, Bob Maza played a lawyer in the series Bellbird (1967-1977,

ABC), but complained about being overlooked for the series Boney (1972-73, Seven)

– a series which finally settled on a white actor to play its lead, a ‘half-caste’ detective called Napoleon Bonaparte. Without Aboriginal actors it is difficult to imagine how characters could be seen as sexy, or even marriageable, to white audiences.

Representations of Aboriginal characters as non-sexual began to change in

1974 when Justine Saunders began her television career, appearing in the ABC series’

Essington (1974) and Rush (1975). As historical dramas both of these programs seek to represent the violent interactions between early colonists and Indigenous tribes. In

Essington , Saunders’ character is sexually abused. This sexual aspect of Australian history finds its way into the write-up about the series in the TV Times :

The alien environment reduces the European settlers to impotence because

they are unable to adapt their social structures and ideals to their new

surroundings (Editor, 1975).

The term ‘impotence’ metaphorically carries with it the sense of hostility and alienation that existed within white society. It does not convey the possibility of long- term co-operation or affection between the two communities. In these early roles, then, there was no possibility that Saunders’ character could be in love, or be loved, by a non-Indigenous person. Just two years later Saunders could be seen as sexually attractive and ordinary in the soap opera Number 96 . But in this role, the issue of racism prevents her character from being seen as marriageable to white audiences.

180 ‘I Guess It’s Novel to Them – Having a Lubra Cut Their Hair’ – Romancing

‘Racism’ in the Nineteen-Seventies

In 1976, Australian primetime television produced its first avowedly sexy

Aboriginal character, Rhonda Jackson (Figure 14), in the long running serial Number

96 (Cash Harmon for Ten). In this popular soap Saunders’ character enters the series as a young hairdresser. From her first appearance (episode 989) Rhonda’s co-workers at the ‘Continental Salon’ greet her with slight suspicion, gossiping about what an untrustworthy ‘Aborigine’ she is. But the worry that Rhonda’s presence causes soon gives way (episode 997) when Dudley, the hairy-chested, medallion-wearing playboy, falls in love with her. Dudley decides to throw a cocktail party for the salon and invites Rhonda as his guest. Wearing a body-hugging, backless and low-cut dress,

Rhonda glides the room serving guests cocktails and nibblies. She is noticeable, and the camera often centres on her ample cleavage during conversation scenes. This is quite deliberate, as it not only foregrounds Rhonda’s attractiveness, which enables her romance with Dudley to become more evocative but, more importantly, foreshadows the dramatic events that follow towards the end of the episode. When the party finishes Rhonda remains alone at the salon, left to clear away the plates and glasses.

The camera frames her actions through the slats on the window on the front door – a voyeuristic looking-in point-of-view shot. She moves out of the frame unaware she is being watched, and the camera pulls out to a long shot of the garden just as a human shadow stalks across the door. Rhonda hears the sound of feet scuffling outside, but as she rushes to the door it is too late. A close-up captures her screaming; a plate smashes to the floor. The masked male figure forces himself into the kitchen and grabs Rhonda, violently pushing down her onto the counter. She struggles as the

181 attacker rips off her dress – her breasts become central again, but this time they become visible. Rhonda is raped. If we can even call it a ‘sex scene’, this is the first involving an Aboriginal character in the history of Australian television drama.

In the eyes of the characters of Number 96 Justine Saunders’ Rhonda is very sexy. Aside from what admirers say about her, she often appears in tight-fitting dresses and make-up, and as a new character in the series close-ups and mid-shots foreground her looks. At one point, Rhonda walks across her flat naked tying-up her silk dressing gown to answer the door. Her body is prominent, in much the same way as other young characters’ – Jaja chops vegetables in a way that makes her breasts jiggle for the camera; Dudley is seen with his shirt unbuttoned, and sometimes shot fully naked conversing with flatmates (who are usually somewhere else) from the shower. In its first season (1972) Number 96 became the first Australian television program to show full nudity and sex scenes. The Box (1974-1977, Ten) premiered two years later and sometimes out-scored Number 96 for top ratings, producing similarly sexually explorative storylines including homosexual and bisexual relationships. Justine Saunders enters the show as the first avowedly sexy Aboriginal character, in a decade where sexual liberation was very much on the agenda. But when Jaja replies to Dudley’s comments about the customers fancying Rhonda (997), it is clear that Aboriginality raises another preoccupation of nineteen-seventies

Australia: ‘I guess it’s novel to them – having a lubra cut their hair’. With the first sexy Aboriginal character in an Australian soap, the issue of ‘racism’ suddenly becomes important. As a result Rhonda’s only sex scene occurs through violence, not mutual romance.

Compared with today’s soap dialogues Jaja’s comments are abrupt, illustrating that Rhonda’s good looks do not guarantee her automatic acceptance from peers in the

182 community. This is because Jaja’s character is central to Number 96 – aside from working in one of the show’s primary locations, her flat and bedroom have their own set. So when Dudley merely frowns with disapproval at her calling Rhonda a ‘lubra’ and, at other times, when her ‘abo’ and ‘boong’ remarks receive sullen silences from

Arnie, a main character is permitted to be ‘racist’. In subsequent soap narratives it is not uncommon to have openly racist characters, though they are usually ‘outsiders’, or

‘insiders’ reformed by the wisdom of others from the community. Later in the series, after Jaja tells Rhonda she wants her to leave because ‘we just don’t want any boongs in the place’, Dudley provides the only voice of conciliation – ‘Silly sausage! How could anyone of our generation be so narrow-minded?’ Dudley speaks these words privately to Rhonda, rather than in direct protest to Jaja herself, and there is no outrage or even frustration in Dudley’s tone. Rhonda’s response, that ‘Jaja’s just a simple country girl’, gives her racism an identifiable cause, yet similarly offers no outright objection to the remark.

Although the community’s response to Rhonda can be read as reinforcing contemporary racial anxieties, it is also possible to view her presence as a catalyst for a more transformative process of white self-reflection. When Dudley and Rhonda snuggle in bed, for instance, he questions why she does not reciprocate his affection and says ‘I know I’m only white trash to you’. Other segments of dialogue awkwardly orchestrate conversations towards ‘racially’ nuanced themes, almost attempting to show how white characters farcically approach the issue of their own racial identities. Arnie is romantically propositioned by Rhonda, and in the very next scene Trixie greets Arnie with the words ‘Why the black look?’ Arnie furrows his brow, telling her to mind her own business. She responds with a Hitler salute and the words ‘Jawohl, Mein Führer!’ Later, Dudley – the film fan – speaks of Birth of a

183 Nation, the Ku Klux Klan and, to indicate just how non-racist he is, ‘BSP’ – ‘Before

Sydney Poitier’. Such efforts at showing a racially ‘aware’ community might be read as encouragement for further interrogation of the issue within the public sphere more generally, perhaps for white people exposed for the first time to other non-white identities, even questioning their racially contingent perspectives. But read in the context of an entire life of the serial, these concerns are only articulated during

Rhonda’s stint. The issue of race enters the community through her character, and makes Rhonda exceptional because of her Aboriginality.

The issue of ‘race’, then, also follows Rhonda and her romantic involvements with both Dudley and Arnold. During her affair with Dudley, Rhonda admits to

Arnold that she faked a relationship with Dudley to get closer to him, but Arnold, who looks uncomfortable and avoids telling her why, coyly refuses her foxy advances.

After being threatened with eviction from the racist Jaja, Rhonda does not find another love interest but rather drifts out of the series several episodes later. But viewed in the context of nineteen-seventies television programming, Saunders’ character can be viewed as a development of sorts in the portrayal of Aboriginal sexiness on television.

But even as she is momentarily seen as sexy, her broader role in the program is far from ordinary. Speaking of developments since her role in Number 96 , Justine

Saunders remains adamant about the need for more ordinary representations of

Aboriginality on Australian television:

Every time you look at these things – these shows, these soapies, whatever, the

dramas – ninety-nine point nine per cent are white people. Also look at the

commercials. And you think, ‘Excuse me, I do drink the coffee, I do brush my

teeth, and I do use underarm deodorant.’ And it's just, you know, sort of all of

184 these whites... a sea of white faces, and you start to get frustrated and you just

think, ‘Excuse me, it's the year 2003! Why haven't we tapped in to say that

look at these incredible talented people out there?’ (Saunders, 2003)

A broader recognition of Aboriginal acting talent might begin to produce more representations of ordinary Aboriginality. Since Justine Saunders’ Rhonda, later

Aboriginal characters also appeared in narratives focused on racism, preventing them from being seen as ordinary, and marriageable within the soap community. One such example is Kylie Belling’s Sarah in Prisoner (1981, Ten) who is victimised, tied-up and painted white for punishment by her racist cell mate. Overt concerns with racism in the genre are understandable at this time too, as the introduction of the Racial

Discrimination Act came into being in 1976 in response to new, and at the time controversial, land rights claims. Number 96 ’s first Aboriginal character also appears in stark contrast to the later presentation of Aboriginality, as a garden statue called

Neville, the pride and joy of Ted Bullpit, main character in the popular sit-com of the early nineteen-eighties, Kingswood Country (1980-1984, Seven).

‘I’ll Never Get a Suntan as Good as Yours’ – Black-and-Not-So-Beautiful in

Nineteen-Eighties and Early Nineties Australian Soaps

From the opening episode of the first series of Flying Doctors , Kylie Belling’s

Sharon (Figure 15) is central in the Coopers Crossing community. As McKee points out, her relationship with Dave is ‘textually ambivalent […] involving many of the signifiers of romance, but insistently denying that romance is involved’ (50). She is a receptionist at the Flying Doctors’ base, and works part-time in the local pub, which is owned by her adoptive parents. From the second episode onwards (‘Trial by

185 Gossip’), when she reads an advice column on ‘how to get a guy’, and then complains to her co-workers, ‘there isn’t a single man around here for miles!’, Kylie Belling’s character is primed for romance. The throng of a V8 engine fades up, and her new man arrives on cue. Sharon rushes to the window – ‘I take it all back, just check out the car!’ They are immediately introduced, and later flirt with each other that night at the pub – Dave is surprised to find her ‘moonlighting’ behind the bar, and Sharon kicks-up her leg, smiling: ‘I’m a woman of many talents’. Their ‘romance’ soon runs into trouble in the fourth episode (‘Dreams of Sand’) when Vic (Maurie Fields),

Sharon’s adoptive white father, evicts Dave from his room when he discovers they snuck out the previous night to go swimming. Later, Vic responds angrily when he finds them sharing a drink at Tom’s house – ‘that’s enough to get the tongues wagging in this town’, he warns. After an argument about their situation, Sharon and

Dave decide to keep the relationship ‘outside of work hours’. Despite all the signs of romance and explosive passion that may have ensued, Sharon and Dave do not hold hands, hug or kiss; their affection for each other remains visually absent.

The racial reasons behind the failed romance are disclosed much later in the series. In episode 14, ‘Departures’ (1986), Vic tells Sharon and Dave why he objected so strongly to their relationship. In this episode, Sharon announces her sudden intentions to leave Coopers Crossing and study social work in the city.

During a heated exchange with Vic about her motivations for ‘exploring’ more of her

Aboriginality away from her adoptive white family (and thus turning her back on them, as Vic interprets it), Vic reluctantly explains his initial discomfort: ‘If you were the same as him and me, colour that is, I still would have thought it, maybe I wouldn’t have said it’. Just before she leaves, Sharon and Dave have their most intimate moments together, romantically sharing a picnic beside the river, but again the issue

186 of Sharon’s Aboriginality suddenly re-emerges. Both talk of the problems of their relationship, though neither conveniently speaks of a shared history of events, and a concern for ‘Black pride’ enters the conversation through Dave. Lying besides her, he muses: ‘I’ve just realised something . . . no matter how hard I try I’ll never get a suntan as good as yours’. When Sharon replies that she’d rather keep her Black skin than ‘peel it off’, Dave shrugs a dismissive ‘Black pride!’ He complains: ‘easy [it is] for you to prey on us whitey’s sense of guilt’. Sharon ends up worrying about leaving

Coopers Crossing for the city, and whether she’ll end up being ‘trapped between

Black and white’. ‘You’ll just have to paint yourself grey’ Dave jibes. He playfully smacks her on the hip and she chases him out of the shot. This is their most intimate

‘soul searching’ moment together, and the issue of Sharon’s ‘race’ gets in the way.

According to Belling a kiss between Sharon and Dave was originally scripted, and even performed for the episode. Belling publicised the cutting of the scene in a

Tracey Moffatt film, and Crawfords vowed never to employ her again. Although she was cast in a later episode of Acropolis Now , she was actually refused the role.

Despite evidence that many (Black and white) audiences appreciated seeing her role in Flying Doctors , Belling suggests the kiss was just ‘too controversial’ for the network to screen:

They were building up, all through the series, the supposed relationship

between me and the pilot, and it actually ends with a kiss. Like we actually

kiss each other. Anyway, it’s a few months after and every body loves it, and

it’s in the can, it’s going to be shown, and they were actually shown almost the

same month they were made. And all of a sudden I got this phone call, and I

had to go back and re-shoot a scene from that show. And what they did, they

didn’t even shoot the whole scene. We had to line up in front of a Polaroid,

187 and re-film it without the kiss. Now it might have looked really foul, because

I look about twelve, and the pilot he’s quite old. But I kind of suspected that

the real reason was that they couldn’t have a Black-white kiss like that on

television (Belling, 2006).

The ‘Nothing Sacred’ episode shows that there can indeed be an Aboriginal romance in the Flying Doctors , involving close contact and even tongues, though it does not involve any Aboriginal characters. Debbie Wilson enters Cooper’s Crossing as an Aboriginal land rights activist and falls for Tom, the principal doctor of the series. Passionately, that is, after she accuses him of being ‘more arrogant than a white grazier’. Her appearance encourages us to think of her as Aboriginal – she has black curly hair and dark olive skin. Her non-Aboriginality is only casually revealed during a conversation with Sharon, when she mentions how difficult it is being white and working with Aboriginal clients. She discusses her ‘sympathies’ for Aboriginal people when she meets Don Shepard, an old white fella who divulges information to her about a sacred site near the town. With the knowledge that the information might strengthen a case against a proposed mining project, Don explains to Debbie that the site is actually a hoax, invented in collusion with tribal elders, to extort money from a greedy pastoralist. Camped out in the bush, Don and Debbie sit beside a bush fire and talk of their respective relationships with the Aboriginal people. ‘You wouldn’t like us all to be mixed-up together . . . assimilation?’ Don asks. Debbie replies in the negative: ‘the Blacks would have to give up too much that’s good and take on too much that’s bad.’ Without questioning where her own personal relationship with

Indigenous people fits with this view, Debbie seems caustically judgemental about all other Aboriginal/non-Aboriginal relations, strengthening her alignment with an all-or- nothing ‘Aboriginal’ political cause. Her blind activism and disdain for white culture,

188 though, does not prevent her from falling for Tom when she arrives back in town. In this single episode hurricane romance, they passionately kiss again before she leaves for the city. Through a white woman representing Black culture, associated with a highly politicised land rights movement of that era, Aboriginality is allowed a passionate kiss with white Australia. The white Debbie kisses Tom at the end of the brief one episode romance, but the Black Sharon does not kiss the white Dave, after their 13-episode romance.

Figure 14 – Justine Saunders’ Rhonda Jackson in Number 96 (1976), as the first sexy Indigenous character in a mainstream Australian soap.

Figure 15 – Kylie Belling as Sharon in th e Flying Doctors (1986). Sharon’s Aboriginality gets in the way of her romantic relationship, which permits her kissing her boyfriend (pictured above).

189 Since Kylie Belling’s Sharon, the issue of ‘Black pride’ recurs in the lives of other sexy Aboriginal soap characters. Kevin is a young character in Home and Away

(1996) who forms a business partnership with his friend Shane selling ‘Aboriginal’ paintings. After a trip to the bush, where Shane becomes sick after Kevin jokingly tells him to eat inedible berries, Kevin has a reawakening, and announces to Shane’s family that he is not ‘qualified’ enough to paint traditional art. He decides to leave

Summer Bay to reconnect with his tribal people. In a twist to the ‘issues’ oeuvre,

Sally, a new Japanese teacher in Neighbours , refuses to teach Aboriginal studies because she also believes she is insufficiently ‘qualified’ (supposedly in a traditional sense) to teach the subject. As the ‘issue’ of Aboriginality comes to the fore in these programs, characters are consistently denied entry into the marriageable community.

Whilst a UK production Call Me Mister (1986) could show a romantic relationship between a white Australian (Steve Bisley) and a Black British actor (Dulice Liecier),

Australian audiences could not experience a romance between white and Aboriginal characters. In the period of radical change to land rights, with the enormous publicity generated by the Mabo (1992) decision, and with overseas events like the ‘million man march’ (1995) in Washington, which commemorated the Martin Luther King speeches, publicised on Australian television, the issue of ‘Black pride’ became problematic for soap representations of sexy Aboriginal characters.

‘It’s all part of our plan … to breed you mob out’ – Heartland ’s First Romantic

Kiss

In 1994 for the first time in Australian television history an Aboriginal man could be seen kissing a non-Aboriginal woman. The program was the 12-part ABC

190 drama series Heartland , and the actors were Cate Blanchett and Ernie Dingo. For this reason, Heartland is a breakthrough in the history of dramatic narratives of

Aboriginal marriageability on Australian television. Their kissing became an interesting moment not only because it demonstrated that Aboriginal people could be seen as sexually desiring subjects but, as it did so, endorsed a very personal engagement between Aboriginal and white Australia. In the series Ernie Dingo plays the character of Vincent who meets Beth (Cate Blanchett), a young white urban professional from Sydney, when he relocates from a remote Aboriginal community in north Western Australia to continue his career in the police force. The romance begins at Brooklyn Waters, a small northern New South Wales coastal town, when

Beth arrives with plans to renovate a house bequeathed from her recently deceased grandfather. After visiting the house, which is located near the Aboriginal ‘mission’ on the outskirts of the town, Beth discovers she has Aboriginal relatives living nearby, the result of her grandfather’s fraternising many years ago. Her connection to the community becomes more skewed when she meets Vincent who, as the only

Indigenous face in the local police force, is forced to advocate for the community over the wrongful arrest of a teenager from the mission. As an interracial couple, stuck between the two racially polarised communities, the success of Vincent and Beth’s relationship becomes allegorical of the reconciliation process.

Vincent and Beth’s relationship becomes political at different points throughout the series, but to say that the series deals with Aboriginality as a single issue is to underestimate the narrative’s overall complexity. Loving affection is not immediately apparent between the two, but takes several episodes to develop. When

Beth travels with Vincent to his home town, she feels estranged from Vincent’s family, a sense which is heightened by Vincent’s strange behaviour towards his own

191 Indigenous de-facto wife, whom he broke tribal laws to marry. Beth does not know where she stands in relation to Vincent’s feelings – whether she is a girlfriend, wife, or simply his friend. Different family members interpret their relationship differently, and Vincent always tells them the answer – in his native tongue, that is. Vincent’s nickname name for Beth is ‘Jubby’, which he explains to her means ‘lizard’ in his language – ‘like in Elizabeth, just a friendly name…’ Beth is not sure what to make of the term, but pursues her feelings and awkwardly attempts to understand Vincent’s troubled relationship to his tribe. Her desire to fit in with Vincent’s family, and likewise Vincent with Beth’s, illustrates a careful negotiation between cultures, but one which eventually promises success through dialogue and commitment to each other.

Beth’s commitment to Vincent – and white culture’s acceptance of Aboriginal law and justice – moves towards a more reconciliatory moment at the end of the series, where the couple kiss. The kiss occurs as Beth and Vincent sit together on a cliff-top and, after a heartfelt discussion about leaving Brooklyn Waters to get away from the stigmas they face there, their conversation turns to the subject of Vincent and

Beth’s living together, and more optimistically even marriage. They embrace, and after tenderly kissing Beth, Vincent asks ‘how do you feel about kids?’ Beth beams a smile at Vincent’s eagerness. He cheekily goes on to explain, ‘its all part of the plan.

. . to breed you mob out.’ They kiss again and intertwine through a more lasting hug.

The camera circles them once, then dramatically pans-out to a crane-orchestrated panorama of the New South Wales hinterland they impressively overlook.

Didgeridoo music sounds, which is followed by the scrolling titles and the accompanying theme music. The narrative closure suggests a moment where the macro- and micro-political are clearly interrelated. In reconciliatory terms, the scene

192 suggests a personal coming-together of Black and white Australia which, if successful, at least enables a speaking of the nation’s past, its racially exclusionary treatment of Indigenous bodies, and families – a theme explored in more detail throughout the following chapter. Injustices of assimilation are addressed in the exchange, but the kiss also offers a decidedly Aboriginal-centered resolution to the micro- and macro-political relationship – the creation of a new Aboriginal marriage, family/tribe.

The central romance narrative in Heartland provides a way of presenting reconciliation to white audiences in personal terms. As the prospect of an Indigenous family is seen to be desirable, so too the commitment to social justice and a proper recognition of Indigenous histories becomes a more everyday concern. A future of co-existence and co-operation is offered at the end of the series. But as a mini-series, with a finite narrative, this future is implied rather than depicted. Their future romance and happiness together exists outside of the program. Despite this Heartland remains an important program for showing an Aboriginal romance, complete with everyday depictions of sexualised affection, such as kissing and hugging.

‘Do a Couple of Push-ups, Have a Shower, Slap on Some Aftershave and Wait for the Time of Your Life’ – Sexy Aboriginal Men of the Late Nineteen-Nineties

The above quote is taken from the series Breakers (1998-1999, Ten) – it is relationship advice given from Boris, the café chef and teenage confidant, given to

Reuben (Figure 16) who is about to go on a first date with his new girlfriend, Brooke

(episode 316). In 1998 Breakers appeared on Australian television as an alternative to

Neighbours and Home and Away , in terms of casting, content and scheduling.

193 Breakers is set at Sydney’s Bondi region, centring around an old beach front building called ‘The Breaker’, which houses all the main locations – a café’, the local newspaper office, a modelling school as well as a youth drop-in centre. The beach location understandably contributed to the overseas market appeal of the show, but

May suggests that Breakers differed from its predecessors Neighbours and Home and

Away by showing that ‘Australia is not necessarily about having, or hoping for, a family life with a home and backyard’ (2003: 202). The Breakers community is populated with urban young people, and the series often concerns itself with ‘issues’ arising from a mix of cultural and sexually diverse characters; homelessness and drug abuse; relationships and self-esteem. But to view the program strictly for its issues- based storylines is to misjudge its novel representation of ‘the everyday’ within the genre, particularly for creating the longest sustaining Aboriginal male character on

Australian commercial television, in Heath Bergersen’s Reuben. In sustaining a central role for the show’s two-year lifespan, it should not be surprising to discover that, as Boris says in the opening quote, Reuben does indeed have the time of his life.

Brooke, a visiting casting agent at the Breakers modelling agency, falls in love with Reuben just before she leaves for a job in New York. In their stolen romance,

Reuben’s Aboriginality is not problematised. Neither is it redundant or insignificant in expressions of love but, on the contrary, Aboriginality figures as a significant and everyday facet of Reuben’s character. In the first scene where their mutual feelings are first acknowledged, Brooke tells Reuben she does not want to cause him heartbreak. ‘You’ve given me everything’, Reuben replies. A counter-shot captures

Brooke’s joy, as she closes her eyes and leans in for the kiss. Their kissing continues, after a cut-away to the Bondi panorama, and then an exterior shot of Brooke’s apartment, showing their lasting affection through the evening. There is nothing

194 generically unusual about the presentation of this relationship, or their kissing. In their next scene Rueben’s Aboriginality plays a more evident role. He takes Brooke to the cliff tops at Bondi, where they speak of being at peace beside the sounds and colours of the waves. He describes the differences between the western and eastern coastlines, and how he suddenly grew much wiser coming to Bondi after meeting his biological parents, and living on the streets. He has spoken of these ‘issues’ earlier in the series, so they do not provide the main focus in this instance. As they walk they also discuss Brooke’s life in the acting industry, and the prospect of maintaining a long-distance relationship. After two intervening storylines, the romance narrative resumes with the sound of the didgeridoo and a shot of the waves below the cliff top; the camera pans slowly upwards, across the cliff face, and follows the didgeridoo upwards towards Reuben, playing. The shot fades to a close-up of him, which fades into a counter of Brooke, smiling. It is a very marriageable Reuben, wooing his white girlfriend with a phallic didgeridoo.

Figure 16 – Heath Bergersen as the marriageable Indigenous character Rueben in the teen drama Breakers (1999).

195

Figure 17 – The sexy Indigenous actor Aaron Pedersen, nominated ‘ Cleo ’s Bachelor of the Year’ in 1994.

An important part of Rueben’s character was the actor’s input, particularly through the scripting process. Bergersen helped write an episode dealing with his character meeting-up with his biological mother, a narrative mirroring his own experiences at that time. The episode was screened on mother’s day. In this instance,

Aboriginality as an issue becomes secondary to the character’s own emotional development. Bergersen describes Reuben and Brooke’s kissing as ‘quite modern, quite groundbreaking’. He goes on to mention what being seen as sexy and

Aboriginal on television might mean for Indigenous and non-Indigenous people more generally:

I reckon it’s going to change things for the better. But it may get people to

think about us in a different way, in a different light. With a lot of scruffy

196 Aboriginal people I know, there’s still a fair bit of racism there, being called

‘boongs’, ‘dirty Aboriginals’, that sort of thing. When you’re all clean cut,

and toned and everything, like a football player or something … I reckon it

would be a good thing if we had more of that you know, definitely (Bergersen,

2005).

Rarely are ‘scruffy’ people stigmatised for being ‘white’, identified as ‘dirty whitefellas’. His comments are similar to other Aboriginal actors, who protest the lack of authority roles for male actors in the industry. Kevin Smith, for instance, alludes to a long history of Aboriginal trackers and policemen who have shaped

Australia when pointing-out how few Aboriginal police, medical, fire and rescue characters there have been in Australian television dramas (Smith, 2005).

An important Aboriginal male actor who has begun breaking this trend is

Aaron Pedersen (Figure 17), whose roles also present the actor as sexy and marriageable. Pedersen first appeared on television as a reporter for the science show

Quantum (1985-2001, ABC) in the mid nineteen-nineties. After a major role in the film Dead Heart in 1996, he made headway in the police dramas Wildside (1997-99,

ABC) and Water Rats (1999, Nine), but appeared more recently as a doctor in the

ABC series MDA (2002-2005). In 1994 he was voted the first Indigenous Cleo ’s

Bachelor of the Year. What is new about Pederson’s career is that all of his roles on television are for characters who are not only sexy, but occupy positions of authority.

To highlight just how far Pedersen’s roles have developed this combination of attributes, Wildside featured the actor as Vince Cellini, a doctor at a police medical centre who has an affair with colleague Kate Holebeck (Abi Tucker); later in the series he has a threesome with two white women. In the high budget action series

Water Rats he plays detective Michael Reilly, again a central character, who is

197 frequently courted by sexy women – in ‘Good Times and Adventures’ (episode 94), for instance, Reilly forms a relationship with the madam of a brothel; later he goes under cover for a swinger’s party, and is called ‘a spunk’ by one admirer. Pedersen often talks about his Aboriginality in the media, and emphasises how important it has been as an Indigenous actor starring in such roles. Speaking about watching television whilst he was growing-up, Pederson says ‘when I did see Aboriginals, which was rare, they were getting arrested or being drunk. I knew Aboriginals who were doctors, lawyers, community leaders, and I thought “this is not right”’ (Pedersen quoted in Arkinstall, 2003: 9). Being seen as sexy and being seen as an authority figure are not mutually exclusive traits for soap and drama characters. An examination of George Clooney’s career after ER , or Lucy Liu’s role as a lawyer in

Ally McBeal , leading to her starring as a Private Investigator in Charlies Angels , might suggest that it is even a generic expectation that both traits occasionally overlap.

Aaron Pedersen and Heath Bergersen belong to ensemble casts, in roles which allow for them to have relationships. They are shown to be sexy and, unlike music which invites the listener to imagine a relationship with the singer, we are shown their relationships on the screen. With his roles for characters in police and medical dramas, Pedersen tends to be presented as a stud – unattached, in control, macho, but very much available for a long term relationship. Bergersen, on the other hand, has tended to appear in roles which accentuate his youthful attractiveness, being available for long term romances with female characters.

198 ‘Love’s not About Our Similarities, It’s About Our Differences’ – The Secret

Life , Deborah Mailman and Kel’s Theory of Relationships

In The Secret Life of Us (2001-2004, Southern Star for Ten) Deborah

Mailman’s Kelly is a central character throughout the entire four series of the program. She is the most popular long term Aboriginal character to appear in an

Australian television drama since Heath Bergersen in Breakers . In this series

Deborah Mailman plays Kelly, a disillusioned real estate agent who moves into an inner city flat with a group of other young urban professionals. In the first episode of the series, Kel appears as quirky – she wears a black skirt and a bright pink top with matching pink lipstick; a leopard skin boa-scarf is draped around her neck, her fringe tucked away behind a pair of massive sun glasses on her head; and her handbag is an outrageous bright green, and cow-patterned. Kel is introduced into the series when

Alex and Evan throw a housewarming party to acquaint with her as a new flatmate.

In a more generic sense, her centrality is guaranteed later when she becomes involved in the first romantic narrative of the series. Kel leaves her housewarming early after an obnoxious ex-boyfriend suddenly arrives, but whilst outside she meets Joseph, a young man tinkering with his vintage ‘MG’ sports car. They talk and arrange a date.

During the date – a meal at the pub – Kelly’s voice-over begins to worry about

Joseph, and his petty insistence on splitting the bill down to the nearest cent. He takes

Kelly home that night, and things begin to appear ominous when he leans in for a first kiss. She turns her head, instead anticipating a kiss on the cheek. In a final close-up they both reposition, but awkwardly bump noses. Apologetically they talk over each other. Finally, Joseph cups his hand around Kelly’s cheek, and they catch each other’s eyes. A bluesy piano score builds in the background, and they finally kiss –

199 with tongues. Saying goodbye, Kelly contentedly smiles, her voice-over humorously closes the scene: ‘One good kiss wipes away at least two personality defects, sometimes more if alcohol is involved.’

Much like Pedersen and Bergersen’s roles, Mailman’s Kel is not seen to perform her Aboriginality through ‘issues’ driven storylines, though her Aboriginality is still a significant feature in the program. Much like the earlier Number 96 , and the more recent serials Melrose Place (US) and This Life (UK), Secret Life of Us is a flat- drama, based in inner city Melbourne. It often features culturally and sexually diverse characters, and does not shy away from screening gay and lesbian sex scenes. Secret

Life is certainly not as issues driven as Breakers , but it chooses to explore particular themes, rather than issues, through individual characters, who provide voice-over insights into the drama. From the movie-length opening episodes, Kelly’s character becomes associated with the theme of relationships. During the first episode, for instance, Kelly splits up with an abusive ex-boyfriend, starts dating a new boyfriend,

Joseph, and gets a job as a relationship matchmaker at a dating agency. Similar to

Reuben in Breakers , Kelly’s Aboriginality is explored only occasionally through the series, but unlike Kylie Belling’s Sharon and Justine Saunders’ Rhonda, her

Aboriginality is not seen to hinder relationships or shape with whom she chooses to have sex.

Her Aboriginality does become important in the episode ‘Have a Little Faith’ when Kelly considers converting to Judaism to please her boyfriend’s mother. Evan suggests ‘you must be the first Aborigine in the history of the world to become

Jewish’. In an attempt to convince herself that the conversion is the right thing to do,

Kelly responds:

200 You know there are a lot of similarities between Aboriginal and Jewish culture

… both are ancient cultures, both have a strong connection to the land, a

history of displacement, and the tradition of oral story-telling.

The seriousness of Kel’s analogy is immediately mocked, when her voice-over continues, ‘I love the internet… you can become an expert overnight, in any field.

Clickedy, click and hello brainiac!’ Kel discusses her Aboriginality with Evan, but her own thoughts are more central to our understanding of that discussion. In this context Kel’s voice-over makes Aboriginality momentarily central, not as an issue, but rather as an ordinary part of her character.

Figure 18 – Signs of marriageability. The sexy Indigenous actress Deborah Mailman, who plays Kelly in the Secret Life of Us , is profiled in HQ magazine (2003).

201 Kelly’s Aboriginality becomes more central to the issue of her (potential)

Jewishness when she visits her Nanna (Christina Saunders) later in the episode. They sit down together and share a cup of tea, as Kelly broaches the subject. She explains how their marriage would entail a conversion to Judaism. Kelly confides in her

Nanna’s wisdom, confessing that she does not know who she is anymore. ‘Kelly, you’re Aboriginal, you’re an Aboriginal woman’, Nanna reassures her. Kelly raises the ‘issue’ of having ‘Jewish’ children. Nanna’s response is firm: ‘If you have children, you know they’ll always be Aboriginal, like you, like me, like your mum’.

The scene concludes with the pair laughing and reminiscing about Kel’s grandfather, who ‘lived on the land, like the old way’. Kelly’s voice over closes out the scene, as she shares the memory of her Grandfather joyously dancing around their old kitchen, embracing them both with the sound of his laughter. In the final scene of the episode

Kelly, Nathan, Evan and Alex are lying in a park, staring at the stars – Kelly describes the constellations through her Grandfather’s Dreaming. Aboriginality becomes spectacularly central to the entire episode, and helps Kelly overcome the temporary

‘issue’ of her religious faith. In the context of the show, where familial visits are rare, the episode shows Kel’s Aboriginal background, without it becoming an issue. In a turnaround from previous Aboriginal soap narratives, her Aboriginality actually becomes a way of dealing with her faith and Jewishness. Aboriginality becomes momentarily central, and Jewishness made into the issue.

Part of Mailman’s sex appeal outside of Secret Life , which is promoted across a variety of sources besides just television texts (see Figure 18), draws upon knowledge of her Aboriginality. The idea of celebrity, in this instance, shows that sexiness in the media is also an attribute of personality. A recent issue of HQ (Highly

Quotable) magazine, for instance, has an image of her on the cover (May/June, 2003)

202 – she is wearing a smart black ball-gown, which teasingly reveals her cleavage, and with her hands on hips, she smiles directly at the camera, the caption reading ‘You

Beauty!’ The article covers familiar ground of the celebrity interview, which is revisited in more detail through an appearance on the late night chat show Enough

Rope (ABC). Among other things she proudly talks of her father’s fame as a rodeo rider in Mt Isa, succeeding at school and university despite her shyness, and landing a part in Secret Life . In a number of different places Mailman talks of her

Aboriginality, and how Secret Life has helped change traditional representations of

Aboriginal people in the media (see Tedmanson, 2003). In one instance Mailman states: ‘It’s nice to finally have an Aboriginal person on screen that isn’t a victim of domestic violence or all those sort of issues that affect our community’ (Torpy, 2002:

9).

In surveying the Australian mediasphere over the past thirty years, the most obvious difference between Deborah Mailman and her predecessors, Kylie Belling and Justine Saunders, is that Mailman’s image is much more self-authored. Outside of Secret Life Mailman is permitted and encouraged to talk about her roles, her portrayal in the media, and her Aboriginality. For her role in Secret Life , Mailman won the Silver AFI award in 2002 for ‘Most Outstanding Actress in a Drama Series’.

The generous publicity such awards generate for actors cannot be substituted for publicity generated from appearing as a guest actor, or given the roles that come from being cast as just an Aboriginal actor. In that respect, it does not appear exceptional or exploitative when Kel finally finds a nice boyfriend, has explosive sex with him for two episodes, then wises-up to his selfishness and throws all of his clothes out onto the street. And when she does find the ‘perfect’ boyfriend, her philosophising is equally unexceptional, but nevertheless insightful:

203 And I realised then that love’s not about our similarities, it’s about our

differences. We all need stimulating, something to push against. We all need

someone to remind us we’re unique.

Within the everyday, Mailman’s character deals with sex – as most characters in soap and drama narratives do – through relationships. As an Aboriginal character, her sexual relationships do not simply involve the single issue of ‘domestic violence’, but the rather unspectacular quest of finding the right man.

Since Secret Life ceased production due to staffing and scheduling problems in

2004, different dramatic portrayals of Aboriginal characters have occurred on

Australian television screens. Following a successful mini-series, Channel Nine began production of the series The Alice (2005-2006). The series focuses on the lives of the town’s inhabitants, and stars Luke Carroll as Michael as an Arrernte man who runs a local tour adventure business. Michael holds a romantic flame for Jess (Jessica

Napier), a nurse at the hospital. Like most soap characters, Luke has relationship problems – a facet which is comically exploited when he hosts an ‘agony aunt’ radio program, calling himself ‘Doctor Love’. The Alice also features a second regular

Indigenous character, Michael’s sister, played by Kyas Sherriff. The following year,

SBS began screening the drama series Remote Area Nurse (RAN) (2006), featuring a predominantly Indigenous cast. Sexual tension between the newly arrived white nurse on the island and a tribal elder becomes symptomatic of the racial tensions between the two communities. Though the relationship does not develop beyond the first series, another Black-white romance briefly develops in a later episode. Both of these programs feature sexy lead characters for different purposes – in RAN interpersonal relationships provide a means for exploring broader community attitudes, between white and Black cultures; The Alice , on the other hand, presents its

204 two sexy Indigenous characters as central to the white community, sharing strong connections to an extended Indigenous family. Unlike the conflict developed throughout the Flying Doctors , these ‘traditional’ and ‘modern’ elements are not seen to compromise each other. Alongside Secret Life , these series both show sexy

Indigenous characters as being eligible for long term relationships – they present

Indigenous marriageability to white audiences.

Interracial Controversies

The occasional moments of interracial sexual intimacy described throughout this chapter, as they have been documented in the public sphere, have not caused a great deal of controversy in the mediasphere itself. In the US the first interracial kiss was scripted into an episode called ‘Plato’s Stepchildren’ in Star Trek during the 1968 season – between the actors William Shatner (Captain Kirk) and Nichelle Nicholls

(Lieutenant Uhura). The kiss was so controversial that the networks actually banned it. In ‘Plato’s Stepchildren’ the Enterprise arrives at a new planet where the inhabitants are called Platonians, because they dogmatically follow the philosophies of Plato. By harnessing the philosopher’s ideas, the leader of the Platonians has telekinetic powers and, because he is bent on convincing his visitors of their bad faith, he makes the crew do unusual things such as behaving like animals, acting violently, and even kissing each other, heterosexually that is. What is significant in the scripting of the kiss is that both characters are forced. The moment their lips are cued to meet,

Kirk gives a stern look across to Plato, and to convey his anger grits his teeth. Visible teeth suggest there was no kissing, a fact substantiated in Shatner’s autobiography.

205 That their non-kissing was noticed, and spoken about in the public sphere, demonstrates how vastly different US attitudes to interracial intimacy have been.

The US soap opera One Life to Live (1968) is purported to be the first to show an interracial romance, between a Black housekeeper’s daughter (Ellen Holly) and a white doctor (Paul Scott). Holly played a character who attempted to conceal her

Black identity, and during the romance she was recognised by other characters as being white (Allen, 2005). Not until the mid nineteen-eighties, with programs like

Days of Our Lives , could interracial relationships between Black and white actors be shown without controversial reaction in mainstream US soaps. According to

Bramlett-Solomon and Farwell (1997), moments of interracial intimacy are still relatively rare in mainstream US productions.

The United States is a country where Black actors have a relatively strong presence in the media, not only appearing as central in mixed-race programs like Law and Order , ER and Ally McBeal , but also as creators and producers of all-Black shows like The Cosby Show of the nineteen-eighties through to the current My Wife and

Kids . Interracial romances in these programs are still rarely explored. In programs where the cast are mainly white actors, such as Friends , Seinfeld , Sex in the City and

Everybody Loves Raymond , interracial relationships do occur, from time to time, though are incorporated within issue storylines. Elaine in Seinfeld cannot figure out whether to identify her ‘biracial’ boyfriend as Black or white; in another episode

Kramer is shunned by his new girlfriend’s family when turning up ‘Black-faced’ after falling asleep under a sun-bed. In Everybody Loves Raymond , Raymond’s brother becomes interested in a Black colleague, but makes a fool out of himself when he speaks cliché street slang and dances ‘Black’ to impress her. The awkwardness of showing interracial relationships on US television stands in contrast to representations

206 of UK drama and soaps. The Bill , for instance, features Francis, a Black gay character whose white boyfriend regularly turns up at work. In This Life , Ferdie is a bisexual dispatch biker, of Mexican descent, and has a Scottish boyfriend; Millie is of Indian descent, a lawyer, and dates a white boyfriend. East Enders frequently sustains central Black and non-white characters who also date and form intimate relations with white, as well as other non-white, characters.

The relative ease with which UK television presents interracial relationships, when compared to the anxiety expressed in the US, might suggest that, at a superficial level, Australian scripting, broadcasting and audience attitudes lie somewhere in between. However, it must be remembered that compared to both countries

Australian drama output is much lower. A more important point to remember is that the most mainstream, long running commercial dramas on Australian television –

Home & Away and Neighbours – have yet to feature marriageable Indigenous characters. However, the uncontroversial nature of Aboriginal-white sexual relationships screened on Australian television can be seen as encouraging, when viewed from a reconciliatory perspective. Over the last ten years in the non-

Indigenous public sphere images of Aboriginal characters have become more central and, as goes with their acceptance in these roles, sexy too. Though these representations may be criticised for being simply ‘white’ – produced for, and by, white people – such comments fail to identify any encouraging changes that have occurred in the public sphere, however they maybe traced. If non-Indigenous people are seen to be more comfortable in their relations with Indigenous people, the non-

Indigenous public sphere might likely become considerably more generous of

Indigenous perspectives, so much for the better. As these new perspectives are self- authored, and are sustained over the long term, other changes might be possible.

207 Aboriginal-Aboriginal Marriageability: The Secret Life and Beyond

This chapter began with an historical first – Justine Saunders’ Rhonda Jackson appearing as the first sexy Indigenous character in a mainstream drama serial. Nearly thirty years later and Secret Life presents us with television’s first marriageable

Aboriginal female character. But the program’s final series offers an even more radical historical first than this – an exclusively Aboriginal romance offered for white viewers to identify with. In the episode ‘Facing It’ Kelly has a one night stand with

Corey (Aaron Pedersen), a famous AFL footballer. But Kelly still has feelings for her old boyfriend, and decides to call things off with Corey. She visits his apartment and hesitantly begins the break up. Kelly’s voice wavers as she delivers the first protest ‘I just came to tell you to stop ringing me’. ‘Really? You could have told me that over the phone. I’m not a stalker’, Corey smiles. With the heart rending mellow guitar riff building, a reverse close-up frames a confused looking Kelly. All the conventions of romance are firmly in place, as Corey moves closer, sweeping her hair from her eyes.

‘I have a boyfriend, and I …’ Kelly tries to continue. But it is too late, and they kiss in the dusky light of the closing evening. ‘You know what we just felt? That’s not usual for me’, Corey says. Her expression is more pained, ‘me neither’. Her voice over continues ‘The Truth will set you free. The thing that feels right, is right’. In

2005, this is the very first Aboriginal-Aboriginal kiss to be screened on white mainstream television drama.

Corey and Kelly’s relationship develops quickly over the following episodes – and the depiction of sexual intimacy is central to this. They argue and fight, even break up, only to get back together again. The episode ‘The Big Leap’ spectacularly confirms their long term commitment to each other. Corey is away preparing for the

208 weekend game, but Kelly’s only interest in football is the prospect of exhilarating sex after each victory. With this anticipation she watches Corey on television with her flatmate Justin who teases Kelly by reminding her of St Kilda’s recent poor form.

Their attention is heightened as the football commentary announces a last minute grab by Corey. The full time siren sounds, and Corey dramatically kicks the winning goal.

Her flat mates celebrate, but the scene quickly cuts away to Kelly and Corey passionately kissing in bed. The sound of the football commentary can be heard loudly in this scene:

Mailands takes a screamer. What a grab! He’s lining up, comes in, and he

pumps it right through the middle. The crowd has absolutely erupted. What

an unbelievable climax to the game.

The love-making is inter-cut with shots of the other flatmates, grinning at each other as they listen to the clamorous climax. The self-consciously masculinised commentary provides the scene its humour, which has its post-coital punch-line when

Corey realises something is wrong – ‘ah me leg, I’ve done me leg’. Reaction shots to the noisy love-making indicate approval, a sign that both Aboriginal characters are acknowledged as attractive by the other members of the soap community.

But Corey’s bedroom exertion serves a broader narrative function – to confirm his marriageability. When Kelly answers the door to Corey wearing a brace clamped to his leg, the other flatmates are fully aware of the cause. Kelly appears visibly shocked, and immediately apologises – ‘you must hate me?’ ‘I don’t hate you. I love you’. Love is stronger than football, and their kissing signals the beginning of their lives together. Kelly and Corey’s relationship continues to the end of the series. In the final episode Kelly leaves her friends in St Kilda to live with Corey in Brisbane

(the youthful destination for all soap romances and honeymoons). Her narration

209 concludes the series, and together this marriageable Indigenous couple leave for the sunset – happily ever after, so to speak.

From Justine Saunders to Deborah Mailman; Number 96 to Secret Life ; one- time guest to main character; rape victim to professional relationship matchmaker; there has been a considerable shift to representations of sexy Aboriginal characters in

Australian soaps and dramas. For Aboriginal male characters, Pedersen and

Bergersen have started in shift industry perceptions as to how Aboriginal masculinities can be represented. Seeing these images of Indigenous Australians as sexy and ordinary presented to non-Indigenous audiences offers ways of thinking about interpersonal relationships between members of different communities. But together, Aaron Pedersen and Deborah Mailman in Secret Life of Us have shown audiences a more radical embodiment of Aboriginal sexual representation. It is a romance between two Indigenous characters – aimed at a mixed, but predominantly non-Indigenous audience. Their relationship is offered to non-Indigenous viewers – with the belief that they will be able to imagine themselves as Indigenous, to identify with those characters. Heartland presented its romance between and Ernie Dingo and

Cate Blanchett – a white viewpoint for the audience to identify with, their way into the story. At the end of Secret Life , that way in, is Mailman – the Indigenous, marriageable character.

210 Chapter Six – Ordinary Lives: Indigenous Parenting in the Media

On a cold June morning at the foot of Uluru Nova Peris-Kneebone stood bundled-up in a baggy white and blue SOCOG (Sydney Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games) tracksuit in front of an army of local and international journalists. Sir William Deane, Australia’s then Governor General, waved his torch over Nova’s to officially ignite the first leg of the Olympic torch relay, a journey that would culminate six months and 27,000 kilometres later, with Cathy Freeman lighting the cauldron in Sydney’s Homebush Stadium. The first Indigenous athlete to win

Olympic gold (in the Atlanta games four years earlier), Nova Peris was chosen as the

Indigenous face of the nation, to inaugurate the Games from ‘the belly of Australia’

(Peris and Heads, 2003: 4). Two weeks before the relay the Mutitulu Community held a sports carnival, where famous Aboriginal sports-personalities and celebrities, including Ernie Dingo, Evonne Goolagong-Cawley and Nicky Winmar, participated.

As a sign of respect to the traditional landowners – and at considerable risk to her running career too – Peris announced during the carnival she would run her leg of the torch relay barefoot. More controversially, and in defiance of SOCOG regulations,

Peris also decided to run with her 10 year-old daughter Jessica. In the midst of the ceremonial hype, generated via the carnival’s absence of press coverage, Peris’ run emerged as perhaps the most personalised affirmation of Aboriginality throughout the entire Games coverage. Nova and Jessica were seen as a nuclear Aboriginal family – mother and daughter, running together side by side. After the torch was passed to

Goolagong-Cawley, Jessica Peris was interviewed about her participation in the event.

She spoke of being handed the torch by her mother – ‘It was awesome. Yeah. I really

211 enjoyed it, especially near the rock – it’s huge! And especially if I'm with my mum –

I look up to my mum a lot’ (J. Peris in Wilde, 2000).

In general terms, desirable images of parenthood may communicate sentiments of love and trust within the community – who is to be loved, and who is to be trusted to provide that love are questions that resonate around parental figures. In a more long term sense, these relationships may also be viewed as a means of transferring knowledge, skills or other valued characteristics to successive generations. Relationships may be materially motivated, with the inheritance of property or financial assets being transferred through marriageable partnerships involving inheritances. 1 Pro-creation through marriage can also be seen as a way of passing on knowledge, spiritual succession, or ties to sacred objects and land – themes explored through the central relationship in the Heartland series. Returning to

Vincent’s comments about having kids at the end of the series – ‘it’s all part of our plan, to breed you mob out’ – this chapter considers the reconciliatory implications of being seen as Aboriginal, marriageable and having kids in the mediasphere. Nova and Jessica’s relationship, as it generates more interest within the mediasphere, is a life-narrative that presents Aboriginality as successful, on an inter-generational basis.

Seeing Indigenous parenthood as desirable partially addresses prior paternalistic beliefs in the need for Indigenous welfare and protection, embodied most destructively in the policy of child removal that created Australia’s ‘Stolen

Generations’.

This chapter explores narratives of Aboriginal motherhood and fatherhood in relation to the representation of Aboriginal marriageability in the mediasphere. As I have suggested throughout this thesis, marriageability is a combination of sexiness

1 This dynamic is explored in recent reality shows such as The Bachelor and Australian Princess , the latter series inspired by the marriage of Tasmanian real estate agent Mary Donaldson to the Crown Prince of Denmark in 2004.

212 and ordinariness. Whilst the previous chapter examined ‘fictional’ representations of sex on television, in their most acceptable, uncontroversial forms, this chapter concerns itself with the profiles of Indigenous actors, celebrities and sports people.

The previous two chapters were interested in sexualised representations, and those which occasionally become more ordinary over time, and hence marriageabile. The importance of authorship to these profiles illustrates the media’s ability to accommodate strongly self-identified Indigenous personalities, who are able to communicate – for themselves – the multidimensionality of their lives within twenty- first century Australian society. In the previous chapter representations of Indigenous sexuality in recent television soap dramas, in particular the Secret Life of Us , indicated the strong possibility for changing representations of marriageability in the white mainstream mediasphere. By contrast to sexualised images and narratives, this chapter is concerned more with the representation of marriageability and ordinariness , through Indigenous families. It sets itself apart from the previous case studies by looking at the ways in which sexy personalities become somewhat unsexy, and ordinary in a way which renders them marriageable as parents.

Images of parenting are traditionally not considered sexy. There exists an incompatibility between parenting and sexiness, and this is indeed the case in public representations of marriage – stereotypically, partners lose interest in sex with their husbands and wives when they are married. Mothers are generally not represented as sexual – this is almost a transgressive idea. But the existence of children in the family unit makes clear that these two elements must co-exist. Marriages are about sexiness, but also about being able to live together day to day – making children, and raising children. I would argue that parenting represents the most ordinary aspect of marriageable relationships. While I have explored sexiness in some detail throughout

213 the thesis, I have not yet offered a detailed analysis of exactly what I mean by ordinariness. This – and the relationship between sexiness and ordinariness – is the central focus of this chapter. In presenting the ordinariness and sexiness of marriageable Indigenous Australians such as Nova Peris, this chapter argues that the key image which brings these elements together is the Indigenous family.

Ordinariness

Steve Mickler’s book The Myth of Privilege (1998) argues that representations of Indigenous people as ordinary in the media are important ones. As this thesis has demonstrated, ordinary representations of Indigenous lives are historically rare, though there is evidence suggesting such images are becoming increasingly popular in the white mediasphere. Mickler examines a particular history of Indigenous representation in Australian popular culture, and asserts that Indigenous people are significantly over-represented as subjects of news reporting. As Chapter Two illustrated, such representations are diametrically opposed to those ordinary representations of soap dramas, magazines and advertising. Detailing this particular history of journalistic representation back to the 1967 referendum, Mickler argues that the current interest in Indigenous issues is related to a broader question of citizenship rights. Chapter One of the thesis highlighted how it was not possible to represent

Indigenous subjects as ‘ordinary’ in the media prior to 1967 – Indigenous people were not considered full or equal citizens of this country. In terms of political representation, social welfare, civil rights and cultural representation, Indigenous people were denied fundamental participation in mainstream Australian society. Pre-

1967 media represented Indigenous people as being dependent upon white society,

214 their service to white Australians is encapsulated in the popular phrase ‘our

Aborigines’.

After the 1967 referendum, Mickler argues that mainstream forms of

Indigenous representation changed significantly. Indigenous people gained greater political visibility in the following decade, through publicised land rights claims and the federal policy of ‘self-determination’ in 1973. Indigenous people were claiming more than equal rights, those which reflected their unique relationship to this country.

Marking a crucial difference from other forms of citizenships, Indigenous people sought rights that could not be transferable to the broader non-Indigenous citizenry.

News reporting of Indigenous issues began to show Indigenous people as radically separate from the mainstream – Indigenous rights in these instances were, and often still are, imagined as being incompatible with ‘ordinary’ forms of citizenship. News journalism provides a focus which visualises difference, and such an intense focus on

Indigenous lives made it difficult for Indigenous citizenship to be presented as ordinary in other forms of popular representation. In the post-1967 era, Australian media newsworthy and exceptional images of Aboriginality become dominant.

As Mickler argues, such an exclusive focus on Aboriginality through news reports formed a basis upon which to exclude Indigenous people from a more

‘practical ethics of representation’ (256-306). According to Mickler claims made over ‘Aboriginal rights’ in the media – those differentiating between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people, legally and institutionally – do not allow for the taken-for- granted, mundane nature of non-Aboriginal rights. As it is reported in the news- media, ‘Aboriginal Sovereignty’ is not seen to incorporate the previously unacknowledged ‘right to be ordinary’. ‘Ordinariness’ – a characteristic to be offered across a wide spectrum of popular media outlets – becomes a means for building

215 meaningful representations of citizenship in the mediasphere, as it creates a foundation upon which Aboriginality is seen as an ordinary characteristic in itself. A shift in the media’s emphasis away from Aboriginality as ‘a problem for whites’

(Hartley and McKee, 2000: 150) promises to challenge the mythical status of

Aboriginal people as ‘privileged’ – exceptional Australians. Without diminishing other Indigenous rights, such as claims to land, affirmation of culture and justice, the right to be seen as ordinary also provides an impetus for building a greater diversity of representations of Aboriginality in the media.

Australian mainstream media – particularly television and women’s magazines

– tend to favour the nuclear family as the cornerstone of suburban, ordinary life. Over the past five years Australian television has witnessed an increasing demand for lifestyle and reality programs, which privilege certain notions of family life.

Programs like Backyard Blitz , Ground Force and Burke’s Backyard assume the importance of property, particularly houses, to the lives of their audiences and subjects. The drama of daytime soaps like Neighbours and Home and Away are established upon long running family legacies, which continue in various forms through present day characters. Family life is often the focus in women’s magazines, consumer and current affairs programming, celebrity chat shows, as well as reality programs like The Biggest Loser and Celebrity Overhaul . Images of families are scattered across primetime television, and are perhaps representative of ordinariness in its most mainstream manifestations. Such a correlation between families and ordinariness in the media has particular consequences for the representation of

Aboriginal marriageability. For if Indigenous Australians are to be represented as suitable for marriage in the mainstream media, they must be seen not only as sexy, but

216 also as capable of sustaining long term relationships. The most powerful of such images are those of parenting and child rearing.

Historical Families

Indigenous families have been treated as extremely problematic throughout white Australian history. In relation to this history, their contemporary presence as ordinary in the media brings an extra political dimension that representations of sexiness do not. Report of the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and

Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families (otherwise called Bringing Them

Home Report ) (1997), illustrates the extent to which this history is still with us. The report outlines the invasiveness of past governments policies, enacted through private institutions, seemingly well-intentioned individuals and community groups, towards

Indigenous families. A formal national policy of child removal in Australia can be traced back to official legislation dating from 1940, though practices of ‘protecting’

‘full bloods’ from white society and ‘absorbing’ ‘half-castes’ dates back to the mid nineteenth century (Part 4). Since colonial times Indigenous family structures were considered morally inferior to those of white settlers, and European civil society. At the end of pioneer colonialism in the early twentieth century Aboriginal Affairs policies gradually targeted traditional family structures, with the establishment of colonising institutions such as missions, schools and houses. A national policy of protectionism was initiated during the time of the Second World War, and aggressive policies of child removal were pursued. The policy was practiced under the racial and scientific idea of ‘biological absorption’. Darwinistic philosophies of the mid nineteenth century decreed that ‘half-caste’ Indigenous children had better life

217 chances if they were trained, educated and civilised to white standards. Once taken away from natural parents it was hoped they would soon lose their Indigenous identity, and could be saved from what was considered an unworthy and degraded tribal existence. In one form or another child removal was practiced in every

Australian state, and the practice of child relocation into non-Indigenous homes and institutions continued into the nineteen-seventies. Removal was often achieved by violent force, and radically changed family lives for ever. The testimony of a six year old child in 1967 reveals how deceptive this practice was:

On the day that we were taken away two officers from the [Western

Australian] Native Welfare Department went to the school and said that they

were taking myself and my sister, Rosylin, home to talk to our grandparents.

The welfare officers also said they were going to take us down to town to buy

some lollies. We actually thought that was what they were going to do. We

started to eat lollies in the back seat but instead of going to the reserve they

continued on and took the turn off to Williams and then to Wandering

Mission.

We hadn’t even had the opportunity to say goodbye to our grandparents.

They knew nothing about us being taken away ('Telling Our Story' quoted in

Markovich, 2003: 10).

The events that followed can scarcely be considered ordinary when compared to such depictions of fictional family lives on Australian television. The actor Heath

Bergersen was one of the last Indigenous children to be removed from his natural parents in Western Australia in the mid nineteen-seventies. As mentioned in the previous chapter, Bergersen’s actual reunion with his natural mother was paralleled by a fictional account in Breakers . This remains one of the few mainstream

218 depictions in television drama of the ‘stolen generations’, though it is also significant that the inclusion of new Indigenous family members lasted just one episode.

The National Inquiry found that the systematic and forced removal of

Indigenous children from their families is in breach of Australia’s international human rights obligations. It contravenes this country’s commitments to prevent racial discrimination and genocide. In this context the representation of Indigenous family life within Australian popular culture takes on an extra historical dimension. As the

National Inquiry recommends, including a formal apology, the recognition and

‘[i]nclusion in human rights training and history textbooks of an accurate account of the violations’ (Chapter Four, 29). A major task identified by the National Inquiry , then, is to increase public awareness of the social and personal effects that past government actions have had on Aboriginal communities, families and individuals.

Intimately, these are communicated, and made public:

Our life pattern was created by the government policies and are forever with me,

as though an invisible anchor around my neck. The moments that should be

shared and rejoiced by a family unit, for [my brother] and mum and I are forever

lost. The stolen years that are worth more than any treasure are irrecoverable

(Confidential submission quoted in Bringing Them Home (Victoria): Chapter 1,

338).

Autobiographical accounts of famous celebrities for instance, provide an important means of making such events familiar to non-Indigenous audiences. Some writers of queer theory may consider this a demonstration of ‘sexual citizenship’.

Ken Plummer’s focus on television talk-show debates and soap-opera narratives

(1995), for instance, emphasises the importance of sexual story telling as a means of publicly transforming what he calls ‘intimate citizenship’. Such stories offer the

219 possibility that previously shameful aspects of society become de-stigmatised, and a new level of understanding reached at a popular and cultural level. The particular importance, and potency, of images of Indigenous families in this context cannot be overlooked.

Extended Families

Historically there have been very few ‘ordinary’ images of Indigenous family life in the Australian media. It is only in the past ten years that we begin to see images emerge through the lives of Indigenous celebrities like Nova Peris, Cathy

Freeman and Ernie Dingo. To be sure, there is an extensive iconography of images of

Indigenous children on Australian television – in advertising and news media.

National sporting events are often marketed through images of Indigenous children – the AFL season, for instance, begins with campaign featuring children from all over the nation, with barefooted Indigenous kids booting the footy around their remote home town. However, these images are removed from what may be considered a family environment, children being presented without immediate parents or even extended family members. The familiarity of Indigenous celebrities such as Dingo,

Peris and Freeman in the non-Indigenous public sphere has ensured a subsequent media interest in their children and family.

Ernie Dingo provides us with the first image of an ordinary Indigenous family in the media during the early nineteen-nineties, in the program 60 Minutes . The program offers a profile of Ernie Dingo’s career. His career and image as the first famous Australian Indigenous comedian ensures that Dingo’s Aboriginality is made central to the story. The voiceover states ‘Ernie Dingo is one of the rarest of

220 Australian species – a Black man who has succeeded in white man’s society’ (ibid).

In this story Dingo’s tribal background is introduced – his name is ‘Oondamooroo’, and he was delivered by his grandmother and aunt on a cattle station two hours away from the nearest hospital, Dingo explains. His relationship to family is illustrated in the segment about his recent marriage to wife Sally. The interviewer contemplates the strangeness of seeing Sally’s white face amongst Ernie’s extended Indigenous family. ‘Apart from us, you’re the only white person here’, the interviewer says. She admits to not noticing, and concludes ‘it was a bit strange at first – but now it feels completely comfortable’. The image is of a harmonious Indigenous family. Sally’s presence is not made problematic, and the question of race does not enter the dialogue. In this program Dingo is presented in his very ordinary, unmistakably

Indigenous extended family.

Figure 19 – Dingo’s Indigenous family – Ernie, his mum (left) and aunt (right) Bessie and Pearlie Dingo featured in an article about the star’s upbringing in the Sunday Times (19/01/2003).

221 Elsewhere Dingo speaks more comprehensively about his family background

(Figure 19). In Oondamooroo (SBS, 1992) Dingo visits his home town of Geraldton and introduces his mum. She takes him to his birth place, Bullaroo Station, and shows him the empty shed outside where he was delivered. In the more recent holiday program Queensland Weekender Dingo travels to an Indigenous tourism site in far north Queensland with Troy Cassar-Daley, and speaks of his mum giving birth.

In Oondamooroo he notices the cockatoos squawking overhead, and says ‘black cockatoo, that’s my grandmother’s totem. When I was here, she was here, they’re still here’. He speaks about his grandmother to his mum in his native language

(without subtitles), and laughs. Dingo’s family is seen to be important and, much like the profile offered in the 60 Minutes program, it is seen to be ordinary and Indigenous at the same time.

Outside of these programs, both of which are life and career profiles of the star, Ernie Dingo’s family is not prominently featured in the media. Desirable elements of parenting skills, however, are suggested in the title of his biography written by Sally Dingo – Ernie Dingo: King of the Kids (2000). Dingo talks about his fondness for children in Oondamooro . Encircled by a large mob of Indigenous kids all impatiently vying for his attention, Dingo turns to the camera and says:

I enjoy talking to kids. I like being in the company of ‘em for the simple

reason that it makes you feel good. I’m just one big kid myself really.

Dingo’s own children feature in some programs, but by and large they are not a significant part of his celebrity image. Dingo co-hosted the program Kidspeak

(1999), with Andrew Daddo – perhaps the most iconic image of the Australian

‘family man’ in the media. In his role as ‘roving reporter’, Dingo speaks with primary school children by drawing out funny comments from them. His appearances

222 in Dolphin Cove (1990) and Clowning Around (1993) also indicate a particular affinity with the pre-teen audience. Without his own children being present in the media, Dingo’s association with children contributes to him being seen as likeable, trustworthy father figure.

Nuclear Families

More recently, Cathy Freeman and Nova Peris’ families have featured in the

Australian media as ordinary. As distinct from Dingo’s family, both are represented in the more nuclear version of familial domesticity. Though Peris’ older daughter

Jessica was born in 1990, little of their relationship was covered in the media at this time. In part this was due to the fact that Peris’ career had yet to fully take off, but also because it became widely known she was in an abusive relationship with

Jessica’s father. Nova gave birth to her second daughter Destiny in 2002, to her new husband, sprinter Daniel Batman (see figure 22). In magazines and television programs Nova’s new family gained a great deal more media interest (see figure 20).

Though Cathy Freeman does not have children of her own, her family background also attracts media interest – particularly since her victory celebration with her mum and brothers after the Olympic 400m gold medal race in 2000. These two contemporary figures are important to the presentation of Indigenous parenthood in the mediasphere – Nova because she is married, and her daughter’s birth has received coverage in the media; and Freeman because, at various times, she openly discusses the possibility of having children.

223

Figure 20 – A celebration of the extended Indigenous family – Nova Peris’ family featuring on This is Your Life (Channel Nine)

In June of 2000 Peris carried the Olympic torch with her daughter, an event that signalled a new interest in her life as a mother. In a publicised tribute to her ancestors Nova ran her leg of the relay barefoot, her celebrated acknowledgment of

Indigenous history was seen as a gesture of reconciliation (see, for instance, Smith,

2000). Children were significant in this moment as, not only was Peris was seen to run alongside her daughter Jessica, but hundreds of excitable Indigenous children too. 2 Elsewhere the image of Nova Peris as a parent is less spectacular, and her relationship with her own children more ordinary. In an interview on Enough Rope

Peris speaks about the difficulty of leaving her ex-husband whilst raising Jessica.

Denton brings Jessica into the conversation in a more light-hearted moment to speak about her mother’s training regime – ‘I can't believe it. She vomits every training session for all the hard work that she does’. The humour of this instance incorporates

2 Ernie Dingo jokes about this event, linking this image of Indigenous childhood to a more domestic, suburban version, claiming to have trained for the run by chasing his two children around the house (Korporaal, 2000).

224 Jessica into Peris’ life story, as a cute and cheeky young teenager. Jessica’s life is not the subject of the interview, even her relationship with Nova – she is an ordinary mother, who has an extraordinary training regime. Alongside her commitment to

Aboriginal reconciliation, ATSIC and Indigenous Sovereignty, Nova’s relationship with her daughter is also rendered an ordinary part of her life.

Taken-for-granted knowledge of one’s personal life is important to being seen as ordinary and marriageable as a parent in the mediasphere. Biographical knowledge, circulated through magazines and television programs, is central to this presentation of Aboriginal personalities as parents. A 2005 Sportsworld feature, for instance, discusses Nova Peris’ return to running after a knee operation. The story focuses on her career up to that point, and includes more details of the injury and operation, training and rehabilitation, than the birth of her baby. The story marks her baby’s arrival as a ‘turning point’ in her life. Along with her marriage to Daniel

Batman, whose career goals and training regimes are also discussed, the birth of her daughter Destiny has given her a ‘new lease on life’. As a sports report, her daughter’s birth is celebrated and understood in relation to her career in athletics, contributing to her weight loss, and neo-natal depression – along with her knee injury, these factors have made her comeback more difficult. Nevertheless, as a marriageable parent it is the ordinariness of her daughter’s birth which is significant in this story.

What makes her extraordinary in this sporting context, is not her Aboriginal motherhood but her determination to be both a mother and an athlete at the

Commonwealth Games.

Since her 400m victory at the Sydney Olympic Games, media coverage of

Cathy Freeman has shown her to be a desirable parent, even though she does not actually have any children. Freeman’s marriageability is suggested in the

225 anticipation, and the speculation this causes, that she does indeed want babies.

‘Cathy’s New Dream … She’d Love a Baby’, reads a front-page headline of the

Woman’s Day magazine (October, 2000). The expectation that Cathy Freeman is pregnant in the article is just that – this makes her parentable . Such speculation presents Freeman’s lifestyle as extremely desirable and, as such, her parenting skills – no matter good they may be – are also an asset.

Although the headline draws attention to the prospect of a baby, the Women’s

Day article ‘Running on Love’ provides a great deal of biographical information about Cathy Freeman. Such information is important to establishing a sense of familiarity and trust about her, which enables her parentability to emerge. As the story is about the possibility of creating a new family, much of Freeman’s personal success is attributed to her own family values, particularly her Aboriginal background. Initially, the story introduces the prospect of a baby through details of her relationship with husband Sandy Bodecker. ‘She’s very much in love with Sandy and wants a family. She’s marvellous with her own nieces and nephews and thinks the world of them’ (Lateo, 2000: 50). In this statement, her family is evoked as an important part of her identity, in the past, present and future. Elsewhere, aspects of

Freeman’s family background rely on very detailed knowledge of her personal life, including her Aboriginality:

Some family members even believe that higher powers intervened for Cathy.

At the crucial moment when Cathy neared the finish, they say the spirits of her

beloved Nanna, stolen generation victim Alice Sibley, and dear Anne-Marie

who died in an institution in 1990, helped guide her across the finish line (52-

3).

226 Through both of these famous Australian sportswomen – Cathy Freeman and

Nova Peris – the media present us ordinary images of Indigenous families. Peris and

Freeman’s families are predominantly represented in relation to their partners.

Compared with Dingo, the sense of family constructed of Freeman and Peris’ lives see them in a more nuclear setting. Despite these differences, perhaps the most significant characteristic all families share is the presence of non-Indigenous partners.

This raises a significant issue in the racial presentation of Indigenous marriageability in the mediaphere – there are no prominent Indigenous parents with kids to

Indigenous partners. Perhaps this pattern of media interest in interracial couplings suggests that the non-Indigenous partner still provides a means of identification with a marriageable Indigenous partner. Non-Indigenous partners still allow a ‘way in’, so to speak, for the media to get their audiences interested. If we compare this observation with the historical account of Aboriginal marriageability in Chapter One, the non-Indigenous/Indigenous partnership clearly has a radically different public status today. The non-Indigenous/Indigenous pairing is currently the dominant mode for representing Indigenous relationships, whereas prior to the nineteen-sixties such couplings were considered violations of long standing legal and social taboos.

The predominant mode of representing Indigenous marriageability, through a single white partner, limits the portrayal of Indigenous people as ordinary in the mainstream. Such a lack of Indigenous-partnered Indigenous celebrities could be seen as regressive, read perhaps as a symptom of the mainstreams’ intolerance of

‘pure-bred’ Indigenous families, and identities. In that light, even Ernie Dingo’s comment could also be read quite differently, as an ironic acknowledgement of a more benign process of having one’s Aboriginality ‘bred-out’ by his girlfriend, a white woman. These readings are possible, of course, if we also read Dingo’s

227 Indigeneity – both inside and outside of the series – as unimportant, inferior and vulnerable. Likewise, the celebrities discussed in the chapter could well be seen as contemporary victims of white assimilation. But if we listen to their voices, what they choose to say about themselves and their partners – and indeed what other people are saying about them too – then it becomes more evident that a more contemporary form of relationship is taking place. These interracial relationships are the dominant mode of representing Indigenous marriageability in the mediasphere, though over time they may eventually provide the space for us to see an all-Indigenous partnership, such as the one in the Secret Life . With the prevalence of more Indigenous celebrities in the mainstream, such partnerships are entirely possible.

Family Lifestyles

Contemporary representations of Indigenous family life in the Australian mediasphere – Cathy Freeman, Nova Peris and Ernie Dingo – strongly suggest the importance of the lifestyle to their continuing public presence. In magazines and television promotions, these celebrities are in high demand in the commercial marketing of lifestyle. A sense of domestic familiarity about these personalities might confirm the argument that images of Indigenous parenthood maintain a longer term visibility in the media through their association with classed notions of lifestyle – middle class lifestyles, to be more specific. The idea of class mobility is suggested in marketing and promotional material associated with celebrity profiles, stimulating aspiration and achievement through particular products. Signifiers of ordinary aspirations, in the media images of these Indigenous families, include weight loss, money and recreation (or holidays).

228 Peris’ image as a mother, for instance, is incorporated into the reality-lifestyle program Celebrity Overhaul (2005). Celebrity Overhaul is a fitness-lifestyle program featuring sporting and non-sporting celebrities such as Merv Hughes and Ita Butrose.

The introductory voice-overs for each episode of the program foreground Peris’ sporting career – ‘the first Aboriginal and Northern Territory resident to win an

Olympic gold medal’. During the show her weight loss goals are framed in a more domestically familial way:

But while she certainly enjoyed the highs, including marriage to athlete Daniel

Batman, her life hit rock-bottom after the birth of their youngest child Jack in

2004. Her weight ballooned, she gained more than 20kg and her energy levels

sank. Nova was eventually diagnosed with depression and a thyroid condition.

She is now on daily medication and a strict diet to control her insulin levels.

Peris’ marriage and her baby’s birth provide background information to her weight loss goals. These events are not particularly celebrated, but are incorporated into the normal and everyday aspirations of middle class domesticity. It is characteristic of the genre that participants and audience members are not selected or differentiated by race, class or social background. Aboriginality is treated as ordinary rather than exceptional. In Celebrity Overhaul the contestants attend a meditation retreat, and Peris speaks about her Aboriginality in relation to the practice – ‘I have a strong spiritual side because of my Aboriginality, so I think I learnt a lot from the meditation’. Like details of Freeman’s extended family, Aboriginality is explored with the everyday make-up of a given lifestyle within the genre. The ‘ordinariness’ of having children may not be explored in any great detail, but with knowledge of Peris’ life already established, her Aboriginal motherhood becomes desirable. Ordinary

229 television, in the form of the chat and lifestyle-makeover shows, presents Nova Peris’ lifestyle as something to aspire to. 3

The association of Cathy Freeman with a particular sense of lifestyle in the media, makes explicit a concern with her fame and money. A New Idea feature (June,

2003), published to promote her autobiography, again speculates about Cathy’s desire for children, but this time with new boyfriend Joel Edgerton – ‘I am shy about marriage, as most divorcees are, and we haven’t talked about kids’ (Davies: 8). The article commences with details of her divorce with Bodecker, and her decision to assert financial independence from former manager (and boyfriend) Nick Bideau.

Aspirations of an appearance on Playschool , Bodecker’s recovery from cancer, and her feelings for her new boyfriend are also discussed. A glossier feature article in The

Australian Women’s Weekly (August, 2000), complete with pictures of Freeman

‘dressed-up’ at home, outlines her financial situation in more detail – a ‘breach of contract’ allegedly costing $3.5 million in lost earnings. By way of introducing

Bodecker’s biography, the article describes their first meeting before the Olympics – as a Nike executive, he met Freeman, a sponsored athlete, at a company function in

Oregon, 1995. The ‘Running on Love’ article celebrates her financial situation, suggesting that her current earnings of $1 million ‘could quadruple, thanks to the acclaim she earned in her opening ceremony cauldron-lighting as well as the gold medal’.

Ernie Dingo’s role as a presenter on the holiday program The Great Outdoors is perhaps the clearest example of the middle-classness of families in the lifestyle

3 Drawing upon John Hartley’s (1999) evocation of television as a teacher of citizenship, Bonner (2003) suggests that the makeover genre in particular strongly signifies the ‘middle-classness’ of Australia’s ordinary television. Makeover programs are accompanied by their own magazines, as well as independent magazine promotions, which extend advice about housing, health and fashion products. Programs provide an impetus for buying commodities, merchandise and assets imbued with the ability to enhance particular lifestyles.

230 genre. In one particular episode Dingo takes his family to North Stradbroke Island, and discusses the ‘long, clean white beaches’ of the region just ‘one hour from

Brisbane, making it the perfect quick escape for the entire family’. Dingo walks along the beach with his two children (Wilara and Jurra) in search of worms for fishing bait, and in another segment sand-surfs with them down a huge dune. His children are not prominent in this story – they do not speak to the camera, or discuss their reasons for enjoying the location. But they are present alongside Ernie Dingo, who we know is their father. Their presence in this story can only be understood in relation to Ernie. Ernie, Wilara and Jurra are representative of a young family, engaged in weekend recreational activities – kayaking, camping and fishing. In these marketable activities, the Dingo family enjoy a holiday that is particularly ordinary.

A slightly different Aboriginalisation of the genre occurred on the program’s

2003 Olympic Games special, when Ernie Dingo and Cathy Freeman were featured for a holiday on the Greek island of Santorini. Freeman is interviewed on a beach, and is seen posing for photos in her bikini with local beach-goers. After they both go shopping for presents, for Freeman’s nieces and nephews back in Australia, she speaks about her desire to travel since retiring from sport. ‘It’s the gypsy in me’, she explains. Ernie jumps in, ‘Nah, that’s just the blackfella in you’. Both laugh, and

Cathy looks at him and replies ‘Yeah, that’s blackfella’. Aboriginality is central to the presentation of lifestyle in this particular show. Extra biographical knowledge of

Freeman’s personal life is not needed to explain who she is, and why her opinions about which ‘hot spots’ she enjoys in the Aegean are important. She is a marriageable personality, and her lifestyle – including her extended family, love of shopping, and desire to work ‘with children and people’ – are ordinary facts presented about Cathy

Freeman. As is her Aboriginality. That Freeman can sell ‘a six night package

231 start[ing] from $4995 per person twin share’, suggests how representative of a middle class lifestyle Freeman and Dingo have become in the mediasphere.

Indigenous Middle Class Lifestyles

The middle-classness of these images of prominent Indigenous celebrities, and their families, may point towards a preferred model of media representation of marriageability. Marriageable images of Indigenous family life tend to be represented as middle class. There is a sense in which other family structures, such as extended versions, may not be so well accommodated in the ordinariness of the Australian media. Indeed, ordinary representations of extended Indigenous families are difficult to find anywhere in the media. A cursory survey of newspaper reports might suggest that particular representations of extended families portray them as problematic – associated with broader social problems like drug abuse (Pearson, 2006), housing

(Higgins, 2006), teenage misbehavior (Editor, 2006) and particularly violence

(Gartrell, 2006; McGuirk, 2006; Banks, 2006). Generic reporting on the issue of

Indigenous families, in news journalism, suggests a need for a counterbalance of ordinary representations, which would present a more complex representation of extended relations to white audiences. As the previous chapter demonstrated, soap and drama narratives have also found representations of the Indigenous family difficult to navigate. Aside from heterosexuality in the texts identified so far it seems that class operates as a defining feature of most representations of marriage and marriageability in the mediapshere, limiting both Indigenous and non-Indigenous forms of relationship. Nevertheless, within the middle class suburban concerns of

232 ordinary media and television, celebrity images of Indigenous families articulate new possibilities for imaging prosperous Indigenous futures.

Alan McKee’s article ‘The Aboriginal version of Ken Done’ (1997) illustrates the unusualness of middle class images of Aboriginal lifestyles in the Australian mediasphere. Rather than seeing images of suburban, material aspiration – such as

Ernie Dingo in a celebrity version of Wheel of Fortune – as ‘inauthentic’ representations, McKee suggests that the middle-classness of these images provides the possibility for re-thinking traditional representations of Aboriginality. Comparing banal television images of Aboriginality with those of Australian film, McKee identifies two dominant tropes by which Aboriginality has traditionally been identified – either as fatal, or as a spiritual Other to white society. Images of traditional Aboriginality – as outback, and seen to be spiritually removed from white culture or, similarly, destroyed by contact with it – evoke a powerful sense of

Aboriginality as Other. Suburban, middle class Aboriginal identities are not seen to

‘have the currency, or the discursive visibility, of those geographically and culturally-

Othered’ (199). The generic fatalism of Aboriginality in Australian film stands in sharp contrast to banal images of aspirational lifestyles presented by Indigenous celebrites. Even though such aspiration is understood to exist within identifiably middle class parameters, it nevertheless produces images of successful Indigenous futures.

Evonne Goolagong-Cawley complains how, in the early nineteen-nineties, her middle-class Aboriginal family life was unfavourably depicted in a 60 Minutes report.

Her account illustrates that the media has not always been so accommodating of her own middle class Indigenous family life. After arriving back in Australia from the

United States, Goolagong-Cawley recalls inviting the production team to film her

233 family attending an Aboriginal cultural festival on the Daintree River in Cape York.

The event was intended for her children, as a means of exploring their Aboriginality.

During the shoot Goolagong-Cawley complained to the interviewer, Richard Carlton, for his ‘sensational’ line of questioning – ‘Do you know that some Aboriginal communities have serious problems with drinking and violence? Are you frightened of what you might find?’ The questions were not aired in the final version of the story under Goolagong-Cawley’s instructions, as she suggests the crew wanted a story focused on alienation, rather than reconnection. The story illustrates McKee’s concerns of how middle class embodiments of Aboriginality are frequently seen as inauthentic, opposed to ‘traditional’, outback versions. Goolagong-Cawley suggests,

‘There existed the presumption that I wanted to see and show my children a homogenised version of Aboriginal life, and that the reality would come as some kind of shock’. Unlike the ordinariness of lifestyle programming, the binarised style of reporting in the current affairs genre seems less adept at presenting middle class

Aboriginality as ordinary in this instance.

Ordinariness or Assimilation?

It is clear from the examples given so far that the dominant mode of representing Indigenous families in the mainstream media is through the nuclear version, which also highlights extended relations. But to what extent are these images of Indigenous family lives merely reflections of white social values and aspirations?

Are the kinds of Indigenous families presented in the media desirable because they depict a sexualised ‘norm’ of married life, just like white heteronormative couples?

In other words, am I asking for images of Indigenous families just like white nuclear

234 families? As Chapter One highlighted, ordinary representations of Aboriginality in the media were criticised for either being ‘assimiliationist’ (see, for instance,

Maynard, 1989; Johnson, 1987) or ‘racist’ (Jakubowicz, 1994) by academics. Critics worried that the Indigenous family in the Fringe Dwellers desired a ‘white’ lifestyle, which denied other – more important – facets of Indigenous lives from being represented, such as a racial consciousness and a stronger tribal identity. Similar criticisms were echoed in the Jhally and Lewis (1992) study of Black American representation in The Cosby Show , which argued that the program privileged white liberal notions of race by sidelining issues of poverty and racism. As nuclear rather than extended versions, are the Indigenous families described in this chapter representations of white assimilation?

In order to argue for the importance of Indigenous families in the mainstream media, it becomes necessary to gauge the extent of Indigenous authorship over these lifestyles. As Chapter Four argued, self-authored texts provide meaningful sites for dialogue, and highlight Indigenous control and destiny within marriageable relationships. For these to be meaningful expressions of reconciliation they cannot simply reflect white interests. Although images of middle class Indigenous families may appear the product of assimilation for some critics, I believe these assertions damage the reconciliatory significance of Indigenous authorship in the mainstream.

As Stephen Muecke (1992) argues (which is outlined further in Chapter Two), the assimilationist critique places a particular ‘burden of representativess’ upon

Indigenous people working in the mainstream. Indigenous people are often expected to speak about how their Aboriginality is represented in the media, provoking questions about the correctness or accuracy of such representations. For instance, when an Indigenous actor enters a television drama as a drunk or alcoholic this may

235 be interpreted as a bad stereotype, whilst a land rights lawyer or councilor may be viewed as a more positive alternative. The first representation may signify assimilation (or its failure), whilst the latter might be seen to embody a more liberatory politics. The same binary value system can be brought to bear on representations of families – extended families might be seen as more authentic expressions of Aboriginal relationships; nuclear or fragmented families read as inauthentic. This critique makes it impossible for Indigenous families to be represented in the same ways non-Indigenous families are, as nuclear, suburban, middle class and heterosexual. Within this framework Indigenous people are forever expected to be seen as different rather than the same as white people. Their politics becomes a function of that difference, which may deny them opportunities white people simply take for granted. I believe that such arguments refuse Indigenous people the right to be seen as authors within the mainstream. It limits how they are seen as active members of white society, asserting control over their Indigenous lives and families. For, if Indigenous people are only ever judged in relation to white history, standards and norms (through ‘assimilation’ or ‘colonialism’), then their thoughts and desires will forever be seen to exist on the margins of white society.

Indigenous authors will be the perpetual bearers of white oppression.

The denial of the right to be seen as ordinary (and not a product of assimilation) has practical limitations for mainstream Indigenous authors. Richard

Frankland is acknowledged to be the first Indigenous film maker to write an episode of the police drama series Blue Heelers (2004). Speaking about this recent development in his career, Frankland expressed dismay that so few Indigenous writers are chosen to work in other mainstream productions. He has suggested that

Indigenous artists often face particular barriers to employment, as they are valued for

236 their Aboriginality rather than their writing skills per se (Frankland, 2006). This translates into a lack of access to key areas of ordinary representation in the mainstream:

The first time in my life I was hired as a man, as a director...I’m still amazed

by it. I mean, it’s the year 2004 and we’re still, now, trying to conform to that

access point so that we can all fit through…And you’ve got to ask yourself,

you know, ‘What the bloody hell is going on?’ (Clague, 2004).

In a contemporary context, then, the assimilationist critique of mainstream white representation is a totalistic one. In its judgement of Indigenous representation, it assumes that non-Indigenous people are equally and unproblematically represented within the mainstream. Not all white people own their own house, live in a nuclear family, want to get married, desire children, are heterosexual or like traveling overseas for holidays. These are limitations specific to the lifestyle genre, which is a dominant (but not the only) mode of representing Australian families in the media.

An assimilationist critique of this genre is particularly divisive if we consider that some – and of course not all – Indigenous people choose to adopt aspects of white society. Particular parts of white culture have historically proven attractive to

Indigenous Australians, such as education, the arts and sport, and it is not the place of white academics to deny these avenues of self or cultural development. Aboriginality does not need to be relinquished or abandoned when identified as middle class, suburban and materialistic. Such a view denies Aboriginal people the choice to select aspects of white society which might be desirable to them – educational or financial opportunities, even (as the lifestyle genre maintains) a bourgeois sense of ‘taste’.

237 Authoring Lifestyles

When Indigenous family lives appear ordinary in the mainstream – taking on elements of middle class taste and aspiration – this does not entail a diminution of

Aboriginal identity. In fact, it often enables its affirmation for white audiences. Such an affirmation can be seen in Indigenous autobiographies, which generate knowledge in the media of particular Indigenous lives and histories. These sources indicate the importance of families to their Indigenous subjects, who are seen to be proud of their

Indigeneity. Testament to the enormous popularity of sport in Australia, the most successful genre of Aboriginal autobiography is that of the sports personality. The earliest example is Lionel Rose, Australian: The Life Story of a Champion (Rose and

Humphries, 1969). Rose’s autobiography was published one year after his famous world title victory in Japan and, like many sporting autobiographies, describes different training regimes and individual events. Compared with later autobiographies, Rose does not talk explicitly about his Aboriginality; though the chapter ‘I Adopt a White Family’ (43-49) recounts him moving in with a new trainer,

Jack Rennie. The chapter opens with a humorous anecdote about Jack’s bad cooking, and how he burnt the toast every morning; he then details the run-ins with Shirley

Rennie, who was frequently annoyed at his schemes to avoid work. Less about his adoption – and ownership – of a white household, the chapter speaks more of white curiosity – ‘they loved to sit and listen to stories about the Aborigines, rabbit hunting, possum chasing, and other things’ (46), he says of Jack’s children. Rose’s account of the family later assures ‘[t]here were no problems over my color. Everything said was open and above board’ (47). The question of assimilation – of an Indigenous

238 person being forced to ‘adopt’ a white suburban family life – is diffused by Rose’s authorship of the situation, which subverts the idea.

More recently – and historically – there have been substantially more autobiographies published by sportswomen than sportsmen. These autobiographies also incorporate material about marriages, relationships and family. As these elements are seen to be connected to ongoing Indigenous histories, authors speak less about the subject of assimilation as a contemporary concern living in white society.

The first significant autobiography is Home: The Evonne Goolagong Story published in 1993. Home is a massive four hundred pages, and covers many aspects of the tennis player’s life besides just her career in the sport. A large portion of the book explores her Aboriginality, with the opening two sections tracing her family’s ancestry through the Wiradjuri tribe. It is a personal history on a grand scale – from first white settlement in New South Wales in the eighteen-hundreds, tribal resistance, the establishment of Boards of Protection in the nineteenth century, and Aboriginal activism and civil rights from the sixties onwards. Goolagong-Cawley refers to her relatives in this encyclopedic history – she speaks of how the family acquired its name, from the Wiradjuri word ‘galagallang’ meaning ‘a lot, or big mob’, when they formed a campsite on the banks of Lachlan River (25); her grandfather remembering the Eugowra massacre of 1896 (25); and her Grandmother’s involvement in the formation if the Aborigines Advancement League in 1933 (32-33). She also writes about her own life, aside from the momentous tennis career – growing up, and traveling around country New South Wales; attending high school and finding a date; later in the book are more details of married life with husband Roger Cawley; and the last section the book tells of a spiritual reconnection with her Home land, in relation to the birth of her two children, Kelly and Morgan.

239 Family backgrounds are also featured in the more recent autobiographies of

Aboriginal sportswomen, Nova Peris (2003) and Cathy Freeman (2003). Freeman, for instance, speaks about her father’s rugby league career, her mother’s Baha’i faith, and the greatest motivation for her success – her younger sister, Anne-Marie, who died of cerebral palsy at the age of 26. Compared with Goolagong’s Home both autobiographies provide more detailed information about personal relationships, marriages, divorces, in relation to their respective careers. Much of this material is already public knowledge, their marriageable status already confirmed in women’s magazine articles and press speculation. In these narratives the focus in not always on family per se, but they describe young women having fun, being reckless, and being in love. Freeman, for instance, describes a turning point in her relationship with boyfriend, and husband to be, Nick Bideau:

‘Oh my God,’ I yelled and ran to him. Nick had been out with his mates the

previous night, then flown to Queensland on the spur of the moment. He was

like my knight in shining armour. We made love on the bonnet of the car, just

up the road from the principal’s house. It was crazy, passionate, but it felt right

(47).

This public statement of intimacy can only be made sense of, as a declaration of love, if it is seen to be authored by a potentially marriageable personality. The romantic sex scene – ‘on the bonnet of the car’ – articulates a particular class dimension to Freeman’s perspective. As an expression of love, this description might be articulated differently from another class location, perhaps less candidly. Peris’ autobiography discloses similar information about sex and relationships, though she concludes her book with a section called ‘Destiny’ – the name of her newly born daughter – which describes her family life with husband Daniel Batman. What is

240 clear from all of these women’s autobiographies is that having children, or in

Freeman’s case the prospect of having children, becomes an undeniable bond of

Aboriginal connectedness. These narratives are, after all, public documents of family continuity. Peris and Goolagong share their sense of Aboriginal continuity, describing family trips to traditional Aboriginal homelands and sacred sights.

Goolagong conveys the importance of maintaining an Aboriginal identity as her children grow up in the United States, and remembers reading the following section from a high school assignment her daughter wrote:

Our exciting trip is something I’ll be thinking of for the rest of my life. This

may seem strange, but when I was there, my instinct told me this is where I

belong. Coming to Australia was probably the best thing my family has ever

done. From having my first taste of Aboriginal life, I’ve become more excited

about my heritage … Learning about my people is one of the greatest feelings

(quoted in Goolagong: 336).

Being able to speak about one’s life, and one’s children, in autobiographical form is a powerful form of public recognition. Popular autobiographies are commonly written by successful people, particular sporting autobiographies which typically coincide with retirements. Without attaining a certain level of success and achievement, privilege and power, autobiographies are seldom publishable.

Goolagong-Cawley’s autobiography proclaims that having children is part of her life’s accomplishments. In the above quote, Goolagong-Cawley states that her children’s embracing of their Aboriginality is immensely gratifying to her, part of her success as a mother.

241 Historical Narratives of Aboriginal Families

Self-authorised narratives of Aboriginal family making are relatively new to the Australian mediapshere. Autobiographies provide information about lives which, for some reason or another, are publicly interesting. Autobiographies which detail the lives of Aboriginal families provide new historical information about the relationship between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australians. The popularity and public acceptance of these narratives, over the past fifteen years, signals a gradual broadening of interest in Aboriginal lives throughout the mediasphere. These autobiographies emerge within a historical context where Aboriginal histories are just beginning to be acknowledged by segments of white Australia. Past injustices such as the forced removal and assimilation of ‘mixed-race’ Aboriginal children from their families are spoken about by ordinary people. More than this, they are seen as shaping the very fabric and everyday concerns of ordinary people. When Nova Peris, for instance, tells Andrew Denton that her grandmother, ‘Nanna Peris’, was taken away from her mother at the age of two, and sent to a homestead by the department of

Native Affairs because one of her parents was white, the deep sense of distrust felt towards Aboriginal family life in white society is evoked. When she speaks of her great grandmother’s attempts to evade the police by rubbing charcoal on her face to make her appearance ‘Blacker’, the racial dynamics of this history is made more obvious. These stories cut to the heart of community definitions of family, for the stolen generations in Australia. Cathy Freeman’s autobiography makes clear why these stories are important, and what they mean to her career as a famous Aboriginal woman:

242 My own grandmother didn’t know her mother. She was taken away when

she was eight years old. She wasn’t allowed to speak her native tribal tongue

and spent most of her life in missions that were effectively prisons, where you

had to fight for a pass to be allowed to leave.

Can you imagine being eight years old and being taken away from your

mother?

Can you imagine walking past your child or your mother in the street and

not being allowed to talk to them?

Can you imagine people coming into your home, burning it down and

destroying everything?

Can you imagine somebody poisoning the water in your taps to try to kill

you?

This is what happened to my people.

All this pain inspires me. I want to be a freedom fighter.

This section of Freeman’s autobiography also describes participating in the

Australian of the Year award ceremony in 1998, when she contemplated not accepting the award from John Howard. Her strong dislike of the prime minister came from his refusal to formally apologise to the stolen generations, to which her grandmother belongs. ‘I’ll never know who my grandfather was or who my great-grandmother was. That hurts, and the pain is very strong’ (257). Freeman states that it was more important for her to ‘feel proud and to show [Aboriginal people] anything was possible’ (258), than to create speculation about her absence.4

4 She goes on to quote Carl Lewis’ advice to her about boycotting: ‘“Go to the party with your best dress on and dance as well as you can. If you don’t want to be noticed, don’t go”’ are his words. ‘I was ready to dance’, is her reply.

243 It is significant that there are so few contemporary everyday representations of

Aboriginal family life in the Australian mediasphere. Those which do exist have undeniably created spaces from which to speak about a previously silenced Australian history of Indigenous families. Not only do these voices emerge through a new

Australian media phenomenon of the late nineteen-nineties (the marriageable

Indigenous celebrity), but they are communicated in the language of a contemporary vernacular, which render their messages crucial to the transformation of mainstream ideas about Aboriginality. Vernacularity means that ideas are not communicated in abstract political terms or cultural studies jargon, for instance, but rather through the words of ordinary citizens who, in these cases, are simply concerned about beloved family members. As vernacular theorists, following Thomas McLaughlin’s phraseology in Street Smarts and Critical Theory (1996), these Indigenous celebrities relate the immediacy of past experiences, the knowledge of their families, their

Aboriginality, in the seemingly unrefined and unsophisticated language of print and journalistic media. Their stories are not seen to be contrived, and as such must be seen as articulating the idea of Indigenous families deserving more recognition in

Australia’s cultural history.

Distinctively, as with the life-narratives provided by Evonne Goolagong-

Cawley, Nova Peris and Cathy Freeman, such identities illustrate the possibility of living Aboriginal and middle-class lifestyles, even though Dingo’s remains the only image of middle-class Indigenous fatherhood. That Aboriginal histories can be seen to occupy such spaces within white society show us not only the success of

Indigenous genealogies up to the present, but also exemplifies the conviction of those celebrities to engage populations previously considered unfamiliar with, and disconnected from, ‘Indigenous history’ – white middle-class people. That these

244 Indigenous people are now seen to lead middle-class lives in the media (and unproblematically), also demonstrates the power of their vernacular voices to bond with members living within different communities. By connecting Indigenous stories to the middle-classness within the Australian mediasphere, those authors begin to author a new, and more transformative, sense of Australian family life. Importantly, such representations succeed by relating the difference of Aboriginality into the language of sameness in the vernacular. When these voices continue to proliferate, in areas traditionally not seen as Indigenous, they become all the more important for challenging those institutions which had in the past so violently denied Indigenous people the sacrilegious bonds reserved for so-called ‘ordinary’ members of any society – relationships, families and parents.

Figure 21 – Ernie Dingo and Cate Blanchett in the ABC drama Heartland . Ernie’s character Vincent suggests to his girlfriend having children.

245

Figure 22 – The birth of Nova Peris’ baby illustrates a more recent embodiment of Indigenous marriageability – the desirability of Indigenous children.

‘Breed You Mob Out’ – Marriageability and Indigenous Futures

The reconciliatory potential that marriageable images of Indigenous parents might represent to the non-Indigenous public sphere is most potently illustrated in the

Heartland series (Figure 21). Public acknowledgement of the desirability of

Aboriginal partnership brings with it a concomitant change in representations of family. A particular Aboriginalisation of the family takes place in the final scene of the series when the two central characters – Elizabeth (Cate Blanchett) and Vincent

246 (Ernie Dingo) – kiss. As discussed in the previous chapter, the interracial implications of their relationship is central to the story. Yet – as a triumph of reconciliatory symbolism – the relationship concludes with the sexualised moment of their kissing. After their kiss, Vincent’s question to Elizabeth directly speaks about the promise of an Indigenous future, through marriage – ‘how do you feel about kids?’ He goes on to explain, ‘its all part of the plan. . . to breed you mob out.’ Their marriage is already effectively Aboriginalised. The possibility of having children enables Vincent’s Indigenous family to redresses the community’s unjust attitudes, but symbolically, as it invigorates a history of Australian Aboriginal rights discourse.

In this context, John Morton (1996) reads Vincent’s statement as the

outcome of the long-term affirmation of Aboriginality that has occurred

steadily since the 1960’s, at least from the time of the 1967 referendum, the

conventional benchmark taken to signify Aboriginal people’s full Australian

citizenship, through to the present Mabo era, which looks forward to a treaty

that seems to some of us as inevitable as a republic and the demise of the

Crown (130-131).

Sex, then, has a particular reconciliatory significance when it comes to

Aboriginal marriageability – especially parentability. Aside from the historical implications of politicising Indigenous history, that may Indigenise elements of national culture and its institutions (including the media), these images imply a degree of Indigenous familiarity within the public sphere. Sexual representations are important as they entail intimacy, visualised and celebrated as public knowledge. In this particular narrative of marriageability, a hopeful model of interaction is offered.

The proper recognition of Indigenous history becomes important, illustrated as a familial and everyday concern.

247 Conclusion

This chapter has asked the question – why is it important to see images of

Indigenous families? In an attempt to answer this question, the chapter has drawn attention to the relatively few examples of ordinary lifestyles that Indigenous people are seen to occupy in the mediasphere. Of those instances of Aboriginal motherhood

(and fatherhood) surveyed, representations of lifestyles provide room for recognisably distinct Aboriginal identities. More than this, personalities such as Nova Peris, Cathy

Freeman and Evonne Goolagong-Cawley demonstrate that representations of their family lives, and relationships, often provide new spaces for exploring important aspects of their Aboriginality. Rather than being seen as inauthentic embodiments of

Aboriginal lifestyles, these instances of parenthood provide a means of imagining

Aboriginal futures within a predominantly white society. Narratives of pro- generation and family-making occupy different models of marriageability than those of earlier times. Through recognition on the sporting field, the personalities surveyed in this chapter make clear the sense in which Indigenous life-narratives can contribute, in part, to a changing of representations of race relations in Australia.

For some considerable time in Australian history Indigenous lives have been classified and distinguished from white Australia, in both racial and class terms.

Racial distinctions were compounded by the view that Indigenous lifestyle, tribal and family lives, belonged to a sub-class outside of white society. Denial of access to basic services and commodities, social and economic power within white society, can be traced to a basic denial of Aboriginal family identities. Stolen Generations’ stories provide compelling details of how family lives were denied distinctively Aboriginal characteristics. In the mediapshere, desirable representations of family life hinge on

248 implicit notions of trust. The most intimate relations of trust are seen to exist between babies and parents, and public images of those relationships convey to us images of those were are expected to trust, respect and love. In Australian society Aboriginal parents were often not trusted – treated as denizens, parents themselves were considered children, wards of the state under white paternal society. The narratives of

Aboriginal family life and parenthood that Evonne Goolagong-Cawley, Cathy

Freeman and Nova Peris share express optimism about generating Aboriginal futures through their children. These representations may not always speak directly about national histories of race-relations, but their ordinariness becomes part of a contemporary change in embodiments of family and, by extension, community. That families and communities may proudly include Aboriginal friends, partners, parents and children, is a possibility these lives indeed suggest.

249

250 Conclusion

Marriageability provides a basis for representing meaningful and lasting interactions between members of different communities. The thesis has considered how mainstream media narratives and images of Indigenous marriageability contribute towards a broader process of reconciliation between Indigenous and non-

Indigenous Australians. In doing so it has examined the ways Indigenous people have been seen as attractive and good looking in the Australian mainstream media.

Turning away from the study of, whilst still engaging with, important political debates about the representation of Aboriginality within news journalism, the thesis has examined more ordinary representations of Indigeneity available to white audiences.

In its analysis of ‘sexy’ texts, the research material identifies a useful area of popular culture which has facilitated significant cultural changes to the representation of

Indigenous issues within the mainstream. Marriageability suggests a fairer ethics in representing such issues through its ability to evoke dignified forms of Indigenous inclusion within the mediasphere. As a historical analysis of popular representations, the thesis has argued that sexiness encourages white audiences to engage in reconciliation as a more personal, emotional and everyday reality. Rather than viewing Aboriginality as an unspecified absence from the mainstream, the thesis has shown how sexy narratives and images of Indigenous people have started to change elements of white community self-representation.

The thesis began by looking at explicitly sexualised representations of

Indigenous people within popular culture. Chapter Three showed that it was not possible for Indigenous subjects to be presented as sexy (publicly acknowledged as attractive) to white audiences until as late as the nineteen-eighties, even then only in

251 marginal genres such as art and pornography. Such representations were not available to mainstream audiences until the early nineteen-nineties. Chapter One detailed a more extensive history of representation and, through its comparison of overseas

Black representations with Indigenous ones, illustrated a discernable lack of sexualised representations in the Australian context. Both of these chapters underscore the importance of an event that took place in 1989, with the marriage of the popular Indigenous comedian, Ernie Dingo, to his white fiancé, Sally Butler.

Throughout the early nineties, in music, sport and television drama programs, sexualised images of sexy Indigenous people began to emerge in the mainstream for the first time. The importance of sexiness to media representations of Aboriginality became more apparent in the late nineteen-nineties and early two-thousands, when

Indigenous artists began promoting their own popular forms of sexiness – through calendars, modeling and casting agencies, for instance. As personalities gained a degree of ‘ordinariness’ and familiarity with white audiences, they become recognised as marriageable. Images of marriageability evoke the possibility of long term relationship with Indigenous partners; marriageable images mark a significant shift away from dominant historical representations of Indigenous interpersonal interactions as dangerous and threatening. Through their circulation within the mainstream, narratives of marriageability also provide a means of communicating important facets of Indigenous history and identity to white audiences.

Marriageability is a theoretical model for evaluating how intercultural relations are imagined. My particular theorisation of marriageability illustrates that relations between different cultures are often understood at an everyday, quotidian level of culture through sexualised narratives and representations. Marriageability is the public expression of acceptable forms of public intimacy. Relations emanate from

252 a sexual basis, and are registered within the everyday through a variety of representations – images of kissing, bodies in calendars, actors within print and television commercials, through to narratives of relationships in marriage and families. As ordinary representations, marriageable images are those which are taken- for-granted, woven into the fabric of mainstream values of co-operation and commitment. These representations provide an intimate means of highlighting how different segments of the community are seen to interact with each other. In its survey of popular genres, texts and forms, the present thesis has shown that the possibility for constructive non-Indigenous and Indigenous dialogue can be imagined, even desired.

Developments in Marriageability

Sexualised representations of Indigenous bodies and personalities occur only recently in the history of Australia’s mainstream media. In following these changes over the past thirty years, it is useful to identify particular patterns of development which point to some defining characteristics and limitations of representations of

Indigenous marriageability.

1. Celebrity and Fame

Chapter Five argued that television drama serials provide one of the most successful sites for representing Indigenous marriageability to white audiences.

Besides fictional narrative-based programs, other television formats have been integral to marriageable representations. Deborah Mailman and Aaron Pedersen, for

253 instance, appeared in non-drama productions before their commercial successes in drama – Pedersen was the celebrity host of the game show Gladiators (1995) and, before that, the science program, Quantum (1994); whilst Mailman presented playschool for a substantial period before Secret Life (1998-2001). Like Ernie Dingo,

Mailman and Pedersen’s commercial acting careers began through Australian films –

Mailman in Radiance (1998), and Pedersen in Dead Heart (1996). Screen texts, including films in this sense, are important for establishing and promoting sexy identities to the mainstream. Television – as a medium which fabricates a greater sense of flow and continuity within the domestic sphere – is a more significant tool for maintaining celebrity identification over time. Alongside magazines, whose advertising strategies increasingly promote television content, television reinforces the domestic appeal of particular marriageable celebrities. Such an appeal can be traced through an increase in lifestyle programs on Australian television screens over the past five years, a format which also relies heavily on magazine promotions.

Prominent Indigenous celebrities have appeared in the following media texts:

Celebrity Make-Over (Nova Peris) and The Great Outdoors (Ernie Dingo as long term host, and Cathy Freeman and Troy Cassar-Daley as guests), whilst Christine Anu was a lifestyle columnist for Who magazine. The profiles of these celebrities are increasingly sustained by a range of other media texts and genres.

The importance of sport on television cannot be overlooked as a means of producing marriageable Indigenous celebrities. As a general feature of Indigenous marriageability in the media, it is significant that most marriageable personalities in sport have been women. Two key sporting marriageable personalities emerge in the early two-thousands, in Nova Peris and Cathy Freeman. It appears that the mainstream has been significantly more interested in the family lives and

254 backgrounds of Peris, Freeman and Eyvonne Goolagong-Cawley, than other

Indigenous women in the media such as Christine Anu and Deborah Mailman. As

Chapter Four illustrated, interest is also generated by the publication of Indigenous sporting autobiographies. The inclusion of autobiographical material in television programs and interviews, which draws upon such material, illustrates a popular interest for Australian sports peoples’ lives. Peris, Freeman and Goolagong-Cawley’s profiles also illustrate the importance of unambiguously strong Indigenous family histories to their lives. Though Indigenous contribution to Australian sport has been acknowledged in a number of academic texts, there remains little material concerned with the representation of sports personalities in the Australian media. In terms of

Indigenous representation, this area is particularly important for further study considering the number of Indigenous sports people actively involved in projects related to reconciliation – Michael Long, Cathy Freeman, Nova Peris and Kyle

Vander Kuyp, for instance. The celebrity status of these individuals, which is cultivated throughout the mediasphere, has arguably strengthened their media speaking positions.

Constructions of Indigenous celebrities, however, reach a particular generic limitation in relation to reality television. As a style of television programming which seeks to depict ‘ordinary’ people participating in unscripted events (rather than actors in scripted narratives), reality provides a random, arguably more democratic, sense of celebrity. Big Brother , for instance, accentuates contestants’ banality in the house, regularly focusing on issues related to co-habitation – the importance of relationships, domestic chores, fashion and sexual interests. Over the past five years, Big Brother has become the most successful show among the 16-39 year old demographic. People like Sara-Marie Fedele (pop star and now columnist), Blaire McDonough (actor in

255 Neighbours ), Wesley Dening (host of Totally Wild ), and several others, have gone on to become regular media personalities since their exit from the show. Initially, all of these people became popular for being themselves – personal appeal lies in their very unexceptional characteristics. Despite the participation of Indigenous contestants in the celebrity version (Anthony Mundine) and an Indigenous producer (Aaron

Pedersen), Big Brother has yet to produce a single Indigenous contestant during its regular season. The lack of Indigenous contestants in programs like Big Brother denies a particular sense of ordinariness that differs from the ordinariness attributed to conventional celebrities. Without such a presence in reality programs Indigenous celebrities are still required to demonstrate their exceptionality first, in terms of acting in a major film or through sporting success, before they become seen as ordinary.

Elements of reality frequently cross over into other popular genres, and in

Australia this has included the life-style renovation show. This style of programming has become increasingly important in the representation of domestic ordinariness and aspiration. A number of variations in this format have emerged over the past three years and, among many others, have included The Hot House , The Block , Back Yard

Blitz and Ground Force . The first two are much closer to the reality format, providing contestants a budget for renovating a house or an apartment; by contrast, the latter programs select ‘ordinary’ viewers and surprise them by performing a

‘make-over’ on their garden or house. These programs evoke a particular sense of middle-class, suburban aspiration, and have increasingly become a significant means of representing the ordinariness of marriageable relationships in the media. A number of Indigenous interviewees were concerned that their remained little to no representation of Indigenous people in these genres. Their comments underlie a point

256 made in the final chapter of the thesis, that middle-class representations of Indigenous lifestyles are still rarely portrayed outside of the lives of celebrities.

The Indigenous celebrities surveyed in the thesis do illustrate new embodiments of mainstream representation. Representations of Indigenous sexiness, ordinariness and marriageability are conveyed through a number of Indigenous celebrities. These images are particularly important as they have allowed white audiences to see, for the first time, media representations which depict intimate forms of engagement with ordinary Indigenous lives. The importance of the reality genre, in this respect, lies in its ability to further bridge the perceived gap between the viewer and the viewed, celebrity and home viewer.

2. Marriageability, Gender and Families

The primary material studied in this thesis suggests particular tendencies in terms of gender and Indigenous marriageability. From the earliest forms of sexy representation in television drama, from Justine Saunders (nineteen-seventies) and

Kylie Belling (nineteen-eighties), followed by later celebrities like Christine Anu

(mid nineties onwards), Cathy Freeman and Nova Peris (early two-thousands), it is clear that marriageable women are more prominent in the media than Indigenous men.

Even in non-mainstream productions like Tracey Moffatt’s Nice Coloured Girls and

Nicci Lane’s pornographic films, female actors provide the earliest embodiments of

Indigenous sexiness. In almost all areas of mainstream production, including music, drama and sport, marriageable Indigenous women outnumber male counterparts. An exception to the trend is Ernie Dingo, who is perhaps the most marriageable

Indigenous person (both male and female) in the mediasphere. That he remains the

257 only ongoing Indigenous marriageable man, a status sustained over a period of nearly twenty years, must be seen as a serious limitation upon how Indigenous forms of masculinity are seen to interact with white society. This absence is most apparent in popular music, but can also be seen in modeling and advertising texts. Generally speaking there is a higher proportion of sexy Indigenous sports men than women in the mediasphere, however images of marriageable men in this area remain worryingly absent.

In relation to the history of Indigenous marriageability outlined in Chapter

One, there is a strong argument to be made for additional representations of marriageable Indigenous masculinities in the mediasphere. In the context of this history, the dominant mode of representing Indigenous sexual relationships in white society has been through an Indigenous woman/white man partnership. Historically the strongest taboos were established in relation to partnerships between white women and Indigenous men, of these only a handful have been documented as public history.

Ernie Dingo’s presence as the only marriageable Indigenous male figure is an important one in this respect. In dramatic personae and through accounts of his personal life, Ernie Dingo typifies the sense of informal reconciliation that marriageability most strongly suggests. Without any further representations of marriageable Indigenous men in the media, however, Dingo risks being burdened as the only male representative of Aboriginal ordinariness. Further images of

Indigenous men, in this context, might begin to challenge narratives of colonisation and dispossession that underpinned patriarchal relations between settlers and

Indigenous communities within white Australian history. It is through such images of masculine marriageability that more traditional representations of white family life begin to look very different.

258 Alongside the need for images of marriageable Indigenous men, the thesis also urges for the inclusion of narratives of Indigenous families in the mediasphere.

Representations of families provide more ordinary embodiments of sex and sexuality; families are one of the most mainstream expressions of marriageability. It is clear from the families surveyed in Chapter Six that representations of both nuclear and extended families can co-exist in the mediasphere. Such families reveal that, while sometimes elements of white middle-class lifestyles can be adopted, a publicly strong

Indigenous identity is still retained. Indeed, as the final chapter suggested, it is through marriageable profiles that family histories become publicly known within the mainstream. For this reason, representations of families may provide one of the strongest challenges to white notions of history in the mediapshere, in that they enable a transformation of non-Indigenous identities towards an Indigenous (and

Indigenously-owned) future. Ernie Dingo’s words at the end of the Heartland series –

‘it’s all part of our plan…to breed you mob out’ – suggests the potency of representing the Indigenous-non-Indigenous family union. As a statement about a shared interracial future through marriage, it is clear that the possibility of having

Indigenous offspring is not an undesirable prospect. On the contrary, with the recognition of Indigenous history and justice in mind, the desirability of Indigenous children may promise to Indigenise the mainstream in its most intimate form of marriageability.

Conclusion

In identifying occurrences and patterns of Indigenous marriageability in the mainstream white mediasphere, the thesis has endeavored to identify everyday,

259 informal representations of reconciliation. The case studies presented in the thesis do not suggest that, as mainstream representations of Indigeneity, they are compromised by prurient white interests and aspirations. It has been a central aim of this thesis to examine the media in terms of its generic representation of relationships, and to gauge how/if/where Indigenous people are seen as sexy and ordinary, in relation to other subjects in the media (for instance, overseas Black subjects or white Australians). By examining the media in its own terms, the research attempts to engage important debates about Indigenous representation, as a means of encouraging further debate and change within the mediasphere.

This thesis has drawn upon an emerging field of literature which considers the importance of ordinary representations of Indigeneity within the mainstream mediasphere (Hartley and McKee, 2000; Mickler, 1998; McKee, 1997a; b). The research designed an approach which avoided the dominant academic language of

‘positive images’ and ‘stereotypes’ in its examination of, and engagement with, mainstream representations of Aboriginality. By doing so, I have developed a theory of Indigenous marriageability first mentioned in passing in Hartley and McKee’s book The Indigenous Sphere (2000). By exploring in detail its meanings and function, I have suggested that the emergence of popular representations of

Indigenous sexiness have enabled new kinds of interracial relationships to be imagined between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. In doing this, the thesis has also sought to encourage new histories of media representation which, it is hoped, can bring about more accessible forms of commentary and dialogue, between

Indigenous people, the media and academia.

260

Appendix 1

List of Persons Interviewed and Consulted

Kylie Belling – Actor and theatre director.

Heath Bergersen – Actor and musician.

Simon Cardwell – Modeling agent and photographer.

Wayne Coolwell – Television journalist.

Richard Frankland – Producer and film maker.

Jessica Gooda – ‘Jinnali’ model.

Karla Grant – Producer and television broadcaster.

Narelda Jacobs – Television journalist.

Gavin Jones – Producer, musician, and events management coordinator for ‘Vibe Australia’.

Vincent McManus – Agent and director of ‘Lights Camera Action’.

Kevin Smith – Actor.

Kyle Vander Kuyp – Sporting personality and celebrity.

Bev Webb – Agent and director of ‘Jiriki Management’.

Anthony Wallace – Acting agent.

261

Appendix 2

Interviewee Questions

1. What motivated you to get into acting/production/sport?

2. Do you think it’s important that Indigenous people are seen as attractive and good looking in the media?

3. What kinds of feedback do you get from Aboriginal people about your work in the media?

4. Do you think Aboriginal men are represented any differently from women in the media, as role models or sex symbols, say? If so/not, in what areas?

5. Do you think the ‘Black is beautiful’ message is useful for Indigenous actors/performers/celebrities?

6. What are the areas of the media where you feel that Indigenous people are yet to receive proper recognition?

7. What other changes would you like to see in the representation of Indigenous people in the media?

262

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