Urban aborigines

Abstract

This book concerns the re-entry of Aborigines into Australian life - specifically the life of urban Adelaide - after generations of restriction to isolated rural areas. Aborigines are moving into Australian cities in increasing numbers - in 1957 one in sixteen of South Australia's Aborigines lived in Adelaide, by 1966 one in four did so. Some adjust easily to city life, others face seemingly insoluble problems of housing and employment, social tensions, health and welfare, education and law. Often their experience on reserves and the fringes of small towns has in no way prepared them for urban life. The physical confrontation involved in this re-entry is already leading to legislative and social changes for Aborigines. It is beginning to arouse public conscience about Aboriginal conditions, and the voice of the Aboriginal is beginning to be heard. This study is a representative picture of Aborigines in Australian cities today, and it speaks for the future of Australia, black and white.