'Modern stone-age slavery': images of Aboriginal labour and sexuality

Abstract

As a white girl growing up in Bardon, Queensland, I used to stretch out on the carpeted floor in our steamy lounge room to watch television with my brothers and sisters. Tarzan, the pale 'Wild-man, showed us how 'natural man' behaved in the jungles, and his partner lane did the same for 'natural woman'. My young brother learnt the exotic language - that rather repetitive 'bwana mon-tinna bibi', spoken amidst whooping bird and ape sound effects. Lost in Space showed us the white nuclear family in the technologically advanced future and my brothers did 'tribal' dancing to its theme song. The Flintstones taught us 'yab-a-daba-d-o-ol' and the life of a farcical 'modem stone-age family'. This recently revived spoof on the 1960s American nuclear family was full of ambiguity about what 'primitive society' meant and made no reference to North American Indians. Fred and Earney were the hard done~by breadwinners who went out to earn a wage, while Wilma and Betty kept house and respectively raised the stereotypical sweet toddler Pebbles and the boyish Bam Barn, with his trademark club. In The Flintstones, the men thought they were dominant but the wives were cleverer, 'nagging' and covertly controlling them. The men tried to evade the women's demands, but Fred Flintstone was always calling out W+L-M-A!', demanding that his food and everything else be organised for him.