Bringing the Truth Home: the role of oral history and testimony in building and fragmenting Australian collective history and the Stolen Generations

Main Article Content

Koreen Cueto

Abstract

Australia’s fraught colonial past has made the search for a collective history exceptionally difficult; history wars surrounding policies of child removal in particular are a testament to the nation’s fractured memory. This essay examines the role of oral history in the promotion of both truth and healing – not only for separated Indigenous families, but also for the collective national identity which has suffered as a result of colonial Australia’s failure to pay heed to Indigenous voices.


Keywords
Stolen Generations; history wars; oral history

Article Details

How to Cite
Cueto, K. (2018). Bringing the Truth Home: the role of oral history and testimony in building and fragmenting Australian collective history and the Stolen Generations. NEW: Emerging Scholars in Australian Indigenous Studies, 4(1), 92-97. https://doi.org/10.5130/nesais.v4i1.1524
Section
Articles
Author Biography

Koreen Cueto, University of Technology Sydney

University of Technology Sydney, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, PO Box 123, Ultimo NSW 2017, Australia. koreen.cueto@student.uts.edu.au