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November 13th, 2008
08:37 pm - 50 Books by POC - Auntie Rita
My eighth book review. *Auntie Rita* is a biography of Rita Huggins, written by historian Jackie Huggins in collaboration with her mother.
Rita was born in Queensland and taken to Cherbourg mission as a child. She worked as a domestic on a station before getting her ticket (which stated that the mission thought she was assimilated enough to enter the white world).* Jackie was 'born free', outside the reserves.
To incorporate these two points of view, they have chosen to have the bulk of the text as Rita's narration of her life in slightly standardised Aboriginal English. Jackie sometimes adds italicised comments which either provide context or give her interpretation of events.
A striking example of their different perspectives on life is that Rita agrees that the mission did the right thing by moving her away from her family and into the girl's dormitory when she was in her early teens because she was going with boys. Jackie writes 'No, Mum, none of youse deserved it. They brainwashed you into believing you were responsible and it was your fault. It was about white paternalistic control and surveillance.' (29)
*Auntie Rita* also includes some documents from the files that the Department of Native Welfare (now renamed). Files like these were kept on all people in the mission system and Rita's covers the period 1942 to 1974.** This was slightly longer than usual, perhaps because Rita was involved with an Aboriginal rights organisation in the 50s and 60s.
These documents are heartbreaking. They include Rita's request for an exemption to allow her to leave mission control and, even more heart wrenchingly, her father's earlier request that she be returned from a position as a domestic where he thought she was being hurt and from which she did not write to him. The official responded that she 'probably did not write for some good reason' and took no action.
Jackie had difficulty accessing the files which are still regarded as Departmental possessions. In 1990 when she saw them for the first time she was permitted to look but not touch as white officials turned the pages and commented on the contents.
The book gives real insight into the lives of two generations of Aboriginal women. One raised in the mission and one born free. It's a fairly grim read at times, but Rita and Jackie both have an excellent sense of humour and the overall emphasis of the book is on the importance of family.
Clinging to family - close relatives and more distant kin - comes across as the best way to remain free within the confines of white twentieth-century Australia.
* The missions and the Department for Native Welfare exercised great control over people on the missions who were, for example, not allowed to leave without permission or to receive the wages for work they did. Even though I know this, I am once again speechless as I write it.
** Truly.
Jackie Huggins and Rita Huggins, *Auntie Rita* (1994)
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Comments:
Hi, just so you know, you have weird giant font formatting going on, which I am finding makes it hard to read your review.
Do you know how I change the font size in ljs other than my own? (the 50 POC challenge account?)
To be honest I'm wondering how it got so big in the first place. Did you write it in word and paste it in as rich text? If you edit the post as "HTML" any font tags should show up at the beginning of the post and you could delete them.
*checks* Though it looks like you figured it out anyway :)
I think I fixed it.
No idea how I did it in the first place. |
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