Constitutional Recognition: within a colonial framework

• Published in: NEW: Emerging scholars in Australian Indigenous Studies
• Main Author: Songco, Diane
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: University of Technology Sydney 2020
• Subjects: First Nations
• Online Access: https://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/student-journals/index.php/NESAIS/article/view/1588; https://doi.org/10.5130/nesais.v5i1.1588

Constitutional recognition of Indigenous Australians has been a longstanding national movement reflective of the international struggle of Indigenous communities within a colonial framework. The Uluru Statement from the Heart, delivered at the 2017 National Constitutional Convention, addressed to the Australian public, called for support in the creation of constitutional reforms to build on changes made in the 1967 Referendum. Glen Sean Coulthard’s Red Skin, White Masks takes a difference stance on recognition for Indigenous peoples, specifically citing First Nations peoples in North America. In understanding the goals of the Uluru Statement and the arguments raised in Red Skin, White Masks, constitutional recognition may begin to address vital problems such as the dispossession of Indigenous land and lack of inclusion in state politics, but its existence as part of the settler-colonial governance will always act as a deterrent for true decolonization.