Australian Identity

The Australian identity is a diverse concept that has developed overtime through significant events in our history. As a result of these events, it is has established Australia into a multicultural society that now includes numerous new lifestyles. However, it is an evolving concept that is still becoming, as further cultures are migrating to Australia and introducing unique traditions to the Australian life. This idea is further explored in the poem ’No more boomerang’ by Kath Walker, which exhibits how the Australian Aboriginals were forced into a westernized lifestyle by the British migrants. In ‘But I was born here, Miss’ by an unnamed migrant child, we venture into the life of an Australian migrant child who underwent difficulties at his school because of his ethnic background. In Tim Winton’s ‘Neighbours’, we witness how the juxtaposing lifestyles of the migrants and the Australians come together and live as one, peaceful community.
Comprehending a new way of life is frequently a difficult task to undertake, especially if it is forced upon. The poem ‘No more boomerang’ is a prime example of how a significant event in Australia’s history, the Arrival of the First Fleet, impacted on Australia’s identity. The Australian Aboriginals were the first migrants of Australia, and they lived and created the first Australian lifestyle.. The author, Kath Walker uses parallelism in the form of ‘No more’, which represents how much of the Aboriginal culture has been lost and has come to stop because of the new customs and traditions implemented by the Anglo-Saxons which entitles a new civilized culture. This notion is reinforced in the third stanza of the poem through repetition of ‘No more’ in the line, “No more sharing of food”. This stanza refers to how the Aboriginals are now no longer following their old customary lifestyles and instead are slowly familiarizing themselves to the new British way of life. It is unmistakable that the Aboriginal’s had a problematic period