Writing Heritage: The depiction of Indigenous heritage in European-Australian writings.

Gray, Geoffrey

Writing Heritage: The depiction of Indigenous heritage in European-Australian writings Michael Davis 2007 Australian Scholarly Publishing and National Museum of Australia Press, Melbourne, xxi+379pp, ISBN 1740971442: 9781740971447

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This is a book with a foreword (Michael Dodson), a prologue (Craddock Morton) and an introduction (Michael Davis), which are united in the belief that it presents the 'views of non-Indigenous people who wrote about Indigenous heritage in their own words' (pp.viii, ix, xiv, xx). To be precise, the volume is actually about Aboriginal heritage; the Torres Strait Islands are not included. Davis writes that his aim 'in this book is not to discuss Indigenous cultural heritage as such, nor to describe a history of heritage production; rather, it is to describe textual representations of this heritage' (p.xv). He continues:

 One of the themes apparent throughout the
 writings examined is a notion held by
 Europeans of an 'authenticity' in Indigenous
 heritage. Other themes include the influence
 of ideas about primitivism, and the engagement
 between European-Australians and
 Indigenous heritage as manifested through
 the development of markets, museums and
 exhibitions, and fieldwork practices involving
 photography, film and recording (p.xv).

By and large he delivers, despite what I consider a poor grasp of the wider political and social history in which much of this collecting occurred and a poor understanding of the aims of social anthropology as practised in the University of Sydney under AR Radcliffe-Brown, Raymond Firth and AP Elkin.

There are surprising scholarly omissions, especially as the bulk of the text is about the collecting practices of individuals and museums. A few examples: Philip Jones' (1996) doctoral thesis, 'A box of native things', on the first one hundred years of the South Australian Museum; hardly any reference to the work of Isabel McBryde, who has done so much in making heritage part of the legislative regime of protection and preservation; and Olive Pink's tireless work at preservation is also overlooked (Marcus 2001). More recent omissions are probably due to the long delay between the submission of the manuscript and its final publication. For example, Tim Rowse's (2005) biography on HC ('Nugget') Coombs and his earlier volume of the legacy of Coombs, Obliged to Be Difficult (Rowse 2000); David Thomas' (2004) Reading Doctors" Writing (his doctorate was finalised in 2001 at the Northern Territory University).

When Davis writes about the artists Margaret Preston and Albert Namatjira, there is barely any recognition of the considerable material published about both these artists and how this current work relates to that previously published. For example, Nicholas Thomas, in Possessions: Indigenous art/colonial culture (1999:95-163), and the edited volume, The Heritage of Namatjira: The watercolourists of Central Australia (Hardy et al. 1992), devote considerable space to discussions of the art produced by Preston and Namatjira. In short, this volume shows little scholarly engagement. The omissions further highlight the conceptual peculiarity of the book. It is half-way between a reader and a scholarly volume. Quotations and the author's brief commentary closes rather than develops an argument.

The truncated nature of the commentary by the author is unfortunate. Davis rarely introduces people, so it is often difficult to determine their importance, and the index is poor (for example, there are numerous references to tobacco in the text but only three in the index). The commentary often replicates the quote. Sometimes the quote doesn't match with the comment and observation he makes. Other times it is misinterpreted.

The conceptualisation of Indigenous heritage is somewhat narrow, focusing primarily on material culture and cultural artefacts, especially stone implements (axes) and barks; Davis makes no reference to other obsessions of collectors--amateur and professional, non-scientific and scientific--such as skeletal remains, skulls and their measurement, soft tissue (brains) and blood samples (serology). Like stone implements and barks, they, too, were used as markers to measure intelligence and intellectual capacity of Aboriginal people, as well as to construct Aboriginal people culturally and socially. They, too, are heritage.

The lack of engagement with scholarship after 2001 extends into a cursory update of developments in heritage legislation after 2001, ceasing at 2004 (pp.302-4). Certainly when he writes about events in the 1990s and the changes in legislation, he writes with greater certainty and is discursive in his approach. Notwithstanding, there is within the covers much to be mined by students and scholars about what was written on Aboriginal artistic endeavours and the collection of Aboriginal artefacts, especially stone implements and barks, in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

I had hoped for a better book, as Davis has a long interest in heritage and worked professionally on heritage issues for most of his working life. The breadth of primary materials assembled is commendable and allows a detailed examination of the changing meanings of heritage, but in the end it is a deeply unsatisfying book. It is not so much the content itself but the way in which the content is presented--small bite-sized sections (almost snapshots), repetitions, the excessive use of quotes--so that it lacks an integrated whole. It is a usable, interesting reader, which, despite its general lack of engagement with scholarship in the area, is useful for students and scholars alike.

REFERENCES

Hardy, Jane, JVS Megaw and M Ruth Megaw (eds) 1992 The Heritage of Namatjira: The watercolourists of Central Australia, Heinemann, Melbourne.

Jones, Philip 1996 A box of native things, doctoral thesis, University of Adelaide.

Marcus, Julie 2001 The Indomitable Miss Pink: A life in anthropology, UNSW Press, Sydney.

Rowse, Tim 2000 Obliged to Be Difficult : Nugget Coombs' legacy in Indigenous affairs, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

Rowse, Tim 2005 Nugget Coombs: A reforming life, Cambridge University Press, Port Melbourne.

Thomas, David 2004 Reading Doctors' Writing: Race, politics and power in Indigenous health research, 1870-1969, AIATSIS, Canberra.

Thomas, Nicholas 1999 Possessions: Indigenous art/ colonial culture, Thames & Hudson, New York.

Reviewed by Geoffrey Gray, AIATSIS <geoff.gray@aiatsis.gov.au>