By Salih Durmić
2020
For the purpose of responding to the objectification and dehumanization of refugees, often as racialized subjects, this essay rhetorically refers to the dominant racial identity of Australia and its history of European migration with the words “white people.”
The “great” superpowers of Europe have a long and brutal history of imperialism. The English, French, Spanish, Italians, and Dutch empires were big on expansion and colonization for a variety of reasons, whether it be financial, political, or religious. However, none of these empires had a positive image in the eyes of the people they conquered. Oftentimes, they would send missionaries to preach Christianity. Some would try to “civilize” the barbarians they now rule. They would establish large feudal enterprises by extorting the cheap labor and essentially robbing the indigenous people of their nation’s natural resources, all in order to profit off of it in the developed world. Overall, history has revealed to us that wherever the white man sets foot, he needs to familiarize that territory. And one place where the English really succeeded in doing so was in Australia.
Australia, prior to British settlement, was a large island with the Aboriginals living on it. The Aboriginals are the indigenous people of Australia, but they didn’t live under one rule. The people were divided into tribes and groups that spoke different languages and had different customs. However, they got along for the most part. They were able to communicate amongst each other and lived a simple yet fulfilling life. When the British arrived, they sent three fleets of prisoners to live there and serve the rest of their sentences as manual laborers. This took place in the late 18th century and over time Australia evolved to the developed nation that it is today. Similar to the United States, Canada, England, and Germany, Australia is one of the prime destinations for people in search of a better life. Refugees and emigrants from countries which lack solid opportunities for education and work tend to try to move to countries like Australia.
In Safdar Ahmed’s Villawood, we are given a first-person viewpoint of the Villawood Immigration Detention Centre in Sydney, Australia. Villawood is a place where the Australian government keeps illegal immigrants such as war refugees, asylum seekers, and people who overstayed their visas or maybe broke a law while they were on their visa. We see that these people live in horrific conditions. They are mistreated by the prison guards and are really just subhuman to the eyes of the Australian government. Most of them haven’t even committed any serious crime besides illegally entering because they weren’t welcome back home. However, they are treated like violent criminals who are a danger to society. In the cartoon, we can see one where the Australian politicians are calling them “queue jumpers” and “country shoppers.” Right after, we see how Kurdish Iranians inmates at Villawood explain that they are illegal in their own countries of birth. Iran doesn’t give them access to basic rights such as healthcare. Seeing things like this really makes you feel sorry for these people, because they had no say in the situation they would be born into and how their own home country would label them. The biggest irony in this whole story is how the White Australian guards and case workers look at these people as illegal arrivals, when they too are not supposed to be there. They should be back in England or Ireland where their ancestors were born before illegally moving to the Aboriginals territory. By their own thinking, they shouldn’t be in Australia. We can see from Villawood, that white people love to target those who are different and feel like they deserve the best for themselves. White people hate that which is foreign and use excuses such as them being possible terrorists or something similar to justify their hatred.
The second text, which gives us another interesting perspective on this topic of immigration and acceptance is called “Australian Babel: A Conversation with Karrabing.” This text is actually a dialogue between six women where they discuss the Aboriginal Australian cultures and languages in the Arnhem Land on the northern coast. Before the dialogue, there is an excerpt from the Bible, Genesis 11:1-9. The book of Genesis in the Bible covers the early history of humanity as well as the creation of the universe by God, and the origins of the Israelites. This specific passage is about the story of the Tower of Babel. Some important context of this story is that the word babel means a confused noise made by a number of voices. So, what happens is that a long time ago humans all spoke one language and lived together. They settled in modern day Iraq and decided to build the tallest tower that would reach the heavens. When God saw what they were doing, he decided to confuse them by making them all speak different languages and scattered them across the Earth. This story is the origin of different communities of people and languages according to the Christian religion. After the Genesis excerpt, the dialogue of the six women is shown. However, in the first four pages the dialogue is in the Australian Pidgin language, and then in the next four it is rewritten in English. The Australian Pidgin is the combination between Aboriginal language and English. A pidgin language is a sort of combined common language between two languages, so that different people can better understand each other. It is a similar concept to a Creole. In the dialogue, the women are discussing how the Aboriginals all lived near each other but spoke different languages. Povinelli says, “The countries we are talking about are not very far from each other. Like if we were healthy people we could easily walk from Mabalug to Banagaiya if the tide was out” (6). Then Sandra Yarrowin adds on one word: “Karrabing.” Karrabing means tide out. When the tide was out, the Aboriginals could easily cross to the neighboring territory where a different group lived. Their languages were different yet they all understood each other. They weren’t homogeneous but respected each other and often intermingled comfortably. However, the white settlers didn’t like this when they arrived. They began to force English upon everyone and made them adopt their own culture. The women conclude that the white man wanted power, and the way to get that was to make everyone follow one way, his way. However, we can see that Karrabing is the real way because that is the way God wanted us to be according to Genesis. Having one language in society is not as ideal as different ones that interact with each other.
In conclusion, these two texts, despite initially seeming very simple, hold a very deep and complex meaning. Villawood seems fun as it is a cartoon that looks appealing and easy to read. However, in the year 2020, people are still locking up others just because they are trying to live a safe life. Is this really a crime? Interestingly, all the inmates we see are non-white and for the most part Muslims. White Australians are not even trying to hide their true feelings towards these political refugees who are suffering from wars they have no control over. In the Australian Babel, we can see that the white folks of Australia do not even have the right to judge others on their illegal means of coming to Australia. They too did the same, and intentionally destroyed a beautiful culture and way of life that the Aboriginals maintained for centuries. Why do white people hate aliens and that which they represent? This is something we will never know.
Works Cited
Ahmed, Safdar. Villawood. Medium, 2015, medium.com/shipping-news/villawood-9698183e114c/.
Lewis, Angela and Cecilia Lewis, Joclyn MacDonald, Elizabeth Povinelli, Linda Yarrowin, and Sandra Yarrowin. “Australian Babel: A Conversation with Karrabing.” Specimen: The Babel Review of Translation, 2017.
