Christianity, Identity, Power, and Employment in an Aboriginal Settlement

This essay examines Aboriginal people's expression of Christian ideologies, values, and behaviors in regard to personhood. Christian practice in Galiwin'ku is a repertoire of individualization that fosters self-reliance and self-actualization, which relate to employment benefits and positions of political authority. Christianity is an important and equivocal site for staging opposition between community residents and for the expression of indigenous political agency within and beyond the settlement. Examining how Christianity informs the production of identities sheds light on some of the ways in which Aboriginal people negotiate tensions arising from a market economy and an egalitarian ethos. (identity, Christianity, indigenous agency, Aboriginal Australia) ********** Prolonged marginalization in the national economy has affected Aboriginal people living in remote regions of Australia (Austin-Broos and Macdonald 2005), and for several years the Aboriginal politician, Noel Pearson (2000), has urged for the indigenous people's integration into the market economy in order to reach greater economic self-sufficiency. Australia's indigenous citizens are currently confronted with a "dual challenge of cultural difference and rapid change," Austin-Broos (2005:1) declares. She contends that the central issue now facing many Aboriginal people is the tension between their resistance to out-migration from their communities and the state's and Australian federal government' s reluctance to create jobs in these regions. The harsh reality of these competing interests has meant economic deprivation, poor health, limited educational opportunities, a small labor market, and welfare dependency for the majority of Australia's indigenous citizens. A notable absence from these pressing issues is a consideration of the role that Christianity plays in negotiating the tensions between government and Aboriginal interests. An exception to this neglect is a review of the transition from a domestic moral economy patent to hunter-gatherers to an engagement with a cash economy by Peterson (2005), who discusses the emergence of life projects that are indigenous derived and developed independently of those promoted by the state and market. Peterson (2005) contends that in comparison with North America, life projects in Australia are often fragmented, reactive to government policy, and contested within communities. He observes that when discussions about life projects seem to be the most self-conscious and coherent, they are often formulated in a Christian context. Peterson (2005:14) also notes that the ways people involve themselves in "the treadmill of wage labor" include out-marriage, moving away, or becoming involved with a Christian sect. This essay attempts to contribute to understanding how Aboriginal people have responded to new conditions and how they remake themselves in the changing contexts, with Christian practice as the point of entry. Fieldwork (2003-2005) in the Yolngu settlement Galiwin'ku, located in northeast Arnhem Land, examined how particular forms of Christian ideologies, values, and behaviors inform Aboriginal people's understanding of personhood and selves. Research also considered the relationships among productions of identities and the realities of employment and power in remote community living. (1) REPERTOIRES OF INDIVIDUALIZATION IN ABORIGINAL SOCIAL LIFE Following Weber's (1930) connection of the Protestant work ethic with the spirit of capitalism, Christianity may be contextualized as a space within which individual initiative and agency are shaped. Protestantism, notions of "citizenizing," and the permeation of a market economy into Aboriginal social life must all be viewed as processes and discourses of individualization. They are individualistically grounded models that prioritize the relationship of the spirit and body to an almighty God and to work, and in doing so transform the notion of person to enable wealth accumulation and procurement of citizenship rights mainly through social security and welfare payment schemes. …