The two part series The Secret River, is based on Kate Grenvilles book of the same name. The series is about the colonisation of Australia through the story of Will and Sal Thornhill, who 'takes up land' on the Hawkesbury River. Will is a convict, his character may be seen as akin to many poor Dickensian characters. Once freed in Australia he has an opportunity to start a new life, which he wants to do on a point of land along the Hawksbury River. It is here the main issue of the book manifests; the cultural differences between the white settlers and the Aboriginal people, who have very different perspectives on the issue of land ownership. The story is of the bloody and brutal settlement of the area, with characters such as Smasher Sullivan, Saggity Birtles, and Ned's perceiving the Aboriginal people as nothing but uncivilised savages, who they can abuse.
When Will is presented as wanting to settle the land, he is full of exuberance and passion. He is presented as a good father and husband, effectively civilised after his criminal [pat has been overcome. His view on the land is typical of western standards; if the land is unsettled it is assumed that the land is not owned making it free for a settles to take. His desire to own the land and make his mark is seen with the way he titles the land Thornhills Point.
The underlying theme is that of cultural misunderstanding and different attitudes. While ownership to the western world meant possessing and often using the artefact or land owned. Where there was land which did not appear to be worked, and no ownership rights exerted, it was assumed the land did not belong to anyone. Indeed, after Captain Cook discovered Australia, he claimed it for the Crown as terra nullius, or uninhabited, indicating that it was an empty continent (Eckermann et al., 2010).
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This attitude denied any rights or legitimacy to the Aboriginal people. This ethnocentric approach towards colonisation is clearly evident in The Secret River, especially Smasher Sullivan and Saggity Birtles, who exhibit the use of stereotyping towards the aboriginal; assuming specific unfavourable characteristics without attempting to get to know the natives on land. Indeed, it may be argued that the ethnocentric approach that was inherent in many of the settlers' attitude often lead to xenophobia, where they were afraid of the aboriginals as they did not understand. This may be typified with the way in which the relationship develops, and the way in which the government sent a military regiment to punish aboriginals who took one of the settlers; Spiders', crop.
The core element of the cultural clashes between the settlers and the aboriginal people is the claiming and use of the land. The western culture of ownership did not exist within the Aboriginal nation. Within the aboriginal culture land has a completely different meaning, it has a life of its own, and rather than belonging to people, people belong to the land with a spiritual, social and physical connection to that land (Clarke, 2014). A key element is the perception of land as a mother, with aboriginals having a responsibility to care for the health of the land and water on that land (Pettit, 2015). When aboriginal people, with a strong spiritual connection to the loan, see it being taken, and then altered by settlers, there is a natural desire to protect that land. The aboriginal people had existed for generations without the need to cultivate land, the process of cultivation invariably resulted in destruction of the natural environment. While to the western eyes the cultivation of land may have been an improvement, to the aboriginal people it was not only destruction of land, but a harming the environment, which also deprives them of their native habitat which had been providing for them for millennia.
Clarke, P. A. (2014). The Aborginal Australian Cosmic Landscape. Part 1: THe Ethnobotany of the Skyworld. Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 17(3), 307 -- 325.
Eckermann, A. K., Dowd, T., Chong, E., Nixon, L., Gray, R., & Johnson, S. M. (2010). Binan Goonj: bridging cultures in Aboriginal Health. Chatswood: Churchill Livingstone/Elsevier Australia,.
Kingsley, J., Townsend, M., Henderson-Wilson, C., & Bolan, B. (2013). Developing an Exploratory Framework Linking Australian Aboriginal Peoples' Connection to Country and Concepts of Wellbeing. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 10, 678 -- 698.
Pettit, E. J. (2015). Aborigines' Dreaming or Britain's Terra Nullius: Perceptions of Land Use in Colonial Australia. Iowa Histrial Review, 5(1), 23 -- 60.
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