The Aboriginal people of Australia have a rich and vivid culture. Or perhaps, it could be phrased as: they had a rich and vivid culture. This is because these people have endured discrimination and decline ever since William Dampier first met with them in 1697. On that occasion, Dampier found the aborigines to be "miserable and nasty" just because they refused to carry six heavy canoes for him.

Much of this early discrimination was based on the fact that the British found the aborigines to be inferior to them. Sir George Shaw, the famous British zoologist, observed "the wretched natives to be less elevated above the inferior animals than in any other part of the known world." Since being dispossessed of their most valuable possession-their land- the aboriginal people have come under various policies implemented by the Commonwealth Government of Australia which was founded in 1901. These included protectionism, assimilation...