AHC: An Aboriginal Nation

Your challenge is to create a plausible scenario where Indigenous Australians manage to create their own modern, separate nation. It doesn't have to encompass the whole of the continent, but it must remain on mainland Australia.
 

Vexacus

Banned
Your challenge is to create a plausible scenario where Indigenous Australians manage to create their own modern, separate nation. It doesn't have to encompass the whole of the continent, but it must remain on mainland Australia.

How about they all move to Ramsay Street?:D
 
I don't see any possible way at all to have the aboriginal people have an independent, strong and modern nation. They were nomadic people before the Europeans arrived and many of them choose to keep to that life style, and with the Europeans outnumbering them after colonisation I just can't see it happening without getting the alien space bats involved.
 
You want the Potato. You want that Potato so much, you see that Potato and you're like...

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Because the Potato.is.the.hypest.vegitable. That thing is rich in a Vitamin C and B6. Those thing will keep you health and help you recover from injuries. It can grow pretty much everywhere regardless of climate. It's easy to grow, doesn't require that much water and you can grow it in bulk.

Ignoring the above, what you need is to force the Aborigines to stop being hunter gathers, to a more agricultural focused society. You do that, the population will grow a bit more and then it's only a matter of time before a nation develops. Potatos.
 

dead_wolf

Banned
Yeah best you could get without completely changing the geographic/ecological history of the continent is something akin to the US style reservations/native nations.
 
Yeah, I was about to say that Land of Red and Gold does pretty much that. And the PoD is the evolution of a different type of potato, so Karnee got it spot on.
 
In addition to the internal suggestions (hunter-gatherers-to-agriculturists, potato) and all the imperialism-apologist suggestions (impossible, reservations, bantustans) there are other outside actors who's history of exploration and trade didn't necessarily colonise or destroy local groups, but rather brought outside contact which could lead to trade, agriculture and proto-state formation. Some who come to mind are the Acehnese, Chinese, Hadramis from Yemen, Omanis and/or Polynesians.
 
In addition to the internal suggestions (hunter-gatherers-to-agriculturists, potato) and all the imperialism-apologist suggestions (impossible, reservations, bantustans) there are other outside actors who's history of exploration and trade didn't necessarily colonise or destroy local groups, but rather brought outside contact which could lead to trade, agriculture and proto-state formation. Some who come to mind are the Acehnese, Chinese, Hadramis from Yemen, Omanis and/or Polynesians.

Colonialismé is not cool but it would have cool to see a permanent Macassan influence in the Northwest. Imagine if they came across those huge walls of iron in the Pilbara and Kimberley!
 
What about a mixed-race population? Say, some Indian or Indonesian merchants show up and establish a few trading posts, mostly inhabited by men. The merchants take local wives, who help to instill aspects of their culture into the next generation. Obviously, the mixed-race cultures would lean heavily toward the settlers rather than the indigenous peoples, including their agriculture and mostly likely their religion, but you might see a cultural fusion in the predominant languages (which could be aboriginal ones, or at the very least, creole languages) and the styles of art, music, and clothing. The indigenous people would definitely contribute their knowledge of the land, including edible wild foodstuffs, which could lead to some bush foods gaining prominence (in the same way that, say, yerba mate arose from Paraguay, rooibos came from South Africa, or even foods like maple syrup and wild rice from eastern North America).

The mixed-race cultures exhibit explosive population growth to the extent that they couldn't be displaced by incoming European or Asian colonists (should they even arrive). If colonization does still take place, it's more along the lines of Africa or Southeast Asia than the settler colony of Australia that we know. The colony or colonies that are formed would eventually gain independence as states with indigenous leadership and indigenous population majorities.

For a model, I'm thinking of something like Paraguay - Where most of the local people have Guarani blood and speak Guarani, and where Guarani foods such as yerba mate, various soups such as pira caldo and soyo, and various breads and cakes based on corn and manioc are popular nationwide. Yet, there's the undeniable Spanish influence in lifestyle and material culture - Most Paraguayans are Roman Catholics, they wear Western clothing, they live in houses based on Western architecture, they eat many Spanish-derived foods, and they enjoy playing the same sports popular throughout Latin America. Actually, the largely unmixed indigenous populations of most African and Pacific Island countries share the same level of Westernization as the Paraguayans. A Christian Papuan living in urban Port Moresby is far removed from the lifestyle of his ancestors but he's still regarded as an indigenous Papuan.
 
There are two ways one could achieve this:

First: one could of course have a prolonged contact with the Makassans: IOTL, the Yolŋu learned how to make superior spears and canoes from the Makassans (they also got smallpox in the 1820s; too late to be of much help, immunity-wise); the Yolŋu may even have elements of Islam into their traditional religion.

The Makassan trepangers perhaps were too distant from the Yolŋu: IMHO, while it was of course decent and humane, even admirable, of them to respect Yolŋu (and one would assume any other Indigenous Australian Peoples') customs and land, needless to say frankly magnanimous in comparison to what the Westerners as a whole did to (from what I can tell) all (and certainly at least pretty much all) Indigenous Australians in the form of what amounted to nothing short of genocide, nonetheless the Yolŋu - and the precolonial Indigenous Australian population as a whole - could certainly have used ocean-going sailing ships, gunpowder, steelmaking, writing, intensive agriculture and state-level social complexity, all of which the Makassans had. Contact with the world beyond would certainly have made it quite possible for the Indigenous Australians to stand a chance against the Western Invaders.

Or: As Jared has already done, one could have a more or less fully indigenous development of culture. Now, since he has done such an excellent job with the Lands of Red and Gold, I will just mention a few things: The Gunditjmara at Lake Condah could provide a useful starting point for indigenous state societies to form; the eel farming (more like ranching actually, but you get the point) in the area reminds me of Mosely's theory on "The Maritime Foundations of Andean Civilization", so it could work.

That said, the other good place (perhaps better) is North Queensland because: New Guinean crops can grow there. Now, I know New Guinea isn't part of the Indigenous Australian cultural area, but the two lands were connected during the Last Ice Age... Anyway, the relatively wet tropical climate would be far more suitable for New Guinean crops - taro, winged beans, certain beefwood trees, bananas, a species of toddy palm, nipa palms, pili nuts, black-fiber palms, Pandanus palms, sugarcane and were all first cultivated in New Guinea. With the addition of native North Australian crops such as macadamias, Australian "limes", zig-zag vines and wattles, and livestock such as eel-tailed catfish, redclaws, stingless bees, honeypot ants, jade perch, Australian Giant Freshwater Prawns, and of course emus, dogs and pigs (the latter two from New Guinea). Hunting and fishing would also be important, especially of macropod populations.
 
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