the secret river

Universidad del Claustro de Sor Juana Derechos Humanos y Gestión de Paz Lenguas Anglófonas IX Diego Antonio Robles Tomé Ensayo sobre la lectura: El Río Secreto, Grenville Kate. The Secret River The colonization of Australia, as other colonization countries, it’s full of violence and oppression of indigenous or aboriginal people, they are moved of their origin places and his culture changes for life. But in this special case the situation have another variation, the settlers did not come by choice, they come like prisoners of England, and they cannot leave the country. And now this two cultures have a very strong clash for survive. The book start with the principal character, William Thornhill, in the middle of the nowhere, just arrive to this unknown island with his family, and here is his first meeting with the aboriginal people. In this first part of the book we can see and imagine one of the principal topics, the relationship between the aboriginal people of Australia and the colonists of England, when this last arrive to the country. This meeting are very important, because are two very different cultures that now are going to live in the same place without their consent. There is one important problem here, the colonists are prisoners of England and they can't leave the country, New South Wales, so now they try to claim the land as theirs because now is their prison. But from the other side, the aboriginal people always was live there, so the first conflict that they are going to have is for the land. Another topic that we can see is the superiority that the colonist bring to the country, they now need to survive in one land that don't know anything about it, exiles, then see the naked black men and they first try to protect his family, but then realize that they are alone in this strange place, and need to survive, so they try to implant one form of superiority to the aboriginals. For the aboriginal people the colonist need to leave, they represent a danger for their culture and for their land. To understand the whole conflict, the author bring us back to the childhood of the principal character William, I think with a propose to realize that what kind of people send to Australia as a prisoner. In their childhood Thornhill need to steal to eat, they wasn’t see steel as a bad action until they use it for survived. So this break a little the image that we can have of the prisoners, sometimes there are there only because their lack of opportunities and in their majority was very poor people. The social stratification in England in that time, 1800, makes that families like Thornhills live in continuous hunger, without education and social injustices, and conditions like this makes people to choose sometimes in a peculiar way. In England William was the oppressed, the system makes he thinks that is in an inferior position of class, the people always see to him dawn, but now in Australia he have the opportunity to become in the oppressor, now he can look the other people, the aboriginals, down. As a summary of this part I think that the author try to tell us is, the persons who was send it to Australia as a prisoners with their families there are, in his majority innocent people, and their only crime was been a product of the system that excludes them. Another important topic that we can see is the relationship with the land, and the conception of property that the English people bring to Australia. For one side the English people have this conception of private property, and they start to divide the land and claim as theirs. They think that they are the owners of the land because the aboriginal are savages, and they can took their land because their does not took advantage of their. For the other side, it’s the way of see the land for the aboriginal people, they are very attachment to their land and their culture and traditions are related to conserve the environment, they don't need to exploit the land, they thought in the importance of the balance between nature and human been. As we see on the class, the aboriginal are one whit the land, with the nature, all his foundational myths are related with the animals, and the attachment with the nature. If they destroy the land are destroying themselves at the same time, that why have a lot of problems with the white people, because the conception of conservatism is different. The white people thinks that the native persons are ignorant, but they have a lot of knowledge. "There were no signs that the blacks felt that the place belonged to them. They had no fences that said this is mine. No house that said, this is our home. There were no fields or flocks that said, we have put the labour of our hands into this place." In this quote we can see reflected the last part, the white people doesn’t saw the necessity of respect the land of the aboriginals, because for they are only savages. This example can put it on the majority of colonisations around the globe, like in Mexico, for the settlers the indigenous people are only savages to their services. The racial topic are very important here to understand why the white people treat aboriginal people as inferior, we need to understand that the social hierarchy what the white people came are very strong, in England they was nothing, in Australia they are the highest stair of the social stratification, obviously, seen from a white point of view. To respond to the question that if I think it to be a realistic portrayal I think it was, it give us an overview of the history of Australia, although it is very difficult to know for sure how things happened since the author of the novel is a white person, and yet who writes the official story are the white people in Australia, we can lose a lot of point of view of the aboriginal people, and that a history that it’s not written. We can see and compare this history with the history of a lot of oppressed civilizations, as we know the official history are not the correct one, only reflects the winner point of view, in this book we can saw the booth sides, a little more of the white perspective, but we can realize the treatment that the aboriginal people was suffer. And we can turn and see the situation in this moment and the aboriginal people still been oppressed, their culture are underestimated also his way of see the globe, his relationship with the land. If the Australians turn over to see the aboriginal people they can learn a lot of them. More right now with so many environmental problems that Australia are passing. Now finally I can say that this book is highly recommended, mainly because it offers a partial view of the situation of colonization, it is a good way to introduce you to the history of Australia, which although it is not often mentioned in school, here you can aboard in not so convectional way.