The Pros And Cons Of Torres Strait Islanders

Torres Strait Islands are located between Australia and Papua New Guinea. There have been Torres Strait Islanders as one of the Australian Indigenous group. As another Australian Indigenous group, Aborigines, had been invaded and colonised their land, culture, and life from the eighteenth century, Torres Strait people also had similar, but different experiences through the history. For example, while Aboriginal people’s land settled by the British convicts from the 1788 of the First Fleet, Torres Strait people met white people differently from Aboriginal people, because they lived in islands, not Australia’s main land where Aboriginal people have lived. However, like the Aboriginal people, the Islanders had many foreign things were brought …show more content…
Traditionally, the Islanders have had strong connection to their land and the sea, for example, their myth and the hero stories relate to each island (Beckett 1983, p. 203). However, the annexation to Queensland actually meant the islands ‘became part of the British Dominions’ (Kidd 1993, p. 35). The land to be owned others, not Islanders, may have caused the Torres Strait people to feel uncomfortable and risk of their land because, it is well- known that the Australian Aboriginal land was destroyed by outsiders’ mining of gold. As one of the threats which occurred in the Islands, Beckett (1983, p. 206) exampled that in Badu, an immigrant people took control of local government council and began to control all lands and abolished traditional rights. Such risk and disgust led some Murray Islanders ‘did not wish to participate in the Queensland Government 's land rights scheme’ (Harris & Ramsay 1996, p. 121), and the Mabo was raised. Thus, the Islanders had several risks and threats of their land and life by governed by outsiders and as a result of this, the idea of the Mabo