Analysis Of The Film Rabbit-Proof Fence

Rabbit-Proof Fence presented a realistic representation of the removal of Aboriginal children from their families. This film displayed numerous factors that led to child removals including eugenics, paternalism, and Christianizing mission. Half-caste children like Molly, Gracie, and Daisy were relocated to the Moore River Settlement School which trained girls to be domestic workers or farm laborers and eventually these half-caste children were able to be assimilated into the white society. While the chief protector of Aboriginal Australians A.O. Neville believed that he was helping half-caste children by taking them out of their communities and placing them in settlement camps. The child removals had an adverse affect on both the indigenous …show more content…
White settlers would kidnap half-caste and would give them an education so they can grow up and eventually get a job like the white citizens. “Aboriginal children of mixed descents were always in danger of being taken away from their mothers as governments sought to “protect” them from tribal influences” (136). These half-caste children were forbidden to speak their native language since they will grow up as still being half caste and not fully assimilated with the whites. These half-caste were trained to work as household servants or as farm laborers. In the movie the children were forced to eat with a spoon and fork to help assimilate them into the white society. They were forced to take a showers and say “please” and “thank you” to the nuns. These children were forced to pray before they eat and go to church which played a part in the Christianizing mission. Conversion was the goal of the civilizing mission but it was much more difficult than expected since it is hard to change people’s way of thinking. “Throughout their trek the girls are pursued by the forces of official assimilation under the direction of A.O. Neville, the state’s Chief Protector of Aborigines, earnest believer that “In spite of himself, the native must be helped”(145). Neville’s plan was to steal all the light-skinned aboriginal children and forcibly integrate them into the white society by either house servants or adoption and to give these children the benefit of being in a white society. This will now allow the half-caste to become white instead of being an unwanted race. Rabbit-Proof Fence does not display frontier violence or environmental imperialism throughout the movie which might have made the movie more realistic because these factors did play a role in the effects of