James Cook University researchers will examine how Torres Strait Islanders have historically dealt with outsiders and their influence, in a bid to better enable Indigenous people to negotiate with governments in the present day.
Associate Professor Sana Nakata, Head of Research at JCU's Indigenous Education and Research Centre, will lead the study.
She said the Productivity Commission has again found that federal, state, and territory governments have not made any significant gains in improving the life outcomes of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
"This landmark study addresses a significant gap in our understanding of Torres Strait Islander agency.
"We'll be examining how Torres Strait Islanders have navigated legal and policy frameworks of governments over the past century, and find how Islanders adapted to changes in their region but still managed to preserve parts of their traditional way-of-life," said Associate Professor Nakata.
She said the team will use a combination of extensive archival research interviews, oral histories and community research workshops with Torres Strait Islanders both on the mainland and in the Torres Strait.
"This project will enable us to undertake a comprehensive study that has the potential to empower Indigenous narratives, contribute to cultural preservation, and inform policy development in ways that can benefit all Indigenous communities," said Associate Professor Nakata.
She said understandings of Torres Strait Island traditions of self-reliance and making their own way in life had been marginalised in modern times.
"Indigenous people are too often represented as either beneficiaries of benevolence or victims of colonisation. By centring Islander perspectives, we can produce a history of political action and change that takes seriously the agency of Islanders in navigating complex conditions.
"This restores Islanders' position as a people who have always advanced self-determination agendas, on their terms and not others, in order to build futures of our own making," said Associate Professor Nakata.
The five-year project has been funded by a more than $1.7 million grant from the Australian Research Council's Discovery Indigenous scheme.
