AustLit

'Thinking Black tells the story of Cooper and the Australian Aborigines’ League, and their campaign for Aboriginal people’s rights. Through petitions to government, letters to other campaigners and organisations, and entreaties to friends and well-wishers, Thinking Black reveals their passionate struggle against dispossession and displacement, the denial of rights, and their fight to be citizens in their own country.'

'Bain Attwood and Andrew Markus document the circumstances behind the most significant moments in Cooper’s political career — his famous petition to King George V in 1933, his call for a ‘Day of Mourning’ in 1938, the walk-off from Cummeragunja in 1939 and his opposition to an Aboriginal regiment in 1939. It explores the principles Cooper drew on in his campaigning, not least his ‘Letter from an Educated Black’, surely one of the most intriguing political testaments written by an Australian leader.'

'Thinking Black sheds new light on the history of what it has meant to be Aboriginal in modern Australia. It reveals the rich and varied cultural traditions, both Aboriginal and British, religious and secular, that have informed Aboriginal people’s battle for justice, and their vision of equality in Australia of two peoples: equal yet distinct.' (Source: Publisher's website)

'The Struggle for Aboriginal Rights is the first book of its kind. Not only does it tell the history of the political struggle for Aboriginal rights in all parts of Australia; it does so almost entirely through a selection of historical documents created by the Aboriginal campaigners themselves, many of which have never been published. It presents Aboriginal perspectives of their dispossession and their long and continuing fight to overcome this.'

'In charting the story of Aboriginal political activity from its beginnings on Flinders Island in the 1830s to the fight over native title today, this book aims to help Australians better understand both the continuities and the changes in Aboriginal politics over the last 150 years: in the leadership of the Aboriginal political struggle, the objectives of these campaigners for rights for Aborigines, their aspirations, the sources of their programmes for change, their methods of protest, and the outcomes of their protest.'

'Through the words of Aboriginal activists, across 150 years, The Struggle for Aboriginal Rights charts the relationship between political involvement and Aboriginal identity.' (Source: Publisher's website)

'This is an important book. It represents a detailed enquiry into issues of major significance, draws on a wide range of sources including oral testimony, and affords ample evidence of a resolute, open-minded approach, free of ideological blinkers. Ten years ago, historians in this country lacked the capacity to approach contact history with such sensitivity. This is not to say, however, that the book is free from problems.'  (Introduction)