Reading indigeneity without race: Color, representation and uncertainty in photographic evidence

Reading indigeneity without race: Color, representation and uncertainty in photographic evidence

This chapter illustrates some of the challenges of reading Australian Aboriginal identities in photographs, including where Aboriginal people have been used to represent an Other that is not necessarily consistent with their own self-identity, using images from early Great Barrier Reef scientific and holiday expeditions. Nicolas Peterson argues that photographs can serve as both illustration and evidence of colonial attitudes. He argues that photographs that were once used to illustrate a particular narrative in a colonial context can be reread in the present as evidence of something else. Judgments about Aboriginality are highly contentious and are the source of significant anguish, hardship and deprivation in Australia where families have been torn apart through the identification and reidentification of who is considered to be Aboriginal and who is not. The Great Barrier Reef is Australia's premier tourist destination and the holy grail of marine science. Photographs that deliberately portray Aboriginal people at the Reef demonstrate indigeneity through established tropes and performances.

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