Barry Judd

Race relations, Indigenous Australia and the social impact of professional Australian football

We consider how Indigenous athletes have become symbols of what is perceived by white Australia to be progressive race relations. In particular, the mens professional sports of Australian football and Rugby League draw the most heavily mediated attention as well as significant numbers of Indigenous players. We draw upon the narratives of key advocates of Indigenous participation and performance in professional Australian football: journalists and recruiting managers. The emergent theme of white privilege is used to examine how their advocacy of Indigenous performance masks shortcomings in access and opportunity beyond playing roles. We conclude with the idea that race relations progress fulfils the needs of white Australia but fails to sufficiently deliver genuine opportunity for Indigenous Australian participants.

Changes in assumptions about Australian Indigenous footballers: from exclusion to enlightenment.

The participation of large numbers of Indigenous players in Australian professional football is a relatively recent phenomenon. Prior to the 1970s participation was, at best, limited. This paper identifies the underlying assumptions, shared values, beliefs and ideologies that have been held by the chief recruiters of elite teams. Football club recruiters are ideal subjects because, more than any other group of persons, they are gatekeepers of the game at the elite level. Furthermore, many have served in this generalized role over a long period of time. Recruiters were interviewed to understand how the recruiting strategies involving Indigenous players have changed. We investigated the interpretive frameworks that have been used by recruiting working staff, and to identify some of the complex dynamics that have enabled a shift from a blunt exclusion to a form of participation characterized by Stuart Hall as ‘inferential racism’. An analysis of factors that facilitate narratives and aligned opportunities for Indigenous players revealed that several themes permeate the language of recruiters.

Indigenous People, Race Relations and Australian Sport

1. Indigenous studies and race relations in Australian sports 2. Aborigines, sport and suicide 3. Indigeneity and the performance of corporeal masculinities in the Australian Football League 4. Bridging the Indigenous health divide: football and men engaging 5. Warlpiri warriors: Australian Rules football in Central Australia 6. Duelling paradigms: Australian Aborigines, marn-grook and football histories 7. Contested space - the Australian Aboriginal sporting arena 8. A modern day Corroboree - the New South Wales Annual Aboriginal Rugby League Knockout Carnival 9. Voices from the boundary line: the Australian Football Leagues Indigenous Team of the Century 10. The question of indigenous origins and the unlevel playing field: outside the boundary of the dominant paradigm