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Clip description
This clip includes the ending of the speech. This is the section where Keating continues with his message of hope for significant change in Australian society. He outlines some of the changes that he can see already, such as a growing appreciation of the diversity and depth of cultures in Indigenous Australia, of the richness of our national life and identity with the participation of Indigenous people, their music, art and dance.
The genius and resilience of people who have survived many thousands of years, including cataclysmic changes, for example, helps us to learn to live with our environment. He references, importantly, ‘the wisdom contained in their epic story’ and how much colonial settlers have lost through living apart.
Curator’s notes
While admitting the outrages of the colonial takeover and the ongoing suffering of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, Keating underlines the value of the uniquely Australian democratic system. He defines this as interested in justice and in a sense he is suggesting that ‘all of us’ take the step of reconciling with the Indigenous people just that one step further.
He outlines here that the basis of this reconciliation is already laid, that the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ contribution to the life of the nation is widely appreciated. Now he asks, imagine success in the acceptance and incorporation of these people into the whole of the fabric of the nation.
His speech ends with a call to the imagination, that Australia cannot imagine the Indigenous people have no place in the nation, that Australians cannot imagine failure in this. He ends the speech with confidence, reassuring that this will happen within the decade, a reference to the United Nation’s Decade for the World’s Indigenous Peoples.
