The West Australian and South Australian education departments have made lists of appropriate and inappropriate words to describe Aboriginal people and culture, The Australian reports.
– Dreamtime is no longer an acceptable term to describe the collection of Aboriginal creation stories, and should be referred to as The Dreaming or The Dreamings.
– The structure of traditional Aboriginal society should not be described as primitive – but as complex and diverse
– The term native should be replaced by indigenous groups or language groups.
– Instead of saying myths and legends, teachers should say Dreaming stories, teaching from The Dreaming or creation stories.
– Aborigine should not be replaced by the term Aboriginal person.
– Rituals should be called ceremonies
– religion should be avoided in favour of spirituality
– tribal should be shunned for traditional.
– tribe should be replaced by Aboriginal people,
– horde should be replaced by language groups
– instead of clan the term family groups should be used
The list of terms was developed with input from a wide variety of sources, including departmental staff, Aboriginal organisations and academics.
>> read the whole story in The Australian
SEE ALSO:
Anthropologists condemn the use of terms of “stone age” and “primitive”