7 SOG Flashcards
Nana’s death -> stories of “life”, “traditions” + “heritage” lost
Her photo “quietly” put in suitcase
- suitcase (performative device) = symbol/represents transition, memory, family connection, Aboriginal knowledge, culture and spirituality . Contains picture of dead so repository for grief/ easier to carry but each death adds to difficult to bear
- suitcase = visual representation of every day trauma/overt and subtle
- Nana’s photo removed from wall reveals grief so common that fam have a process for dealing with loss
- Foil for chapel
Black Skin Girl
“the letters of the alphabet appear on her dress”
The Woman “tires”
She “attempts to evade the letters”
Link w Remembering “boy, mule…”
- at first, childlike game but Woman becomes increasingly uneasy
-Transformation from joy to panic = confronting for audience - Woman sings in her own language as painfully attempts to protect herself from oppressors. Contrast bw english alphabet and Womans resistance, highlighting tension bw violence of colonisers + strategies of resistance
- language = key tool of communication
- facilitates internal colonisation -> killing identity, replacing it with different version of the world (through english language)
- racist treatment forced upon indvid’s through deprivation of language
Photography story
Woman describes room in parents’ house with “trophies”, “pennants” and “memories of weddings, birthdays […] and family visits”
- monuments to the “good times”
- celebrations against western standards/FNP used ‘mediums and methods of the conquerors’/Indigenous people have excelled -> joy and pride
- celebrations of love and family/hinted at in previous scene
- Nana’s photo removed from wall reveals grief is so common the fam have a clear process of dealing with it
- European heritage -> fam succeeding in foreign model
- Interconnection bw family, pride, laughter and sorrow throughout whole play -> represents multiplicity of experiences of grief
- trophies = assimilation
Aunty Grace
She marries an “Englishman” and moves to “London”
Woman, Dad and Nana in “peaceful” and “silent” protest march
Link w “thirsty for change”
- assimilation process -> indicative of acceptance of oppression + Western world
- AG manifestation of ppl who assimilate w/ oppressor
- Eng/London = home of empire but AG embraced it -> abandoned family/culture/identity
- Family participate in peaceful march in scene after Vocke’s court report -> draws on audience’s knowledge of ATI death in custody + reference to ‘police camera’, increasing fear but makes bravery of resistance more admirable -> institutional racism
-Ice block continues to melt -> aud reflect on they culpability (blame) and see urgency of change needed - Indigenous culture eroded
- KEY IDEA: FNP racially profiled, eg interpret Indigenous grief as agression -> link to “smile for the police camera”
Gallery of Sorrow
“collection of images” depict the “phases of Aboriginal history” including images of “protection”
Images vary in different performances but typically include regulation or residence, slavery as employment, marriage, social life and other aspects of daily life
- multi media instillation/performance utilising range of dramatic strategies
- Cements link between 7 phases of Aboriginal history as the 5 stages of grieving (diagram on back cover)
- Aus use guise of ‘protection’ to assume control over Indigenous ppl and their lives + systematically replaces their culture with British culture
- Decimation of Indigenous Australian culture occurred incl. whole languages -> Aboriginal Australians even have to think in English
- Ultimate colonisation = controlling thoughts
- Ice block suspended by 7 ropes, representative of 7 stages of Ab. history …
Mug Shot
Woman delivers court report about the death in custody with “no hint of emotion”
“finally breaks out” and recounts events in voice of court + her own to explain “his condition aroused immediate concern”
eventually describes “limp body” before he is “pronounced dead”.
- Scene = switch to dispassionate tone of court report
- The woman’s voice breaks in most difficult, emotional parts
- emotional distancing -> repressing and suppressing emotion, burying trauma/suitcase symbolises stashing trauma
- emotional distancing measures helped her tell her stories but she cannot hide her grief/pain (shows movements along the 7 stages constant)
- Flat disconnected monotone + hard facts of Vocke’s story -> highlights the apathy and brutality w/ which he had to contend in his final moments
- Institutional racism -> report omitted true cause of death/reduces identity and individuality
- legalese used to sanitise racist murders
Plea
The Woman “places the suitcase down at the feet of the audience”
Walking Across Bridges
“ So many people”/”we can’t go back now”
BP3
- suitcase to aud = shift of responsibility/Woman carried suitcase alone, now aud have witnessed her pain and now have responsibility to carry it/share burden -> up to rest of Aus to take more action/make change
- Emphasises need to change the racism and oppression which caused the baggage
- Add. scene depicting 2000 Walk for Reconciliation reflects evolution of play to reflect Aus society
- Bridge walk = optimism for reconciliation /healing
- EXT. 2021 performance = another scene to end bc not as hopeful following BLM movement in 2020 + anniversary of deaths in custody report
March
“Four helicopters circled the crowd”
“Smile for the police Camera”
- Wht. Australians view protest as potential for violent criminality -> racially profiled/ = ignorant of reason to protest
- Helicopter support assumption that the protest will get violent/symbolic of a need to control
- FNP = rejecting narrative -> resistance and rebellion
Plea
“We have been taught to cry quietly”
“I am so full and know my capacity for grief”
“These are my people’s stories. They need to be told.”
- Feeling of entrapment -> can’t show vulnerability bc = weakness -> fear of giving ‘another reason’ for oppression/sign = less than
- for too long reality has been untouched
- cant show emotion/taught to suppress bc such grief = common experience/the norm
- remained quiet to avoid drawing attention
- Link to WC in forgetting
??
Everything has its time
“In the end it isn’t something you read or write that changes your life, it is something you do”
- urge for action
- exposing the false claims of responsibility and care
- ‘deeds not words only’
Everything has its time
Stage direction -
“The word reconciliation is packed into [the suitcase]”
- connotations of packing away for later
- discouraged and ashamed about the lack of readiness for change/lack of responsibility
Invasion Poem
ATI ppl are “silenced by a single wave of a stick”
- oppression has been happening too long -> fear has been permanently instilled in FNP -> struggle to gain autonomy -> powerless
- constant reminded of distribution of power
- grief carried for so long -> wears a person down -> question own sanity/itch away at confidence and self assurance to stand up forself
