Walkabout

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Walkabout is term dating to the pastoral era in which large numbers of Aboriginal Australians were employed on cattle stations. During the tropical wet season, when there was little work on the stations, many would return to their traditional life on country. It was also used to describe unexplained absences of any kind. This was commonly treated as the product of a nomadic predisposition to wander aimlessly.[1] [2] [3]

Temporary mobility[edit]

"Temporary mobility" is a neutral term covering various forms of movement from place to place, without the specific connotations of "walkabout". Young Indigenous adults have the highest mobility rate of all age groups in Australia; males make up the majority.[4]

Research on temporary mobility[edit]

Mobility as a topic of research is difficult to track and measure.[4] In 2010s research, professionals identified technology as being a factor of then-current mobility in young Indigenous adults in Australia. However, no formal, sound research has been conducted on this subject matter specifically. The lack of female Indigenous presence in research results has determined[how?] that Australian women participate in the national census less than their male counterparts leading to the underrepresentation of women in mobility research.[5] This under-representation in research is due to the fact that most mobility research relies highly on census data as its primary form of data collection. The census occurs on one night nationally, which can make it difficult to track mobility, as does the finding that women in Australia are typically out of their usual residence at night, also leading to the under-representation of women in research.[6]

As of 2008, government statistical measures were not able to provide any detailed indication of the frequency, volume, or direction of Indigenous temporary mobility.[3]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ o'Kane, Michael (2013). "Project MUSE - Laws, Customs, and Practices in Australian Native Title". Collaborative Anthropologies. 6: 334–352. doi:10.1353/cla.2013.0013.
  2. ^ Peterson, Nicolas (2003). Myth of the “walkabout”. Routledge. ISBN 9780203464786.
  3. ^ a b Prout, S. (2008). "On the move? Indigenous temporary mobility practices in Australia". Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research (48). ISBN 0 7315 4947 3. ISSN 1442-3871. Retrieved 8 March 2020.
  4. ^ a b Bell, Martin; Ward, Gary (1 January 2000). "Comparing temporary mobility with permanent migration". Tourism Geographies. 2 (1): 87–107. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.584.6777. doi:10.1080/146166800363466. ISSN 1461-6688.
  5. ^ Zander, Kerstin K.; Taylor, Andrew J.; Carson, Dean B. (1 July 2014). "Impacts of Service and Infrastructure Provision on Indigenous Temporary Mobility in the Northern Territory of Australia: Insights from the 2011 Census". Population, Space and Place. 22: 99–116. doi:10.1002/psp.1871. ISSN 1544-8452.
  6. ^ Biddle, N.; Prout, S. (2010). "The geography and demography of Indigenous temporary mobility: an analysis of the 2006 census snapshot". Journal of Population Research. 26 (4): 305–326. doi:10.1007/s12546-010-9026-1. JSTOR 41110944.