White mothers, Indigenous families, and the politics of voice

Abstract

Ongoing histories of genocide, dispossession and child removal continue to shape the Australian nation. Speaking of such histories is fraught with racial power differentials that dictate which particular voices will be given space within public discourse. Examining how a ‘politics of voice’ is deployed within the writings of white academics is one important site for better understanding how it is that white voices continue to occupy a hegemonic position within the Australian academy and in everyday talk. In this paper I examine how particular representations of white foster/adoptive mothers of Indigenous children in Australia highlight the problematic nature of research seeking to represent experiences classified as previously ‘unspoken’. In examining the work of one particular white Australian academic I suggest that it is important that white academics engage in research practices that highlight, rather than overlook, matters of race privilege and which ground white people in histories of colonisation and in a relationship to the fact of Indigenous sovereignty.