Encounters with Indigeneity: Writing About Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples

For four decades, Jeremy Beckett has shone a light on previously marginalized fields of life. While the many went in search of “traditional culture,” Beckett was fascinated to learn how people who often lacked wider recognition of their Aboriginality went about their lives. In the process he changed our understandings of those people and highlighted the issues they confronted. He has enriched our appreciation of the diversity of Indigenous identities and experiences, and his knowledge is shared in this book. He was an expert witness leading up to the Mabo decision and has brought Australian Indigenous studies into a world framework. His work continues to be influential to many: those who revisit his ideas here and those who are newer to his work.

Jeremy Beckett taught anthropology at the University of Sydney and was a visiting professor at the City University of New York Graduate Center, the Australian National University, New York University, and the University of Texas–Austin. He has carried out long-term field research with Australian Aboriginal people and Torres Strait Islanders. He is the author of Past and Present: The Construction of Aboriginality and Wherever I Go.