Beyond Black and White Essentialism, hybridity and Indigeneity Yin C. Paradies Centre for Health and Society, University of Melbourne and Menzies School of Health Research, Charles Darwin University Abstract Non-Indigenous conceptions of Indigeneity have historically focused on con- trolling the socialization, mobility and reproduction of Indigenous people. In the Indigenous community, we have only recently begun to demarcate our own space in which to debate the nature of Indigeneity in Australia. To date, we have successfully deployed notions of Indigeneity, via the strategic essen- tialism of pan-Aboriginality, to create an effective political community. However, such a deployment of Indigeneity also results in every Indigenous Australian being interpellated, without regard to their individuality, through stereotyped images that exist in the popular imagination. The essentialized Indigeneity thus formed coalesces around specific fantasies of exclusivity, cul- tural alterity, marginality, physicality and morality, which leave an increasing number of Indigenous people vulnerable to accusations of inauthenticity. Only by decoupling Indigeneity from such essentialist fantasies can we acknowl- edge the richness of Indigenous diversity and start on the path towards true reconciliation in Australia. Keywords: essentialism, hybridity, identity, Indigenous, reconciliation, Whiteness Constructions of Indigenous 1 identity have been a preoccupation of both the Australian popular imagination and the Australian nation-state from the earliest days of colonization (Chesterman and Galligan, 1998; Gardiner-Garden, 2003; McCorquodale, 1997). Historically, non- Indigenous approaches to defining and understanding Indigeneity have focused on the need to surveil and control the socialization, mobility and biological reproduction of those with some descent from pre-colonial peoples of Australia (Dodson, 1994). In an analysis of over 700 pieces of legislation, McCorquodale (1986) found 67 different definitions of Indigeneity. Much more recently, Indigenous people have begun to mark Journal of Sociology © 2006 The Australian Sociological Association, Volume 42(4): 355–367 DOI:10.1177/1440783306069993 www.sagepublications.com