CoŶteŵporary AďorigiŶal PerĐeptioŶs of CoŵŵuŶity, (with P. Dudgeon, J. Mallard & D. Oxenham) in Psychological Sense of Community: Research, Applications, and Implications, Ed. A. Fisher, C. Sonn & B. Bishop, New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers, 2002. pp. 247-267. CONTEMPORARY ABORIGINAL PERCEPTIONS OF COMMUNITY 1 Pat Dudgeon, John Mallard, Darlene Oxenham, and John Fielder Curtin University of Technology INTRODUCTION Aboriginal Australian people have lived on the continent for over 40,000 years. They were a hunting-gathering people, and the total number of inhabitants prior to colonisation is estimated to be at least 300,000 people, and possibly as high as 1,000,000 (Bourke, 1994). With the onset of colonisation in 1788, as was the case for many other Indigenous peoples, the subsequent centuries were characterised by genocide; by forced removal from land, peoples, families; by enslavement; and by assimilation and destruction of cultural ways. Despite this, the fact that Indigenous people have sustained their identity, and are experiencing a cultural renaissance, is a testimony to the determination of the human spirit. Introduction This chapter focuses on contemporary Aboriginal 2 perceptions of “community”. By exploring what contemporary Aboriginal people understand community to be, we aim to contribute to community psychologists‟ endeavours to work in empowering and culturally appropriate ways, and to be aware of the social and political complexity, and cultural diversity, of Aboriginal communities in Australia. Beliefs and assumptions about the Aboriginal community are broadly framed by historically available dominant discourses on Aboriginal people. Muecke (1992) identifies these dominant discourses as either racist, romantic or anthropological. However, over the past 20 to 30 years, Aboriginal people‟s own lived experiences of community have gained mainstream public recognition. Gradually, Aboriginal voices and resistant Aboriginal discourses