The Problems of Cultural Identity in Jedda
When ever I watch Jedda, I have this internal debate about whom I detest the most: Doug, the man who sees all the Aborigines as hopelessly savage; or, his wife who believes she can save Jedda from a life of savagery with her “wholesome food,” cultured living, and good shoes and fancy dresses. While Doug truly believes that Aborgines “don’t tame, only on the surface,” he at least acknowledges that Sarah is denying Jedda her intrinsic rights and freedoms by not letting her be with her people and learn their traditional language, religion, and practices of “walkabout,” tracking, and hunting. Sarah, on the other hand, believes its best to keep Jedda away from the other Aborigines, whom she calls “monkeys” and “pickininnies,” and whom she warns threaten to ‘contaminate’ Jedda with their ‘bush ideas.’ What we see in Sarah is the dominant belief that assimilation of Aborigines was the root to prosperity and happiness, a process that often involved the forced removal of children from their families. This is, of course, something that happened in the United States and Canada with residential school systems as well. (Or, American Indian Boarding Schools, as they are called in American history books, if they are referenced at all).
By making them seem so misguided and even unlikable, the directors of the film clearly wanted to challenge the ideas represented by both Doug and Sarah, and to present their contrasting perspectives as wrong-headed. Despite its many flaws in representation, Jedda represents an important early attempt in Australian film to at least consider the Indigenous experience and to grapple with race relations in Australia, something that was startlingly progressive for 1950s Australia. Even if we find the film incredibly frustrating from our 2017 perspective, its important to keep in mind that it was made prior to the 1967 referendum that would grant Aborigines citizenship.
Jedda was also the first film to employ Aboriginal actors in leading roles, and some film critics have made the arguable claim that it is “the first Australian film to take the emotional lives of Aboriginal people seriously” (See Jane Mills’s Jedda, 16). I’ve read some interesting criticism about how the Chauvels clearly wanted to show their respects for the the tribal peoples’ connection to the land of northern Australia and documentation suggests they went to great lengths to consult with them on the making of the film. However, that certainly doesn’t leave them above reproach in the making of this deeply flawed film. Jane Mills and Barbara Creed are two film scholars who’ve held them to account for the film’s racist and patronizing perspective and we shouldn’t be afraid to critique that ourselves. Despite Charles and Elsa Chauvel’s attempts to portray a more sympathetic image of Indigenous experience and the complexities of cultural identity, the film still resorts to, an at best, paternalistic viewpoint defined by racist ideas. This scene certainly embodies one such idea: that, despite her cultured upbringing, Jedda’s tribal roots threaten to take hold like a kind of possession, a madness that neither she, nor her adoptive mother can control. Follow this link to see the scene again. If you’d like to hear actor and now tribal leader, politician and activist, Rosie Kunoth-Monks talk about her experience playing Jedda, this site has an interview with her.
