Aboriginal people have lived in Australia for at least 65,000 years, surviving as hunter gatherers. 250 years ago, the British arrived, bringing with them industrial modernity, as well as disease and – sometimes – violence. During most of this modern period, British settlers and their descendants adopted what has been called \"the great Australian silence\", paying little attention to the Aboriginal people they had displaced.
Since the 1960s there has been a transformation in how non-indigenous Australians think about indigenous culture and history. One of the key voices in this transformation has been that of the anthropologist and linguist Peter Sutton, who has a particular expertise in Aboriginal languages and has lived and worked with Aboriginal people all over Australia for more than half a century.
In 2011, Peter published a book titled 'The Politics of Suffering', in which he argued that decades of liberal policy in outback communities had worsened the suffering of Aboriginal people. Today we discuss what Australians get wrong about indigenous affairs.
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