Addressing Cultural Difference in Indigenous Copyright Cases

Bibliographic Data

ID2145200
AuthorsRiccardo Mazzola (0000-0002-4897-2103, University of Macerata, corresponding author)
Year2023
Volume33
Issue3
Pages195-212
Publication date2023-07-03
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueAnthropological Forum (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0066-4677 • E-ISSN: 1469-2902
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/00664677.2023.2264519
OpenAlexW4387460012
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited17

This article presents and discusses two different ways through \nwhich the Ganalbingu people (Australia) addressed cultural \ndifferences in the normative conceptualisation of artworks in a \njudicial setting. The analysis focuses on linguistic conduct held by \nthe plaintiffs, their representatives, and expert witnesses in two \ncases discussed before the Australian Federal Court (Northern \nTerritory): Bulun Bulun v Nejlam Pty Ltd (1989) and Bulun Bulun v R \n& T Textiles Pty Ltd (1998). In both cases, Ganalbingu artist Johnny \nBulun Bulun lamented a violation of his copyright in two \npaintings. This article mostly relies on affidavits and judicial \ndocumentation, and aims to show and attempts to explain the \nexistence of two opposed tendencies in the judicial narrative on \ncopyright law: namely, an enforced (attempt to) assimilation of \nGanalbingu culture to the Western legal categories of \n(intellectual) property and copyright law, however simultaneously \n’insisting on difference’, that is emphasising the fundamental \ndistinctions between Ganalbingu and Western normative \nconception of artworks. The article particularly enlightens the \nimpact on the Ganalbingu judicial narrative of anthropological \naccounts rendered through affidavits, especially in one of the two \ncases in which Bulun Bulun was involved. After investigating the \nnature and function of those accounts, it concludes that several \nfactors can explain the seemingly ambivalent nature of \nGanalbingu linguistic conduct, ranging from a ‘spurious’ nature of \nmisappropriated artworks to forms of resistance to an unbalance \nof power potentially leading to unwanted colonisation

Ambivalence · Indigenous · Linguistics · Narrative · Normative · Plaintiff · Political science · Sociology · Cultural Heritage Management and Preservation · Jury Decision Making Processes · Law · Law in Society and Culture · Psychology · Social Psychology

Tools

Open DOI