Aboriginal Beliefs vs. Mining at Coronation Hill

The Containing Force of Traditionalism

Bibliographic Data

ID8960725
AuthorsIan Keen (Australian National University, corresponding author)
Year1993
Volume52
Issue4
Pages344-355
Publication date1993-12-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueHuman Organization (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0018-7259 • E-ISSN: 1938-3517
PublisherSociety for Applied Anthropology (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.17730/humo.52.4.3333705311321468
OpenAlexW2006630325
LanguageEN
Citations received11
References cited7

A dispute in Australia about a potential gold mine at Coronation Hill in the Northern Territory brought together three key icons in the discourse of development: Aboriginal sacred sites, conservation, and mining development. The paper outlines the history of the debate, which came to a head in May 1991. It then reviews both arguments proposed by those who sought to discredit or defend certain Aboriginal claims, and some counter-arguments. Sacred sites legislation and the like construct a frame of recognition in which the consequences of beliefs are binding on people who do not subscribe to them. Such a frame tends to reify beliefs as traditional attributes of a social category. An insistence on unchanging tradition in this particular debate aimed to contain potentially binding forms of belief within strict limits, to prevent the extension of cosmological principles to new conditions and hence to forestall the possibility of the consequences of those extensions being binding on others. This insistence has

Archaeology · Coronation · Geography · Humanities · Sociology · Traditionalism · Cultural Heritage Management and Preservation · Indigenous Health, Education, and Rights · Mining and Resource Management · Philosophy

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