Dark Emu

I have been looking for a copy of this book for a long while now, and was lucky enough to be gifted a voucher recently, so I bit the bullet and bought it new (rare for me).
First published in 2014, (and reprinted a lot!) then revised in 2018, I have a copy of the slightly longer revised edition.

This is a fascinating book, with extensive references and bibliography which clearly spells out all Pascoe's source material.

The quick overview is (not Pascoe's words), that history is written by the victors - or in this case - the colonists. For as long as Australian history has been written, the Aboriginals have been described as Stone-aged man depicted as subsistence hunters, who live is temporary shelters. Pascoe uses the original colonists and explorer's diaries which describe what they found as they moved through remote parts of Australia. Pascoe has organised his evidence into chapters titled Agriculture; Aquaculture; Population and Housing; Storage and Preservation; Fire; The Heavens, language and Law; The Australian Agricultural Revolution; Accepting history and Creating the Future.

I found much of what Pascoe has set out in this book compelling, although I do think he brought all his best work at the beginning, and it faded out towards the end. Pascoe has a very fair point that Western civilisation makes the criteria against which cultures are assessed. Australia's colonial history was brutal, and land was taken at will, converted to grazing land and it's inhabitants effectively chased away. It suits the colonists narrative that the Aboriginal were fully nomadic, had no ties to the land, had no organised tribal structure - it makes it so much easier to justify the occupation of these lands. This all makes sense.

The various descriptions of agriculture, land management, waterways management, periodic controlled burning of undergrowth and building of structures is very compelling - extensive quotations from multiple and varied sources. A large part of Pascoe's narrative is that the history writers were selective in the information they used, and the specific wording used was all tailored to justify the way the Aboriginals were treated.

So far so good, but I have a few concerns with this book, which I will briefly outline below.

1 - I have concerns that Pascoe could be guilty of what he accuses history writers of - careful section of quotations from source material. What I mean here, is if historians took only the parts of writing which described aboriginals as stone-aged, is Pascoe taking only the quotations that suit his own narrative?

2 - I worry that Pascoe overplays his assertions. For example, I have no doubts about elaborate fish and eel traps, waterway and well management and construction of dams. Even the management of fishstocks - traps which allow smaller fish to pass through, capturing only mature fish. However I was less convinced with the evidence of cultivating fish and breeding to complete the ‘aquaculture' component.

3 -Pan-Continent Government - the back of the book claims that it is demonstrated that the Aboriginals had organised this. The detail, however, is that there was no evidence of violent change - to me this doesn't appear to be the same thing. Cooperation and organisation between adjacent tribes sharing lands etc - yes, but I am not sure I was convinced on a pan-continent government.

5 - Gavin Menzies. Pascoe almost had me convinced until he resorted to referencing Menzies and his 1421 book. Now there is a book to be skeptical about - amateur historian with lots of ideas and a lack of evidence.

For me the agricultural section was the most interesting. The symbiotic relationship between the Aboriginals and the land was clearly demonstrated - the scale of some of the agricultural claims I think would need further verification. And there is no doubt that some of the traditional Aboriginal foods are now becoming popular - you only need to casually view Australian Masterchef to see that has developed even further since this book was published.

So overall, I found this incredibly interesting, and while I have not rushed off to do my own research and check sources as Pascoe's detractors recommend, I am no historian, and I read for entertainment, so I probably won't, although I happily read explorers tales so will know what to keep and eye out for!

4 stars.

A great read that tears apart simplistic definitions of “hunter-gatherers” vs “agriculturalist”.

There's some contention about accuracy - it does feel a little like Bruce might be overstretching himself trying to build a farming narrative - but separate to that it at leasts helps readers appreciate how Aboriginals treated the whole of Australia as their farm, cultivating it in simple-yet-complex ways on a scale larger and looser than we might imagine.

A fascinating reevaluation of our history, and one that provides a basis for further developing our own uniquely Australian identity.

Who were the first humans to bake bread?

If you had asked me a few months ago, I would have probably guessed the Egyptians.

But what if it was the Aboriginal Australians? And not by any small margin. There is evidence to suggest that Australians were cultivating grains and baking bread more than 30,000 years ago, a good 15,000 years ahead of the Egyptians.

In Dark Emu: Aboriginal Australia and the Birth of Agriculture, author Bruce Pascoe writes:

And this baking was not a one-off occurrence. Archeaologists found a 25,000 year-old grindstone at distant Kakadu in the Northern Territory: the bakers of antiquity. Why don't our hearts fill with wonder and pride?
Why indeed?

As Pascoe illustrates again and again, the Europeans who first arrived in Australia had preconceived notions about the people who lived there. They assumed that Aboriginal Australians were not sophisticated so they conveniently overlooked all evidence to the contrary. He writes:

It is clear from the journals of the explorers that few were in Australia to marvel at a new civilization; they were there to replace it. Most were simply describing a landscape from which settlers could profit. Few bothered with the evidence of the existing economy, because they knew it was about to be subsumed.
The evidence of advanced societies was not hidden away; it was there all along in the many diaries that Pascoe quotes from repeatedly. Aboriginal Australians cultivated fields, constructed large, permanent dwellings, stored large quantities of food and water, and developed ingenious systems for catching fish — all the qualities that scientists use to define advanced cultures. And yet the world today still largely views these people as nomadic hunters and gatherers.

But as we have seen with the Europeans who set foot in the Americas, it was more convenient to assume the natives were nomadic when you were busy stealing their land.

Dark Emu is a fascinating and painful history of Australia. Yet Pascoe did not write this book simply to assign blame, but to point a way to a better future.

For the Indigenous Australians knew quite a lot about gardening, soil management and fire management. While Europeans were importing seeds that were difficult to grow in the country, the locals had cultivated species that thrived, species that could solve significant food and water challenges. The natives used controlled fires as a tool for enriching the soil and preventing more destructive fires — a practice that is now in demand throughout Australia (as well as here in the Western US).

Knowing the truth about Indigenous Australians isn't just an academic exercise. Learning how they coexisted with the land and the animals poses important lessons for our path towards a more sustainable and compassionate future.

My only issue with this profound book is Pascoe's insistence that we will always eat meat, and that Australians should turn toward harvesting kangaroos. While I understand his motivations (moving away from conventional animal agriculture), I think he could and should aim higher. Just as it's vital to understand our history, it's equally vital to evolve. Just because our ancestors ate meat does not mean our descendants are bound to a similar fate.

NOTE: This review first appeared on EcoLitBooks.com.

I've been sitting on this review for a while as I felt it wasn't exactly my place to give this book a rating - much like rating a biography, who am I to say if the story of such a persons life was good or bad? With Dark Emu I thought, how can I give a rating to the stories and way of life of Indigenous Australians? However, I have decided that I should at least give my thoughts on this brilliant book. This book was so educational and I really enjoyed reading and learning - no matter how disappointed I was that I had not been taught these things in school and the sheer volume of things I just did not know. I think this book should be one that all Australians read and should be in the school curriculum. It is incredibly well researched and the evidence presented makes you question how you didn't know all of this before (although we already know why). I thoroughly enjoyed reading Dark Emu and would highly recommend it.

Kind of mind blowing. Feel a bit sick that I needed convincing of all of this info (because it's so far from what I was taught growing up)

Really incredible. A must read for our generation, I think. Truly deepened my understanding of Australia

Such an important book

This book proves that there is a need for a more comprehensive coverage of this subject of Aboriginal Australians and their pre colonial agriculture. At 156 pages of text far too short so therefore not as in depth as I would have thought possible.

None the less fascinating. Recommended.