policy & reform
campusreview.com.au
How to Colonise 101
A student complaint prompts
Griffith University to change how a
First Peoples course is delivered.
By Kate Prendergast
A
student at Griffith University
has called out a professor for
promoting a colonial version of
history in a first-year Indigenous studies
class. The complaint has prompted
Griffith to change the method of the
course’s delivery.
In a 729-word public post on his Facebook
page published on 27 March, student
Andrew Beitzel accused Professor Regina
Ganter of championing a white saviour
narrative, and framing German missionaries’
interaction with Australia’s Indigenous
peoples as more positive than problematic.
Beitzel’s post was accompanied by
25 images of the class’s PowerPoint
slides. At the time of writing, the post has
attracted 2400 reactions, 1500 comments
and 1300 shares.
Professor Ganter, who is a non-
Indigenous German woman, is the
convener of the 12-week First Peoples
(1088LHS) course at Griffith’s Gold Coast
campus and, in the original course outline,
was the lecturer of half of its classes.
A professor of Australian history in the
School of Humanities, she has a long
and established career collaborating with
Indigenous communities and academics,
and has published numerous papers on
Australia’s Indigenous history, present and
inter-cultural encounters. She has also
sat on the Research Advisory Committee
for the Australian Institute of Aboriginal
10
and Torres Strait Islander Studies, and
developed an ARC-funded project
on German missionaries in Australia.
Beitzel, however, a descendent of the
Stolen Generations, took issue with the
class’s content and tone.
“I knew it was going to be bad when
the first slide was a picture of a German
missionary handing Aboriginal children
lollies as gifts, presented without
comment,” he wrote.
Finding her preamble on the German
Enlightenment and Hegelian dialectics far
from germane, Beitzel said, “The lecturer
proceeded to talk about the, in her words,
‘German difference’ in missions, and how
German missions were better for Aboriginal
peoples than English-run missions.”
He also alleges the professor claimed
that “missionaries prevented genocide”, and
that the course itself was created without
consultation with local Indigenous Elders
impacted by the Stolen Generations.
“We never needed our souls to be saved,
and we never needed our culture to be
taken from us from missionaries who
were here illegally … This class is teaching
white students to effectively be colonisers,
learning a history from a white perspective
that uses Aboriginal accounts that only
further a pro-mission bias.”
In an official response, Professor
Paul Mazerolle, pro-vice-chancellor
(arts, education and law) at Griffith
University, stood by Ganter, defending
her “excellent reputation” and pointing
to her distinguished career working in
the Indigenous studies field and with the
Indigenous community.
The university has nonetheless treated
the student’s complaint seriously and
taken a number of steps to address the
concerns raised.
Following the incident and the social
media-driven outcry, a meeting was
convened between Ganter; the co-chairs
of Griffith’s Council of Elders; staff from
the Office of Indigenous Community
Engagement, Policy and Partnerships; and
the GUMURRII Student Support Unit.
From this meeting came a collective
recommendation that the university’s
Indigenous studies major “be led and
primarily delivered by an Indigenous
teaching team”.
The university intends to act on this
recommendation and make more
Indigenous appointments to teach in the
major. Griffith also says Ganter previously
advocated for this method of delivery.
Griffith and Ganter subsequently agreed
that “the remainder of the First Peoples
course will now be taught by an Indigenous
academic”, Mazerolle said.
Mazerolle and the head of school
also met with Beitzel in an effort to fully
understand his concerns about the First
Peoples course.
In a separate meeting, Beitzel spoke with
GUMURRII and members of the Council
of Elders for “support and guidance in
relation to the complaint processes at the
university”, Mazerolle said.
“Our focus is on ensuring the best
outcomes for students in the course.”
The First Peoples course is described
on Griffith University’s website as an
examination of what it means to be
Indigenous today, and looks at “the
structures of disadvantage and sources
of Indigenous empowerment in a
transnational context”. ■