Modern Australian

In both schooling and sport, Australia has slowly come to recognise its Aboriginal talent pool

  • Written by Colin Tatz, ANU Visiting Professor, Politics and International Relations, Australian National University
In both schooling and sport, Australia has slowly come to recognise its Aboriginal talent poolIndigenous Australians – just on 3% of the population – comprise at least 10%, and generally 12%, of elite footballers.AAP/Julian Smith

The year was 1979, not 1879, when Fr Eugene Perez, a Catholic priest in the Kimberleys, asserted that “his” Aborigines “correspond to the Palaeolithic age”, “primitives who...