Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders: Community Cultural Identity (Coursework Sample)

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders: Community Cultural Identity
Name:
Institution:
Table of Contents
Executive Summary……………………………………………………………………..3
Introduction……………………………………………………………………………...3
Description of Aboriginal Cultural Identity……………………………………………..3
Health Issues of the community…………………………………………………………5
Programs run by community health service……………………………………………..6
Improvement in the Community Resulting From the Program……………………….....6
Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………….7
References………………………………………………………………………………..8
Executive Summary
The Aboriginal people have continuously been discriminated against with regards to health as a result of language or geographical barriers. Cultural barriers also play a fundamental role in this disparity as the group has strong traditions and beliefs that influence the delivery of care. It is critical for medical practitioners to understand these subtle details to facilitate delivery of proper care without prejudice. This paper provides a review of the cultural elements that make up the population and their traditions that are believed to have a role in increasing the susceptibility of this community to diseases compared to other citizens. Besides, the primitive conditions that affect the group are also addressed as well as the programs run at the community level to enhance well-being and good health.
Introduction
Culture is defined as a manner through which human groups organize themselves and interact with their environment. It enables us to have a framework through which we can understand common behaviors that may not be apparent to outsiders. Working with cross-cultural situations, calls for practitioners to accept individuals who have different cultures by respecting their backgrounds (Krysinska, Martin, and Sheehan, 2009).
This paper provides a description of the culture of the Aboriginal people in Australia to enable public health personnel to attend the community’s health concerns without preconception and prejudice based on erroneous ideas. In this case, the author narrows down on how the subject under study relate or interact with others and how other individuals classify their world of the living.
Description of Aboriginal Cultural Identity
In this case, the culture will be elaborated under visible behaviors, covert factors, elemental issues, beliefs, presumptions, artifacts, location of traditional land and ancestry. In reference to Korff (2012), Aboriginal culture is considered to be devoid of culture previously, due to their lack of material possessions. At first, the community was against using the wheel to till their land when the Europeans first arrived thus terming them as primitive due to the European’s inability to comprehend the complicated spiritual and cultural lives.
Cultural identity defines the self-perception of an individual as a discrete separate entity portraying certain traits. Carson et al. (2007) report that it is related to social identity which includes roles in the social setting. While character establishes a set of individual positions, each in the community maintains varying interactions and relationships hence giving a sense of belonging whether at the family, community or national level.
The Aboriginal Australians interpret ancestral lands as Country and are an integral element of their identity. The culture hence associate family to “country” with one having to express knowledge and identify themselves with these ancestral lands. According to Flood (2004), the group believes in the presence of “countries” where it was not just a name given to describe creeks, hills or trees. This is perceived as the Kuuti that accorded them life. They believed in a supreme being who created their lands for them to hunt and have fun.
The community believed that they occupied those locations seeing that Malu and Ngintaka gave them life, the plants, the people as well as their language. The identity of this community is widely associated with the land which his ancestors historically occupied, also known as country. In this case, the invasion of these lands resulted in the physical loss of their territories as well as sovereignty. Occupation of these lands, as well as colonialism, has triggered loss of beliefs, language such as South Slavey as well as social structures that formed the underlying fabric of the culture.
The Aboriginal occupy the southern parts of the Australian continent with caves such as the Allen’s Cave located on the Nullarbor plains. In most of those theories, the north, and northwest regions were identified as the areas of arrival. Each of the groups adopted their environment as well as dreamings also defined as their belief systems. They reflected how the people identified their lands and environment to enhance co-existence among the aspects of their world (Krysinska, Martin, and Sheehan, 2009).
Health Issues of the community
Between the years 2004 and 2008, about 66% of Indigenous deaths occurred before attaining the age of sixty-five years as compared to 20% of the rest of the population (AIHW, 2011). The number of diabetes cases in children hailing from Aboriginal backgrounds was six times greater compared to non-indigenous children. Biddle (2011) states that in 2010, indigenous Australians were hospitalized at a higher rate, five times, compared to the number of non-indigenous persons. Between 2004 and 2005, cardiovascular disease posed the greatest challenge regarding death. Kidney disease also led to more deaths amongst the aboriginal people.
In reference to Couzos and Murray (2007), eye conditions such as cataract, refractive erroe, trachoma as well as diabetic retinopathy also cause problems. Smoking is a key concern amongst the indigenous population thus increasing disease burden. The factors that increased the susceptibility of the community to such conditions include the poor economic circumstances such as poverty, inadequate environmental sanitation as well as the poor living conditions. Rowley et al. (2008) states that additional factors include the Aboriginal behaviors that deteriorate life such as poor diet, use of alcohol and tobacco as well as low activity levels, poor nutrition, and infections.
Programs run by community health service
The government is geared towards providing efficient and effective health services for the Aboriginal population. In reference to Australian Bureau of Statistics (2010), 920 million dollars were spent in the year 2014/2015 on provision health programs directed to these particular cultures in remote areas. These include Medicare and improved access to drugs using the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. The levels of funding for these programs have continued to increase.
The programs also include Indigenous Australian Health’s program that was established in 2014 which consolidated other health funding streams such as primary health care base funding streams, primary health care base funding, child and maternal health activities, stronger futures in the Northern Territory as well as the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander chronic disease Fund. According to Australian Bureau of Statistics (2011), 94 million dollars have also been allocated to improving maternal and infant health through programs such as Better Start Life. The Healthy for life program has been expanded into a further 32 Aboriginal community health organizations aimed at improving the management of diseases.
Improvement in the Community Resulting From the Program