Aboriginality and Socioeconomic Attainment in Australia's Northern Territory

Abstract

Aboriginality occupies an ambiguous position within the dominant discourse of Australian stratification systems. Al though most sociology texts document the condition of Abor iginals with numerous social indicators of disadvantage, there has been little serious attempt to explore the complex causal processes which position them within the European social structure. The population of the Northern Territory, of which just under a quarter are Aboriginal, presents therefore an in teresting field for investigating the effects of Aboriginality as a causal component of an individual's life chances. Results from regression models tested on 1986 Census data indicate that while Aboriginality exerts a significant influence on socio economic attainment, there are important differences in the patterns of causal explanation of life chances between rural and urban Aboriginals. In some respects these are as prominent as the general effect of race itself. Implications of these findings for the contemporary definitions of Aboriginality as a dimen sion of the wider Australian stratification system are dis cussed.