Racism, Moral Community, and Australian Aboriginal Autobiographical Testimony

From almost the first moment of colonization in 1788, British authorities sought to "civilize" Aboriginal Australians by separating Aboriginal children from their families. Racist discourse located Aboriginal people as not quite human Others who were outside moral community with white colonists. As excluded Others, Aboriginals were subject to treatment that would be deemed "criminal" if inflicted on persons located within the moral community. Autobiographical testimony by Aboriginal people separated from their families has been a significant political tool for undermining racialized moral exclusion. This article explores how Margaret Tucker's If Anyone Cared (1977) uses autobiography to challenge assumptions of white moral superiority, and to call white readers into moral community with Aboriginal speakers.