Diaspora, materialism, tradition: Anthropological issues in the recent High Court appeal of the Yorta Yorta

In this paper, Dr Weiner inspects some of the appeals made to tradition and continuity of tradition in the High Court appeal of the Yorta Yorta Native Title case. He suggests that certain common notions of tradition call forth conflicting anthropological accounts of cultural articulation, and that this conflict is not properly acknowledged within the anthropology that concerns itself with Native Title issues strictly speaking. He contrasts two ideal-types of indigeneity in the post-colonial world of settler society and then attempts to conflate the resulting contrast by an appeal to a more sophisticated and contemporary materialist theory.