| The extermination of the Tasmanian Aborigines has become one of the darkest moments in Australian history. However, some historians assert that history was not a violent one. The mainstream historiography predominantly produced by the White historians is not entirely free from the vestiges of the hegemony of colonial discourse. The colonial discourse works in a binary opposition Europe/Other or White/Black. Europeans become the subject in the production of history knowledge of the colonial era. Mudrooroo's Doctor Wooreddy's prescription for enduring the ending of the world is a project of the revision of the history of Tasmanian Aborigines. In this masterpiece, Mudrooroo (Colin Johnson) chronicles the destruction of the Tasmanian Aborigines after the advent if the European settlers. This paper is framed in the postcolonial theories of the subaltern of Spivak and Chakrabarty since it discusses a historical novel composed by an Aboriginal author. From the beginning, the relation between the European settlers and the Aborigines is not symmetrical. The former, as represented by George Augustus Robinson, the Chief Protector of Aborigines, sees the latter, as represented by Woorreddy, as uncivilized creatures. Therefore, they needed to be civilized, among others by Christianizing them. Upon this reason, the Aborigines are compelled to succumb to the oppressive contract with the settlers. The first tool of the contract is the civilizing mission which consists of symbolic violence. The settlers forbid the Aborigines to observe their spiritual activities and their traditional customs. They also must change their names into European names. The second tool of the oppressive contract is the exertion of physical violence such as threats, killing and raping. Besides, the White settlers also trespass their sacred grounds where Aboriginal ceremonies are observed. As a result, the Aborigines are alienated; their relation to nature is destroyed. They suffer from the agony of colonization and, as a result, one by one perishes. The advent of the White settlers becomes the doom of the Tasmanian Aborigines. Mudrooroo's narrative is a perspective in the Australian historiography in which the history is written by the subaltern group. This kind of narrative restores to the subaltern group, in this case the Australian Aborigines, their historical being. |