Queensland Aborigines, Multiple Realities and the Social Sources of Suffering: Part 2 Suicide, Spirits and Symbolism (Report‪)‬

INTRODUCTION This is part two of a paper based on an ethnographic study with residents of an Aboriginal town in rural Queensland during sixteen months residential fieldwork (1995-6). It is a large ex-reserve community of about 2000 residents, and home to descendents of the 40 different language groups that were sent there under the Queensland government's evolving legislative framework. (1) I've maintained a relationship with the town and some of the families ever since. The study seeks to understand the residents' everyday life and high levels of social and emotional distress in terms of their relationship to a history of colonisation and institutionalisation. I explore how these historical realities relate to contemporary marginality and current dynamics as residents try to control their fate and their relationships with government institutions such as health, law, welfare and education.