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NAIDOC has its origins in the fight
for Aboriginal rights that began to gather pace in the 1920s and
1930s. In those years, organisations such as the Australian
Aborigines Progress Association, the Australian Aborigines League,
and the Aborigines Progressive Association were established to
draw attention to the living conditions suffered by Aboriginal
people and their lack of citizenship rights.
In 1937 activists William Cooper
and William Ferguson joined forces to plan a ‘Day of Mourning’
for 26 January 1938, the 150th anniversary of British settlement
of Australia. Around 1000 Aboriginal people attended a conference
on that day, and the following week a deputation presented the
Prime Minister with a proposed national policy for Aboriginal
people. (This was rejected because the Commonwealth then had no
constitutional responsibility for Aboriginal affairs.)
Cooper also wrote to the National
Missionary Council of Australia (NMCA) seeking its support in
promoting a permanent annual Aborigines Day. From 1940 the NMCA
encouraged churches to observe the Sunday before the Australia Day
weekend as ‘Aboriginal Sunday’. In 1955 the NMCA changed the
date to the first Sunday in July.
In 1957 a National Aborigines Day
Observance Committee (NADOC) was formed with support and
cooperation from Federal and State governments, the churches and
major Indigenous organisations. Its aim was to promote Aboriginal
Sunday as a day to focus community attention on the nation’s
Aboriginal people.
After the 1967 Aboriginal
Referendum and the establishment in 1972 of a Federal Department
of Aboriginal Affairs, the national focus on Indigenous issues
increased significantly. In 1974 NADOC became an all-Indigenous
committee, and in 1975 extended Aboriginal Day to National
Aborigines Week.
In 1985 NADOC agreed to change the
dates of the week from July to September and in 1988 the
committee’s name was changed to NAIDOC—National Aborigines and
Islanders Day Observance Committee—to acknowledge Torres Strait
Islander people.
In 1991 the committee decided to
shift the celebrations back to the first week in July (Sunday to
Sunday) starting from 1992.
The committee was wound up in the
mid-1990s, when the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander
Commission (ATSIC) assumed control of NAIDOC Week, making
decisions on the theme, venue and poster.
In 2005 an interim committee was
set up in South Australia to coordinate National NAIDOC
celebrations in Adelaide. Since 2006, Indigenous leader and former
Senator Aden Ridgeway has been the chairperson of the national
committee. He was given the role as NAIDOC’s custodian in 2005.
Read more about NAIDOC
Week
Read more about the Indigenous
tribes of the Hinchinbrook region
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