Indigenous Digital Life

Settler societies habitually frame Indigenous people as ‘a people of the past’—their culture somehow ‘frozen’ in time, their identities tied to static notions of ‘authenticity’, and their communities understood as ‘in decline’. But this narrative erases the many ways that Indigenous people are actively engaged in future-orientated practice, including through new technologies. Indigenous Digital Life offers a broad, wide-ranging account of how social media has become embedded in the lives of Indigenous Australians. Centring on ten core themes—including identity, community, hate, desire and death—we seek to understand both the practice and broader politics of being Indigenous on social media. Rather than reproducing settler narratives of Indigenous ‘deficiency’, we approach Indigenous social media as a space of Indigenous action, production, and creativity; we see Indigenous social media users as powerful agents, who interact with and shape their immediate worlds with skill, flair and nous; and instead of being ‘a people of the past’, we show that Indigenous digital life is often future-orientated, working towards building better relations, communities and worlds. This book offers new ideas, insights and provocations for both students and scholars of Indigenous studies, media and communication studies, and cultural studies.

 

“The future is Indigenous, and this book proves it. Bronwyn Carlson and Ryan Frazer explore where we are and where we’re going, as they advance the complexity of how Indigenous participation and innovation across social media has led anticolonial thought, collaboration, and cultural connectedness. In exploring the everyday experience of Indigenous people online, they provide a first of its kind, expansive review exploring dating and love, irreverence and humour, activism and resistance, and even death and mourning. In doing so, they theorise how these everyday visible actions both connect us and create opportunities for expansive agency to Indigenous peoples and communities.” (Sandy O’Sullivan, ARC Future Fellow, Professor, Macquarie University, author of ‘A lived experience of Aboriginal knowledges and perspectives: how cultural wisdom saved my life’) 

“This highly relevant and impactful book expresses the challenges but even more so the Australian Indigenous daily interactive digital life of land-based experimental, political activist, fun, and radical Indigenous love, experienced fully, intertwined with bodily, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually-filled moments extending into genuine social justice movements. Australian Indigenous decolonizing techniques of digital technologies exist here and now while simultaneously creating possible futures always already.  The scholactivism of Bronwyn Carlson and Ryan Frazer nuanced throughout this book is like gaa-waasikozid anang, " a shining star," that invites all Indigenous peoples and their true allies globally to further become active passweweg,"echo-makers." As we say in Anishinaabemowin, when the research of Australian Indigenous social media invites and welcomes in this manner, aanish noa niinitamawind, "we are the medicine," nimika doa diing, "reaching out to dance with each other.  Maampii dibendaagoziyaang, "Here is where we belong," digitally.” (Grace L. Dillon, Anishinaabe, Professor, Portland State University, editor of Walking the Clouds: An Anthology of Indigenous Science Fiction) 

“Social media has empowered Indigenous Australian communities to connect more readily, while at the same time allowing hateful racist speech to flourish. They have become social spaces for fun, hooking up, nostalgia, lending practical help, and activism against colonial practices, while also changing the way community mourning-- Sorry Business-- takes place. All of these everyday practices, however, must be conducted against the constant background noise of colonial attitudes and racism. Bronwyn Carlson, a pioneer and pre-eminent in the field, and her long-time collaborator Ryan Frazer, have distilled a decade of research into this vital compendium of the lived, everyday realities of being an Indigenous person on social media. It is a signal milestone in the literature on online culture.” (Stuart Cunningham, Distinguished Emeritus Professor, Queensland University of Technology, co-author of Social Media Entertainment: The New Intersection of Hollywood and Silicon Valley)                                  

Bronwyn Carlson is a professor and Head of the Department of Indigenous Studies at Macquarie University. She is the author of The Politics of Identity: Who Counts as Aboriginal Today? (2016), which includes a chapter on identity and community on social media. 

Ryan Frazer is postdoctoral research fellow at Macquarie University, currently working on a project that explores Indigenous people’s experiences of online violence. Since 2014, he has worked as an associate research fellow in Indigenous Studies. He completed his PhD in 2019 at the University of Wollongong.