International Day of the World's Indigenous People
Today (09 August), we celebrate the International Day of the World’s Indigenous People.
There are an estimated 370 million indigenous people in the world, representing 5,000 different cultures. They are inheritors and practitioners of unique cultures and ways of relating to people and the environment. They have sought recognition of their identities, way of life and their right to traditional lands, territories and natural resources for years, yet throughout history their rights have always been violated. (1)
Today, we focus on a study on the Aboriginal Australian, in the Aboriginal Study. (2, 3) Researchers confirmed from the Study that the Australian’s Aboriginal civilisation is the oldest on the planet. They also discovered: • Modern humans are all descendants of a single wave of migrants who left Africa about 72,000 years ago. • Papuan and Aboriginal ancestors split from the main group around 58,000 years ago. • They reached the supercontinent of 'Sahul' that originally united Tasmania, Australia and New Guinea around 50,000 years ago, picking up the DNA of Neanderthals, Denisovans and another extinct hominin along the way. • Papuans and Aboriginals then split around 37,000 years ago, long before the continents were finally cut off from each other around 8,000 years ago. • The genetic lineages show that the first Aboriginal populations swept around the coasts of Australia in two parallel waves. One went clockwise and the other counter-clockwise, which takes no longer than 2,000 to 3,000 years. • By 31,000 years ago, Aboriginal Australian communities became genetically isolated and started to diverge greatly from one another.
Perhaps, the most important discovery for the Aboriginal community is their genetic map, which could help people of the stolen generation reconnect with family and country. It could also help facilitate the repatriation of Aboriginal samples and artefacts held in museums. (4)
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