The Importance Of Being Cultural Competent By Doris...

This essay will provide information and outline the importance of being cultural competent, explore issues the Indigenous community have faced, and explain how Doris Pilkington Garimara drew attention to those problems. Cultural competence means to respect, accept and appreciate all cultures without any form of prejudice (Murphy, 2011). In the early twentieth century, Pilkington highlighted the issues about racism and the Stolen Generations to create awareness about those topics, lead people to respect and embrace Indigenous cultures, and hopefully lead those people to become culturally competent too. Doris Pilkington Garimara was an Indigenous Australian author born in 1937 at Balfour Downs Station, Western Australia, near the†¦show more content†¦The aim was to force the children to adopt white culture. They were required to reject their Indigenous heritage and were forbidden to speak their tradition languages. Females were taught to become domestic servants, and men were to become stockmen (Korff, 2017). Despite their efforts to live like white people, many of the Stolen Generations were not seen as equals, and experienced racism and abuse. Unfortunately, there were people who agreed with the assimilation policy, or deny that any Indigenous children were stolen (Korff, 2017). These people believe that the children were being saved from being mistreated by their families and becoming malnourished. However, authorities who took children away usually pretended that their parents neglected them and were left starving. Although, according to Jens Korff (2017) there is plenty of evidence that the children were left hungry because Indigenous people were not paid the full amount of wages they were owed. Many Indigenous people today still suffer the effects of the destruction of their culture and identity. Pilkington was a member of the government sanctioned Reconciliation Committee in hope to restore the relationships between the white and Indigenous people, and was a promoter of National Sorry day, a yearly event that started in 1998 to commemorate the government’s mistreatment of the