aboriginal studies
Philip Morrissey
Rosalie Fraser
Shadow Child
Hale & Iremonger $16.95pb, 270pp
0 86806 658 3
R OSALIE FRASER, a two-year-old Aboriginal child, is taken from
her family by Child Welfare authorities and fostered with a
distant relation of her non-Aboriginal father. She suffers years
of abuse at the hands of her foster mother. Occasionally she
runs away but her foster mother is always able to charm her into
returning. She finally leaves for good when she meets a young
man named Stan whom she later marries. In her mid-twenties a
gynaecological operation which becomes unexpectedly complicated
and painful causes flashbacks of the abuse she endured as a child
and she realises she has to confront her past. She writes Shadow
Child and in conclusion recommends writing as a therapy for
anyone 'who has problems to come to terms with'.
Well and good, we might say. The author's achievement is
self-evident. She rose above the trauma of her childhood to
create a family life and overcame literacy problems in order to
write Shadow Child. On the surface this would seem a comfortable
read: the life-narrative road has been travelled before by
indigenous writers and we recognise the stops. There are detailed descriptions of family relationships and their modulations; we learn about the lives of the author's children; about changing jobs and changing residences, childbirths and Aboriginal spirituality (though these visions and illuminations can have an eccentric quality, as when an evil spirit appears in the form of a beautiful puppy dog, for instance). But notwithstanding the familiar genre this is an unsettling book. Therapeutic for its author, it leaves the reader with misgivings and anxieties. These relate to two issues: first, the disturbing subject matter, and second, the relation of writing to the social world.
Shadow Child is specifically grounded in questions of child welfare and child abuse. While an unhappy childhood has been described as good training for an author, the grossly abusive childhood is not so flippantly dealt with. At this moment there are untold numbers of child soldiers, child prostitutes, and child labourers all around the world. On a micro-level cases of sexual and physical abuse of children continually come to our attention. How can these realities be represented, and more tellingly, imaginatively transformed so that people are willing to listen? The careless representation and discussion of these cases seem sometimes as abusive and exploitative, in their own sphere, as the practices they expose and deplore.
There are several levels of abuse in Shadow Child. The State institutes impersonal forms of objectification, as surveillance, evaluation and dossier-keeping are implemented by anonymous people doing their jobs. It is in the confinesof the author's foster family that personalised abuse occurs. The perpetrator is the author's foster mother, and the fact that she fulfils the dual role of nurturer and torturer means that it is not an easy task for Fraser to disengage emotionally. Fraser provides a compendium of forms of abuse extending from systematic beltings to cruel violations of a sexual nature. One dreadful act in particular, if proven in court would have brought its perpetrator many years' imprisonment.