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https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-12-03/first-nations-people-given-names-like-bing-crosby-and-stalin/103140862>
"Bing Crosby remembers the moment he discovered there was another, more famous
man bearing his name.
“I didn’t know there was another Bing Crosby,” he says.
“I was listening to the wireless, and I got a shock.”
The Walmajarri man was living on a cattle station on the edge of the Great
Sandy Desert in northern Western Australia.
His name had never been an issue.
Bing was entering middle-age by the time he realised he had a famous namesake.
“He seems alright… I like Bing Crosby’s music, but I like Slim Dusty more,” he
chuckles.
And he wasn’t the only one making a startling discovery.
Bing was part of a generation of Aboriginal people who grew up on the vast
cattle stations of northern Australia.
Many — like Bing — were named by the white pastoralists who ran these stations.
Bing’s mother was named Shirley Temple. She was a beautiful woman, locals say,
who had soft, shiny, curly hair.
But some men were given the names of the worst mass-murderers in human history
— names like Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini.
Other First Nations people were named after objects or animals, such as
Flourbag, Mosquito, Billycan, Helicopter and Frypan.
The names have been carried through life by people in remote pockets of
northern and central Australia — relics of a time not that long ago when
Aboriginal people were denied basic rights, including the right to name their
own child."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
