Hello everybody,
I have joined this list a few months ago and am
thoroughly enjoying all the discussions that are taking place on the list. (even
though the issues disscused are not always that positive) I am a Dutch student,
studying at Adelaide Uni for one year. One of the subjects I am taking is
Depicting Aboriginal Cosmology, which is a fascinating, but demanding subject.
Your discussions have been helpful for my essays so far - thanks! but the topic
for my next essay is a bit more complicated and I was wondering and hoping you
might be able to provide me with some ideas. The topic is the term
"Dreamtime", whether this term is adequate for the matter it covers or
not.
My idea is to relate the concept of the
dreamtime to christian religion - why isn't it called religion for example (does
this have something to do with the fact that christianity is see as superior to
Aboriginal beliefs?) and to the western concepts of dreams - to see to what
extent these ideas about dreams can be related to the term dreamtime. Other than
that, I'm also wondering when and why the Aboriginal people started to use the
word dreamtime themselves - and whether this has had an impact on their
conception of the "dreamtime".
This topic might be a golden oldie for all of
you, but it is new to me and I was hoping you might be able to give me a few
perspectives on it.
Any comments are welcome!
Thanks very much,
Elise de Bree