The Reshaping of Identities in Dark Secrets by Australian Indigenous Poet Jeanine Leane

Abstract

The article deals with the contemporary Australian Indigenous poetry, particularly with the verse of Jeanine Leane. Until very recently a marginalised voice in Australian literary studies, Australian Indigenous poetry has obtained an important role in the articulation of Indigenous peoples’ political thought, successfully performing both educative and healing function. Constituting an indictment of white Australian racism, a recuperation of neglected Aboriginal history, and a call for change, Indigenous authors have become involved in the production that used to be reserved as the exclusive domain of Europeans. Based on the premise that literature can play an important role both in maintaining and disrupting the exercise of power, and written against the backdrop of critical whiteness studies, the article focuses on Leane’s collection Dark Secrets (2010). It investigates how the poet uses her medium to explore various aspects of indigeneity and intervene in the public dynamics of racial separation. More specifically, it shows that, by challenging the ongoing reproduction of whiteness as a static privilege-granting category and system of dominance, and affirming Indigenous Australians’ authentic rather than an imposed cultural personality, Leane’s poetry performs personal and collective empowerment of Australian Indigenous peoples and represents an important site for the renegotiation of an inter-racial relationship.