Writing as Kin: Producing Ethical Histories Through Collaboration in Unexpected Places. Researching F.W. Albrecht, Assimilation Policy and Lutheran Experiments in Aboriginal Education

Abstract

This chapter explores the possibilities of relationality through collaboration between an Indigenous and non-Indigenous scholar. It describes an attempt to move beyond the problematic ways in which Indigenous history has largely been written by non-Indigenous historians who utilise archival sources without engaging with the Indigenous communities or people about whom they write. We describe the methodology of a project that focuses on the work of the Finke River Mission and its head missionary Friedrich Wilhelm Albrecht who, during the 1950 and 1960s, initiated an education scheme that targeted ‘half-caste’ Indigenous girls living on pastoral stations across Central Australia.