Young people working for change

It is not a figment of our imagination that, for the first time, young people know each other and work together for change across the globe. The Oxfam International Youth Parliament is a network of young leaders in 92 countries who are working for positive change in their own communities. These young people are in no way homogenous. They come from unique communities, and work on a diversity of issues at local, national, regional and international levels.

In PNG and Southern Africa they are combating HIV-AIDS with peer education, in Mexico, Fiji and Pakistan they are advocating for the rights of women; and in India, East Timor and Zambia they are working with farmers to achieve sustainable livelihoods. In their connection to each other their work is strengthened. The power of their connectedness is in human rights educators sharing materials between the Solomon Islands and Zimbabwe and by common campaigns for peace through Africa or for trade justice across 20 countries.

It is the diversity and distinctiveness of action partners that makes the OIYP network dynamic. We have found that connecting young people already working for change in their own communities strengthens all of their work as they draw on each other’s experiences, ideas and resources. Their conversations about gender or strategies for combating HIV-AIDS reveal their diversity and create a dynamic environment for new ideas and new approaches to be developed or shared.

One Australian action partner is Tim Lehâ. Tim is a Kamilaroi and Tongan young Australian. Tim’s work focuses on addressing the lack of representation of Indigenous people in the media. He works for balanced depictions of Indigenous people, media created by Indigenous people, and media developed in culturally appropriate ways. He’s trying to create an alternative to the outdated media content already in the public domain in Australia and, globally, to challenge perceptions held by non-Indigenous people, and provide realistic images for Indigenous people. Tim has been working this year with Living Black on SBS, recording a different style and type of story about Indigenous people across Australia.

May Miller-Dawkins sat down and had a yarn with Tim Lehâ about his views on youth culture, the universal and the particular.

MMD: Is youth culture homogenised?

TL: We are homogenised “only if we don’t resist” … I would argue for the particular.

MMD: Well, what defines “youth culture”?

TL: Youth culture is defined by young people. We relate to any social sphere based on our experience. As an Indigenous person I don’t want to generalise. For a lot of Indigenous people the last thing we want to do is say we represent people other than ourselves.

My experience is very specific - I’m from an Indigenous community so there are universal aspects but my interpretation is very specific. I grew up non-traditionally and my Dad’s Tongan so I identify as Tongan also. Identity, any kind of identity, is malleable.

MMD: What are the differences between you and your parent’s generation?

TL: There are socio-economic differences between the generations of my family. I think that my parents are a product of their generation - they have a commitment to working for work’s sake and for survival. I, on the other hand, have resisted working solely for money. I am not willing to work myself to the bone for little reward. But in the end, socially conscious people tend to do that anyway. So maybe it’s just a different way of manifesting.

I am both a practical and impractical person. My impracticality is because my parents have been able to support me in that. I couldn’t have had that freedom without them. Some people say that everyone’s born equal. That’s not the case. I believe in social equity - that people are different and we don’t all have access to the same opportunities. I’m lucky that I’ve had my parent’s support behind me.

MMD: What about similarities between the generations?

TL: We have some core values. Our concept of family is that if you’re mob, you’re mob. Doesn’t matter if someone is a distant relation - if they’re part of the mob, they belong.

MMD: What about political views?

TL: My politics are more formed than my parents. I’ve been arguing with my mum since high school. She used to argue that we should go back to the 50s and I thought otherwise. I thought she had a misplaced notion of innocence. Mum learns now from watching Living Black - she gets all fired up. She’s having a new education. For me, I’ve always liked the quote “If you’re not angry, you’re not paying attention.” I think that it applies.

MMD: Has your work with Living Black exposed you to many different people and communities?

TL: I’m so privileged in my job - being welcomed into communities. Doors are opened - I can spend time with people and their families and get to discuss things they wouldn’t normally talk about. Being in that position, you have to be very careful and follow protocol.

There’s a difference I believe between journalism and Indigenous journalism but I’m not sure what that is. Indigenous journalism is still finding itself and will continue to as there are more Indigenous journalists.

In my view there are core values in Indigenous journalism which complement journalistic ethics - they are Indigenous ethics. It’s like the notion of Indigenous human rights versus universal human rights. Concerns about Indigenous media coverage aren’t new - people like Marcia Langton and Lester Bostock have published on this in the past and there are now guidelines for mainstream media to follow. Unfortunately those that do are in the minority. I think that as more Indigenous media is created you will see the difference in Indigenous ethics and ways of storytelling.

MMD: How has your involvement in international networks changed your understandings of youth culture?

TL: The more I’ve networked I’ve found that Indigenous peoples globally have so much in common - which isn’t about being united in victimhood. I think that the concept of being united in victimhood is wrong.

Although Indigenous peoples I’ve met have had similar experiences of colonisation – with deliberate acts dealt against Indigenous Peoples for the purpose of dispossession, I’ve also found that we share similar practices of culture and respect for land and life.

MMD: A lot of the talk of globalisation is about a global culture - do you think that globalisation is driving the homogenisation of culture?

TL: People are uniting from globalisation but there are still so many people who feel alone. No matter how much you talk about global effects or global capitalism, some people are very alienated and isolated in this world. When I think of globalisation I think of the zealots of the global project.

But the way I see it, globalisation means a time when people around the planet are linked. I define it as the free movement across borders of people, ideas and technology. And I don’t think it’s anything that new. Back in the Roman Empire, the Mediterranean rim was the edge of the world for them and there existed the free movement of people, ideas and technology in the world they knew. They had globalisation for their world view.

In Australia, pre-invasion, when there were over 500 language groups, and song lines, trade routes, and dreaming tracks spanned the continent - there was movement of ideas, peoples and technologies: they also had globalisation for their worldview.

In the end, globalisation is a reaction to post-modernity. I see it as a need to argue once more for the universal. Some people get lost looking at the bigger picture…

Tim is one of 301 OIYP action partners working for change in their communities. Their action is made more dynamic by the free movement of ideas across a diverse and disparate network. And across that network there are as many interpretations of youth culture as young people.

As Tim says, youth culture is defined by young people. Beyond that, we see across the OIYP network that young people have the power to effect positive changes to strengthen their communities. As just one example, Tim’s work continues to impact on perceptions of Indigenous Australia by Indigenous and non-Indigenous people alike in positive and powerful ways, creating new spaces for new voices to be heard.