Terra nullius is a Latin term meaning "nobody's land". It was a principle that several nations used in international law to justify claims that territory may be acquired by a state's occupation of it.
The Dreaming represents the time when ancestral spirits wandered over the land and created life and important physical geographic formations and sites. It is an all-embracing concept that provides rules for living, a moral code, as well as rules for interacting with the natural environment.
In February 1965 Charles Perkins led a group of university students on a bus trip around rural NSW to challenge racism. Their trip became known as the Freedom Ride.
In 1770 Captain James Cook landed in Botany Bay and claimed possession of the East Coast of Australia for Britain under the doctrine of ‘terra nullius’, the only way he could do so according to the international law of Europe in the late 18th century without consulting with or defeating Aboriginal people.
The second question of the 1967 Australian referendum of 27 May 1967 asked whether to give the government the power to make laws for Aboriginal people, and whether to count them in the Census.
In January 1972, four young Aboriginal men, Billy Craigie, Tony Coorey, Michael Anderson and Bert Williams drove from Sydney to Canberra to protest the government's rejection of Aboriginal land rights. they placed a beach umbrella and a tent on the lawns outside Parliament House with a sign that read ‘Aboriginal Embassy'.
