Abstract
Aboriginal people assert that a crucial contemporary problem for them is the need, after centuries wherein their culture has been destroyed, to build an Aboriginal identity. This study set out to examine some aspects of the construction of identity from a sociology of knowledge approach. It attempted to map the ‘worlds’ within which Aboriginal people locate themselves and to examine the theorizing through which these worlds were objectivated. Three sites were selected for study: one city, one country, and one tradition-oriented. Interview data revealed that reality definers in each group projected fundamentally different models of Aboriginal society. Within these worlds, the school was a sub-structure providing a locus for theorizing with which students interact to form their identity. Reality-definers within the school situation were found to project positive theorizing about Aboriginal identity which was formulated differently from one site to another; this theorizing legitimated the model of worlds proposed by Aboriginal people. In the case of students, incipient theorizing on the part of non-Aborigines typified Aborigines negatively. Aborigines, however, while also typifying Aborigines in general negatively, interacted with the theorizing, not of other students, but of reality-definers and typified themselves positively. The rudimentary theorizing of both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal students about the world of schooling was positive.