ABSTRACT
Like Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man, local Kooris struggle with the imperceptibility that cloaks their journey in pursuing Indigenous community development and reterritorilisation in the City of Newcastle). Invisibility concerns the desire to be socially seen in regards to rebuilding and reclaiming First Nations peoples’ rightful place within the city. Having a voice, being heard, and being seen or understood is the desired state. Seeing the institutions and governance structures created is the desired state. Recognising the social capabilities of the community to mobilise Indigenous social relations, governance, language, culture, and cultural identity to overcome the disadvantage that First Nations peoples experience is the desired state.
Indigenous community development has become, as it will be argued, in a purposeful and critical sense wilfully invisible in policy spaces in the neoliberal age. Community-based Indigenous organisations at the heart of resurgence and community development and overcoming community disadvantage in the city of Newcastle over the last 45 years are merely seen today as Indigenous service delivery organisations.
