Bennelong Society

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The Bennelong Society was established to:

promote debate and analysis of Aboriginal policy in Australia, both contemporary and historical;
inquire into the causes of the present appalling plight of many contemporary Aboriginal people;
seek to influence public opinion so that the prospects for amelioration of the condition of these people are improved;
encourage research into the history of the interaction between Australia's Indigenous people and the Europeans and others who settled in Australia from 1788 onwards, and of the ideas through which this interaction was interpreted by both Europeans and Aborigines;
make available to the Australian community, particularly through the Internet, the results of these activities.

The society was named after the Eora man, Bennelong, who served as an interlocutor between the Indigenous Australian and British cultures, both in Sydney and in the United Kingdom almost from the start of British settlement of Australia in 1788.^[1]

The Bennelong Society's Website ([1]) was officially launched by Senator the Hon. John Herron with a speech at Parliament House, Canberra on 15 May 2001.

The Society holds an annual conference at which the Bennelong Medal [2] is awarded.

Recipients of the medal have been:

2002: Professor Boni Robertson, who had chaired the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Women's Task Force on Violence
2003: Dulcie and Dorothy Wilson, members of the Ngarrindjeri community of South Australia, and significant dissidents in the Hindmarsh Island bridge controversy
2004: Pastor Paul Albrecht AM, Director of the Finke River (Hermannsburg) Mission from 1970 to 1998
2005: Warren Mundine, vice-president of the Australian Labor Party

The Society is regarded as a conservative think-tank on Indigenous issues and is affiliated with conservative commentators in debates on Indigenous affairs.^[2]^[3]