Owing to some odd circumstances, I've spent the better part of my life studying the language and culture of my home, the "Gathang" territories of Australia. It is a lonesome task, as this region is often referred to as the, "most racist place in Australia," and my personal experience suggests that's a correct measure.
To maintain my enthusiasm, I sometimes experiment with new ways of accessing the culture and history of the landscape I grew up in. Having fallen into 3D printing in recent years, I suppose it was only natural I'd try my hand at designing some historical figures. These are 2mm scale, the idea being to play the tiny game on a side-table.
My sad experience is this:
Initially I wanted to create wholly aboriginal armies. Something in the range of about 200 figures each, to simulate traditional battles from my region. Most especially, the pivotal battle of Myall River in 1827, where the combined forces of the northern Biripi seem to have taken issue with the entire eastern portion of the southern Worimi. The social structure of the landscape today can be traced back to this single battle, and it's also the largest battle I've ever heard of in the region.
It also ended up not being fought. Everyone showed up, but the Worimi were armed with (unloaded) guns, so the Biripi refused to engage. This pretty much sums up the colonial situation in the region at the time. A number of colonials showed up to watch the battle, some of whom were expressly invited to the viewing by the Worimi.
So I figured I should make some colonial figures too. Just to fit the scenario. And then I figured, well, if I'm making a few colonials now, maybe it wouldn't be so hard to represent the other colonials nearby at the time. First it was a few shepherds, then some drovers, hunters with kangaroo dogs, maybe a party of station hands, some of whom must necessarily be convicts, so maybe a party of convicts, and a few soldiers of the 17th Regiment to keep them in check during the 1830s, and hey, why not a detachment of soldiers, and the infamous "major" of Port Stephens...
...
Yeah.
So I ended up playtesting some game ideas with my usual small-scale stuff this way, and very quickly went down the route of trying to use all the figures I had available. I went to all the trouble of making them, right? So why not? And before I even knew what was happening, I had phalanxes of "Gathang" warriors facing off against colonial 17th Regiment gunlines. I put the game down, packed the models up, and walked away.
I suppose you could say my experience with this mirrored the actual colonisation of the region. Largely my mistakes were driven by my unfettered uptake of technology. It was there, so why not? And to a degree I wasn't hurting anyone. And maybe some good could've come from it, exploring traditional modes of warfare and embracing the pride and discipline of "Gathang" warriors from back in the day. But the sad truth now is that most of the historical material we have from my region is focused squarely on colonial pursuits, and it's easy to let that bleed into any other idea whatsoever.
I think it's fair to say also that for many Aboriginal people where I'm from, the British 17th Regiment sit right beside the German
SS on the evil scale. And that's not irrelevant, when you consider my grandfather fought in Greece and Crete, while my earliest immigrant ancestors in Australia actually purchased land from the very people my 17th Regiment figures were made to represent. They really were some of the worst history has to offer.
It's pretty much impossible for people who aren't Aboriginal to seek cultural guidance on stuff like this, and so often, as with my experience here, the result is just a bunch of semi-offensive curious stuffed in a draw out of sight. Not a great result, whichever way you flip it. But hard to know how else it could've gone.