Note: Comments are in bold after the section, introduction was written by Mr Watterson
“Municipal Gum” by Oodgeroo Noonuccal is an allegorical exploration of the dispossession and forced assimilation into white Australian culture that many First Nations people experienced. Throughout the poem, the persona mourns the removal of a gumtree - symbolic of Aboriginal Australian culture - from its native environment. The poem can be read as a critique of the colonial perspective that condoned assimilation of First Nations peoples that was dominant in non-indigenous Australian culture for much of the 20th Century.
Through the use of enjambment Focus on idea first sentence, then language features, the theme, dispossession and forced assimilation is portrayed. Noonuccal purposefully used enjambment to create a pause between “express” and “Its hopelessness” when it is read or spoken. The pause in poem implies a more somber, exhausted and emotionless tone in “Its hopelessness,” and the effect of the deepening in tone encourages audiences to feel as if there is no hope in resisting against the forced assimilation of white culture. More evidence - hopelessness as the main point - talk about connotations of mournfulness This also causes audiences to consider both how helpless the First Nations people were while being oppressed and forced to follow white Australian culture, as well as what the effect of white culture has on all people who live in Australia.
Dispossession and forced assimilation into white Australian culture is portrayed through the symbolism of the gumtree, the city street and bitumen, and “cool world of leafy forest halls.” Put this paragraph first The gumtree is a native Australian plant, which can symbolise the First Nations, who were originally from Australia. The “city street” and “hard bitumen around your feet” are representative of white Australian culture, as infrastructure and roads were brought into Australia by the colonisers. The “leafy forest halls” symbolise First Nations culture, as First Nations people used what nature provided as their shelter. Gilbert uses “gumtree in the city street” and “rather […] in the […] leafy green halls.” to imply that the gumtree, symbolising the First Nations people, were forced into white culture against their will. Audiences are then lead to believing that through the furthering destruction of nature and sacred spaces of the First Nations people, conditions regarding their rights are not improving, but instead, worsening.