Indigenous people repeatedly state that they do not want white people to tell their stories for them, but within Australia’s legal system, where non-Indigenous lawyers are in the majority, it is a fact that non-Indigenous lawyers will have to make choices about how Indigenous women and their interests are represented. This chapter aims to educate lawyers as to how to best work with Indigenous women. It discusses: how the colonial background is relevant to Indigenous women today; the differences between Indigenous male and Indigenous female issues; how lawyers can assist and the ways law and bureaucracy can fail to protect indigenous women; and practical suggestions for providing effective legal representation to Indigenous women. Case studies are used to further illustrate these points.

Link no longer available – this chapter is in Women and the Law in Australia, 2010, p.228-248 (ISBN: 9780409325959)