Aboriginal Tasmanians in the context of "Ethnic groups"

Tasmania (/tæzˈmeɪniə/; palawa kani: Lutruwita) is an island state of Australia. It is located 240 kilometres (150 miles) to the south of the Australian mainland, and is separated from it by the Bass Strait. The state encompasses the main island of Tasmania, the 26th-largest island in the world, and the surrounding 1000 islands. It is Australia's smallest and least populous state, with 573,479 residents as of June 2023. The state capital and largest city is Hobart, with around 40% of the population living in the Greater Hobart area. Tasmania is the most decentralised state in Australia, with the lowest proportion of its residents living within its capital city.

Tasmania's main island was first inhabited by Aboriginal peoples, who today generally identify as Palawa or Pakana. It is believed that Aboriginal Tasmanians became isolated from mainland Aboriginal groups around 11,700 years ago, when rising sea levels formed Bass Strait.

Bruny Island is a 362-square-kilometre (140 sq mi) coastal island of Tasmania, Australia, located at the mouths of the Derwent River and Huon River estuaries on Storm Bay on the Tasman Sea, south of Hobart. The island is separated from the mainland by the D'Entrecasteaux Channel. The island and the channel are named after French explorer, Antoine Bruni d'Entrecasteaux.

The island's Aboriginal name is lunawanna-allonah, from which the island settlements of Alonnah and Lunawanna are named.

Palawa kani is a constructed language created by the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre as a composite Tasmanian language, based on reconstructed vocabulary from the limited accounts of the various languages once spoken by the Aboriginal people of what is now Tasmania (palawa kani: Lutruwita).

The centre wishes to restrict the availability of the language until it is established in the Aboriginal Tasmanian community and claims copyright. The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) is used to support this claim to copyright as it declares that indigenous people have the right to control their "cultural heritage, traditional knowledge, and traditional cultural expressions" and that states must "recognise and protect the exercise of these rights". However, the declaration is legally non-binding and languages cannot receive copyright protection in many countries, including Australia and the United States. The centre however provides a list of place names in palawa kani and consents to their free use by the public. Dictionaries and other copyrightable resources for learning the language are only provided to the Aboriginal community.

Hobart (/ˈhoʊbɑːrt/ HOH-bart) is the capital and most populous city of the island state of Tasmania, Australia. Located in Tasmania's south-east on the estuary of the River Derwent, it is the southernmost capital city in Australia. Despite containing nearly half of Tasmania's population, Hobart is the least-populated Australian state capital city, and second-smallest by population and area after Darwin if territories are taken into account. Its skyline is dominated by the 1,271-metre (4,170 ft) kunanyi / Mount Wellington, and its harbour forms the second-deepest natural port in the world, with much of the city's waterfront consisting of reclaimed land. The metropolitan area is often referred to as Greater Hobart, to differentiate it from the City of Hobart, one of the seven local government areas that cover the city. It has a mild maritime climate.

The city lies on country which was known by the local Muwinina people as Nipaluna, a name which includes surrounding features such as Kunanyi / Mount Wellington and Timtumili Minanya (River Derwent). Prior to British colonisation, the land had been occupied for possibly as long as 35,000 years by Aboriginal Tasmanians, who generally refer to themselves as Palawa or Pakana.

The War of the Worlds is a science fiction novel by English author H. G. Wells about an attempted invasion of Earth by beings from the planet Mars with much greater intelligence and more advanced weapons than humans. The Martians intend to eliminate mankind and conquer Earth because their own older and smaller world has reached the "last stage of exhaustion". It was written between 1895 and 1897, and serialised in Pearson's Magazine in the UK and Cosmopolitan magazine in the US in 1897. The full novel was first published in hardcover in 1898 by William Heinemann. The War of the Worlds is one of the earliest stories to detail a conflict between humankind and an extraterrestrial race. The novel is the first-person narrative of an unnamed protagonist in Surrey and his younger brother who escapes to Tillingham in Essex as London and Southern England are invaded by Martians. It is one of the most commented-on works in the science fiction canon.

The plot is similar to other works of invasion literature from the same period and has been variously interpreted as a commentary on the theory of evolution, imperialism, and Victorian era fears, superstitions and prejudices. Wells later noted that inspiration for the plot was the catastrophic effect of European colonisation on the Aboriginal Tasmanians. Some historians have argued that Wells wrote the book to encourage his readership to question the morality of imperialism. In the preface to his collected works in 1933, Wells explained: "My early, profound and lifelong admiration for [Jonathan] Swift...is particularly evident in a predisposition to make the stories reflect upon contemporary political and social discussions", adding "The War of the Worlds like The Time Machine was another assault on human self-satisfaction", both being "consciously grim, under the influence of Swift's tradition".

Van Diemen's Land was the colonial name of the island of Tasmania during the European exploration and colonisation of Australia in the 19th century. The Aboriginal-inhabited island was first visited by the Dutch ship captained by Abel Tasman in 1642, working under the sponsorship of Anthony van Diemen, the Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies. The British retained the name when they established a settlement in 1803 before it became a separate colony in 1825. Its penal colonies became notorious destinations for the transportation of convicts due to the harsh environment, isolation and reputation for being escape-proof.

The name was changed to Tasmania on 1 January 1856 to dissociate the island from its convict past and to honour its European discoverer, Abel Tasman. The old name had become a byword for horror in England because of the severity of its convict settlements such as Macquarie Harbour and Port Arthur. When the island became a self-governing colony in 1855, one of the first acts of the new legislature was to change its name.

The River Derwent, also known as timtumili minanya in palawa kani, is a significant river and tidal estuary in Tasmania, Australia. It begins its journey as a freshwater river in the Central Highlands at Lake St Clair, descending over 700 metres (2,300 ft) across a distance of more than 200 kilometres (120 mi). At the settlement of New Norfolk in the Derwent Valley its waters become brackish, flowing through Hobart, the capital city of Tasmania, its seawater estuary eventually empties into Storm Bay and the Tasman Sea.

Historically, the banks of the Derwent were covered by forests and frequented by Aboriginal Tasmanians. With the arrival of European settlers, the area saw agricultural development and the construction of dams for hydro-electricity generation during the 20th century.

The Huon River (/ˈhjuːɒnˈrɪvə/ HYOO-on-RIV-ə, Mellukerdee/palawa kani: Taloonne) is a perennial river in the southwest and southeast regions of Tasmania, Australia. At 174 kilometres (108 mi) long, the Huon River is the fifth-longest in the state, with its course flowing east through the fertile Huon Valley and emptying into the D'Entrecasteaux Channel, before flowing into the Tasman Sea.

At its mouth, the Huon River is over 5 kilometres (3 mi) wide, and in the lower reaches, the river's average depth is 3 metres (10 ft), with maximum depths of up to 12 metres (39 ft). The Egg Islands, in this lower tidal zone, are ecologically significant for their rich wetlands and birdlife.

Lunawanna is a small township on the western side of Bruny Island, Tasmania, facing the D'Entrecasteaux Channel. It is named after part of the Tasmanian Aboriginal name for Bruny Island, Lunawanna-alonnah, a nearby township about 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) to its north being named Alonnah.

Lunawanna is in the federal electorate of Franklin, the Tasmanian House of Assembly division of Franklin, and the Tasmanian Legislative Council division of Huon. The Bruny Island local council amalgamated with Kingborough council in 1994 and Lunawanna is located in the Kingborough Council local government area.