Edward Koiki Mabo - an Australian hero. His biography written with Noel Loos has been updated and re-issued.

The decision in the High Court of Australia in Mabo v Queensland No. 2 1992 (Cth) which gave legal recognition to the traditional land interests of Aboriginal Australians is a major factor in Australian life to-day.  Across the nation, Aboriginal nations, clans, families are working to make the most of their life in modern Australia based on this recognition and how access to their own land can provide economic benefits and security.

University of Queensland Press (UQP) has now re-issued with some updating the original book written by Koiki Mabo and my friend Noel Loos. My friend Noel is retired these days but had a hectic time with the filming and subsequent media interviews relating to the television documentary, Mabo.

Here is the original blurb about Noel Loos from the UQP website:

Professor Noel Loos teaches the history of black-white relations in Australia at James Cook University in Townsville. He has conducted close research into Aboriginal mission history, frontier conflict, the place of Aborigines in colonial society, and the evolution of government policies for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island people. In the 1970s he pioneered the development of teacher education programs in Queensland for Aboriginal and Islander people. Professor Loos has published widely on indigenous history and politics, including: Invasion and Resistance; Aboriginal-European Relations on the North Queensland Frontier 1861-1897 (1982); Succeeding Against the odds: Townsville’s Aboriginal and Islander Teacher Education Program (1989); and Indigenous Minorities and Education: Australian and Japanese Perspectives of their Indigenous Peoples, the Ainu, Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders (1993). A Friend of Koiki Mabo for 25 years, Professor Loos edited Edward Koiki Mabo: His Life and Struggle for Land Rights, which was published by UQP in 1996

The site for Noel's papers at the National Library of Australia.