The name is absent

87

Therapy is a machinery devised to ensure that deviants remain
within the institutionalized definitions of reality. Theories
of deviance and treatments of deviance, in a particular society,
■

will have related therapies which will vary according to the psycho-
logical' model held by a particular society. For some situations
exorcism will be appropriate therapy, for others the appropriate
therapy may be psycho-analysis or counselling.

The incorporation of deviance,.theoretically, within the symbolic
universe and the provision of therapy, entails that the threat

■V
to the reality of the symbolic universe is removed.

4

Nihilation is conceptual machinery which works towards the

same end, namely the preservation of the universe of meaning of
the dominant group. It does this, however, by denying any status
to meanings outside its own symbolic universe. This machinery
is used against individuals or groups foreign to the society and
therefore ineligible for therapy.

First, deviant phenomenon may be given a
negative ontological status, with or without
therapeutic intent. The threat to the
social definition of reality is neutralized
by assigning an inferior ontological status
and thereby a not-to-be-taken-seriously
cognitive status, to all definitions existing
outside the symbolic universe (Berger and
Luckmann, (1966:132-33).

Two courses are then open: the society may liquidate physically
what it has liquidated conceptually, or, having nihilated the
symbolic universe of the deviant group, it may devise a therapy                    .!

to integrate the deviants into the dominant group.

I
‘1

J
Γ

The thesis outlined above will be examined, namely,

I
1) that the conceptual machinery of nihilation has been applied
to Aborigines in Australia by means of legislation and policy,

I

2) that such nihilation will be supported by appropriate forms
of legitimation,

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