Indigenous Person's Health Journey: Narrative on Nova Peris's Mental Health Issues Due to Racism

Running head: INDIGENOUS PERSON'S HEALTH JOURNEY
Narrative/storying on an Indigenous person's health journey
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1
INDIGENOUS PERSON'S HEALTH JOURNEY
Selected indigenous person: Nova Peris
Chosen indigenous health issue: mental health
Introduction
Improving the overall health standard of indigenous population in Australia is a
prolong challenge for Australian government. The gap in the health status of the non-
indigenous and indigenous Australians always remain unacceptably high and this has been
identified as the major human right concern by the United Nations Committees. The
important social determinants of indigenous health inequality in Australia include lack of
proper access of primary health care, lower standard of living and racial discrimination.
These health inequalities increase the physical and mental health concerns among the
indigenous population in Australia and thereby further creating a barrier towards their success
(Australian Human Rights Commission, 2017). The following assignment aims to analyse the
health journey of Nova Peris, a renowned sports person in Australia from indigenous origin.
Upon analysis of the health journey of Nova Peris via a story-telling format, this assignment
will act as a source of inspiration for other indigenous people who aspires to succeed in life
via doing something significant. The assignment begins with a brief career history of Nova
Peris followed by mental health issues as a result of racial discrimination and its subsequent
impact on her family and community members.
Reason for telling the story
Nova Peris is popular for her significant accomplishments in sports. She is the first
indigenous Australian woman to win gold medal in Olympic at 1996 Atlanta Olympic as a
player for women’s hockey team. This versatile sports person also achieved similar success
upon switching to athletics. Her 200-meter sprint and 100-meter relay in 1998
Commonwealth Games fetcher her two gold medals. Her achievement earned her the title of
Young Australian of the year (1997) and was later awarded Order of Australian medal. After
her retirement from sports she became a prominent political personality and an aboriginal
activist. She was a treaty ambassador for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission.
On 2013, then prime minister of Australia Julia Gillard recruited Nova Peris as the senate
candidate for Northern Territory on 2013 federal election. Her promising professional career
as a sports person and political achievement while being an aboriginal woman made her story
worth sharing from the perspective of indigenous person’s health journey (Ricci, 2013).
Indigenous health issue(s) of Nova Peris
In spite of having a successful career as a sport’s person, Peris’s life was just like any
other indigenous population residing in Australia. One of the prime health concerns that can
be easily highlighted in Nova Perris’s life is victim of racism. Racism is broadly defined as
practices, behaviours and prejudices that underlie unfair and avoidable inequalities across
different groups in the society based on ethnicity, race, religion and culture. Racism is often
conceptualized at three levels. The first one is overlap with the prevailing practice, second is
interpersonal racism and the third one is institutional or system based racism (Kelaher, 2014).
The life story of Peris highlights that she has been victim of all the three form of racism
(Peris & Heads, 2003).
According to Peris, she has faced discrimination dur to her race especially during
childhood. Nova also believes that she was also the subject of racism when she was offered