澳大利亚一项新研究挑战了长期被接受的人口估计，表明1788年殖民前原住民人口约为220万人，远高于1930年人类学家Alfred Radcliffe-Brown提出的25万人估计12。这项由澳大利亚研究委员会卓越研究中心发表在《自然人类行为》期刊上的研究，采用考古学、遗传学和环保建模三种独立方法得出结论1。
研究显示，殖民造成的人口损失规模骇人听闻12。在1788年至1861年间，研究估计约有206万人死于殖民影响2。仅1789年的天花疫情就造成约22万土著人死亡2。弗林德斯大学全球生态学教授Corey Bradshaw表示，这反映了殖民化对原住民人口造成的巨大人口崩溃，并指出屠杀数据库被低估"一个数量级"12。
当代原住民人口仍未恢复到殖民前水平。2021年人口普查显示原住民人口约81.3万人，占澳大利亚总人口的3.2%1。按目前增长率，原住民人口预计到2047年才能恢复到殖民前规模1。此外，澳大利亚仍有超过100种第一民族语言在使用，但有些面临严重失传危险1。
A new research study challenges a long-standing demographic assumption about Australia's pre-colonial Indigenous population, suggesting it was substantially larger than previously believed. The research estimates the Indigenous population at the time of colonisation in 1788 at approximately 2.2 million people, compared to the widely accepted 1930 estimate of around 250,000 put forward by anthropologist Alfred Radcliffe-Brown.12
The study, published in the journal Nature Human Behaviour by Australia's Research Council Centre of Excellence, employed three independent methodologies—archaeology, genetics, and environmental modelling—to arrive at its conclusions.12 Between 1788 and 1861, the Indigenous population declined by more than 2 million people.1 According to the research, approximately 2.06 million deaths occurred during the colonial period, reducing the population to roughly 7 percent of its pre-contact size.2 A single outbreak of smallpox in 1789 alone caused approximately 220,000 Indigenous deaths.2
Corey Bradshaw, a professor of global ecology at Flinders University, characterised the findings as reflecting a "demographic catastrophe" caused by colonisation.1 He noted that massacre data has been underestimated "by an order of magnitude."2 The population decline resulted from introduced diseases, frontier violence, malnutrition, and other colonial impacts.1
The current trajectory of Indigenous population recovery remains slow. The 2021 census recorded approximately 813,000 Indigenous Australians, comprising 3.2 percent of Australia's total population.1 At the current growth rate, the Indigenous population is not projected to recover to pre-colonial levels until 2047.1 Additionally, while over 100 First Nations languages remain in use across Australia, some face severe risk of being lost entirely.1
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