Suchergebnisse

Since the introduction of multiculturalism as a public policy in 1973, the peopling of Australia by migrants from many different countries has become a celebrated national narrative. One place where this story has been told is in the nation's museums. Yet the aims and content of Australia's early migration exhibitions, which were among the first in the world, remain unrepresented in the relevant literature. They also remain disconnected from later exhibitions and museums of migration, when in fact they had a profound influence on them. This thesis asks: whose stories were told in Australian exhibitions of immigration history? And how did they change? To explore these questions, this thesis weaves a history of key exhibitions across institutions. A combination of archival research and interviews with museum curators reveals the complex ideas, decisions and circumstances that shaped these displays. The broader historical and political developments surrounding the opening of the Migration Museum in 1986, the Powerhouse Museum in 1988, the Australian National Maritime Museum in 1991, the Immigration Museum in 1998 and the long gestation of the National Museum of Australia from 1980 until 2001 provide the vital context for the exhibition analyses. A survey of the literature relating to multiculturalism, migration history and museums in Australia locates the chosen exhibitions within wider debates about ethnicity, identity, concepts of heritage and the role of national museums. I argue that we can understand museum exhibitions about migration in Australia between 1984 and 2001 as operating within two broad and internally variable phases. The first phase, "inventing the nation of immigrants", was characterised by a radical, revisionist and unashamedly multicultural challenge to standard national narratives; the second, "democratising the nation of immigrants", by a more conservative and inclusive approach that, in an attempt to include all Australians in the migration story, distanced itself from political controversy. ...

Taking the absence of Aboriginal people in South Australian settler descendants' historical consciousness as a starting point, 'Memory, Place and Aboriginal–Settler History' combines the methodologies and theories of historical enquiry, anthropology and memory studies to investigate the multitudinous and intertwined ways the colonial past is known, represented and made sense of by current generations. Informed by interviews and fieldwork conducted with settler and Aboriginal descendants, oral histories, site visits and personal experience, Skye Krichauff closely examines the diverse but interconnected processes through which the past is understood and narrated. 'Memory, Place and Aboriginal–Settler History' demonstrates how it is possible to unsettle settler descendants' consciousness of the colonial past in ways that enable a tentative connection with Aboriginal people and their experiences

Australian history has generated intense political and historiographical interest in recent years, as historians, politicians and public commentators weighed into captivating and divisive contests over the nation's past. Commemorations, museums and school syllabuses became sites of great public interest and contestation, powerful reminders of the politics of collective memory. While such discussions continue to stimulate argument and analysis in scholarly articles, opinion pieces and public commentary, little is known of their impact on the wider community. What do so-called "ordinary Australians" think about the nation's past? Are the historical questions it raises also debated in our sports clubs, living rooms and community centre kitchenettes? Does that historical concern reach out beyond opinion pages or academic journals, and across the garden fences that Tom Griffiths wrote about in relation to historical practice?

This book offers a wide-ranging survey of Australian engagement with the Pacific Islands in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Through over 100 hitherto largely unexplored accounts of travel, the author explores how representations of the Pacific Islands in letters, diaries, reminiscences, books, newspapers and magazines contributed to popular ideas of the Pacific Islands in Australia. It offers a range of valuable insights into continuities and changes in Australian regional perspectives, showing that ordinary Australians were more closely connected to the Pacific Islands than has previously been acknowledged. Addressing the theme of travel as a historical, literary and imaginative process, this cultural history probes issues of nation and empire, race and science, commerce and tourism by focusing on significant episodes and encounters in history. This is a foundational text for future studies of Australia's relations with the Pacific, and histories of travel generally.