AustLit

'Paul Carter's The road to Botany Bay does not claim to be Aboriginal history. But it has some pointed things to say about the ways that Aboriginal history has been and is being written in Australia. In concluding Carter proposes as a better way what he calls "an aboriginal history of space", which might "evoke their historical experience without appropriating it to white ends" (p. 350). A consideration of the role given to Aborigines in the book is instructive both about the writing of Aboriginal history in general, and about Carter's enterprise in particular.'  (Introduction)