AustLit

'In "The Australian Legend", Russel Ward wrote that "the convict influence on Australian society was very much more important than has usually been supposed'" Here, he was evoking an understanding that the unusual and ignominious origins of Australian society had, for many years, plagued our history and our sense of ourselves, and this had been manifested in a tendency to ignore convict heritage, to excuse it, or to downplay its true and vital significance to the development of Australian identities and institutions.

'Even in 1958, as some of Australia's finest historians were producing or preparing scholarly accounts of Australia's convict past, and as popular anxieties surrounding our convict heritage were easing, Ward's foregrounding of the convict legacy was, in his own view at least, audacious and insubordinate. And yet, as with many aspects of his thesis, Ward's views on convict heritage were striking not so much because they were original or outrageous, but because they were cleverly articulated, and resonated powerfully with ideas and impressions that were long-held and deep-seated. Here, I examine how Ward interpreted Australia's convict heritage, tracing the lineage of his ideas to describe how he borrowed and differed from earlier writers. The discussion contributes to our understanding of how Australians have debated and dealt with the lingering legacies of the convict past, but also considers what Ward's treatment of this subject tells us about his own ideas and influences, and his place as an historian and radical-nationalist.'

Source: Article abstract.