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AbstractHistoryArchive Description
'The story of Jessie Argyle, born in the remote East Kimberley and taken from her Aboriginal family at the age of five, and Edward Smith, a young Englishman escaping the rigid structures of London. In a society deeply divided on racial lines, Edward and Jessie met, fell in love and, against strong opposition, eventually married. Despite unrelenting surveillance and harassment the Smith home was a centre for Aboriginal cultural and social life for over thirty years.' (Source: back cover, 2003 edition)
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Other Formats
- Large print.
Works about this Work
-
Fever in the Archive
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Humanities Australia , no. 5 2014; (p. 23-35)Anna Haebich investigates how the West Australian Department of Indigenous Affairs archives (1898-1972) have been utilised by Indigenous writers/researchers.
-
Writing, Space and Authority : Producing and Critiquing Settler Jurisdiction in Western Australia
2017
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Journal of Australian Studies , May vol. 41 no. 2 2017; (p. 141-155) 'On the edge of Stirling Gardens in central Perth, Western Australia, five large, old-fashioned pen nibs stand in a curved line, their tips in the ground. Anne Neil’s sculpture, Memory Markers, commemorates the history of this site, which includes the Supreme Court. Taking this sculpture as an emblem of writing, which in the context of its setting highlights the relationship between literature and law, this article explores the image of the pen in the ground. As a symbol of literacy, it evokes the powerful network of discourses—particularly law, science and religion—that underwrote the imperial project. It signals, in Michele Grossman’s terms, “the event of literacy [that] radically interrupts and disrupts—but never eliminates—pre-existing Aboriginal epistemologies”. The article goes on to explore the sculpture as a symbol of the assertion of jurisdiction, the speaking of law in and over colonised space. It analyses a group of written texts associated with this site, from colonial legal assertions of jurisdiction over Aboriginal people in Edward Landor’s The Bushman (1847), through a proclamation under the Aborigines Act 1905 (WA), to Stephen Kinnane’s Indigenous family memoir of life under that act, Shadow Lines (2004).' (Publication abstract) -
Tracking Precarious Lives in Stephen Kinnane’s Shadow Lines
2013
single work
criticism
essay
— Appears in: The Journal of the European Association for Studies of Australia , vol. 4 no. 1-2 2013; (p. 130-142)'Stephen Kinnane’s Shadow Lines (2003) pertains to the genre of Indigenous
inter-generational life writing in which the younger generation of Indigenous writers substitutes white editors in recording the lives and memories of their own families and community elders, thus seizing a greater amount of control over the representations of Australian Indigenetiy. Kinnane extends the genre by appropriating the tools of colonial domination, most notably the archive, and by inscribing, in a self-reflective way, his own subjectivity in the text. As a result,Shadow Lines is a multilayered narrative that presents a functional and ontented interracial marriage and family life of Kinnane’s grandparents, as a wayof counteracting the close regulation and policing of Aboriginality in the early twentieth-century Western Australia. In addition,Kinnane juxtaposes the archival materials to other sources of information, mostly the orally transmitted memories of relatives and friends, thus reclaiming the agency of his ancestors and providing a truthful representation of their lives and the lives of the local Indigenous community.' (Source: abstract)
-
Archival Salvage : History’s Reef and the Wreck of the Historical Novel
2011
single work
criticism
— Appears in: JASAL , Special Issue vol. 11 no. 1 2011; (p. 1-21) 'In recent years debates about the ethics of portraying Indigenous subjects and subject matter have almost been superseded by circular debates about 'true' Australian history and who has the right to tell it. This has been disappointing in a context of the morally and formally imaginative speculations of historians such as Tom Griffiths, Fiona Paisley, Stephen Kinnane and Greg Dening, and also in a context of Indigenous studies Professor Marcia Langton's evidently too-hopeful calls for the activation of a shared cultural space. But as this local debate has become more heated, more public, the oddest spectacle of all in recent years was the recent lambasting of historical novelists.
Novelist Kate Grenville was a particular target of attack. Notable historians such as Mark McKenna, John Hirst and Inga Clendinnen vociferously condemned dramatic accounts of the past as anachronistic, unethical and, most curious of all in relation to the fictioneer's job description, untrue. I revisit the 'history wars' stoush to argue that these historians overlooked the suasion of broader, local political battles to determine and culturally enshrine particular narratives of Australian pasts; I argue that they also eschewed the linguistic turn of postmodernism and the contributions made therein by prominent historical scholars in their own field such as Hayden White and Dominic LaCapra. The paper finally shows how Grenville, Kim Scott and other novelists have engaged with colonial archival materials, deploying particular narrative techniques that enable them to generate compelling postcolonial dramatisations of colonial pasts. (Author's abstract)
-
Kin-fused Reconciliation : Bringing Them Home, Bringing Us Home
2007
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Australian Humanities Review , August no. 42 2007; 'Fiona Probyn-Rapsey discusses the biopolitical management of Indigenous people within the contemporary nation through an analysis of white liberal discourse on Reconciliation. She looks specifically at the image of the nation as family and the pedagogic nationalist argument for extending the "white" family to include Aboriginal kin and to "bind Aboriginality to whiteness". She analyses how a wide range of Indigenous life narratives (including those by Morgan, Russell, Pilkington-Garimara, Lalor, Scott and Brown, Kinnane, Simon and Randall) describe familial relations between white and Indigenous family members. She argues, in her formulation of the phrase "kin-fused Reconciliation", that a liberal "extended family" model of the Nation is potentially assimilationist' (Anne Brewster and Fiona Probyn-Rapsey, Introduction).
-
Paperbacks
2003
single work
review
— Appears in: Canberra Sunday Times , 12 October 2003; (p. 19)
— Review of Women on the Rocks : A Tale of Two Convicts 2003 single work novel ; Shadow Lines 2003 single work biography ; Blackwattle Road 2003 single work novel ; Raymond's Medal : The Recollections of a Decorated General Assistant in Rural Australia 2003 single work novel -
Memoir
2003
single work
review
— Appears in: The Bulletin , 18 November vol. 121 no. 6399 2003; (p. 68)
— Review of Take Me to Paris, Johnny 1993 single work autobiography ; Shadow Lines 2003 single work biography -
In Short : Non-Fiction
2003
single work
review
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 26-28 December 2003; (p. 25)
— Review of The Adventures of Barry Crocker : Bazza 2003 single work autobiography ; The River 2003 single work prose autobiography ; Shadow Lines 2003 single work biography -
Across Racial Boundaries
2004
single work
review
— Appears in: The West Australian , 20 March 2004; (p. 8-9)
— Review of Shadow Lines 2003 single work biography -
Untitled
2004
single work
review
— Appears in: JAS Review of Books , March no. 22 2004;
— Review of Shadow Lines 2003 single work biography -
Indigenous Life Stories
2004
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Life Writing , vol. 1 no. 2 2004; (p. 209-218) -
Joint Winners of Stanner Award
2006
single work
column
— Appears in: Koori Mail , 15 March no. 371 2006; (p. 31) -
Kin-fused Reconciliation : Bringing Them Home, Bringing Us Home
2007
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Australian Humanities Review , August no. 42 2007; 'Fiona Probyn-Rapsey discusses the biopolitical management of Indigenous people within the contemporary nation through an analysis of white liberal discourse on Reconciliation. She looks specifically at the image of the nation as family and the pedagogic nationalist argument for extending the "white" family to include Aboriginal kin and to "bind Aboriginality to whiteness". She analyses how a wide range of Indigenous life narratives (including those by Morgan, Russell, Pilkington-Garimara, Lalor, Scott and Brown, Kinnane, Simon and Randall) describe familial relations between white and Indigenous family members. She argues, in her formulation of the phrase "kin-fused Reconciliation", that a liberal "extended family" model of the Nation is potentially assimilationist' (Anne Brewster and Fiona Probyn-Rapsey, Introduction). -
Archival Salvage : History’s Reef and the Wreck of the Historical Novel
2011
single work
criticism
— Appears in: JASAL , Special Issue vol. 11 no. 1 2011; (p. 1-21) 'In recent years debates about the ethics of portraying Indigenous subjects and subject matter have almost been superseded by circular debates about 'true' Australian history and who has the right to tell it. This has been disappointing in a context of the morally and formally imaginative speculations of historians such as Tom Griffiths, Fiona Paisley, Stephen Kinnane and Greg Dening, and also in a context of Indigenous studies Professor Marcia Langton's evidently too-hopeful calls for the activation of a shared cultural space. But as this local debate has become more heated, more public, the oddest spectacle of all in recent years was the recent lambasting of historical novelists.
Novelist Kate Grenville was a particular target of attack. Notable historians such as Mark McKenna, John Hirst and Inga Clendinnen vociferously condemned dramatic accounts of the past as anachronistic, unethical and, most curious of all in relation to the fictioneer's job description, untrue. I revisit the 'history wars' stoush to argue that these historians overlooked the suasion of broader, local political battles to determine and culturally enshrine particular narratives of Australian pasts; I argue that they also eschewed the linguistic turn of postmodernism and the contributions made therein by prominent historical scholars in their own field such as Hayden White and Dominic LaCapra. The paper finally shows how Grenville, Kim Scott and other novelists have engaged with colonial archival materials, deploying particular narrative techniques that enable them to generate compelling postcolonial dramatisations of colonial pasts. (Author's abstract)
-
Tracking Precarious Lives in Stephen Kinnane’s Shadow Lines
2013
single work
criticism
essay
— Appears in: The Journal of the European Association for Studies of Australia , vol. 4 no. 1-2 2013; (p. 130-142)'Stephen Kinnane’s Shadow Lines (2003) pertains to the genre of Indigenous
inter-generational life writing in which the younger generation of Indigenous writers substitutes white editors in recording the lives and memories of their own families and community elders, thus seizing a greater amount of control over the representations of Australian Indigenetiy. Kinnane extends the genre by appropriating the tools of colonial domination, most notably the archive, and by inscribing, in a self-reflective way, his own subjectivity in the text. As a result,Shadow Lines is a multilayered narrative that presents a functional and ontented interracial marriage and family life of Kinnane’s grandparents, as a wayof counteracting the close regulation and policing of Aboriginality in the early twentieth-century Western Australia. In addition,Kinnane juxtaposes the archival materials to other sources of information, mostly the orally transmitted memories of relatives and friends, thus reclaiming the agency of his ancestors and providing a truthful representation of their lives and the lives of the local Indigenous community.' (Source: abstract)
Awards
- 2004 joint winner Stanner Award
- 2004 shortlisted Queensland Premier's Literary Awards — Best Non-Fiction Book
- 2004 shortlisted Festival Awards for Literature (SA) — Award for Non-Fiction
- 2003 joint winner Western Australian Premier's Book Awards — Non-Fiction
Last amended 14 Jul 2020 14:01:09
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