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AbstractHistoryArchive Description
'In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, people of mixed Aboriginal and European ancestry were commonly assumed to be morally and physically defective, unstable and degenerate. They bore the brunt of society's contempt, and the removal of their children created Australia's stolen generations. Nowhere People is a history of beliefs about people of mixed race, both in Australia and overseas. It explores the concept of racial purity, eugenics, and the threat posed by miscegenation.' (Publication summary)
Notes
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Dedication: For my sisters Mary and Judy and for the grandmother we never knew.
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This work includes chapters:
Part. 1. Ideas from overseas
I. The ball and chain of hybridism
2. Fear of miscegenation
3. Eugenics - a new religion
4. The most primitive of man
Part. 2. Ideas and policies in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Australia
5. Racial ideas at the time of federation
6. A dying race
7. A problem emerges
8. Outcasts in the outback
9. 'Very immoral subjects'
10. Breeding Out the Colour
11. 'A colossal menace'
Part. 3. Absorption and assimilation in the post-war period
12. The caste barrier
13. Removing children.
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Other Formats
- Also sound recording.
Works about this Work
-
White Closets, Jangling Nerves and the Biopolitics of the Public Secret
2011
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Australian Literary Studies , June vol. 26 no. 2 2011; (p. 57-75) 'This essay attempts to outline the relationship between the 'raw nerves' that Denis Byrne describes in the epigraph above, and the cultivation of 'indifference' that Stanner identifies as being characteristic of 'European life' in Australia. Here I situate indifference as numbing the 'jangling' of 'raw nerves' and as cultivated, disseminated and feeding specific forms of public secrecy. How did the white men who enforces segregation by day and pursued Aboriginal women by night manage their 'jangling nerves, if indeed they did jangle? How did they manage to be seen and known and have their secrets kept for them, as much as by them. How did this contradiction of segregation and sexual intimacy, if indeed it is a contradiction, work, My hope is that if we can understand how the white men (and those around them), regulated these jangling nerves, then we might be able to understand the relationship between indifference, public secrecy and the biopolitical forms that Australian whiteness took in the twentieth century, and specifically in the period of assimilation, extending from the 1930s to, roughly, the end of the 1960s.' (Author's introduction p. 57)
-
Aboriginal Women's Memories : An Attempt at Rewriting Official Australian History
2010
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Partnership Id-Entities : Cultural and Literary Re-Insciption/s of the Feminine 2010; (p. 45-54) 'In 1997 the 'Bringing Them Home' report opened a new chapter in Australian history by bringing to light one of the most systematic and cruel colonial practices based on assimilation ideology and policy : the so-called Stolen Generation. The report on the two year National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families estimates that from 1911 to the end of the 1970s the shocking nomber of 100,000 children were removed from their families with the aim of 'civilizing' them by integrating them forcibly into European culture. To confirm the magnitude of the phenomenon, the Aboriginal writer, Anita Heiss once said: 'I haven't met one Indigenous Australian who hasn't been affected by the policies of protection that lead to what we commonly refer to as the Stolen Generations'.
Since the report was released, this deep and complex question has been many times represented in literature as well as in cinematographic fiction...'(p. 45)
-
y
Witnessing Australian Stories : History, Testimony and Memory in Contemporary Culture
Melbourne
:
2010
6037495
2010
single work
thesis
'This book is about how Australians have responded to stories about suffering and injustice in Australia, presented in a range of public media, including literature, history, films, and television. Those who have responded are both ordinary and prominent Australians–politicians, writers, and scholars. All have sought to come to terms with Australia's history by responding empathetically to stories of its marginalized citizens.
'Drawing upon international scholarship on collective memory, public history, testimony, and witnessing, this book represents a cultural history of contemporary Australia. It examines the forms of witnessing that dominated Australian public culture at the turn of the millennium. Since the late 1980s, witnessing has developed in Australia in response to the increasingly audible voices of indigenous peoples, migrants, and more recently, asylum seekers. As these voices became public, they posed a challenge not only to scholars and politicians, but also, most importantly, to ordinary citizens.
'When former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd delivered his historic apology to Australia's indigenous peoples in February 2008, he performed an act of collective witnessing that affirmed the testimony and experiences of Aboriginal Australians. The phenomenon of witnessing became crucial, not only to the recognition and reparation of past injustices, but to efforts to create a more cosmopolitan Australia in the present. This is a vital addition to Transactions critically acclaimed Memory and Narrative series.' (Publisher's blurb)
-
Telling the 'Truth' about Australia's Past : Reconciliation as Recognition in Society and Literature
2009
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Bernard Hickey, a Roving Cultural Ambassador : Essays in His Memory. 2009; (p. 107-125)This essay will explore, 'the most significant steps which have been most recently taken in Australia with the aim of fostering such a process; the analysis will be conducted through an overview of major institutional undertakings in that respect and through a consideration of the central role of narratives as powerful instruments of investigation endowed with the strength of imagining and shaping a different future.' (109)
-
Review of Henry Reynolds, Nowhere People
2008
single work
review
essay
— Appears in: Journal of Australian Colonial History , vol. 10 no. 1 2008; (p. 191-197) 'There are some difficulties associated with reviewing this book. It is somewhat perplexing; it purports to have a bearing on Reynolds' own family history, a history that is, to some extent, covered in the prologue and the postscript. It also promises to show how international race theory 'shaped Australia's identity' but the connection in this work is not entirely convincing. The prologue is an introduction to Reynolds' own family history and putative descent from Aboriginal ancestry. Nowhere people is a new weapon in the unremitting History Wars that threaten to diminish the standing of historical scholarship in Australia. Reynolds has entered into an ongoing debate about the nature of the colonial conquest of Australia and is consistently under attack from the opposite end of the political spectrum. ' (Introduction)
-
Native Titles
2005
single work
review
— Appears in: The Bulletin , 11 October vol. 123 no. 6491 2005; (p. 68-69)
— Review of Nowhere People : How International Race Thinking Shaped Australia's Identity 2005 single work autobiography -
Evolutionary Politics
2006
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , April no. 280 2006; (p. 14-15)
— Review of Nowhere People : How International Race Thinking Shaped Australia's Identity 2005 single work autobiography -
Telling the 'Truth' about Australia's Past : Reconciliation as Recognition in Society and Literature
2009
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Bernard Hickey, a Roving Cultural Ambassador : Essays in His Memory. 2009; (p. 107-125)This essay will explore, 'the most significant steps which have been most recently taken in Australia with the aim of fostering such a process; the analysis will be conducted through an overview of major institutional undertakings in that respect and through a consideration of the central role of narratives as powerful instruments of investigation endowed with the strength of imagining and shaping a different future.' (109)
-
Aboriginal Women's Memories : An Attempt at Rewriting Official Australian History
2010
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Partnership Id-Entities : Cultural and Literary Re-Insciption/s of the Feminine 2010; (p. 45-54) 'In 1997 the 'Bringing Them Home' report opened a new chapter in Australian history by bringing to light one of the most systematic and cruel colonial practices based on assimilation ideology and policy : the so-called Stolen Generation. The report on the two year National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families estimates that from 1911 to the end of the 1970s the shocking nomber of 100,000 children were removed from their families with the aim of 'civilizing' them by integrating them forcibly into European culture. To confirm the magnitude of the phenomenon, the Aboriginal writer, Anita Heiss once said: 'I haven't met one Indigenous Australian who hasn't been affected by the policies of protection that lead to what we commonly refer to as the Stolen Generations'.
Since the report was released, this deep and complex question has been many times represented in literature as well as in cinematographic fiction...'(p. 45)
-
White Closets, Jangling Nerves and the Biopolitics of the Public Secret
2011
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Australian Literary Studies , June vol. 26 no. 2 2011; (p. 57-75) 'This essay attempts to outline the relationship between the 'raw nerves' that Denis Byrne describes in the epigraph above, and the cultivation of 'indifference' that Stanner identifies as being characteristic of 'European life' in Australia. Here I situate indifference as numbing the 'jangling' of 'raw nerves' and as cultivated, disseminated and feeding specific forms of public secrecy. How did the white men who enforces segregation by day and pursued Aboriginal women by night manage their 'jangling nerves, if indeed they did jangle? How did they manage to be seen and known and have their secrets kept for them, as much as by them. How did this contradiction of segregation and sexual intimacy, if indeed it is a contradiction, work, My hope is that if we can understand how the white men (and those around them), regulated these jangling nerves, then we might be able to understand the relationship between indifference, public secrecy and the biopolitical forms that Australian whiteness took in the twentieth century, and specifically in the period of assimilation, extending from the 1930s to, roughly, the end of the 1960s.' (Author's introduction p. 57)
-
y
Witnessing Australian Stories : History, Testimony and Memory in Contemporary Culture
Melbourne
:
2010
6037495
2010
single work
thesis
'This book is about how Australians have responded to stories about suffering and injustice in Australia, presented in a range of public media, including literature, history, films, and television. Those who have responded are both ordinary and prominent Australians–politicians, writers, and scholars. All have sought to come to terms with Australia's history by responding empathetically to stories of its marginalized citizens.
'Drawing upon international scholarship on collective memory, public history, testimony, and witnessing, this book represents a cultural history of contemporary Australia. It examines the forms of witnessing that dominated Australian public culture at the turn of the millennium. Since the late 1980s, witnessing has developed in Australia in response to the increasingly audible voices of indigenous peoples, migrants, and more recently, asylum seekers. As these voices became public, they posed a challenge not only to scholars and politicians, but also, most importantly, to ordinary citizens.
'When former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd delivered his historic apology to Australia's indigenous peoples in February 2008, he performed an act of collective witnessing that affirmed the testimony and experiences of Aboriginal Australians. The phenomenon of witnessing became crucial, not only to the recognition and reparation of past injustices, but to efforts to create a more cosmopolitan Australia in the present. This is a vital addition to Transactions critically acclaimed Memory and Narrative series.' (Publisher's blurb)
-
Review of Henry Reynolds, Nowhere People
2008
single work
review
essay
— Appears in: Journal of Australian Colonial History , vol. 10 no. 1 2008; (p. 191-197) 'There are some difficulties associated with reviewing this book. It is somewhat perplexing; it purports to have a bearing on Reynolds' own family history, a history that is, to some extent, covered in the prologue and the postscript. It also promises to show how international race theory 'shaped Australia's identity' but the connection in this work is not entirely convincing. The prologue is an introduction to Reynolds' own family history and putative descent from Aboriginal ancestry. Nowhere people is a new weapon in the unremitting History Wars that threaten to diminish the standing of historical scholarship in Australia. Reynolds has entered into an ongoing debate about the nature of the colonial conquest of Australia and is consistently under attack from the opposite end of the political spectrum. ' (Introduction)
