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In the last two decades of the twentieth century Australia became an attractive travel destination for alienated middle-class Westerners in search of a spiritual utopia. In such texts Aboriginality is represented as a source of spiritual transcendence and as a remedy for the evils of modern consumerism and industrialisation. This article examines a number of books by white New Age spiritual travellers-James Cowan's Two Men Dreaming (1995), Marlo Morgan's Mutant Message Down Under (1994), and Harvey Arden's Dreamkeepers (1995) - that claim to (re)discover a lost, universal, sacred heritage within Aboriginal cosmologies. The discourses employed by recent Australian New Age travel texts are prima facie examples of postcolonial forms of cultural appropriation. Yet the involvement of indigenous agents in the production, promotion, and critique of such texts complicates the argument that these texts are simply new forms of cultural colonisation (Author's abstract).
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Last amended 16 Jun 2011 11:21:49
27-43
'New Age Trippers': Aboriginality and Australian New Age Travel Books
Studies in Travel Writing
Subjects:
- Mutant Message Down Under 1991 single work novel
- Two Men Dreaming : A Memoir, A Journey 1995 single work prose biography
- Dreamkeepers : A Spirit-Journey into Aboriginal Australia 1994 single work prose
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