Tabla de contenidos para Vol. 57 no. 3 2022 en Agora

The Eureka Rebellion, which culminated in the Battle of the Eureka Stockade on 3 December 1854, continues to be a focal yet divisive event in Australia’s history. The Eureka Flag, on which the Southern Cross is the dominant symbol, was made and first flown in 1854 by the gold miners as an assertion of their rights against colonial authority. By virtue of its visibility, the Eureka Flag is intrinsically linked to the political interpretation of the Ballarat uprising in 1854. Traditionally, the political left has claimed the legacy of the Eureka Rebellion, viewing it as an act of defiance by working miners asserting their rights against colonial authority. Unions and workers claim the Eureka Flag, to which the rebels swore an oath at Bakery Hill on 30 November 1854, as…

Teachers of American History have recently found themselves the target of increased scrutiny as the phrase ‘Critical Race Theory’ (CRT) has moved to the forefront of public awareness, transforming the job of History education in an explosion of anger, misunderstanding, and distrust. This ongoing debate over how race and racism are presented to schoolchildren is not the first disruptive controversy in US public education, and certainly won’t be the last. What separates those past debates from the current fervour is the degree to which the public has embraced the conspiracy theory that an inclusive, honest evaluation of history constitutes indoctrination, and that the professionals who make History education their calling are little more than ideological actors. As educators, we must make clear our true intent: to provide students with an…

Sometimes our classroom conversations flow easily, when students seem to navigate complex vocabulary effortlessly, question perspectives respectfully and delve deeply into the topic at hand. This article is not aimed at those times. History is, has been and perhaps should be a space for disagreement. We explore historical sources, interpret and evaluate them. We debate competing interpretations or versions of events. We are reliant on sometimes unreliable narrators to provide a snapshot of the past. We understand that many important perspectives are omitted or actively excluded from the historical record. And that isn’t even touching on why some histories are so hotly contested. Often, the issue being debated is not the nature or significance of past events but its contemporary implications. What does it mean for us today? What does…

Australian history has been the subject of vigorous contestation for many years on several fronts, from counting massacred dead to defining slavery in our colonies.1 First Nations history is riven with contestations—the struggle for recognition, rights and equality is one of its defining features. Such tensions usefully orient us to the complexity of such histories and in turn prompt our critical engagement. Here I propose some strategies for teaching the contested history of Australia’s relationship with its First Peoples. Object-based learning (OBL) has grown in prominence as a useful and exciting way to connect students with the past. Recent Agora articles and the popularity of TV shows like Antiques Roadshow confirm our appreciation of the way material culture connects us in moving ways.2 We can learn a vast amount from…

In September 1840, Superintendent Charles La Trobe, chief administrator of the Port Phillip district, directed that Indigenous people of the Kulin Nation be removed from the vicinity of the fledgling town of Melbourne. His instruction was conveyed to George Augustus Robinson, Chief Protector of Aborigines in the district, but it fell to Assistant Protector William Thomas, who was responsible for the area around Melbourne and Westernport, to enact it. This was an extraordinary action by an officer charged with the ‘protection’ of the First People of Port Phillip, and effectively banished the Woi Wurrung and Boon Wurrung from their country for nearly a century. It came a mere five years after Europeans first arrived to claim those lands for themselves. These and other documents are displayed in the Old Treasury…

The British people who came to Australia in 1788 were predominantly adherents of a religion that had only existed in anything like its modern form since the sixteenth century, when King Henry VIII made his break with Rome over the dissolution of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon. The settlers encountered a people in Australia who had a history on the continent stretching back about 65,000 years and a complex set of religious beliefs that, arguably more than those of the British, permeated every aspect of their lives. In the 1890s the telegraph operator and ethnologist, Frank Gillen, coined the term ‘dream times’ as a rough English translation of ‘Alcheringa’ to sum up the beliefs of the Arrernte people of Central Australia, whose culture and religion he had come to…

Bruce Pascoe’s Dark Emu is a popular and important book that is influencing teachers and students in their knowledge and understanding of Australian Aboriginal history.1 It has also become highly controversial, with a number of critics disputing both the thesis presented and the use of evidence to support that thesis.2 History depends on a respectful and accurate use of sources. The Dark Emu controversy is an opportunity for students to explore what ‘good history’ is by asking the following questions. • How do writers create historical texts? • How do we test sources of evidence? • How can writers and historians use the same evidence but differ in their conclusions? The Thesis of Dark Emu Pascoe’s aim is to overturn the conception that Indigenous Australians before European invasion were ‘simply…

Why Did We Decolonise Our Library? Our college has embarked on a journey of discovery about Indigenous peoples, cultures and histories.1 As part of this journey, we completed a Reconciliation Action Plan that detailed our current and future actions to further practical reconciliation.2 One aspect of this was to have information in our library that reflected current factual knowledge and did not perpetuate stereotypes and racism. Information management is an ongoing process. Libraries need to continually revisit and re-evaluate their current collection so it reflects modern understandings, not historical biases. With expert support from Dr Aleryk Fricker of Deakin University, we spent about 50 hours between us in total across a year decolonising a large library in our P–12 school of 1300 students. Guidelines from several Queensland organisations were useful…

On 10 April 2015, the New South Wales government officially recognised both Wahluu and Mount Panorama as the dual name of that ancient Wiradjuri mountain in Bathurst.1 In celebrating the change, the Wiradjuri Elder Mr Dinawan Dyirribang told the Western Advocate: ‘Co-naming the area is not about making one element of that history more significant than any other, but merely recognising that the history of this very special mountain goes back much further than the last century’.2 The dual name allows space for both the Wiradjuri’s enduring Dreaming history and the annual V8 Supercar tradition of recent times. This article investigates elements of Australia’s contentious history of naming and renaming places, as well as the sociocultural implications of renaming in Australia. It asks whether dual-naming offers an avenue to reconciliation…

Hold on, hold on, Pat, I didn’t want to rile you, but when you start talking about my arguments as racist, that is really not on, it is not on. I can’t begin to tell you how surprised I was when the usually genteel, polite exchange of ideas that typifies the BBC’s In Our Time radio show descended suddenly into a rather fiery debate. I wasn’t expecting the topic to be controversial, and I certainly wasn’t aware that the show’s host—whose voice I know almost as well as my own after years of loyal listening—would feel so personally invested in the controversy. It was startling and, let’s be honest, a bit thrilling to eavesdrop on such eminent, articulate people in heated disagreement. I shouldn’t have been surprised. Robust debate in…

The Challenges I spoke to a teacher recently who expressed dismay about a change made to the Year 7 curriculum at their school. The previously three-week unit on First Nations was to be extended to six weeks, and the Ancient Greece unit would be cut down to make room. The teacher had two major complaints: there simply are not enough resources to teach a six-week-long unit on Ancient Australia and, even if there were, teachers simply don’t have time to find them and craft them into a meaningful unit on top of their other responsibilities. The teacher wanted to stick with the existing Ancient Greece unit that had been largely unchanged for many years. Knowing how busy they are, I don’t blame them. However, this conversation did make me think…

When teaching Humanities, my Year 7–10 students will often bring up examples they have seen on social media. Tik Tok and Instagram are the current favourites, Facebook is only for ‘old’ people, while one student asked if I ‘was ok’ when I asked if they used Twitter. These conversations and many more led to discussions with my peers about the use of social media by our students. Is it a place to inform or is it all misinformation?. One time, when teaching my Year 10 class about the Stolen Generations, members of the class not only brought up what they had learned about the topic from Tik Tok videos but also what they’d learned about similar experiences of First Nations people from other countries. The prime example was Canada’s residential…