Irruptions of the Dreamings in Post‐Colonial Australia

This essay is written round four ‘funny stories’ from Northern Australia. Metamorphosis instigated by a Dreaming is central to all four stories and this is why the stories are counted as ‘funny,’ and received with glee. The analysis illuminates a topic that has been attracting attention in recent contributions to Aboriginal ethnography: how Dreamings irrupt into contemporary histories and act in ways that have political significance, contesting whitefella paradigms and re‐asserting the world‐view of the original Australians.     

Mission Encounters in the Colonial World: British Columbia and South-West Australia

This paper considers various aspects of the interactions of missions and indigenous peoples in regions of Canada and Australia. An analysis of first encounters indicates that the introduction of Christianity was dependent on both evangelist and client population agreeing to a modus operandi for the mission. The structure and operation of the mission were determined by the pre-existing indigenous society and the financial and personnel resources of the mission organizations. Attitudes towards, and acceptance of, Christianity were not static, they depended on changing material and political circumstances both within and outside indigenous communities. This comparative analysis indicates that religious change was not only negotiated between missionary and "convert," but among indigenous peoples themselves. The decision to profess Christianity was not a one-off decision made by individuals or communities. Rather it was a long process of change which was contingent on the perceived advantages and disadvantages of the mission world and countervailingpressures from within indigenous and colonial societies.     

Constructing Colonial Christianities: With Particular Reference to Anglicanism in Australia,ca 1850–1940*

This paper argues the need for new histories of the various settler churches or Christian confessions of Australia and for a new approach to colonial confessional history itself. It suggests that the confessions should be seen not as transplants (as is commonly done) but as variants of their churches of origin and, taking Australian Anglicanism as the primary example, demonstrates a method by which their evolution might be examined. The shaping effect of an assortment of influences, ideas, events, and pressures is explored in a series of settings, from the global to that of local micro‐cultures. It is suggested that if the many forms each of the churches has taken in myriad contexts can be identified in this way it should be possible to construct new, variegated colonial confessional histories.     

The Colonial Religion of the Anglican Clergy: Western Australia 1830 to c. 1870

This article sets out to remedy an historiographical oversight in Australian history by identifying the principal characteristics of the religious culture of Anglican clergy in the colony of Western Australia between 1830 and about 1870. Using sources, both personal from clergy or clergy wives, and official correspondence with the colonial governments, and clergy correspondence to mission societies and their bishop, a number of features of clergy religion are delineated. They enable a comparison to be made between metropolitan and colonial Anglican clergy cultures. These include anxieties about status and income; the involvement of the clergy in charity, education, church building, and public worship; isolation and religious competition. While many of these were familiar to English clergy, they took on new aspects in the colonial context, which required the clergy there to become conscious that the colony was a new land, however much they attempted to remake it in their own ecclesiastical image.     

中岛真雄与近代中国东北的日本殖民化报纸

在近代日本对中国东北的殖民文化侵略史上,中岛真雄是一个关键性人物,在日俄战后的二十年时间里,他先后在营口、沈阳、哈尔滨创办了《满洲日报》、《盛京时报》、《大北新报》三个著名中文大报,成为名副其实的中国东北殖民地报业出版第一人。追踪和考察其创办三报的过程,有助于在更深层次上认识日本殖民文化侵略的复杂性及其作用,并推进中国报业发展史的研究。     

Cartographies of the Colonial/Capitalist State: A Geopolitics of Indigenous Self-Determination in Australia

'Indigenous self-determination' is a multivalent term that has come to represent various meanings in different political and cultural contexts. Indigenous peoples' strategies for self-determination have become increasingly prominent in the domestic polities of many 'first-world' nations, and in the sphere of international law and human rights. These strategies have challenged the cartography of the nation-state with competing claims to land ownership, sovereignty, and self-governance. In Australia, indigenous strategies for self-determination are diverse and holistic and revolve around issues including land rights, law, environmental management, and control over service provision. These are evident in a variety of both 'elite' and 'popular' geopolitical texts. Meanwhile, Australian governments have created new structures that have attempted to encapsulate meanings of 'self-determination,' allowing some indigenous decision-making control, whilst entrenching the nation-state's ultimate hegemony over land. The geopolitics of indigenous strategies for self-determination, and tensions concerning the meaning of the term, are examined, revealing some ways in which discursive trends and material structures interact in locally produced relations of power.