Ghosts of Sorrow,Sin and Crime: Dark Tourism and Convict Heritage in Van Diemen’s Land,Australia

Established as a British imperial penal colony, Van Diemen’s Land received approximately 75,000 convicts before cessation of convict transportation in 1853. A vast network of penal stations and institutions were created to accommodate, employ, administer, and discipline these exiled felons. Popular interpretations of Australia’s convict past highlight dynamics of shame, avoidance and active obliteration that characterized Australia’s relationship to its recent convict past. Yet, closer examination of these colonial institutions suggests a far more ambivalent relationship with this “dark heritage,” evidenced by continuous tourism and visitation to these places of pain and shame from the mid-nineteenth century to the present.     

La République, l’affaire Dreyfus et la raison d’État

It is often said that the Dreyfus Affair was a key moment in the history of french republicanism. But the philosophical sens of this turning point remains to be elucidated. Indeed it is not certain that the republican discourse can then be reduced to the apology of the individual and of justice against the reason of State. The aim of this article is to analyse the arguments mobilised in the Dreyfus camp by certain figures of republican socialism, like Jean Jaurès, or of republicanism like Alfred Fouillée, Emile Durkheim and others. The examination of the positions of Célestin Bouglé, a young sociologist close to Durkheim, is here privileged: it is situated, through his biography and his work, at the crossroads of diverse tendencies, from positivism to neo-criticism.     

General Cariappa encounters ‘White Australia’: Australia,India and the commonwealth in the 1950s

There have been a number of studies of the White Australia policy and some examination of white Australia's relationship to the new, multiracial Commonwealth that emerged after the Second World War. Drawing extensively on Indian sources, this article examines how Australia was viewed by India's high commissioner to Australia and New Zealand, General K. M. Cariappa. In the period from September 1953 to April 1956 he sparked considerable controversy by suggesting that the White Australia policy ran the risk of alienating Asian opinion and undermining the Commonwealth ideal in India and Pakistan. Cariappa maintained a high public profile throughout his stay in Australia and was widely regarded as one of the most prominent diplomats posted to Canberra in the 1950s.     

Review Article – The Industrial Heritage of Australia and New Zealand: an essay in bibliography and criticism

Abstract

Historical archaeology, which includes industrial aspects, has become well established in Australia and New Zealand in the last few years. The growing number of field and archaeological investigations has led to the establishment of a theoretical underpinning which is probably better developed than in Britain and the United States. An exciting range of publications is critically reviewed in this article.     

La typologie des nations et l’Espagnol mélancolique: Notes pour l’interprétation d’un cliché

Included in the traditional typology of nations, the image of the melancholy Spaniard is a cultural stereotype which appears with a remarkable continuity since the Spanish Golden Age. Developed by foreigners--particularly by the French--this stereotype is also adopted by the Spaniards themselves. It is then necessary to inquire about the persistance of this stereotype through-out the centuries and to examine how--and why--the Spaniards did adhere to the image given by foreigners and the typology of nations. The examination of this stereotype aims at analyzing its mechanism, at discovering its representations--sometimes very different--and the implications involved. The image of the melancholy Spaniard is deeply subjective representation which engages a complex work of the imagination: it concerns the representation of the other and the consciousness that every nation has of itself, revealing many elements about the one who produces it.     

Critical Masses: Augmented Virtual Experiences and the Xenoplastic at Australia’s Cold War and Nuclear Heritage Sites

Critical Masses is a multidisciplinary pilot project that aims to graphically represent and mediate the histories, spaces and narratives concerning former nuclear installations within central Australia. These include the abandoned British atomic test sites at Emu Field and Maralinga, the Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM)/Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile (IRBM) rocket launchers at Woomera, and the decommissioned US National Security Agency early warning satellite base at Nurrungar. Significantly, each of these Cold War sites are situated in either hazardous, remote, secure and/or culturally sensitive areas and require sophisticated analysis and negotiation in order to best render their complexity for both online access and on-site tourism. In association with the Maralinga-Pilling Trust and traditional indigenous landowners a multi-tiered approach (re)creating these locations is being modelled across platforms for diverse audiences. Digital materials are being authored and designed for stand-alone DVD, online interactive sites and archives, an immersive/simulated space for interpretation centres, and augmented/enhanced reality interfaces via GPS and mobile/handheld devices used in situ at key sites.     

A Blessing in Disguise: Nanxun and China’s Small Town Heritage

This article analyzes Nanxun, a lower Yangzi delta town known for its silk products, as a case study of China’s development and underdevelopment. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a booming silk trade linked Nanxun to the global market and made it an extraordinarily wealthy town, yet little was achieved in terms of urban development. Scholars have attributed the underdevelopment of Nanxun to economic factors, and perceived it as entirely undesirable. This article argues that a largely overlooked cause of Nanxun’s underdevelopment was the conformist culture of Nanxun’s ruling elite. The merchants who created the wealth of the town by their very natures preferred to create a safe and secluded zone in which the familiarity of their living environment could be preserved and the comfort of a traditional lifestyle assured. The underdevelopment of Nanxun turned out, however, not to be completely negative. The town did not sustain its status as a trading center, nor develop into a major city, but its arrested development preserved much of its original layout and, moreover, its culture. From a cultural and environmental point of view, Nanxun’s underdevelopment may have proved to be more valuable than if the town had become an indistinguishable industrial site.     

‘The Garrison Mentality’ versus ‘La Survivance’: English‐French relations in lower Canada, 1791–1838

Legacies of Fear: Law and Politics in Quebec in the Era of the French Revolution by F. Murray Greenwood. Toronto: University of Toronto Press for The Osgoode Society, 1993. Pp.xvi + 359. £26.00 (hardback); £13.00 (paperback). ISBN 0–8020–0534–8; 0–8020–6974–6.

The Christie Seigneuries: Estate Management and Settlement in the Upper Richelieu Valley, 1760–1854 by Françoise Noel. Montreal and Kingston: McGill‐Queen's University Press, 1992. Pp.xiv + 221. £29.95 (hardback). ISBN 0–7735–0876–7.

The Patriots and the People: The Rebellion of 183 7 in Rural Lower Canada by Allan Greer. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993. Pp.xiv + 385. £32.00 (hardback); £12.50 (paperback). ISBN 0–8020–2792‐X; 0–8020–6930–4.     

Transnational blackface,neo-minstrelsy and the ‘French Eddie Murphy’ in Intouchables

The 2011 French film Intouchables is an interracial buddy film about a black caregiver from the suburbs and a quadriplegic white aristocrat. Éric Tolédano and Olivier Nakache’s film broke box office records in France and abroad, becoming the second highest grossing French film of all time in domestic release and the most successful non-English film on the export market. However, the film’s critical reception was mixed; some celebrated the film’s social conscience while others denounced its racism. In this article, the author analyses the film’s treatment of race, specifically the ways in which Tolédano and Nakache draw on tropes of American blackface, neo-minstrelsy and 1980s Hollywood interracial buddy comedies starring Eddie Murphy to visualise racial inequality and discrimination in contemporary France. The author tracks the ways in which these American tropes align and do not align with representations of cultural diversity and the banlieues in France, and he ultimately argues that the film’s financial success and ambivalent reception track with the contradictory politics of American tropes for representing blackness.     

Symbolic Reparation,Heritage and Political Transition in South Africa’s Eastern Cape

This article first examines the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s recommendation of symbolic reparation for apartheid, and its effect on South African heritage. Second, it considers the relationship between public history and civic nation building in South Africa, as well as problems in trying to develop an inclusive public history through museums. Case studies drawn from Grahamstown and Mthatha in the Eastern Cape are explored as examples of the redevelopment of the old and establishment of the new public history as part of the negotiated transition.     

Colonising Italians: Italian Imperialism and Agricultural ‘Colonies’ in Australia, 1881–1914

The historiography of Australian imperialism before the First World War has often neglected a context wider than the relationship with Great Britain. Yet this era also implicated non-British governments and their emigrants. Despite their small numbers, Italian settlers are significant for highlighting Italy's empire-building and Australia's struggles for national and imperial unity. Italy's foreign policies after 1901 opened commercial opportunities across its diasporic networks, which included subsidising agricultural ‘colonies’ in Australia. The contemporary discourses of sectarianism and racism voiced before Federation articulated political and popular resistance against Italian immigrants. The rhetoric shifted after Federation as state governments examined the issue of land tenure for closer settlements (small agricultural farms), appealing to an argument about serving unemployed Australians before approving foreign settler schemes. The history leading up to two Italian projects in Western Australia and Queensland in 1907 allows reflections on Italy's diaspora colonisation and Australian responses to foreign imperialism.     

‘…to exercise in all loyalty,discretion and conscience’: on insider research and the World Heritage Convention

While research on the World Heritage Convention has expanded tremendously in the last decade, little attention has been directed towards the research published by a handful of what can be characterised as insider researchers. Within this context, ‘insider researchers’ refers to individuals working at or on behalf of the core international institutions implementing the World Heritage Convention, such as the World Heritage Centre, and thus conduct research on a system they are part of. Coding articles published in international peer-reviewed journals, this article explores the themes and topics tackled in these articles and addresses the strengths and weaknesses of insider research within the World Heritage context.     

Balto,the Alaskan Dog and his Statue in New York’s Central Park: Animal Representation and National Heritage

This article explores the statue of Balto in New York’s Central Park within a framework of discussion of animal representation in creating national heritages. It discusses the reasons for Balto’s statue being sited in New York with reference to the competing demands for different heritage commemorations within the park’s space. In exploring the role of different interests in promoting this particular commemoration the article questions a simplistic notion of heritage being created by bodies of the state and draws analogies with other national animal ‘symbols’ such as Greyfriars Bobby, and ‘The Dog on the Tucker Box’. The article suggests that animal commemoration in everyday space may help create ongoing interest in animal pasts while noting the disjuncture between the represented animal and Balto’s actual existence.     

Life Among Ruins,Bermuda and Britain’s Colonial Heritage

Situated some 600 mi (965 km) east of North Carolina, the island of Bermuda is Britain’s oldest surviving colony. While much of the British Empire has been dismantled, Bermuda remains within the Imperial fold, and is today designated a “British overseas territory.” Within this framework, Bermuda’s heritage tourism landscape perpetuates an institutionally imposed colonialist narrative that neglects to explore the contributions of the island’s under-represented communities. This article explores these issues with respect to the island’s tourism plan. It concludes by highlighting new archaeological research centered on the material lives of enslaved Bermudians.