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Beyond Gallipoli
Beyond Gallipoli New Perspectives on Anzac Edited by Raelene Frances and Bruce Scates © Copyright 2016 Copyright of this collection in its entirety is held by Raelene Frances and Bruce Scates. Copyright of the individual chapters is held by the respective chapter authors. All rights reserved. Apart from any uses permitted by Australia’s Copyright Act 1968, no part of this book may be reproduced by any process without prior written permission from the copyright owners. Inquiries should be directed to the publisher. Monash University Publishing Matheson Library and Information Services Building 40 Exhibition Walk Monash University Clayton, Victoria 3800, Australia www.publishing.monash.edu Monash University Publishing brings to the world publications which advance the best traditions of humane and enlightened thought. Monash University Publishing titles pass through a rigorous process of independent peer review. www.publishing.monash.edu/books/bg-9781925495102.html Series: Australian History Series Editor / Board: Sean Scalmer Design: Les Thomas Front cover image: Exhibition Giant, Gallipoli: The Scale of Our War, Private Colin Airlie Warden (1890–1915), Auckland Infantry Battalion. Photograph by Michael Hall. Courtesy of the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa. Back cover image: ‘Peace’ ferry, with warship in the background, Anzac Cove, 2015. Photo by Bruce Scates.. National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry: Title: Beyond Gallipoli : new perspectives on Anzac / edited by Raelene Frances, Bruce Scates. ISBN: 9781925495102 (paperback) Subjects: World War, 1914-1918--Social aspects--Australia. World War, 1914-1918--Social aspects--New Zealand. World War, 1914-1918--Social aspects--Turkey. War and society. Other Creators/Contributors: Frances, Raelene, editor. -
A Critique of the Militarisation of Australian History and Culture Thesis: the Case of Anzac Battlefield Tourism
A Critique of the Militarisation of Australian History and Culture Thesis: The Case of Anzac Battlefield Tourism Jim McKay, Centre for Critical and Cultural Studies, University of Queensland This special issue on travel from Australia through a multidisciplinary lens is particularly apposite to the increasing popularity of Anzac battlefield tourism. Consider, for instance, the Dawn Service at Gallipoli in 2015, which will be the highlight of the commemoration of the Anzac Centenary between 2014 and 2018 (Anzac Centenary 2012). Australian battlefield tourism companies are already fully booked for this event, which is forecast to be ‘the largest peacetime gathering of Australians outside of Australia’ (Kelly 2011). Some academics have argued that rising participation in Anzac battlefield tours is symptomatic of a systemic and unrelenting militarisation of Australian history and culture. Historians Marilyn Lake, Mark McKenna and Henry Reynolds are arguably the most prominent proponents of this line of reasoning. According to McKenna: It seems impossible to deny the broader militarisation of our history and culture: the surfeit of jingoistic military histories, the increasing tendency for military displays before football grand finals, the extension of the term Anzac to encompass firefighters and sporting champions, the professionally stage-managed event of the dawn service at Anzac Cove, the burgeoning popularity of battlefield tourism (particularly Gallipoli and the Kokoda Track), the ubiquitous newspaper supplements extolling the virtues of soldiers past and present, and the tendency of the media and both main political parties to view the death of the last World War I veterans as significant national moments. (2007) In the opening passage of their book, What’s Wrong With Anzac? The Militarisation of Australian History (henceforth, WWWA), to which McKenna contributed a chapter, Lake and Reynolds also avowed that militarisation was a pervasive and inexorable PORTAL Journal of Multidisciplinary International Studies, vol. -
Submission by Heritage Guardians on Behalf of 82 Individuals
Submission by Heritage Guardians on behalf of 82 individuals This submission is made by Heritage Guardians on behalf of the individuals whose names appear below, following their agreement to be included. The submission addresses the first and second terms of reference of the inquiry: • the stated purpose of the proposed work and its suitability for that purpose; • the need for the work. The Australian War Memorial’s $498 million extensions should not proceed. They cannot be justified. The money would be better spent on direct benefits to veterans and their families and on other national institutions. The Memorial should be revered, but Australia has many stories. Excessive veneration of the Anzac story denies the richness of our history, as presented in our many cultural institutions. The Memorial has been treated most generously by successive governments and has suffered less from the ‘efficiency dividend’ that has damaged other institutions. The Memorial wants added space to display more of the big artefacts representing recent conflicts, and to ‘heal’ veterans. Responsibility for veterans’ welfare belongs not with the Memorial but with Defence and Veterans’ Affairs. The Memorial’s ambition to provide a ‘therapeutic milieu’ for veterans trivialises the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder and suggests that memorials can play such a role – a claim for which there is scant evidence. Much of the Memorial’s extended space will be taken up with a grandiose foyer and space to display decommissioned planes and helicopters, which do little to promote an understanding of Australia’s wars, while providing a tourist attraction. Cultural institutions around the world can display only a small proportion of their holdings at any one time. -
'The First Casualty When War Comes Is Truth'
‘The First Casualty When War Comes is Truth’ 54 ‘The First Casualty When War Comes is Truth’: Neglected Atrocity in First World War Australian Memory Emily Gallagher Fourth Year Undergraduate, University of Notre Dame ‘The first casualty when war comes is truth’1 Hiram W. Johnson It is assumed, at least in the West, that the glorification of war is a thing of the past. Even more widely accepted is the perception that modern veneration honours the dead without bias or prejudice. In fact, the rich tapestry of the ANZAC legend glorifies war and readily rejects its associated horrors, projecting constructions of heroism and virtue onto national memory. Exploring the popular perception that inhumane war practices are inherently non-Western, this paper assesses the persisting silence on the grotesque experiences of soldiers in war. An examination of the nature and use of chemical warfare in World War One (WWI) and historiographical analysis of Australian scholarship on WWI will form the foundation of case evidence. Additionally, the psychological analysis of ‘joyful killing’ will be discussed as a potential framework through which modern commemoration can expose past embellishments. Bruce Scates’ Return to Gallipoli considers death and the ‘narrowed’ nature of ANZAC war commemoration. He argues that commemorative services perform a conservative political purpose, 1 Attributed to Senator Hiram Johnson in 1917, this quote originates from Samuel Johnson in 1758. See Suzy Platt (ed.), Respectfully Quoted: a Dictionary of Quotations Requested from the Congressional Research service(Washington: Library of Congress, 1989), 360. 55 history in the making vol. 4 no. 1 where personal mourning is displaced with sentiments of patriotism and sacrifice.2 Pronouncing WWI the ‘great imaginative event’ of the century, Peter Hoffenberg argues that Australians have sought to comprehend the catastrophe of war through references to landscape.3 Certainly, the WWI cemeteries on the Western Front strongly support this venture. -
Saving the Nation's Memory Bank an Open Letter to the Prime Minister
Saving the Nation’s Memory Bank An Open Letter to the Prime Minister We write as friends and supporters of the National Archives of Australia. Some of us are historians, including multiple winners of Prime Minister’s Awards, some are independent writers and researchers, and some are former members of the National Archives Advisory Council. We have differing political viewpoints but share a deep love for the knowledge of Australia’s past embodied in its archives and libraries. We are writing to you because we fear that the integrity of the nation’s premier memory bank, the National Archives of Australia, is in jeopardy and to urge you to secure its future. As the institution created by parliament to maintain the official records of the Commonwealth, the National Archives is one of the pillars of our democracy. It makes decision-making more transparent. It holds governments, past and present, to account. And in the words of Justice Michael Kirby, it ‘holds up a mirror to the people of Australia’. In this respect, the National Archives is not like other cultural institutions, such as museums, galleries and opera houses. Its most important users have yet to be born. The value of many items in its collection may not become apparent for many years because we simply do not know what questions future inquirers may ask. Only in recent years, for example, have researchers begun to tap the riches of the National Archives’ repatriation records, the largest continuous record of the health of any people anywhere, for medical as well as historical research. -
Anzac Day Media Style Guide
2013 Anzac Day Media Style Guide Anzac Day Media Style Guide 2013 Contents (click on headings below to navigate the guide) About this Guide ..................................................................................................................................... 4 Further acknowledgements .................................................................................................................... 5 Your feedback is welcome ...................................................................................................................... 5 Getting Started ........................................................................................................................................ 6 Anzac/ANZAC ...................................................................................................................................... 6 Anzac Day or ANZAC Day? .................................................................................................................. 7 Background: The Gallipoli Landings on 25 April 1915 ............................................................................ 8 Key Dates of the Gallipoli Campaign ....................................................................................................... 9 Gallipoli, Gallipoli and Gelibolu ......................................................................................................... 10 John Simpson Kirkpatrick (1892-1915) ............................................................................................. 10 -
Museums and History
Understanding Museums: Australian museums and museology Des Griffin and Leon Paroissien (eds) Museums and history In the years following World War II, history in Australian schools, universities and museums generally continued a long-standing focus on the country’s British heritage and on Australia’s involvement in war. However, by the 1970s Australia’s history and cultural development had begun to take a more important place in literature, in school curricula, and in universities, where specialised courses were providing training for future historians and museum curators. The essays in this section recount the way museums in Australia have dealt with crucial issues of the formation of national memory and identity. Contents Museums and history: Introduction, Leon Paroissien and Des Griffin War and Australia's museums, Peter Stanley History in the new millennium or problems with history?, Tim Sullivan Museums, history and the creation of memory, 1970–2008, Margaret Anderson Redeveloping ports, rejuvenating heritage: Australian maritime museums, Kevin Jones Museums and multiculturalism: too vague to understand, too important to ignore, Viv Szekeres Online version: http://nma.gov.au/research/understanding-museums/Museums_history.html Image credit: Ludwig Leichhardt nameplate, discovered attached to a partly burnt firearm in a bottle tree (boab) near Sturt Creek, between the Tanami and Great Sandy Deserts in Western Australia. Photo: Dragi Markovic. http://www.nma.gov.au/collections/highlights/the-leichhardt-nameplate Understanding Museums - Museums and history 1 http://nma.gov.au/research/understanding-museums/Museums_history.html National Museum of Australia Copyright and use © Copyright National Museum of Australia Copyright Material on this website is copyright and is intended for your general use and information. -
Australian Journey Resource Guide
Australian Journey The Story of a Nation in 12 Objects Resources for the Journey Texts to Read | Websites to Visit Podcasts to listen to | Film and Literature Primary Sources |Defining Moments This booklet is produced by the Australian National University as a free educational resource. We gratefully acknowledge our collaboration with Monash University, the National Museum of Australia and all the cultural institutions featured in this project. Join us on an Australian Journey Australian Journey is designed for anyone, anywhere interested in Australia. Exploring the themes of Land, People, and Nation, it offers a road map to our country’s Past, Present, and Future. Australian Journey will take you the length and breadth of the continent, and across almost four billion years of history, in 12 short and engaging episodes. And every episode uses objects to reveal the stories of a nation. What do these pieces of the past tell us about their time, their purpose and their maker? Some of the objects we have chosen are famous, iconic or familiar; others obscure, even quirky. But all our objects tell a story and all find a place in the National Museum of Australia. Australian Journey is presented by Professor Bruce Scates and Dr Susan Carland. Resources for the Journey This booklet recommends a range of resources to complement each episode of Australian Journey. School teachers, international university students and the general public can use this guide to find texts, websites, podcasts, films, and literature to augment teaching and learning about the Australian nation. A collection of written, audio, internet and visual sources, this booklet will enable you to extend your knowledge of Australian history and engage further in the historical debates around the objects featured in Australian Journey. -
Centenary (Australia)
Version 1.0 | Last updated 11 May 2021 Centenary (Australia) By Bruce Scates From 2010-2020, Australia fielded the longest, most expensive, and arguably most complex Great War centenary of any combatant nation. It involved unprecedented investment from the state, but was also driven by popular initiatives. “Bottom up” commemoration involved actual people taking on the work of remembrance, shaping and reshaping its complex, and much contested character. The form that labour took, in locations as diverse as museums and battlefields, performative theatre and critical history, is the subject of this article. Table of Contents 1 Introduction 2 Historical Background 3 Orchestrating Anzac: Government Infrastructure 4 History Wars 5 Government Sanctioned Remembrance: The Dispersal of Centenary Funding 6 Commemorating from the Bottom Up 7 Conclusion Notes Selected Bibliography Citation Introduction At the beginning of 2014, James Brown warned of the drift ofA ustralia’s First World War commemorative program. “Anzac”, the former army officer claimed, had become the country’s “national obsession”. Whilst the rest of the world pondered the cost of a war that had torn Europe apart, Australians claimed a bungled battle on Gallipoli signalled the “birth of a nation”. While historians gauged the dimensions of a truly global conflict, Australians exaggerated their comparatively minor part in it. The nomenclature of 2014-2018 is telling. Elsewhere it marks the centenary of the First World War; in Australia it is styled “the Anzac Centenary”. The centenary, Brown concluded, would prove “a discordant, lengthy and exorbitant four year festival of the dead.”[1] There is much to be said for that analysis. -
Remembering the Battle for Australia
Remembering the Battle for Australia Elizabeth Rechniewski, University of Sydney Introduction On 26 June 2008 the Australian minister for Veterans’ Affairs, Alan Griffin, announced that ‘Battle for Australia Day’ would be commemorated on the first Wednesday in September; this proclamation fulfilled a Labor Party election promise and followed a ten-year campaign by returned soldiers and others to commemorate the battles that constituted the Pacific War. The very recent inauguration of this day enables an examination of the dynamics of the processes involved in the construction of national commemorations. The aim of this article is to identify the various agencies involved in the process of ‘remembering the Battle for Australia’ and the channels they have used to spread their message; to trace the political and historical controversies surrounding the notion of a ‘Battle for Australia’ and the conflicting narratives to which they have given rise; and to outline the ‘chronopolitics,’ the shifts in domestic and international politics that ‘over time created the conditions for changes in the memoryscape and, sometimes, alterations in the heroic narrative as well’ (Gluck 2007: 61). The title of this article is intended to recall Jay Winter’s insistence that the terms ‘remembering’ and ‘remembrance’ be used, rather than memory, in order to emphasise the active role of agents in the creation and perpetuation of memory and acts of commemoration (2006: 3). Timothy Ashplant, Grant Dawson and Michael Roper, in a broad ranging study of war memory, emphasise the role of constituencies, or agents of remembrance in the process of memory formation and the struggle to articulate distinct and often competing memories in the array of arenas available. -
Australia's Martial Madonna: the Army Nurse's Commemoration in Stained
Australia’s Martial Madonna: the army nurse’s commemoration in stained glass windows (1919-1951) Susan Elizabeth Mary Kellett, RN Bachelor of Nursing (Honours), Graduate Diploma of Nursing (Perioperative) A thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at The University of Queensland in 2016 School of History and Philosophical Enquiry Abstract This thesis examines the portrayal of the army nurse in commemorative stained glass windows commissioned between 1919 and 1951. In doing so, it contests the prevailing understanding of war memorialisation in Australia by examining the agency of Australia’s churches and their members – whether clergy or parishioner – in the years following World Wars I and II. Iconography privileging the nurse was omitted from most civic war memorials following World War I when many communities used the idealised form of an infantryman to assuage their collective grief and recognise the service of returned menfolk to King and Country. Australia’s religious spaces were also deployed as commemorative spaces and the site of the nurse’s remembrance as the more democratic processes of parishes and dioceses that lost a member of the nursing services gave sanctuary to her memory, alongside a range of other service personnel, in their windows. The nurse’s depiction in stained glass was influenced by architectural relationships and socio- political dynamics occurring in the period following World War I. This thesis argues that her portrayal was also nuanced by those who created these lights. Politically, whether patron or artist, those personally involved in the prosecution of war generally facilitated equality in remembrance while citizens who had not frequently exploited memory for individual or financial gain. -
Goethe University Frankfurt Presents the 2Nd Goethe/Monash Academic Exchange Event National Celebrations and Cultural Memory In
Goethe University Frankfurt presents the 2nd Goethe/Monash Academic Exchange Event 12 February 2014, 18.30h, IG Building Room 311, Westend Campus, Goethe University Frankfurt National Celebrations and Cultural Memory in Multicultural Societies The significance of national memorial holidays such as Australia Day or ANZAC Day Prof Rae Frances and Prof Bruce Scates from Monash University Melbourne together with Prof Astrid Erll and Prof Frank Schulze-Engler from Goethe University Frankfurt will discuss how modern societies deal with contested events of their national histories. How does perception change over time and which ideological messages are transmitted today? Who is addressed, who is included, and who is not? Australia Day and ANZAC Day serve as examples, celebrating events that some Australians seem to proudly perceive as the origin of modern Australia, while other Australians predominantly see them as the beginning of European invasion of the continent, suppression, and suffering, or as a national myth that excludes indigenous people as well as later generations of migrants. Many other Australians, often with a more recent history of migration (e.g. from continental Europe or Asia), might not ascribe much relevance at all to either memorial day and simply enjoy the public holiday. It is the dynamics of collective memory, increased amongst others by modern media, that shape cultural identities, both on an individual as well as national level. While politics might draw on such events in order to create a national identity – and again the question to be discussed here is: who is addressed, who is included, and who is not? – there is also a more subliminal level of negotiation and perception within society.