Quicksands: Foundational Histories in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand

by Nicholas Thomas (Editor), Klaus Neumann (Editor), Hilary Ericksen (Editor)

Presents 12 essays from such disciplines as history, sociology, English, legal studies, ecology, and art history which explore the changing discourse of the early encounters between European and Australian indigenous peoples. The narratives of cultural contact are dissected to reveal the ways in which cultures construct different meanings from history. "Why has 'national identity' preoccupied so many writers and artists on both sides of the Tasman? Why have the stories of the first settler societies in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand exercised such a hold over our collective consciousness? And why is this history once again part of contemporary political and cultural debate? This innovative trans-Tasman collaboration explores how the founding of Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand have been remembered and reimagined over more than two centuries. At the dawn of a new century, when the facts of these cultural encounters are increasingly under challenge, the writers of Quicksands argue for a new 'Australasian' consciousness and imagine new ways to negotiate the quicksands of our national histories. From a range of disciplines as diverse as art history, law and sociology, the contributors to this collection include Deborah Bird Rose, Stephen Turner, Paul Carter, Greg Dening, Judith Binney, Tim Rowse, Ross Gibson, Julian Thomas, Jonathan Lamb, Paul McHugh, Nigel Clark, John Morton, Nicholas Smith and Geoff Park."

281 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1999

Reviews

[Malcolm · Rating 3 out of 5]

Most certainly a book for thinking about – these essays challenge many of the basic assumptions of the histories of Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand, and challenge many of the myths that the two countries take for granted. The stand-out piece for me is Stephen Turner's 'Settlement as Forgetting', a critical reading of popular and high culture as marking New Zealand's colony of settlement as new. However, as with many collections of essays it is overall uneven.