An interpretation of the demise of the traditional ties between Australia and Great Britain during the 1960s. Until a generation ago 'Britishness' lay at the heart of Australian political culture. This text gives a viewpoint of how the idea of Britishness lost its meaning for Australians and their political institutions. Argues that the transformation was due not to the traditional view of Australia's growing nationalism, but rather to Britain's move away from 'Empire' towards the European Economic Community. Includes notes, bibliography and index. Author is a lecturer in history at the Menzies Centre for Australian Studies, King's College, London, and at the University of Southern Denmark. He previously wrote 'Courting the Common Market' and 'British Culture at the End of Empire'.

This thesis examines the powerful, partially-concealed discourse of British imperialism that prevailed in the English childrens annual and explores the implications of anglo-centric stories, images and information for Australian readers. This study reveals that imperialist discourse also promoted ideologies about class, gender and race that did not adequately mediate twentieth-century socio-economic developments, presenting evidence that in the generic English childrens annual, what might be termed {607}the twilight of the British Empire was perpetuated long after its actual demise. English childrens annuals were replete with material that invariably presented England and its values and attitudes in idealised, positive ways. Employing the term, {607}the British embrace, to adopt Stuart Wards usage, this work interrogates idealism in the English annual. The central argument of this study is that English annuals were a profoundly middle-class literary form, devised originally to instruct and entertain. Publishers of this popular, yet conservative, genre responded to new trends and my first chapter draws upon publishing and social history to locate annuals in the contexts of historical and technological change. Other chapters trace how and to what extent distinctively Australian audiences and settings were addressed and constructed in the annual genre. Through analysis of class, gender and racial otherness, I investigate how annuals purveyed English middle-class dreams and fantasies. A final chapter on Englishness in the genre analyses some of its effects upon twentieth-century Australian readers. Childrens annuals were bestsellers and were exported in great numbers to Australia. Adults purchased them as prizes and gifts, especially at Christmas-time. Many older Australians have nostalgic associations with the annual genre and with individual annuals. Twentieth-century Australians were often connected by familial ties to Britain and, like the English suburban households they emulated, Australian households often had English childrens annuals in their libraries. Annuals were considered innocuous texts and were trusted to impart to children knowledge and ideals. Because annuals seldom overtly positioned children as learners they succeeded in this. However, their specific teaching function was problematically ideological.

Australia's Empire is the first collaborative evaluation of Australia's imperial experience in more than a generation. Bringing together poltical, cultural, and aboriginal understandings of the past, it argues that the legacies of empire continue to influence the fabric of modern Australian society.

Sir John Seeley once wrote that the British Empire was acquired in “a fit of absence of mind.” Whatever the truth of this comment, it is certainly arguable that the Empire was dismantled in such a fit. This collection deals with a neglected subject in post-Confederation Canadian history – the implications to Canada and Canadians of British decolonization and the end of empire. Canada and the End of Empire looks at Canadian diplomatic relations with the United Kingdom and the United States, the Suez crisis, the changing economic relationship with Great Britain in the 1950s and 1960s, the role of educational and cultural institutions in maintaining the British connection, the royal tour of 1959, the decision to adopt a new flag in 1964, the efforts to find a formula for repatriating the constitution, the Canadianization of the Royal Canadian Navy, and the attitude of First Nations to the changed nature of the Anglo-Canadian relationship. Historians in Commonwealth countries tend to view the end of British rule from a nationalist perspective. Canada and the End of Empire challenges this view and demonstrates the centrality of imperial history in Canadian historiography. An important addition to the growing canon of empire studies and imperial history, this book will be of interest to historians of the Commonwealth, and to scholars and students interested in the relationship between colonialism and nationalism.

While the British Empire is long gone, it survives as a recurring flashpoint in heated debates about the present and future of Britain and the nations over which Britain once ruled. Embers of Empire in Brexit Britain turns a critical eye to the widely-held notion that the long shadow of the imperial past has much to answer for, and asks to what extent should the residual after-effects of Britain's colonial empire be taken at face value? From the 'Rhodes must fall' controversy and contested anniversaries to immigration scares and the question of what Britishness is in a post-imperial world, an eclectic mix of expert researchers, writers and commentators consider the legacy of the British empire in the battle over Brexit. As the United Kingdom haggles its way out of the European Union and casts about for an alternative future, this volume shows how the memory of the empire is still as potent a political force as ever.

As the debate about an Australian Republic becomes more heated, this first detailed study examines the relationship of the Australian colonies with Britain and the Empire in the late nineteenth century and looks at the beginnings of Australian nationalism.

Dark Emu puts forward an argument for a reconsideration of the hunter-gatherer tag for pre-colonial Aboriginal Australians. The evidence insists that Aboriginal people right across the continent were using domesticated plants, sowing, harvesting, irrigating and storing - behaviors inconsistent with the hunter-gatherer tag. Gerritsen and Gammage in their latest books support this premise but Pascoe takes this further and challenges the hunter-gatherer tag as a convenient lie. Almost all the evidence comes from the records and diaries of the Australian explorers, impeccable sources.