This book is about how Australians have responded to stories about suffering and injustice in Australia, presented in a range of public media, including literature, history, films, and television. Those who have responded are both ordinary and prominent Australians—politicians, writers, and scholars. All have sought to come to terms with Australia's history by responding empathetically to stories of its marginalized citizens.Drawing upon international scholarship on collective memory, public history, testimony, and witnessing, this book represents a cultural history of contemporary Australia. It examines the forms of witnessing that dominated Australian public culture at the turn of the millennium. Since the late 1980s, witnessing has developed in Australia in response to the increasingly audible voices of indigenous peoples, migrants, and more recently, asylum seekers. As these voices became public, they posed a challenge not only to scholars and politicians, but also, most importantly, to ordinary citizens.When former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd delivered his historic apology to Australia's indigenous peoples in February 2008, he performed an act of collective witnessing that affirmed the testimony and experiences of Aboriginal Australians. The phenomenon of witnessing became crucial, not only to the recognition and reparation of past injustices, but to efforts to create a more cosmopolitan Australia in the present. This is a vital addition to Transaction's critically acclaimed Memory and Narrative series.

One man's search for justice and redemption plunges him into the violent world of Melbourne's underbelly. Defence lawyer Will Harris is reluctantly drawn into a bizarre murder trial. A terminally ill man claims to have witnessed the brutal crime - in a vision. But the looming trial is more than just a media circus: it's Will's first big case since the tragic death of his fiancée. With the pressure mounting, Will's loyalties are split when his fiancée's sister is charged with drug trafficking. The strain of balancing both cases takes its toll and Will finds himself torn between following the law and seeking justice. Blood Witness is a dark powerful thriller from a talented new voice. 'a slick, fast-paced legal thriller set in Melbourne but with a genuine international flavour and with enough twists to surprise even the most avid fans of the genre' West Australian 'the most compelling aspect of the book is the legal one with its debate about the relationship between the law and justice and its insider knowledge of details' Adelaide Advertiser 'an entertaining and interesting thriller and a great start to a new Australian crime series with lots of potential' Book'd Out 'a clever multi-threaded plot' Newton Review of Books '...... as exciting as anything I've read in a long time. It says much for Hammond's story-telling skills and augurs well for his future writing' Devoted Eclectic 'A lot of fun ... and a cracking twist in the tale.' Courier-Mail

A masterful and deeply troubling exposé, Witness is the culmination of almost five years' work for award-winning investigative journalist Louise Milligan. Charting the experiences of those who have the courage to come forward and face their abusers in high-profile child abuse and sexual assault cases, Milligan was profoundly shocked by what she found. During this time, the #MeToo movement changed the zeitgeist, but time and again during her investigations Milligan watched how witnesses were treated in the courtroom and listened to them afterwards as they relived the associated trauma. Then she was a witness herself in the trial of the decade, R v George Pell. Through these experiences, interviews with high-profile members of the legal profession, including judges, prosecutors and the defence lawyers who have worked in these cases, along with never-before-published court transcripts, Milligan lays bare the flaws that are ignored and exposes a court system that is sexist, unfeeling and weighted towards the rich and powerful. In Witness, Milligan reveals the devastating reality that within the Australian legal system truth is never guaranteed and, for victims, justice is often elusive. And even when they get justice, the process is so bruising, they wish they had never tried.

This path-breaking book extends our knowledge of the social and cultural impacts of television, asking new questions about the ways television’s technologies and programming have been experienced, understood and remembered. Television has served as a companion to the historical events that have unfolded in our everyday lives both on and off the screen, and its presence is intricately bound up in our memories of the past and actions in the present. As this volume demonstrates, the influence of television over individual and family behaviours, national identity and ideas of global citizenship is complex and wide-ranging. Drawing upon recent developments in memory studies, history, media and cultural studies, and with particular reference to Australia, leading scholars explore the histories of television, and how its programs and personalities have been celebrated, recalled with nostalgia or simply forgotten. Topics covered include the pre-figuring of television; memories of the struggle for transmission in remote locations; the transnational experience of television for immigrant communities; the evocation of television programs through spin-off products; televised war reportage and censorship; and the value of ‘unofficial’ television archives such as YouTube. As a whole, these essays offer a striking and original examination of the connections between history, memory and television in today’s world.

The compelling story of South Australia's disgraced former chief forensic pathologist and the legal scandals in which he became implicated. For nearly three decades, Dr Colin Manock was in charge of South Australia's forensic pathology services, and played a vital role within the state's criminal justice system: in cases of unexpected or unexplained death, it was his job to determine when a person took their final breath and whether they had died naturally or as a result of something more sinister. Throughout his long career, he performed more than 10,000 autopsies and gave expert scientific evidence in court that helped secure approximately 400 criminal convictions. But, remarkably, Manock, a self-described "witness of fact", did not have the necessary training for such a senior, specialist role, and he made serious errors in several major cases--with tragic consequences, including the apparently wrongful imprisonment of innocent people. The full extent of his wrongdoing and the exact number of cases impacted by it remains a mystery more than twenty-five years after he retired, due to the continuing refusal of those in power to heed calls to launch a formal inquiry into his career. In this book, Rooke examines several of Manock's most controversial cases, and speaks with many of his former colleagues, people directly impacted by his flawed work, and legal experts. At its heart, A Witness of Fact is about how an entire legal system has failed badly, how unsafe verdicts have been swept under the carpet--and how forensic evidence that is admitted in courts of law in Australia and across the world is dubious more often than we would like to think.

First published in 1925, 'The Witness for the Prosecution' is a short story and play by Agatha Christie, an English writer best known for her 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections, specifically those revolving around fictional detectives Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple. When affluent spinster, Emily French is found murdered, skepticism falls on Leonard Vole, the man to whom she impatiently bequeathed her riches before she died. Leonard assures the investigators that his wife, Romaine Heiliger, can provide them with an alibi. However, when questioned, Romaine notifies the police that Vole returned home late that night covered in blood. During the trial, Ms. French's housekeeper, Janet, gives damning proof against Vole, and, as Romaine's cross-examination begins, her motives come under scrutiny from the courtroom. The packed courtroom waited as Romaine mounted the stand to deliver the testimony that has made this the masterpiece of suspense and shock. The ultimate question is whether justice will prevail or not.

This book analyses how an increasing number of new Chinese migrants have integrated into Australian society and added a new dimension to Australian domestic politics as a result of Australia’s merit-based immigration system and its shift towards Asia. These policies have helped Australia sustain its growth without a recession for decades, but have also slowly changed established patterns in the distribution of job opportunities, wealth, and political influence in the country. These transformations have recently triggered a strong Sinophobic campaign in Australia, the most disturbing aspect of which is the denial of the successful integration of Chinese migrants into Australian society. Based on evidence gathered through a longitudinal study of Chinese migrants in Australia, this book examines the misconceptions troubling Australia’s current China debate from six important but overlooked perspectives, ranging from migration policy changes, economic factors, grassroots responses, the role of major political parties, community activism, to knowledge issues.