Looking for Australia: From the Deep Past to Federation

(3 Credit Hours) · Undergraduate

This unit explores the question 'what is Australia?'. It critically interrogates the national framework for Australian history, aiming to explore the continent's long-term history in regional and global context. As well as a long trajectory of transformation, movement and exchange in our region, the unit addresses challenges to the 'nation' from transnational networks of feminists, Indigenous people and other groups, across disciplines, cultures and historical periods. Starting with the concept of 'deep time,' we explore cosmopolitan networks and European 'discovery' from the sixteenth century onward, British settlement and colonization, and key themes in Australian imaginary over the following century, ending with Federation in 1901. Through documentary, material and visual sources the unit aims to develop an informed and critically engaged citizenship, and to give students skills in the historical and cultural analysis of Australia in its global relationships.