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AbstractHistoryArchive Description
'Briscoe's grandmother remembered stories about the first white men coming to the Northern Territory. This... memoir shows us the history of an Aboriginal family who lived under the race laws, practices and policies of Australia in the twentieth century. It tells the story of a people trapped in ideological folly spawned to solve 'the half-caste problem'. It gives life to those generations of Aboriginal people assumed to have no history and whose past labels them only as shadowy figures.
Briscoe's... narrative combines his [own], and his contemporaries, institutional and family life with a high-level career at the heart of the Aboriginal political movement at its most dynamic time. It also documents the road he travelled as a seventeen year old fireman on the South Australia Railways to becoming the first Aboriginal person to achieve a PhD in history.' Source: Publisher's blurb
Notes
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Dedication: For my brother Bill (1944-2003) who served his country well. (vii)
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
-
y
Citizenship in Dalit and Indigenous Australian Literatures
London
:
Routledge
,
2023
26033071
2023
multi chapter work
criticism
'Citizenship in Dalit and Indigenous Australian Literatures examines the difference in citizenship as experienced by the communities of Dalits in India and Aboriginals in Australia through an analysis of select literature by authors of these marginalised groups.
'Aligning the voices of two disparate communities, the author creates a transnational dialogue between the subaltern communities of the two countries, India and Australia, through the literature produced by the two communities. The Covid-19 pandemic has made the divide that exists between the performative citizenship rights enjoyed by the Dalits and the aboriginals and the respective dominant communities of their countries more apparent. The author addresses the issue of this disparity between discursive and performative citizenship through a detailed analysis of select Dalit and Australian aboriginal autobiographies, in particular the works by Dalit autobiographers, Baby Kamble and Aravind Malagatti and aboriginal autobiographers Alice Nannup and Gordon Briscoe. The book uses the dominant tropes of the individual autobiographies as a background to unfurl the denial of citizenship, both in the discursive and the performative form, using the parameters of equal citizenship. In doing so, the author also raises important, groundbreaking questions: How is the performativity of citizenship foregrounded by the Dalits and aboriginals in the literary counter-public? How does this foregrounding evoke violent retribution from the dominant sections? And does the continued violation of performative citizenship point to the dysfunctionality of the performative citizenship status accorded to the Dalits and the aboriginals?
'Questioning the liberal legacy of political, civil and social citizenship, this book will be of interest to researchers studying Dalit and Aboriginal Literature, Interdisciplinary Literary Studies and World Literature, South Asian Studies and researchers dealing with the question of citizenship.' (Publication summary)
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The Story of the Bungalow Alice Springs, 1914-1929 : A Decolonised, Creative Non-fictive Treatment with a Focus on the Women and Children
2021
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Lilith , January no. 27 2021; (p. 81-103) 'The Bungalow began as a tin shed built in 1914 in Alice Springs to house Topsy Smith and her children, of mixed Indigenous and European heritage, whose father had recently died. Over the years that followed many more children with Indigenous mothers and European fathers were taken from their families and brought to live at the Bungalow until about 60 children were growing up there and two more sheds were built. Traditional historiographic methods of research and writing have been combined with the techniques of creative non-fiction, with an overarching focus on decolonisation, to foreground women and children in a story that brings the first Bungalow to life.' (Publication abstract) -
Two Special Lives Celebrated
2010
single work
column
— Appears in: Koori Mail , 24 March no. 472 2010; (p. 42) 'An audience of well-wishers and colleagues attended the recent Sydney launch of two major works celebrating the lives of Gordon Briscoe and Joy Janaka Wiradjuri Williams.' Source: Koori Mail no. 472, 24 March 2010
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Two Special Lives Celebrated
2010
single work
column
— Appears in: Koori Mail , 24 March no. 472 2010; (p. 42) 'An audience of well-wishers and colleagues attended the recent Sydney launch of two major works celebrating the lives of Gordon Briscoe and Joy Janaka Wiradjuri Williams.' Source: Koori Mail no. 472, 24 March 2010 -
The Story of the Bungalow Alice Springs, 1914-1929 : A Decolonised, Creative Non-fictive Treatment with a Focus on the Women and Children
2021
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Lilith , January no. 27 2021; (p. 81-103) 'The Bungalow began as a tin shed built in 1914 in Alice Springs to house Topsy Smith and her children, of mixed Indigenous and European heritage, whose father had recently died. Over the years that followed many more children with Indigenous mothers and European fathers were taken from their families and brought to live at the Bungalow until about 60 children were growing up there and two more sheds were built. Traditional historiographic methods of research and writing have been combined with the techniques of creative non-fiction, with an overarching focus on decolonisation, to foreground women and children in a story that brings the first Bungalow to life.' (Publication abstract) -
y
Citizenship in Dalit and Indigenous Australian Literatures
London
:
Routledge
,
2023
26033071
2023
multi chapter work
criticism
'Citizenship in Dalit and Indigenous Australian Literatures examines the difference in citizenship as experienced by the communities of Dalits in India and Aboriginals in Australia through an analysis of select literature by authors of these marginalised groups.
'Aligning the voices of two disparate communities, the author creates a transnational dialogue between the subaltern communities of the two countries, India and Australia, through the literature produced by the two communities. The Covid-19 pandemic has made the divide that exists between the performative citizenship rights enjoyed by the Dalits and the aboriginals and the respective dominant communities of their countries more apparent. The author addresses the issue of this disparity between discursive and performative citizenship through a detailed analysis of select Dalit and Australian aboriginal autobiographies, in particular the works by Dalit autobiographers, Baby Kamble and Aravind Malagatti and aboriginal autobiographers Alice Nannup and Gordon Briscoe. The book uses the dominant tropes of the individual autobiographies as a background to unfurl the denial of citizenship, both in the discursive and the performative form, using the parameters of equal citizenship. In doing so, the author also raises important, groundbreaking questions: How is the performativity of citizenship foregrounded by the Dalits and aboriginals in the literary counter-public? How does this foregrounding evoke violent retribution from the dominant sections? And does the continued violation of performative citizenship point to the dysfunctionality of the performative citizenship status accorded to the Dalits and the aboriginals?
'Questioning the liberal legacy of political, civil and social citizenship, this book will be of interest to researchers studying Dalit and Aboriginal Literature, Interdisciplinary Literary Studies and World Literature, South Asian Studies and researchers dealing with the question of citizenship.' (Publication summary)
- Adelaide, South Australia,
