AustLit

'India has faced a similar challenge in establishing the serious study of its own writing in English, one made more problematic by the battle not only to overcome ingrained colonial prejudice against that writing as second-hand imitations of British literature, but because of the resistance from nationalist critics championing writing in the autochthonous languages of the subcontinent. The tactical solution amongst academics in Australia has been in part to accept the consolidation of the field in the national context and to look beyond the national to historical complex networks of literary production and circulation under Empire and to current networks of diasporic movements in and out of Australia. Among other things Sharrad shares that the current calibration of research publications in Australia and the allocation of research grants threaten steadily to concentrate resources around a few key international journals and narrow interpretations of the national interest.' (Editor's abstract)