Claiming a Continent: A New History of Australia

The title of this book is dishonest. There is little pretence to this being a comprehensive history of Australia. Instead, its focus is almost exclusively on the British colonists' policies and attitudes towards the indigenous inhabitants, and towards migrants of non-British background. On its own terms, it is very well written. The writing style is by far the most engaging that I've ever encountered in an historical text - and this very fact betrays what is really going on here: David Day has written a polemical argument, rather than a history. * The tone of the narrator borders on the humorous - it is angry, in a sneering and critical way, so much so that it reminded me of the work of the Austrian (not Australian) novelist, Thomas Bernhard. Like Bernhard, Day does not shy away from repetition. His argument is one of insistence. Facts are shaped to fit his purposes, and then deployed effectively. For those figures whose actions he dislikes, he feels entitled to make ad hominem attacks; thus Prime Minister Menzies is described as 'rotund' and 'stout', his bodily habitus being fair game for Day; relatedly, Day feels comfortable offering cursory psychological analyses of political figures - thus Menzies' and PM John Howards' attitudes are 'explained' by their childhood circumstances in country Victoria and suburban Sydney respectively - this is more the stuff of politcal satire than of history. * It is also not accurate to dub this a thoroughgoing revisionist history. Its scope is just too limited. For instance, there is a glaring neglect of women's roles - Day has perpetuated this neglect, rather than questioning it. He mentions various racial groups, but does nothing to tell their history - they are only important in their being the target of racist British colonial attitudes. * There is a frustrating lack of clarity in the presentation of basic chronology. Even on facts central to Day's argument, such as the size of the Australian population, both migrant and indigenous, he refrains from providing tables or summaries. Extracting the factual basis upon which to build an argument, be this his or one's own, is very difficult. * His biased perspective at times leaves him looking a little silly in the face of events. Thus, for several hundred pages he carps against the Colonialists' fears of the "Asian hordes", virtually laughing at them rather than seriously analysing the source of their fears - when the Japanese do begin their expansion in WWII, Day is embarassed; he is left to pull up his trousers with claims such as that Japan never intended to invade Australia, this claim being justified in cursory fashion. Worse still, changes in Australian attitudes and policies are left without an explanation. Day admits, and tacitly praises, the change in policy regarding the origins of migrants after WWII; but he is unable to enter a discussion as to why this change occurred. Having branded Australians as predominantly racist, Day simply r

[This review is based on the original 1996 edition.] This is an excellent overview of Australian history. It covers the entire period from settlement to the modern day (which day depending on the edition you have). Day presents Australian culture as a colonial one, dispossessing a native population, dependent militarily and morally on a mother country, and believing its claim to proprietorship of the land, to use his term, is under constant scrutiny by other contenders. There is also information about the physical development of Australia. Personally though I found that to be a bit lacking. It could have done with a few more facts and dates about when different areas were settled and more about the specific political and social conditions. Dispossession of the original inhabitants and owners of Australia is the first of Day's two main themes. As he shows later, this has largely been ignored until the last few decades, and is still a topic of hot political debate. Day presents the fact of dispossession and the killing of Aborigines through the records and statements of the people of the time. They knew what was happening, did not consider it something to be disguised or concealed, and used various justifications for it, depending on time period and the conscience of the individual. Day presents all the justifications as attempts to render the Aborigines inhuman, or at least lesser humans, and therefore expendable. He himself utterly rejects that and consistently refers to the killings as murder or massacre. He presents the colonists as having a deliberate though not systematic policy of massacre, occurring when new lands were to be used. Also, it may be worth noting that he contrasts this with the events in the other white Dominions of Britain and in America. In Australia, there were no official attempts to negotiate with the Aborigines. There was no attempt to portray it as other than a takeover, except through the denial of Aborigines being humans to begin with. The second theme is the fear of dispossession, and not feeling at home in this country. He goes through the various stages of White Australia, from the obsession with "bleaching" Australia through deportation of non-whites and restricting immigration to the British Isles, to the gradual government recognition of the policy's abandonment by the people of Australia. He also goes through the various stages of industrial development of Australia, and shows through quotes how this was related to possession of this country. All throughout, the fear of dispossession is shown through quotes that talk about quite explicitly, and for an amazingly long period of time. The feeling of being far from the mother country is one that he has to show indirectly. Most of it is shown through the statistics of travel and immigration policies. However, as he shows, it was made quite explicit in World War II, which also began the shift of colonial allegiance from Britain to America. Finally, this book is wel

This book mostly looks at the racial aspects of the colonization and founding of Australia. Most chapter headings indicate the views of the colonists as being very anti Aboriginal. Although the account is biased and highly subjective it lends itself to a very interesting read, one that any scholar of Australia or the far east and especially anyone interested in Indian-white relations will enjoy. The book details the original encounters with the natives as well as contemporary native issues, such as the 1988 bicentennial of the founding in which a massive wave of Aboriginal protest swept the nation to draw attention to the plight. Of course parallels with American Indians are everywhere. A very interesting book, although `Fatal Shore' is probably a superior and less anti-European account.Seth J. Frantzman