01_9781742169996-ffirs

Australian History For Dummies^®

by Alex McDermott

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Australian History For Dummies^®

Published by
Wiley Publishing Australia Pty Ltd
42 McDougall Street
Milton, Qld 4064

www.dummies.com

The moral rights of the author have been asserted.

National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication data:

Author: McDermott, Alex

Title: Australian History For Dummies / Alex McDermott

ISBN: 978 1 74216 999 6 (pbk.)

Subjects: Australia — History

Dewey Number: 994

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Cover image: © alehnia, 2010, used under license from Shutterstock.com

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About the Author

Alex McDermott has been a professional historian since 2000, when he began publishing essays, articles, arguments and a book (The Jerilderie Letter, Text Publishing, 2001) on the career and psychology of Ned Kelly, Australia’s legendary and notorious bushranger. In 2006, he was sucked into the terrifying vortex that is history television, working on the Australian series of Who do you think you are?, as researcher and historical consultant for Immigration Nation and for Screen Australia’s Making History initiative, and as chief writer for the online timeline for the children’s television program My Place.

Alex remains optimistic that a prolonged bout of unemployment may be just around the corner, freeing him up to complete his doctorate.

Dedication

Without any doubt in the world, this book is dedicated to Jo Buckley and our newborn son, Henry Lee.

Author’s Acknowledgements

Bronwyn Duhigg at Wiley first had the idea of a For Dummies book on Australian history and approached me about writing it. Once this was underway, three fine editors at Wiley all helped enormously. Big thanks to Rebecca Crisp, Charlotte Duff and Hannah Bennett for all their encouragement and assistance.

On the history side, there are acknowledgements aplenty. First and foremost, John Hirst, for teaching, supervision and mentoring over the past decade above and way beyond the call of duty. As always, John, my genuine thanks. Aside from John, there are many historians whose ideas and arguments I have relied on in writing this book. The likes of Stuart Macintyre, Gavin Souter, Marilyn Lake, Geoffrey Blainey, Eric Richards, Henry Reynolds, Paul Kelly, Gwenda Tavan and Bev Kingston have all contributed immense insight into the realities underpinning Australian history, and are all well worth following up and reading in their own right.

At more specific points of the book, there have been scholars whose arguments about particular moments or individuals I have found very useful. David Potts on the Great Depression, Bob Birrell on the lead up to Federation, Terry Parsons and Portia Robinson on early NSW, Robert Kenny on Batman’s treaty, Judy Brett on prime ministers Menzies and Lyons, Robert Manne on Doc Evatt and the Petrov Royal Commission, and William Sinclair on the question of economic development were all worth their weight in gold, and worthy of individual acknowledgement. Aside from that, there was the ever-reliable Oxford Companion to Australian History and the various essays in the many volumes of the journal Australian Historical Studies, which provided a wealth of highly specialised information and insight.

Finally, acknowledgement is due to two groups of people who were in many ways instrumental in the shaping of this book — however unwittingly. The students I taught in tutorials of Australian and European history at La Trobe University in the early 2000s gave me a clear sense of the best ways of telling and teaching history in as straightforward and direct a fashion as possible. Likewise, the various producers, directors, scriptwriters and factual television executives who I’ve worked with over the last five years have given me a real insight into the best ways of communicating history to as large an audience as possible. Many of the lessons learnt in this field have directly carried over into the writing of the For Dummies book.

Publisher’s Acknowledgements

We’re proud of this book; please send us your comments through our online registration form located at http://dummies.custhelp.com.

Some of the people who helped bring this book to market include the following:

Acquisitions, Editorial and Media Development

Project Editor: Charlotte Duff

Acquisitions Editors: Bronwyn Duhigg, Rebecca Crisp

Technical Reviewer: John Hirst

Editorial Manager: Hannah Bennett

Production

Graphics: Wiley Art Studio

Cartoons: Glenn Lumsden

Proofreader: Liz Goodman

Indexer: Karen Gillen

The author and publisher would like to thank the following copyright holders, organisations and individuals for their permission to reproduce copyright material in this book:

• Page 25: This map is just one representation of many other map sources that are available for Aboriginal Australia. Using published resources available between 1988–1994, this map attempts to represent all the language or tribal or nation groups of the Indigenous people of Australia. It indicates only the general location of larger groupings of people which may include smaller groups such as clans, dialects or individual languages in a group. Boundaries are not intended to be exact. This map is NOT SUITABLE FOR USE IN NATIVE TITLE AND OTHER LAND CLAIMS. David R Horton, creator, © Aboriginal Studies Press, AIATSIS and Auslig/Sinclair, Knight, Merz, 1996. No reproduction allowed without permission.

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