Aboriginal History Journal: Volume 46 - Edited by: Crystal McKinnon, Ben Silverstein

The articles in Volume 46 each take provocative and generative approaches to the challenge of historical truth-telling:

• Examining the public memory of massacres in Gippsland, Victoria, Aunty Doris Paton, Beth Marsden and Jessica Horton trace a history of contestation between, on the one hand, forms of frontier memorialisation articulated to secure colonial possession and, on the other, the sovereign counter-narratives of Gunai Kurnai communities.
• Heidi Norman and Anne Maree Payne describe Aboriginal campaigns to repatriate Ancestors’ stolen remains over the past fifty years, showing how these campaigns have proceeded along with and as part of nation-building movements towards land rights and self-determination. Their call for Aboriginal relationships with Ancestors to be represented in a National Resting Place aligns their research with these movements.
• We return to Gunai Kurnai Country in a piece authored by Rob Hudson and Shannon Woodcock, who show how the Krowathunkooloong Keeping Place has formed an important site and tool of community work towards cultural resurgence; the article itself demonstrates the value and importance of collaborative and co-designed research methods.
• The volume then includes a conversation between Laura McBride and Mariko Smith about their curation of the Australian Museum’s Unsettled exhibition, through which they responded to the 250th anniversary of Cook’s Endeavour voyage along Australia’s east coast by telling true stories that put Cook in his place.

Find the latest volume here. 

Previous volumes can be found at ANU Press. 

About Aboriginal History

The journal Aboriginal History was founded in 1977. For over forty years, it has been a flagship of the field of Australian Aboriginal history. The journal has a close association with the ACIH, and the School of History contributes by housing its editorial office.

Aboriginal History is published by ANU Press. It is freely available online. Hard copies can be purchased through ANU Press.