The School of History in association with the Australian Centre for Indigenous History is pleased to introduce two new undergraduate course offerings in Indigenous history in Semester 2, 2019.

HIST2142 Indigenous memory and history: on page, stage and screen will examine the ways in which Indigenous people, in Australia and elsewhere, have assumed the right to tell their own histories of imperialism, colonialism and dispossession through diverse forms of memorialisation, performance, writing, art and other modes of  meaning-making. The creative labour of Indigenous intellectuals, artists, filmmakers, writers, and historians shapes contemporary public culture in Australia and other settler-colonial nations, such as Canada, southern Africa, New Zealand and in the Pacific. This course explores such creative labour, both in the past and in the present. We will examine the ways in which Indigenous people have engaged with and challenged imposed cultural and historical forms and practices in ways that have redefined concepts such as sovereignty, self and other, nation and place, and history and time. Students will gain experience working with archives, images, objects, performance, television, lyrics, film and digital forms of storytelling. Dr Maria Nugent will convene this course in 2019.

HIST2241 Global Aboriginal and Native Histories will explore continuities and resilience among indigenous peoples in the Americas, Africa, Asia, the Pacific and in Europe, particularly in relation to the intrusions of colonisation. The survival of these peoples owes much to their agency in maintaining and creating alternative historical narratives, often resisting or negotiating broad concepts of indigeneity. This course explores converging literatures about global Aboriginal and Native histories since colonisation. The course examines the importance of language within historical narratives, assessing the ways in which these narratives generate conditions of survival. The topics covered will include concepts of identity within the process of colonisation and decolonisation, evolving government policies, ideas of sovereignty, treaties and other formal relationships between colonised and colonisers, the forms of post-colonialisms and world-wide movements for redemption, regeneration and reconciliation. Particular attention will be given to the relevant discourses about difference including an examination of the use and sensitivities of various group descriptors such as indigenous, native and aborigine. Dr Lawrence Bamblett will convene this course in 2019.

Enrolments are now open via ISIS for Semester 2. Classes start from 22 July.