Taking liberty : indigenous rights and settler self-government in colonial Australia, 1830-1890 / Ann Curthoys, Jessie Mitchell.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Curthoys, Ann, author.

Mitchell, Jessie, author.

Series:

Critical perspectives on empire

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Aboriginal Australians--Government relations--History--19th century.

Aboriginal Australians.

Aboriginal Australians--Civil rights--History--19th century.

Politics and government.

Aboriginal Australians--Civil rights.

History.

Aboriginal Australians--Government relations.

Australia--Politics and government--19th century.

Australia.

Genre:

History.

Physical Description:

xi, 432 pages ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, United Kingdom ; New York, NY, USA : Cambridge University Press, 2018.

Summary:

"At last a history that explains how indigenous dispossession and survival underlay and shaped the birth of Australian democracy. The legacy of seizing a continent and alternately destroying and governing its original people shaped how white Australians came to see themselves as independent citizens. It also shows how shifting wider imperial and colonial politics influenced the treatment of indigenous Australians, and how indigenous people began to engage in their own ways with these new political institutions. It is, essentially, a bringing together of two histories that have hitherto been told separately: one concerns the arrival of early democracy in the Australian colonies, as white settlers moved from the shame and restrictions of the penal era to a new and freer society with their own institutions of government; the other is the tragedy of indigenous dispossession and displacement, with its frontier violence, poverty, disease and enforced regimes of mission life"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Introduction: How settlers gained self-government and indigenous people (almost) lost it

Part I: A four-cornered contest: British government, settlers, missionaries, and indigenous peoples. Colonialism and catastrophe, 1830 ; 'Another new world inviting our occupation': colonisation and the beginnings of humanitarian intervention, 1831-1837 ; Settlers oppose indigenous protection, 1837-1842 ; A colonial conundrum: settler rights versus indigenous rights, 1837-1842 ; Who will control the land? Colonial and imperial debates, 1842-1846

Part II: Towards self-government. Who will govern the settlers? Imperial and settler desires, visions, and utopias, 1846-1850 ; 'No place for the sole of their feet': imperial-colonial dialogue on Aboriginal land rights, 1846-1851 ; Who will govern Aboriginal people? Britain transfers control of Aboriginal policy to the colonies, 1852-1854 ; The dark side of responsible government? Britain and indigenous people in the self-governing colonies, 1854-1870

Part III: Self-governing colonies and indigenous people, 1856-c.1870. Ghosts of the past, people of the present: Tasmania ; 'A refugee in our own land': governing Aboriginal people in Victoria ; Aboriginal survival in New South Wales ; Their worst fears realised: the disaster of Queensland ; A question of honour in the colony that was meant to be different: Aboriginal policy in South Australia

Part IV: Self-government for Western Australia. 'Little short of slavery': forced Aboriginal labour in Western Australia, 1856-1884 ; 'A slur upon the colony': making Western Australia's unusual constitution, 1885-1890

Conclusion.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Format:

ebook version :

ISBN:

9781107084858

1107084857

OCLC:

1037808996