Since the mid-1980s there has been a sharp rise in the number of literary publications by Indigenous Australians and in the readership and impact of those works. One contemporary Aboriginal Australian author who continues to makea contribution to both the Australian and the global canon is Kim Scott (1957-). Scott has won many awards, including Australia's highest, the prestigious Miles Franklin Award, for his novels Benang (in 2000) and That Deadman Dance (in 2011). Scot...

Children's literature takes many forms - works adapted for children in antiquity, picture books and pop-ups - and now includes the latest online games and eBooks. This vast and amorphous subject is both intimately related to other areas of literary and cultural investigation but also has its own set of concerns, issues and challenges. From familiar authors including Beatrix Potter and Roald Dahl, classic books such as Pooh, Alice in Wonderland, and The Secret Garden

Anne of Tim Hortons: Globalization and the Reshaping of Atlantic-Canadian Literature is a study of the work of over twenty contemporary Atlantic-Canadian writers that counters the widespread impression of Atlantic Canada as a quaint and backward place. By examining their treatment of work, culture, and history, author Herb Wyile highlights how these writers resist the image of Atlantic Canadians as improvident and regressive, if charming, folk.After an introduction that ex...

Our stories are our survival centres on the continuity of Wiradjuri culture. It is a celebration of storytelling and the joys of life within an Aboriginal Australian community. Our stories offers an alternative to the commonly told stories of Aboriginal disadvantage. Using sport as a lens, the book brings to light the continued strength of Aboriginal culture. It places contemporary representations of Aboriginal people and communities into historical context and calls for ...

The degrading environment of the planet is something that touches everyone. This 2011 book offers an introductory overview of literary and cultural criticism that concerns environmental crisis in some form. Both as a way of reading texts and as a theoretical approach to culture more generally, 'ecocriticism' is a varied and fast-changing set of practices which challenges inherited thinking and practice in the reading of literature and culture. This introduction defines what ecocriticism is...

Recent decades have seen a tremendous upsurge of interest among the indigenous peoples of Australia and New Zealand in their history. Life stories, land claims, genealogy, song, dance and painting have all made new contributions to the recovery and representation of the past.Telling Stories looks at the place of life stories and of memory in history: who tells life stories, the purpose for which they are told; the role of story and history in the politics of land claims; and the wa...

In Australia, a ‘tribe’ of white, middle-class, progressive professionals is actively working to improve the lives of Indigenous people. This book explores what happens when well-meaning people, supported by the state, attempt to help without harming. ‘White anti-racists’ find themselves trapped by endless ambiguities, contradictions, and double binds — a microcosm of the broader dilemmas of postcolonial societies. These dilemmas are fueled by tension between the twin desires of equality a...

New Zealand has produced one of the world’s most vibrant film cultures, a reflection of the country’s evolving history and the energy and resourcefulness of its people. From early silent features like The Te Kooti Trail to recent films such as River Queen, this book examines the role of the cinema of New Zealand in building a shared sense of national identity. The works of key directors, including Peter Jackson, Jane Campion, and Vincent Ward, are here introduced in a new...

The Routledge Concise History of Canadian Literature introduces the fiction, poetry and drama of Canada in its historical, political and cultural contexts.In this clear and structured volume, Richard Lane outlines:the history of Canadian literature from colonial times to the presentkey texts for Canadian First Peoples and the literature of Quebecthe impact of English translation, and the Canadian immigrant experiencecri...

This book provides a guide to research and teaching in an Australian Indigenous Studies that is oriented toward the diverse, contemporary world. Central to this perspective is a sensibility to the intercultural complexity of that world – particularly its Indigenous component – and an awareness of the interactional capabilities that the Indigenous (and others) need to successfully negotiate it. These capabilities are important for facilitating Indigenous peoples’ goal of equality as citizen...

Postcolonialism has attracted a large amount of interest in cultural theory, but the adjacent area of multiculturalism has not been scrutinised to quite the same extent. In this innovative new book, Sneja Gunew sets out to interrogate the ways in which the transnational discourse of multiculturalism may be related to the politics of race and indigeneity, grounding her discussion in a variety of national settings and a variety of literary, autobiographical and theoretical texts. Using examp...

This book offers a variety of approaches to children's literature from a postcolonial perspective that includes discussions of cultural appropriation, race theory, pedagogy as a colonialist activity, and multiculturalism.The eighteen essays divide into three sections: Theory, Colonialism, Postcolonialism. The first section sets the theoretical framework for postcolonial studies; essays here deal with issues of "otherness" and cultural difference, as well as the colonialist implicati...