Minorities in Australian Literature Essay

Australian publications consists of many arrayations of the Australian focusing of life that are constructed by numerous demesneal stereotypes. Various critics betoken that the current literary models of the average Australian do non embrace enough ethnic transmutation by the incorporation of innate volume, fe phallics and cultural communities. The representations of Australian people have changed dramatically everywhere a period of term.While the first Australian literary pieces consisted of only one specific brand of psyche, neglecting wo manpower and aborigines, during the nations development and the arrival of more social people, there was a rise in the representations of these minority groups. Following this, in the late 20th century to current years, these minority groups have begun to express and represent themselves through write.Despite the most common representation of the Australian person non including these minorities, there has been a significant cha nge in their representations through literature and the version that does not include them, is predominately used through non-literary workings. The common representation of the Australian people is a tough Anglo-Saxon male who works in labour intensive jobs. This passage has been used heavily to identify Australians, particularly by the current media, to phase on the Australian image.The concept of this type of person representing the whole nation was formed from traditional texts in the 19th century, when the writers were almost entirely face cloth European males and chose to write only of people standardized themselves. When the ladies come in to the shearing shed and Clancy from the overflow, are examples of the types of literary pieces that were written in the 19th century, which focus on the white men of Australia who work in tough jobs in the outback. When the ladies come to the shearing shed, written by heat content Lawson in 1897 is about the reactions of Australian men when women are in their presence.The poem composes the image of masculine men who work in a shearing shed, and represents their job as noble, as women come from the city to shape them. Women are equal as delicate objects of affection that detention little importance to the sassy. The only time in which the women are described doing or recounting something is when they comment on the appearance of the animals, and they gush and say in a girly way, that the dear little lambs are sweet. This universe the only thing that women say, beautifys that they did not hold any real significance to the story, and their eyeshots were completely left out.The way in which the women are portrayed in the poem is not necessarily negative, but they are not particularly valued characters, and are seen as the other. This is due to the attempt of a white male providing his face-to-face opinion on the way another type of person acts, which creates a distorted representation. The men and women in this text have an limpid separation between them, and it is express that they are on very different levels, which is not an accurate portrayal of real life. Clancy of the overflow was written in 1889 by one of Australias most famous poets, Banjo Paterson.The story shares the same representation of the Australian male, who works with animals out in the bush. In the poem Paterson attempts to personify the quintessential Australian, and who believes every man should be which is a strong worker who is in touch with life on the land. Through the eyes of an office worker the poem represents outback life as coveted over city living and working, I am sitting in my dingy little office, where a near ray of sunlight struggles feebly down between the houses tall. Clancy, and his outback life is represented as desired by the city dweller, And I somehow fancy that Id like to change with Clancy, like to take a turn at droving where the seasons come and go. The poem does not include aborig ines, women or ethnic people, which by todays standard is frowned upon but in the time of the poems creation was common in texts. These two, and many more texts from Banjo Paterson and Henry Lawson reinforce the argument that the personification of the Australian person was most usually used in traditional Australian literature, and the opinions of the minority groups are excluded.Progressing from the prejudiced representation that they received from male writers, women have blend in just as equally common and successful as men in Australian literature. In todays Australian society, women are in a better piazza than natural and ethnic Australians in terms of equality, which makes their characterization in literary works more familiar. The freeing of women in Australian literature has given females the opportunity to write about and express themselves through their personal opinions, creating countless female Australian sources.If I had a gun is a poem written by Gig Ryan, that represents her confronting attitudes toward the men that surround her. The poem consists of Gig Ryan explaining the men that she would demand because of their disrespectful attitude towards women. in that respect is . She uses particular examples of the way men in society sexualize her and other women, Id shoot the man who whistled from his balcony. She even writes about the smallest occurrences that frustrate her, illustrating that she doesnt accept any form of gender superiority, Id shoot the man last night who said smile honey. A woman writing about the men that she would figuratively murder, shows the growth that Australian literature has endured. Many years prior, women were only seldom written about and their true feelings and perspectives were silenced. Now, they have the opportunity to voice their opinions, even in a confronting expression and still be embraced by the Australian public. Throughout the 20th century, women, aborigines and ethnic people began to be identif y and represented more regularly, however still commonly through the perspective of Anglo-Saxon males.Despite this improvement, the others could not represent themselves, so someone else represented them. This obviously led to a one-sided representation, because no enumerate how sympathetic the author was, they were viewing things through their own perspective, which is particularly evident with the aborigine representations in texts. The novel Coonardo written by Katherine Susannah Pritchard addresses the complex issues of ownership and the colonial enterprise that was present in its publication particular date of 1958.It contains the flourishing inter-racial relationship of Hugh, a non-indigenous landowner and Coonardo, an indigenous woman as the solution to these difficult situations. This was an proto(prenominal) time in Australia for a topic like this to become a successful novel, especially because the author held a non-biased perspective end-to-end the novel, which would have limited readers to those who did not have a strong opinion on these matters. David Maloufs Remembering Babylon (1993) deals with the problem of how to represent difference and reversing the representations of the other.The main character, Gemmy lived in an aboriginal community for 16 years and an eventual rescue of him by white settlers creates a double cognizance that does not allow for him to fully re-embrace his white culture that soon becomes the other. Malouf, despite his white inheritance does achieve a very open-minded representation of the aboriginal people. He appears to show sympathy towards the indigenous community, which allows him to tell the story through their eyes, casting the white people and the things they did as bad.The point of view throughout the novel is mainly of the tribe that Gemmy belonged to, instead of himself. The novel, while containing a great racial tolerance and toleration towards the indigenous people, does however, still support the notion of the unstable relationship between non-indigenous and indigenous Australians. Remembering Babylon provides a more in depth representation from the point of view of the aboriginal people, whereas Coonardo represents both races equally from an outsiders perspective.Many ethnic immigrants have been left with the smallest amount of representations in Australian literature, due to the face cloth Australia Policy lasting up until the mid 20th century, which has rendered their Australian legacy very young. This obviously has now left them struggling to be represented in key texts because of their short history. Ethnic groups who are represented in literary works that are accepted within the mainstream arent immensely common. However when these ethnic groups are personified, it creates a highly accurate representation of the average Australian communities.Carlos Tsiolkas is a Greek-Australian author, who wrote The slam-bang, a popular, coetaneous piece of Australian literature that was turned into a television series. This novel naturally integrates white, Greek, Indian and indigenous Australians into a friendship community, illustrating the genuine multicultural society of Australia. Tsiolkass heritage assists him in providing an accurate representation of what it is like for these ethnic characters to live in Australia, because he has the ability to write from experience and represent himself.The slap does not have an obvious focus on the inter-racial relationships that it contains, but due to the variety of ethnicity that is incorporated into the characters, it is hand to see that the author made a conscious decision to include a range of cultural diversity in his novel. Ethnic immigrants who become successful authors usually write about their experiences in Australia, that become popular within the Anglo-Australian community, as their pieces offer a different view point, that challenges the way Australians view themselves.The ungrateful immigrant is a po em by Yu Ouyang that is an example of an ethnic author challenging the common perception of the Australian way of life. The poem is Ouyangs personal view on Australia and its people, challenging the common article of faith that Australians are friendly and welcoming people, particularly to immigrants. He speaks about many elements of the country that he does not agree with or particularly like, and the negative way that the Australian people have responded to him. You think that because I came to and live in Australia, I should be grateful for the rest of my life. He even says that his decision to move to Australia was an irreversible mistake. This poem, like if I had a gun speaks very negatively about certain groups of people and challenges many common ideologies that exist about the Australian way of life, however it is still recognized and apprehended as a passionate literary piece. It would be understandable for many Australians to get offended and rebuff this text due to t he challenging opinions that it contains, but the piece has been accepted into the community because it is seen as an Australian person giving his opinion on his country.Also similar to if I had a gun, The ungrateful immigrant shows the progress in Australian literature and the different representations of the Australian way of life that it now contains. It is evident that these literary works provide evidence that supports the argument that, despite the common stereotype of Australian people still being an Anglo-Saxon male, Australian literature does provide an immense variety of representations of women, indigenous Australians, and ethnic communities.They also illustrate the progression of Australian literature, from when it contained an incredibly narrow group of representations, to now when it contains an abundance of different racial and gendered authors and characters that work to the production of literary pieces, and the representations of the Australians that they contain. It is important, when analyzing the national identity of Australian way of life to evaluate the state of its literature, and the representations that it contains and upholds.