Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Australia Historiography'

This thesis examines the reclamation of the 'Blak' body by Indigenous female photo-media artists. The discussion will begin with an examination of photographic representatiors of Indigenous people by the colonising culture and their construction of 'Aboriginality'. The thesis will look at the introduction of Aboriginal artists to the medium of photography and their chronological movement through the decades This will begin with a documentary style approach in the 1960s to an intimate exploration of identity that came into prominence in the 1980s with an explosion of young urban photomedia artists, continuing into the 1990s and beyond. I will be examining the works of four contemporary female artists and the impetus behind their work. The three main artists whose works will be examined are Brenda L. Croft, Destiny Deacon and Rea all of whom have dealt with issues of representation of the 'Blak female body, gender and reclamation of identity. The thesis will examine the works of these artists in relation to the history of representation by the dominant culture. Chapter 6 will look at a new emerging artist, Dianne Jones, who is looking at similar issues as the artists mentioned. This continuing critique of representation by Jones is testimony of the prevailing issues concerning Aboriginal representation

"June 2003" 2 maps in pocket on back cover. Bibliography: leaves 285-308. This thesis critically examines the processes involved in the construction of the linguistic historical record for the north-west region of South Australia. Focussing on the work of Norman B. Tindale, the thesis looks at the construction of Tindale's Pitjantjatjara, Yankunytjatjara and Antikirinya representations. It argues that Tindale effectively reduced a diversity of indigenous practices to ordered categories more reflective of Western and colonial concepts than indigenous views. Tindale did not consider linguistic criteria in depth, had few informants, worked within arbitary tribal boundaries, was biased towards the category 'Pitjantjatjara' and was informed by notions of racial/linguistic purity. These factors which shaped the linguistic record must be taken into account when interpreting records for use as historical and native Title evidence.

This thesis examines the harsh impact of convict transportation on Western Australian life and literary production with a novel, “The Silence of Water”, and an accompanying essay. The Swan River Colony (Western Australia) was established in 1829 with the express intention never to accept convicts; however, almost 10,000 men were transported there from Britain between 1850 and 1868. “The Silence of Water” depicts the life of one convict, Customs and Excise officer and former tailor Edwin Thomas Salt, who was convicted of the murder of his wife, Mary Ann, in Edinburgh in 1860. The case attracted attention in newspapers across Britain partly due to the “extreme provocation” Edwin was said to have suffered because of Mary Ann’s drinking. Edwin’s death sentence was commuted and he was transported to Western Australia in 1862. Edwin later received a conditional pardon that allowed him to live as a free man. In Western Australia he married twice, had more children and worked sporadically as a tailor. He died in Fremantle in 1910. A literate man with no prior convictions, sometimes a drunk and a bully, Edwin Salt differs from the convicts usually depicted in Western Australian fiction. Through the characters of Edwin Salt, his Australian daughter and granddaughter, “The Silence of Water” explores themes of exile, incarceration, family dislocation, secrets and intergenerational silences. The accompanying essay claims complex convict characters are largely missing from Western Australia’s literature and suggests how “The Silence of Water” claims a place for convicts and the women associated with them in Western Australia’s founding colonial narrative. It also discusses key research frameworks, methods and literary strategies. Chapter one examines how the convict figure functions across a range of novels from 1880 to 2015 and finds that Western Australia’s convict figure differs markedly from that seen in novels from other Australian states. Chapter two examines two research methods used to write the novel: engagement with the archives and engagement with place. It demonstrates how exploration of Edwin Thomas Salt broadened to focus on the women associated with him, driven by a feminist theoretical framework. Chapter three discusses some literary strategies selected for “The Silence of Water” and their rationale, drawing on the work of contemporary Western Australian fiction writers. Overall, the thesis illuminates an under-explored area of Western Australian cultural production and contributes new knowledge about Western Australia’s convict era, the consequences of which are still visible today.

Since the 1980s, there has been an increasing emphasis on drama, in live theatre and on film, which re-addresses the ways in which the post-colonial histories of Australia and New Zealand have been written. Why is there such a focus on �historical� drama in these countries at the end of the twentieth century and what does this drama contribute to wider debates about post-colonial history? This thesis aims both to explore the connections between drama and history, and to analyse the interface between live and recorded drama. In order to discuss these issues, I have used the work of theatre and film critics and historians, supplemented by reference to writers working in the field of post-colonial and performance theory. In particular, I have utilised the methods of Helen Gilbert and Joanne Tompkins in Post-Colonial Drama: Theory, Practice, Politics, beginning with their claim that in the post-colonial situation history has been seen to determine reality itself. I have also drawn on theorists such as Michel Foucault, Linda Hutcheon and Guy Debord who question the �truth� value of official history-writing and emphasize the role of representation in determining popular perceptions of the past. This discussion is developed through reference to contemporary performance theory, particularly the work of Richard Schechner and Marvin Carlson, in order to suggest that there is no clear separation between performance and reality, and that access to history is only possible through re-enactments of it, whether in written or performative forms. Chapter One is a survey of the development of �historical� drama in theatre and film from New Zealand and Australia. This includes discussion of the diverse cultural and performative traditions which influence this drama, and establishment of the critical methodologies to be used in the thesis. Chapter Two examines four plays which are intercultural re-writings of canonical texts from the European dramatic tradition. In this chapter I analyse the formal and thematic strategies in each of these plays in relation to the source texts, and ask to what extent they function as canonical counter-discourse by offering a critique of the assumptions of the earlier play from a post-colonial perspective. The potential of dramatic representation in forming perceptions of reality has made it an attractive forum for Maori and Aboriginal artists, who are creating theatre which has both a political and a pedagogical function. This discussion demonstrates that much of the impetus towards historiographic drama in both countries has come from Maori and Aboriginal writers and directors working in collaboration with white practitioners. Such collaborations not only advance the project of historiographic drama, but also may form the basis of future theatre practice which departs from the Western tradition and is unique to each of New Zealand and Australia. In Chapter Three I explore the interface between live and recorded performance by comparing plays and films which dramatise similar historical material. I consider the relative effectiveness of theatre and film as media for historiographic critique. I suggest that although film often has a greater cultural impact than theatre, to date live theatre has been a more accessible form of expression for Maori and Aboriginal writers and directors. Furthermore, following theorists such as Brecht and Brook, I argue that such aspects as the presence of the live performer and the design of the physical space shared by actors and audience give theatre considerable potential for creating an immediate engagement with historiographic themes. In Chapter Four, I discuss two contrasting examples of recorded drama in order to highlight the potential of film and television as media for historiographic critique. I question the divisions between the documentary and dramatic genres, and use Derrida�s notion of play to suggest that there is a constant slippage between the dramatic and the real, between the past and the present. In Chapter Five, I summarize the arguments advanced in previous chapters, using the example of the national museum of New Zealand, Te Papa Tongarewa, to illustrate that the �performance� of history has become part of popular culture. Like the interactive displays at Te Papa, the texts studied in this thesis demonstrate that dramatic representation has the potential to re-define perceptions of historical �reality�. With its superior capacity for creating illusion, film is a dynamic medium for exploring the imaginative process of history is that in the live performance the spectator symbolically comes into the presence of the past.

Women architects are effectively absent from architectural history in Australia. Consulting first the archival record, this thesis establishes the presence of 230 women architects qualified and/or practising in NSW between 1900 and 1960. It then analyses some of these early women architects' achievements and difficulties in the profession, drawing on interviews with 70 practitioners or their friends and family. Finally it offers brief biographical accounts of eight leading early women architects, arguing that their achievements deserve more widespread historical attention in an adjusted canon of architectural merit. There are also 152 illustrations evidencing their design contributions. Thus the research draws on quantitative, qualitative, biographical and visual modes of representation in establishing a historical presence for these early women architects. The thesis forms part of the widespread political project of feminist historical recovery of women forebears, while also interrogating the ends and means of such historiography. The various threads describing women's absence and presence in the architectural profession are woven together throughout the thesis using three feminist approaches which sometimes harmonise and sometimes debate with each other. Described as "liberal feminism", "socialist feminism" and "postmodern feminism", they each put into play distinct patterns of questioning, method and interpretation, but all analyse historiography as a strategy for understanding society and effecting social change.

This dissertation excavates the work of early special effects cinematographer Norman O. Dawn in order to explore film spectatorship, the ephemerality of the cinematic image, and motion picture preservation and archival practices. Best known for his innovations of glass and matte shot techniques, Dawn produced 861 composite images while working in the U.S. film industry between 1906 and 1954. Although technological film historians acknowledge the importance of Dawn’s innovations to the development of motion picture special effects, the composite images themselves as well as the films for which they were produced remain in relative obscurity. Rather than attempting to recover these objects for inclusion in an existing film canon, my research interrogates their obscurity by analyzing Dawn’s special effects processes against the broader economic concerns that inform the dominant practices of the US film industry during the first half of the twentieth-century. My research begins with the Norman O. Dawn collection housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, which is the most comprehensive historical record of Dawn’s work in the film industry. Constructed by Dawn himself between 1962 and 1974, this collection consists of 164 poster-sized collages of archival ephemera that illustrate the special effects processes employed in the production of 235 composite images for eighty-five films. While these eighty-five film titles constitute a tentative corpus upon which to base my research, seventy of these films are lost, which raises questions concerning the relationship between motion picture preservation and film history, specifically why these films have not been preserved while others have and to what extent the economic imperatives of the film industry have determined these conditions. I address these questions in my analysis of archival material related to these films, finding that they traverse several distinct domains of film practice—including early scenic footage for newsreels and the amusement park ride Hale’s Tours of the World, early one-reel travel films, silent-era studio shorts, serials, and B features, and poverty row and independently-produced silent and sound feature-length films—thereby situating Dawn’s special effects at the intersection of the early and contemporary cinematic modes often aligned in studies of cinematic special effects. I argue that this heterogeneous corpus points to a studio-era Hollywood cinema alternative to the classical model, largely forgotten because it is dominated by low-budget product intended to supplement more costly feature films. In contrast to the classical model, this alternate cinematic mode emphasizes the scenic and thrilling elements that characterize both early exhibitionist films and contemporary effects-driven blockbusters. In this context, Dawn’s special effects processes constitute a historically marginalized practice precisely because they are non-routine techniques that provide cost-effective means to produce otherwise economically infeasible scenes, and, as such, operate on the periphery of conventional film production.

This thesis is a socio-economic history of the relationship between music technology and organisational practices in twentieth-century Australia. It argues that the history of technology in the Australian music economy is dependent not only upon the changing technical characteristics of musical instruments and electronic consumer goods but also upon government policy-making, management practices in music technology manufacturing firms and patterns of music technology consumption. The thesis examines economic statistics regarding the import, export and local production of music technology in Australia. The economic statistics have not previously been examined in relation to the history of music technology in Australia. The historical analysis is structured according to a four-part periodisation which includes the Electric Age (1901-1930), the Electronic Age (1930-1950), the Transistor Age (1950-1970) and the Information Age (1970-1990). This periodisation enables the analysis to continually be refocussed as the key technological and socio-economic dynamics change. With this perspective, the history of the relationship between technology and organisation in the Australian music economy has been demonstrated to be dependent on a number of key technological changes. The thesis examines changes including the shift from acoustic to electric recording; the development of transistor-based consumer electronics goods; and the advent of digital information technology. However, a number of key social determinants, particularly organisational modes, are examined including changes from protectionist to more deregulated trade policy; lack of business skills in areas such as marketing, manufacturing technique and industrial research and development; and the development of a sense of popular modernity which is expressed in the consumption of new, technically advanced and glamorous music technology. In addition to the new perspectives on the history of music technology provided by the analysis of empirical economic data, this thesis contributes to the historiography of technology. The analytical framework it proposes locates music technology within what is described as an assemblage of technologies: technologies of production, technologies of sign systems, technologies of power and technologies of the self. This approach makes clear the interdependence of technological and social factors, and the inadequacy of narrow technological determinist and social constructivist accounts. The notion of an assemblage of technologies is further embellished by drawing upon key elements of recent theories of systems analysis: the seamless web, evolution and chaos theory. Through this analytical framework and the socio-economic analysis of the relationship between music technology and organisational practices, the thesis demonstrates that the history of technology cannot be understood unless it is seen as part of a complex and interacting technical, social, economic and institutional system.

Dans un cadre semiotique et historique, cette these analyse les monuments aux morts australiens commemorant la premiere guerre mondiale, et la ceremonie annuelle qui s'organise autour de ce point de repere par rapport a une problematique de la memoire nationale. Nee d'un grand deuil, cette memoire surgit dans l'entre-deux-guerres en creant des lieux ou en attribuant aux villes australiennes ce qui est appele un "sens du lieu". En outre, les monuments aux morts evoquent cette communaute imaginee que represente la nation par une dimension temporelle qu'ils instaurent, a savoir la future-memoire et la simultaneite de la nation. Malgre toutes les techniques employees pour creer des lieux devant jouer le role d'aide-memoire pour les generations futures de l'australie, 70 ans apres l'apparition des monuments, ces lieux sont menaces. En outre, le statut meme d'un lieu en australie est remis en cause par la mobilite urbaine. Que devient alors le lieu de memoire dans ces conditions?
This thesis analyses those war memorials that commemorate the first world war in australia employing a semiological and historical approach. This is combined with a study of the annual ceremony of anzac day which takes place the 86th of april at the war memorial of each australian town. These objects are considered in terms of a problematic of national memory. This memory sprang from the mourning and loss felt as a result of the 1914-1918 wara and contributed in the inter-war period to a certain sense of place in australian towns and cities. War memorials had an important role in evoking an imagined national community. This was possible not only through the fixing of a sense of place, but also via the instigation of a new awareness of time whereby future-memory and simultaneous activity created an idea of the nation. Despite this role of memorials to act as national memory-aids for the future generations of australia, nowadays, 70 years after their construction, their place is threatened. First world war memorials are being moved to make woy for the excessive mobility that dominatres australia. What is the role

This thesis presents an intellectual history of the historiography of Australian Economic History between 1918 and 1965. More specifically, it is a contribution to a relatively novel area of research into 'disciplinary history’. It takes as its basic analytical material the four books widely used for significant lengths of time for undergraduate teaching during the period of the study. The thesis consists of five main chapters, plus an appendix which surveys the institutional development of Australian Economic History and provides the empirical basis for the selection of the works named above. After a brief introduction and overview, the next four chapters consist of a detailed study of one of these works, the historical context in which each was written, and an intellectual biography. The fifth chapter is largely theoretical and conceptual. It analyses the epistemological bases of History and Economics and explores the implications of different models of knowledge for the relationship between Economic History and its two antecedent disciplines, History and Economics. Current perceptions of the state of the discipline in Australia and overseas are also examined. There are three main propositions advanced and their implications explored in the fifth chapter. First, that changes which occurred in Australian Economic History during the period 1918-1965 shifted the discipline from the broad area of History to the broad area of Economics. Second, that the inherent tension and fundamental differences between the two disciplinary areas of History and Economics have profound and complex implications for Australian Economic History at a number of levels and in a number of areas. The third proposition posits that the paradigm shift of the 1950s/1960s in Australian Economic History, and the paradigm shift of the 1960s/1970s in Economic History respectively have resulted in crisis. The final part of the chapter summarises the contents of the preceding chapters, and draws some conclusions based on those detailed studies.

En 1991, l’Australie retient l’idée de réconciliation, concept occidental de source chrétienne, comme politique fédérale principale pour gérer l’héritage colonial qui perpétue la marginalisation de la population autochtone. Définie dans cette thèse comme proposant une nouvelle éthique de la rencontre sur un espace donné, la Réconciliation touche aussi bien le territoire national à travers la question des droits fonciers aborigènes, que l’espace symbolique de l’histoire officielle où sont fixées les représentations des colons et des colonisés. C’est cette « place dans l’histoire » qui est ici analysée, principalement dans les musées et dans l’histoire scolaire des États de Nouvelle-Galles du Sud et de Victoria. Cette thèse porte sur les modalités pratiques de la révision du discours officiel au sein des expositions et des manuels scolaires, et interroge sur les conditions sociétales qui ont permis l’émergence d’un tel nouveau « grand projet » en Australie
In 1991, Australia implemented the idea of reconciliation, a Western, Christian concept, as a major federal policy to deal with the colonial legacy that continues to marginalise its Indigenous population. Defined in this thesis as an ideal proposing an ethic of encounter on a given space, Reconciliation concerns both the national territory, with the issue of Aboriginal land rights, and the symbolic space constituted by the official history in which representations of the coloniser and the colonised are fixed. This “place in history” is at the core of this study, with a focus on the museums and school history in New South Wales and Victoria. This thesis analyses the practical modalities of the revision of the national narrative in exhibitions and school textbooks while questioning the societal conditions that allowed such a new “great project” to emerge in Australia

This practice-based research project consists of a 33,000-word novella, "Folly", and a 50,000-word exegesis that examines the principles of historiographic metafiction (HMF), the recontextualisation of historical figures and scenarios, and other narratological concepts that inform my creative practice. As an emerging sub-genre of historical fiction, HMF is one aspect of a national and international discourse about historical fiction in the fields of literature, history, and politics. Leading theorists discussed below include Linda Hutcheon and Ansgar Nünning, along with the recent critically-acclaimed work of contemporary Australian writers, Richard Flanagan, Kate Grenville, and Louis Nowra. "Folly" traces a number of periods in the lives of fictional versions of the researcher and his eighteenthcentury Irish relative, and experiments with concepts of historiographic metafiction, the recontextualisation of historical figures and scenarios, and the act of narratorial manipulation, specifically focalisation, voice, and point of view. The key findings of this research include: identifying the principles and ideas that support writing work of historiographic metafiction; a determination as to the value of recontextualisation of historical figures and scenarios, and narratorial manipulation, in the writing of historiographic metafiction; an account of the challenges facing an emerging writer of historiographic metafiction, and their resulting solutions (where these could be established); and, finally, some possible directions for future research.

"June 2003"
2 maps in pocket on back cover.
Bibliography: leaves 285-308.
xiv, 308 leaves : ill., maps ; 30 cm.
This thesis critically examines the processes involved in the construction of the linguistic historical record for the north-west region of South Australia. Focussing on the work of Norman B. Tindale, the thesis looks at the construction of Tindale's Pitjantjatjara, Yankunytjatjara and Antikirinya representations. It argues that Tindale effectively reduced a diversity of indigenous practices to ordered categories more reflective of Western and colonial concepts than indigenous views. Tindale did not consider linguistic criteria in depth, had few informants, worked within arbitary tribal boundaries, was biased towards the category 'Pitjantjatjara' and was informed by notions of racial/linguistic purity. These factors which shaped the linguistic record must be taken into account when interpreting records for use as historical and native Title evidence.
Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, School of European Studies and General Linguistics, 2003

Douglas Henry Pike was born in China in 1908, the second of five children, whose Australian parents were missionaries with a Protestant interdenominational faith mission, the China Inland Mission. Following graduation from an English style mission boarding school at Chefoo in northern China, Pike came to Melbourne in 1924; and from 1926 spent twelve years jackerooing on various New South Wales country properties. He returned to Melbourne in 1938, trained for the ministry in a Churches of Christ College, graduated in November 1941, married Olive Hagger and was sent to Adelaide. During pastorates at Colonel Light Gardens and Glenelg he studied at the University of Adelaide for his BA. He achieved History Honours, resigned from the ministry, taught briefly in Adelaide and at the University of Western Australia then returned to Adelaide as Reader from 1950 to 1960. Pike obtained his MA, then the D. Litt. for Paradise of Dissent, a history of South Australia. During the 1950s he wrote a series of newspaper articles, ‘Early Adelaide with the lid off’. Douglas Pike (1908-1974) South Australian and Australian Historian. In 1960 he was appointed to the Chair of History at the University of Tasmania and published his second book, Australia: The Quiet Continent. In 1964 he moved to the Australian National University and commenced his pioneering task as founding editor of the Australian Dictionary of Biography. Therefore the most significant period of his working life in history and historiography covers the years from 1948 until his sudden illness in November 1973, and death in May 1974. The Second World War at first slowed but then stimulated the teaching and writing of history in Australia. Pike commenced his university studies during the war; his research and writing followed in the post-war period. His years in academia witnessed the establishment between 1946 and 1958 of four more universities in Australia, including the ANU, where he spent the last ten years of his life. However, apart from book reviews, obituaries in newspapers and journals, biographical paragraphs and the ADB, Pike’s contribution and significance to Australian historiography has been largely neglected. My thesis is based on personal interviews and correspondence with people who knew Douglas Pike, including family members, together with archival material from the Australian National Library and the universities where Pike worked. Printed sources include newspapers, journals, and Pike’s own published writings.
http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1347424
Thesis (M.A.) - University of Adelaide, School of History and Politics, 2008

Douglas Henry Pike was born in China in 1908, the second of five children, whose Australian parents were missionaries with a Protestant interdenominational faith mission, the China Inland Mission. Following graduation from an English style mission boarding school at Chefoo in northern China, Pike came to Melbourne in 1924; and from 1926 spent twelve years jackerooing on various New South Wales country properties. He returned to Melbourne in 1938, trained for the ministry in a Churches of Christ College, graduated in November 1941, married Olive Hagger and was sent to Adelaide. During pastorates at Colonel Light Gardens and Glenelg he studied at the University of Adelaide for his BA. He achieved History Honours, resigned from the ministry, taught briefly in Adelaide and at the University of Western Australia then returned to Adelaide as Reader from 1950 to 1960. Pike obtained his MA, then the D. Litt. for Paradise of Dissent, a history of South Australia. During the 1950s he wrote a series of newspaper articles, ‘Early Adelaide with the lid off’. Douglas Pike (1908-1974) South Australian and Australian Historian. In 1960 he was appointed to the Chair of History at the University of Tasmania and published his second book, Australia: The Quiet Continent. In 1964 he moved to the Australian National University and commenced his pioneering task as founding editor of the Australian Dictionary of Biography. Therefore the most significant period of his working life in history and historiography covers the years from 1948 until his sudden illness in November 1973, and death in May 1974. The Second World War at first slowed but then stimulated the teaching and writing of history in Australia. Pike commenced his university studies during the war; his research and writing followed in the post-war period. His years in academia witnessed the establishment between 1946 and 1958 of four more universities in Australia, including the ANU, where he spent the last ten years of his life. However, apart from book reviews, obituaries in newspapers and journals, biographical paragraphs and the ADB, Pike’s contribution and significance to Australian historiography has been largely neglected. My thesis is based on personal interviews and correspondence with people who knew Douglas Pike, including family members, together with archival material from the Australian National Library and the universities where Pike worked. Printed sources include newspapers, journals, and Pike’s own published writings.
Thesis (M.A.) - University of Adelaide, School of History and Politics, 2008

"April 2004"
Bibliography: leaves 284-295.
viii, 295 leaves ; 30 cm.
Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library.
This thesis discusses the work of the author Lily Brett, both in terms of the themes explored in her writing, and the political and historical contexts. The interrelationships between history, memory, identity and literature are explored in order to explain both the themes of Brett's writing, and how this writing is shaped by, and shapes, contemporary discourses on Jewish identity and the Holocaust.
Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, School of Social Sciences, Discipline of Gender Studies, 2004

In October 1962, the world was brought to the brink of nuclear catastrophe. The Cuban Missile Crisis marked the closest the United States (US) and the Soviet Union came to military conflict that might have led to nuclear annihilation during the Cold War. This thesis investigates the Australian Government’s policy response to the crisis. In doing so, it makes an original contribution to Australian Cold War history and to the extensive literature on the crisis. The Australian Government’s policy response to the crisis is examined in the context of the Australia-US alliance. A diplomatic history, this thesis relies heavily on declassified government records from Australian and American archives. Additionally, oral history interview transcripts, audio-visual materials, Hansard, newspapers, and private collections, were consulted in order to reconstruct comprehensively Australia’s policy on this matter and the factors that shaped it. This thesis examines: Australia’s awareness of the Cuban situation; the Menzies Government’s policy on the crisis, specifically, factors it considered—and did not consider—in formulating its policy; and the Government’s immediate implementation of that policy, including the reactions of some sections of the Australian community to that policy. It demonstrates that despite limited advance notice and awareness of the Cuban situation, the Government swiftly declared support for the US in the crisis, specifically, its resolution to be presented to the United Nations Security Council. It reveals that certain politicians, diplomats, and public servants were concerned about: Australia’s obligations under the Australia New Zealand United States Security Treaty; the legality of the US response; the precedent set by the quarantine; the implications of US policy on the crisis regarding Australian nuclear ambitions; Australia maintaining its trade relationship with Cuba; and the repercussions the crisis could have on collective defence arrangements, which Australia relied on for its security. Despite these concerns and challenges, the Government considered the successful management of the US alliance paramount in formulating and implementing its policy on the crisis.

This thesis examines the Menzies Government's response to the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962. This is the first historical investigation of the Crisis in the context of Australian-American relations. Its primary objective, therefore, is to fill a historiographical gap in Australia's Cold War history.

The thesis casts new light on the activities of the London-based Arundel Society (1848–1897). It examines the watercolours and chromolithographs produced for the Society made after pre-Renaissance frescoes and Northern altarpieces, the discourse around them, and the ways the prints were collected by organisations and individual subscribers. The Society’s commercial and ideological strategies, its didactic and archival programs, as well as the multi-faceted nature of its authorship are analysed. Using the notion of translation, this thesis explores how mediation affects the reception and meaning of a work of art. The Arundel Society, or Society for Promoting the Knowledge of Art, was one of the first entities to issue high-quality colour reproductions of works of art. Through an investigation of the impact of these colour images on art writing, and the ways in which they helped give visual form to ideas about art, this thesis proposes new value for the Society’s publications. The prints, sculptural casts and texts issued over fifty years were an important contribution to art history in a period when the discipline was developing; they were distributed around the world, bringing popular awareness to the art of earlier times. By examining subscriber lists and exploring the connections between the Society’s members, this thesis demonstrates the ubiquity of the chromolithographs. By considering the prints in a range of domestic and religious spheres, within museums and other institutional contexts, the thesis challenges the idea that reproductive prints are by nature unilateral and poses further complexities about the original, its image and the viewer—it asks questions about what happens if works of art look back. This thesis is the first to examine the Arundel Society’s contribution to a nascent art history and only the second, since Tanya Ledger’s more than forty years ago, to assess its activities in depth. Initially the Society aimed to record and spread knowledge of important monuments. Later it placed greater emphasis on recording works of art to which general access was difficult, and those threatened by decay or destruction; the function of the watercolours and prints as a ‘condition report’ was recognised at the time. In 1860s and 1870s, at the height of the Society’s popularity, the chromolithographs were also used as home furnishings, while in various churches they remain as items for devotion. By surveying extant holdings, this thesis assesses the role of the Society’s publications in the development of museum collections in Britain, the colonies and further afield, and reconsiders the possibilities for these works in the twenty-first century.