Backbencher

New Zealand's economy, like any nation that is not self sufficient, (are there any?) has relied heavily on exports to bring new money into local commerce. Whaling & sealing, flax, pine, and gold were all mentioned briefly. Sheep and cattle ranching seem to be the new staple, and have been that for a good long while. (Ignoring the hiatus due to the rabbit crises, of course!) I suspect tourism might be significant, too. The next major point I see in my notes involved that from the outset as a planned colony, government involvement remained significant, to the point that I would consider the country to be largely socialistic. (Not communist, that is different.) This is a quality that, for better or worse, persisted up until fairly recently. The loss of England as a primary market for New Zealand products hit the government fairly hard, and it teetered on the edge of fiscal insolvency. I'm not too sure which side of the edge of insolvency it might have been on- but the time for drastic action was at hand, and under the guidance of Roger Douglas, the fiscal responsibilities of the nation did a remarkable about face toward what we Americans would call the right. "The Great Transition" to free market happened, albeit painfully, via subsidies that were largely if not completely stopped, government assets were sold and privatized including the national railroad, irrigation works, etcetera and may even eventually come to include the national archives. They seem to have been able to make it work.

Tom Isern teaches us that NZ began exporting lamb by mechanically refridgerated shipping starting in the year 1882. Now THAT surprises me, I even argued with him after class a bit- I was not aware of any refridgeration method other than packing with cut block ice that early. A bit of research- lo and behold, Tom again wins out, there is a company in Germany that has been manufacturing mechanical refridgeration units continiously since the company's inception in... get this... 1882.
Coincidence?

Australia is a bit different- hindered by its own bulk, lack of raw materials, limited access to water over a large percentage of its area, much of its economy is pinned on the same staples as New Zealand... but can never be developed to the same percentage of extent due to the logistics of its vast inhospitable inner reaches. Wheat farming , ranching with both sheep and cattle (largely leased land), semi precious gem stones, open pit mining for metallic ores, again largely extractive and for export with a minimal home market. Potential for heavy manufacture limited due to a lack of readily available local carbon based fuels. Tom mentions a list of transitional periods, but these (mostly traditional) exports seem to STILL make up the bulk of export items extruded by the Australian economy.

The colonies of Australia and New Zealand, though under British monarchical rule, managed to persist economically through three distinct influences: home market, the realignment of trade relations in the late 20th century, and the tradition of state activism.

Much of the early industries of New Zealand developed around an isolated lifestyle such as whaling and sealing, later extractive industries such as flax, kauri and gold exporting became important resources. Generally the economic principles of New Zealand emphasized exports and relied on a planned economy. Was it the New Zealand miracle? Not really. New Zealand has a long history of state intervention and by 1984 the Labour government had gone Neo-conservative, becoming a laboratory of free markets and privatization. Eventually New Zealand developed the freezing works and the cooperative dairies. New Zealand, however, is not rich in raw materials and thus lacks a potent domestic market. Recent developments in the New Zealand market include horticulture, kiwifruit, viticulture, and hydroelectric development.

In Australia, the emphasis lies in winter wheat and mining, particularly gemstones such as opals and sapphires. The manufacturing potential of Australia is also low. Like New Zealand, Australia has a limited domestic market. Overall both island nations are unlike the U.S. with a great portion of the industry being extractive. Both nations are not mature avoid the reliance and ties to Europe, trying to develop the Pacific Rim.

I think it is interesting that even though dependent on the British monarchy, Australia and New Zealand managed to create an economy independent of the crown. While New Zealand did have some problems with government support, their creation of an export-dominated economy helped put them on the map. I think that in the next few years, the reliance on the Australia and New Zealand economies will grow with in the United States. It is an interesting proposition to think that the United States, once a British colony, has been providing a national market for Australian and New Zealand goods. What is a concern however is how the gross national product (GNP) holds up when they begin to have such a strong export situation. Can New Zealand and Australia manage to maintain the globalized world?

There were a few early extractive industries of New Zealand. There were whaling stations along the shore of New Zealand coast. Men were dropped off for 2-3 years and would look for whales. The men would then hop on a whaleboat and harpoon the whales. They would when bring the whales back to shore and cut up the meat. Men would also be dropped off where seal colonies were typically located and would kill seals for about a year. Flax was the chief fiber for making garments. The flax would be woven with feathers to make warm clothes. Kauri pine is rapidly lumbered out now in New Zealand. New Zealand economy has a large emphasis on exports. In 1882, New Zealand had the first freezing works or refrigerated shipping. The two great exports known was meat and butter and after that wool. Some disadvantages to industry in New Zealand were it was not rich in raw materials and lacked a potent domestic market. Production of consumer goods was very low. Some economic comparisons of Australia and New Zealand are they are both small nations and are export orientated. They both had a failure of most enterprises except for pastoralism. There is a continuing importance of pastoralism in Australia and New Zealand. There are more than 100,000 pastoral leases in Australia today, many of which are crown land and are bigger than some U.S. states. Wheat in Australia is a growing industry because it is suitable to semiarid lands and it is imminently transportable as a very secure crop to send abroad. Australian mining consists of coal, gold, copper, opal, and sapphires. Australia and New Zealand are not like the U.S., they do not have greater proportion extractive, both are not mature economies, and have regional leadership.

Lecture 5 was titled, "Economic Development: The Sheep's Back and the Global Market." Even though I am most interested in the social and cultural history of Australia and New Zealand, I found this lecture to be interesting. Professor Isern started off the lecture by identifying three shaping influences on the economies of Australia and New Zealand. The first influence is the home market, the second is the realignment of trade relations in the 20th Century, and the third is the tradition of state activism.

Next we progressed into the agricultural history of New Zealand. This ag history of New Zealand is broken down into six time periods. Maori Husbandry lasted until the 1860s. Subsistence Smallholding ranged from the 1840s to 1850s. The Pastoral Eruption occurred in the 1850s through the 1860s. Commercialization spanned from the 1870s to the 1880s. Development was from the 1890s to the 1980s, and the Free Market picked up in the 1980s to now. Next, we talked about early extractive industries of New Zealand. Several agricultural processing industries are prevalent in New Zealand. Two of these are freezing works and cooperative dairies. The five principle extractive industries of New Zealand include whaling, sealing, flax, kauri, and gold. The general princicples of the New Zealand economy is an emphasis on exports and a planned economy. The disadvantages of industry in New Zealand include the country not being rich in raw materials and lack of potent deomstic market. However, there have been some recent economic developments including horticulture, kiwifruit, viticulture, and hydroelectric development.

After discussing the economics of New Zealand, we moved on to Australia. First, we started off by comparing the two nations saying that they are both small and export oriented. There is diversity in Australian agriculture. Near the coast, intensive horticulture and livestock farming persist. Moving inland, mixed farming and extensive pastoralism are prevalent. Just as with New Zealand, Australia's agriculture has went through several stages in history. The first period is known as Recognized Ignorance, next it is Learning, followed by Incautious Optimism, and finally, Informed Adjustment. We learned that pastoralism is of continuing importance. There is a spread of pastoralism across frontier Australia. Winter wheat is of importance to Australia not only because of the climate, but also due to its ease of transport. Australian mining continues in the areas of open pit mining for gold, copper, and coal and also for gemstones. As with New Zealand, Australia is producing for export because of a limited domestic market.

I enjoyed this lecture. What I found most interesting was the fact that winter wheat is important in Australia. I always imagined sheep and cattle as being the main agricultural commodities and not wheat. Another area that I found intriguing was that the economies of Australia and New Zealand will always have a "cloud" hanging over them from their colonizer. I have learned that England and other European nations still exert that affect in areas of Africa that they colonized, and I find it interesting that Australia and New Zealand feel that presence too. My question of inquiry is, "What is meant by the conclusion where it says skipping a generation in technology?"

Lecture 4 was about the settlement of Australia and New Zealand. The whole convict settlement thing is probably one of my favorite facts about Australia. It's just a little silly that England claimed all of that land, and the only really interesting thing they could think to do with it was to put the criminals there. The description of the prison situation in England is also amusing. The snobby upper class often seemed ready to just ship off all of the members of the lower class who weren't needed for labor. The prison barges also made me think of the book Great Expectations. One of my roommates wanted to get a Norfolk pine tree, it made me laugh and I told him about the Botany Bay of Botany Bay. While the settlement of Australia was largely haphazard and forced, New Zealand had a planned settlement. Upper class people, particularly the non-eldest son of a prosperous family, were encouraged to move to New Zealand and help establish a "quality" colony. I was interested to hear that shepherds and their dogs were shipped to New Zealand as well. I'm kind of curious as to why the shepherds would want to go. If there wasn't much work for them in England? If there was more potential for money and advancement? Or if they just wanted to feel like explorers? I guess technically it could be all of the above.

I found this short article about Aujeszky's disease that infected pigs in the North Island but not the South Island in New Zealand.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=10327536&dopt=Abstract

What Aujeszky's disease is (Pseudo-rabies):
http://www.defra.gov.uk/animalh/diseases/notifiable/disease/aujeszkys.htm
It should be noted that the disease has often been confused for "Swine Fever."

http://www.antecint.co.uk/Main/aujeszky.htm
Important thing to remember is that the disease can be passed within the pig semen.

Further note, by going through Australia's animal biosecurity meetings minutes, there are two other diseases, Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome (PRRS) and Post-Weaning Multi-Systemic Wasting Syndrome (PMWS), that along with Classic Swine Fever (CSF) maybe passed within the semen.
http://www.affa.gov.au/corporate_docs/publications/word/market_access/biosecurity/animal/2002/2002-26a.doc

Hopefully, this has not been an entire waste of your time.

The movie begins in the steamy jungles of the Malaya during WWII. There are quite a few British people living on the island when it is occupied by the Japanese. The Japanese take all the men to concentration camps and the women and children are forced to walk back and forth across the island because the Japanese don't know what to do with them. Originally the number of women and children is about 15 to 20, but soon they are down to five women and five children. A woman named Jean Paget becomes the leader of the group because she can speak a little Japanese. During their long walk they meet up with an Australian POW named Joe Harman. Joe does anything he can to help the women even when it's risky for him, including stealing five of a high ranking officers chickens. For stealing the chickens Joe gets his hands nailed to the side on a building and then he is beaten while the English women watch. All the women are horriffied, especially Jean because she and Joe had become friends. The women think Joe is dead and Joe, who isn't dead, thinks that Jean is married because she is caring for her dead friends baby. The women spend the next three years planting rice in a Malayan village and then the war is over and Jean goes back to England. In England Jean inherits a lot of money, and starts a friendship with her estates manager. Jean then decides that since she has money she should help out the Malayan village that was so kind to her. In Malaya she learns Joe isn't dead. Meanwhile in Australia Joe learns Jean isn't married. Jean flies to Australia and at about the same time Joe comes to England where he also becomes friends with Jean's estate manager. Eventually Jean and Joe both end up in Australia where they fall in love and get engaged. They still have a few problems though. Jean doesn't like the outback town or the homstead where Joe lives. This causes problems in their relationship, but eventually they work it out and live happily ever after.
This movie shows how very different the Australia and English people are. Joe sticks out like a sore thumb in England. One of my favorite scenes was when Joe and Jean's estate manager were in a restaurant. The fact that Joe wanted a beer to drink for lunch and not wine just floored the waiter.

The 4th lecture talked about the settlement of Australia and New Zealand. The first settlement of Australia was based on the need of the British to send convicts out of their country. The British saw Australia as a place were felons would be isolated and would no longer be able to degrade English society. I have to wonder to myself, what our society would be like if there was a continent seemingly worlds away where American convicts could be sent. I definitely think that the British had something going for them in this respect. I know it sounds harsh, but looking at the people of both Britain and Australia today, we see that both countries have remarkable societies that are thriving and have been quite successful over the years. After all, how does one survive on an island full of felons, murderers, and thieves?
In contrast, Edward Wakefield had a different outlook for the planned colonization of New Zealand altogether. He believed that this new country should be populated with the most socially elite. Wealthy landowners were sent to take up residence in New Zealand, but only small amounts of land were able to be purchased at a time, in order to prevent one person from becoming too powerful. I found this to be a good idea as well. Unfortunately, a major gold rush lead to the influx of some highly “undesirable” characters, at least in the eyes of Wakefield.
In my opinion, I see both of these motives as effective. Australia and New Zealand are now inhabited by people who have a strong tie to their personal history. They are civil, law-abiding, socially developed citizens. Their governments also seem to be functioning much more efficiently than our own. I mean no disrespect to the American government, but looking at the culture and history of the two countries, I think that Australians and New Zealanders are fortunate that Americans didn’t settle there first.

An Australian film Rabbit Proof Fence directed by Philip Noyce is reliable to an historian studying the Protection policies of the Australian Government during the 1930's in that it tells a true story about three Aboriginal children who were taken away from their families because they were half-castes. However, it is not reliable in that it only tells us about the effect of Protection policy in Western Australia, not the whole country. But it does give you the main idea of what it would have been like to a degree.This film outlines the experiences three young half-caste Aboriginal girls, who were forcibly taken away by the white Australians, had and recounts their journey back home. Its motive is to increase the awareness of general public, especially white Australians, about the life of many Aboriginal people and hardships and sufferings they had to go through in the twentieth century. The film tells a story of great courage and helps the reconciliation process. But I feel the process will never truly be over.The film helps general public of Australia to gain a better knowledge about Australia's true history. It is also helpful to history students studying Australian history. It tells about removal policies of Western Australian Government and why they were taken. It shows them that girls' experience in the Moore River Settlement was harsh and that the removal policy was cruel and tragic for the families. It also shows how white people regarded Aboriginal people and half-castes and how they wanted to breed them into whites. All in all it is a good educational film based on one of many periodic changes that Australia went through. I also feel you get the true attitude of the Aborigines about this unfortunate happening. This certainly was another environmental aspect to shaping Australia.

When I was watching "McCloed's Daughters" on Saturday the little area of cattle stations was losing their nurse practitioner to another town. So the Oldest sister who has a baby staged a women's breastfeeding sit in on the cattle men's club with other women of the area. They talk about how these clubs have a lot of power to get things done for the district or town they come from. In this case the women wanted them to ask the government to get a new nurse practitioner in the district. Do the cattle men's have that much power to get the government to take notice and do what the cattle men's club want them to? And what exactly is the power that these clubs have?

I know that in the United States these clubs have little influence on government affairs. They tend to be more of and excuse to have a party and get drunk. What exactly is the differences and similarities between cattle men's club in Australia and the United States?

Ada, a mute, widowed woman, is made to move to New Zealand with her young daughter Flora in order to marry Stewart whom she has never met. She speaks in sign language with her nine-year-old daughter Flora and writes messages on a tablet hanging from her neck. Upon arrival in New Zealand, Ada is told she must leave her beloved piano on the beach. Ada, whose whole existence centers on her piano, refuses, but the piano is too heavy to be carried the long distance so it is left behind. George Baines, who has Maori tattoos on his face, offers to trade some of his land to his boss for the piano, which he retrieves from the beach. He then asks Ada to give him lessons. She learns that he will sell the piano back to her in exchange for amorous favors. A glimpse of her shoulder, a caress of her leg are turned into a slow erotic courtship. At first, Ada is repulsed by this crude man's advances. Then her desire is aroused and finally her passion. Flora is the first to realize something is going on between her mother and Baines. She lets her stepfather know that there are no sounds of the piano during Ada's lessons. Stewart goes to Baines's cabin and witnesses their lovemaking. In a fit of rage, he locks his wife up. Ada secretly has her daughter bring Baines a piano key with something inscribed on it. Flora brings it to Stewart and in a fit of rage he chops off one of Ada’s fingers and has Flora bring it to Baines. I really liked the movie which showed the Maori people and we were able to hear the Maori language. There was never a dull moment or anything I disliked.

The Dish refers to the gigantic, 1000-ton radio telescope within a remote sheep farm in the small Australian town of Parkes. The dish is out in the middle of a paddock filed which is very interesting. It was the most powerful receiving dish in the Southern Hemisphere. In 1969, NASA intended to use the Australian receiver as a back-up to its primary dish located in Goldstone, California. However, a last second change in the flight plans for the famed Apollo 11 mission facilitated the use of the back-up dish, making it directly instrumental in conveying to the world Armstrong's first steps on the moon. The citizens of Parkes are preparing for the biggest event in the town's history. In the movie a group of kids are supposed to play America’s National Anthem for the U.S. Ambassador, but instead play some other hip song. Some technical difficulties occur which threaten the worldwide broadcast of the history making event. The power in the town ends up going out and the dish looses its information and Apollo 11. The men working in the dish try hard to re-install the data and hide it from NASA. They end up finding Apollo 11 again but a huge wind storm with 60 mph winds comes. The men are able to get the pictures of Neil Armstrong landing on the moon and taking the first steps. When Buxton tells Burnett about his recently deceased wife and how much she would have loved seeing their endeavor the two men are placed atop the dish as it slowly points itself toward the heavens. It's a beautiful shot that echoes the sentiments being conveyed. The movie captures some of Australia but the movie was rather boring and I would like to of seen more of Australia.

This is an old bit of news, but I find it interesting (perhaps you will too)

http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,56451,00.html

For the past few days I have been reading through issues of the New Zealand Herald. From these readings, it seems to me that what gets reported by the paper is about what we read here in our papers in the United States. One of the similarities that really struck me was that New Zealand seems to have a lot of trouble with a drug called P. As I read on about this drug, I found out it is methamphetamines. In one article, three police officers were injured during a P (or as we would say- meth lab) lab. The officers were not aware of how bad the fumes were, and were not wearing protective gear. The officers were expected to fully recover. In another article, there was a march to bring awareness of methamphetamines to communities. To me, it sounds like New Zealand has about as bad a problem with meth as we do.
Another article in the paper dealt with the Russian cruise liner, Mikhail Lermontov. It sank twenty years ago this February. It sank after striking a rock in Pore Gore Inlet (somewhere on the South Island). The ship lies in about 100 feet of water, and according to the article is the third largest diveable cruise ship in the world. I just thought this was interesting because I have always found sunken ships to be fascinating, especially ones that do not require deep diving submersibles to visit. According to a related article, the Lermontov is a popular dive for New Zealanders.
The overall idea I get from this paper is that in New Zealand, they are concerned with the same things we are in the states. They worry about their politicians, drug problems, and what their sports teams are doing. I don’t know about Australians yet, but to me New Zealander don’t seem to be too different from us in the United States.

This movie is about the life of a young girl that is born in to a family with a grandpa as the tribe leader. Her mom died during childbirth, along with her twin brother. Grandpa was very angry and hard on his son. He didn't want anything to do with his granddaughter. He was more angry when his son named his daughter Paikea, after the great warrior that rode a whale to the new country. Dad ends up leaving the town and Pai is raised by her grandparents. She becomes closest to Grandpa over the years. Dad is continually criticized when he comes to visit for abandoning the tribe and his daughter. Grandpa is a big stickler for tradition. Grandpa is even more mad when Pai's dad says that his German girlfriend is pregnant. Grandpa wants him to have a first born son to become the tribe leader. Grandpa is frustrated and Pai decides to go with her dad to Germany. She changes her mind after one day and comes back home. Grandpa opens a school to train the young boys of the tribe on the ways of the chief of the ancient tribes. Pai is turned away by grandpa since she is a girl. She secretly learns the ways of the chief by spying on the school and asking her uncle for help. To sum up the rest, none of the boys can complete the task of retrieving Grandpa's whale tooth necklace from the sea. Pai eventually recovers it and gives it to Grandma. She holds on to it because Grandpa become ill with worry about the future of the tribe. Pai ends up succeeding in calling in the great whale of Paikea to help the tribe. The whales beach themselves. The community has no luck in saving them. Pai ends up saving the great whale by herself and rides the whale in the ocean like her namesake. Grandpa ends up forgiving himself for being so hard on Pai and she becomes the chief of the tribe despite the old ways say it must be a boy.

I thought that this movie was very good. I'll admit it, I cried also. I thought that the story line resembled the Native American ways of life. Tradition is a hard thing to break and especially the older generation wants nothing to do with it. I would highly recommend this movie to others that aren't in our class. It has an interesting story line and never seemed to be too slow or be uninteresting. I felt bad for the way that Grandpa treated Pai throughout her childhood, but in the end, it all worked out.

Muriel's Wedding: What can I say? This film goes through the stage in life of a young girl in Porpoise Spit in which it is time to settle down with a man and get married and start a family. Muriel is the typical girl that boys ignore. Her unkempt appearance and attitude tend to create the image of the "nerdy", shy girl. Muriel has very mean friends from high school. They tell her not to hang out with them anymore because she is ruining their image. Her dad is very hard on her for not finishing high school and not having a job. He tries to hook her up with a job with a lady that turns out to be his mistress. Mom is the silent parent and seems to have some mental issues that she needs to deal with. Mom gives Muriel a blank check after being told so by the dad. Muriel decides to go on vacation instead of getting new clothes and a makeover for the job interview with her dad's mistress. She is again put down by her "friends" from high school. She ends up running into another class mate that dropped out named Rhonda. Muriel sends postcards home to her parents about her adventures selling makeup with dad's mistress while her and Rhonda decide to pack up and move to Sydney together. Muriel gets a job and is asked out by a guy while working at the video store. Things are starting to look up for Muriel. But then her friend is diagnosed with cancer and will spend the rest of her life in a wheelchair. They go through the typical pity party story between Muriel and Rhonda. Muriel starts answering ads for dates. Ends up getting married to a South American swimmer so he can stay and compete for Australia. His parents pay for the wedding, and Muriel gets a hefty sum of cash to marry the groom. They live in the same house, but are not in love and don't do anything together. Muriel's mom passes away and she goes home for the funeral. Her "husband" shows up to comfort her. That is when she decides to leave him. Muriel goes to Rhonda's house to apologize and ask her to move back to Sydney with her.
I thought that this was a very interesting movie. I don't think that I would recommend it to anyone not in this class though. I thought that it seemed to move a little slow. However, I did agree with and appreciate the story line. I know other women who have family lives like Muriel. I felt so bad for her situation. I was very proud of her when she told her dad to take care of the kids after her mom died and she moved back to Sydney with Rhonda. I think that it represents a similarity to American culture and the old ways of getting married right away, having kids, and not going on any further with a girl's life.

Lecture 4 was entitled "Settlement: Convicts & Pilgrims". It began with pictures of the Sydney opera house, which is a marvelous structure. Coathanger Bridge was also shown along with The Rocks, which is an upscale shopping district. The Rocks was the original site of the convict jail. Pictures of sheep stations were also shown from the South Island. It was discussed how the upperclassmen were sheep ranchers and the lower classmen were miners. William McNeill is discussed as the author of Mythistory. He viewed historians as myth makers and wrote about the founding myths of Australia and New Zealand. Austin Fife believed that historians were disciplinarians of myths and saw historians as "party poopers". The background of transportation was discussed. Georgian England was becoming crime ridden, mostly with street crimes. The crowding of the hulks were becoming a problem due to the suspension of transportation to America. There was a known potential of Botany Bay according to Cook's endeavors. This is the part in the lecture where Professor Isern sang a great song about Botany Bay! Convict colonies in Australia began in 1788 with New South Wales, then moved to Van Dieman's Land in 1812, and followed with Western Australia in 1829. The first fleet arrived to New South Wales, and became overcome with negative reactions to the land. Starvation was a major issue that was dealt with for all of the fleets that arrived in Australia. The convicts consisted of political dissidents and petty criminals. The convicts worked 10 hour days, Monday through Friday, and 6 hour days on Saturday. The outposts for the incorrigible convicts were located at New Castle, Port Macquarie, Morton Bay, and Norfolk Island. Norfolk Island was known as "Botany Bay of Botany Bay". It now has the most peaceful and law abiding citizens in Australia. The end of transportation was accomplished with the Molesworth Committee, with the end in New South Wales in 1852, Van Dieman's Land in 1853, and finally Western Australia in 1868. As a contrast, Wakefield proposed that New Zealand be developed with planned colonization. Only small parcels of land were sold at sufficient prices. This was believed to provide a class of cultured landowners and land sales would help to fund more acceptable immigrants. Pastoralism became the way of life as a frontier phenomenon. After that, the gold rush overwhelmed the ideal. It brought in many undesirables looking to get rich quick. Miles Fairburn was discussed along with his research of New Zealand and the planned society. Problems with Fairburn included that fact that he didn't credit those who assisted him with his research, had an anti-social personality, and had a poor presentation style. A.H. Clark was discussed as writing of the focus of biology for the colonization of New Zealand. A new mythistory of New Zealand is developing related to the revision and extension of the national story. Generational differences have been noted in New Zealanders. The middle-age generation thinks that the younger generation is "going to hell in a handbasket".

I found this lecutre very interesting. As with all lectures, I love the use of pictures to give the class a feel of the environment. I think that the generational differences in New Zealand are much like those here in the United States. A couple from my hometown just had quadruplets after using fertility treatments to have a baby. The mom's grandma thinks that it is just rediculous to have that many babies at one time and is just disgusted with her granddaughter's choice to have quadruplets. On the other hand, our generation thinks that it is a miracle and that they deserve all the help that they need to raise these kids.

Lecture number four started off with pictures of Sydney. We learned that the building that most people associate with Sydney is the Sydney Opera House. I thought this was cool because I never knew what the building was. Are things such as going to the opera popular in Australia? The lecture when on to talk about sheep stations on the south island, and the failure of miners. I found the section on myth to be the most interesting part of the lecture. Being a religious studies minor, I come into contact with the term, myth, on a regular basis. My religion professor, John Helgeland, says that myth creates the world. A myth is a story about the past that is so true it can only be expressed in story. For example, the story of Adam and Eve is a myth. I really liked how William McNeil thought when he said that mythic stories about the past reveals our idenity. I also found it interesting how historians are defined as discplinarians of myth. The last part of lecture four discussed the role of the convicts in shaping society. We learned who the convicts were, and how they first faired against the harsh conditions. I foud it interesting that Australians like to trace their roots to the convicts. I would have never guesssed that. How are the convicts viewed by Australians? I also really like the song, but i was disappointed when he didn't bust out the guitar.

Whale Rider is about a native Maori family who are celebrated as the decendents of the great “Whale Rider”. The “Whale Rider” is who the natives believe brought their people from Hawaii by riding on the back of a whale. The eldest male of the family is the chief, and his oldest son (Porourangi) doesn’t seem take pride in their heritage and does not want to take over the chief position. But the eldest son’s wife is pregnant with twins, one boy and one girl. During child birth the mother and baby boy die, leaving the girl (Pai) and her father. Poruourangi, after his loss, moves to Germany to pursues art and leave Pai in New Zealand with his parents. Pai’s grandfather, the chief, is troubled because he has no willing male decedents to continue the tradition. Pai recognizes this and tries to show him that she wants this position, but the chief looks in the community for a suitable replacement. The reminder of the movie is about this struggle between Pai and her grandfather. I won’t talk about the end not to ruin it for others who want to watch it.

It was a great movie to watch to see what the Maori culture is like and how it is changing. It is also interesting to see how the natives perceive their existence on New Zealand. It was a good movie, not too long (1:45). The plot was a little slow and there were points where I just wanted them to get on with the point.

I find it interesting that Australia was colonized by convicts and other people that England felt were an embarrassment to their country. I knew that Great Britain had done this long before this class, and I thought it was a good idea then and I still do today. After all, one of the benefits of this type of punishment was that the country did not have to build prisons and worry if the convicts escaped. Still, I am forced to wonder what the reasons were for sending the convicts to Australia other than the fact that America had closed its borders to them. The officers that were left in charge to control the convicts had to have a great deal of authority over them as well. Either that or there were quite a few officers keeping tabs on the convicts. There honestly wasn’t anything to keep them from wandering off into the wilds and such other than the possibility of starving to death. Because of this, I don’t think that the worst convicts were sent to Australia. England had the death penalty after all and I know it was used because it was exercised if a convict ever returned from Australia.
I think that it’s strange that once the colonies had started and were successful new people wanted to move in. They were moving in with the very same type of people that they evicted from the motherland in the first place and this just makes me think idiots.
Overall I liked this lecture though. It made me think quite a bit most likely because I thought it was a good idea to begin with and it turned out quite well.

I looked at three articles from the Sydney Morning Herald. The first article was entitled “Open views thrive despite PM’s stance: study.” Opinion polling charts that many Australians are becoming more liberal on many social issues, but they still consistently vote for a conservative government. Australians have become more approving of working mothers, same-sex couples with children, immigration and government expenditure on public service, and are strongly against the privatization of Telstra, electricity and Australia Post. However, Australians endorse a Prime Minister who stands for traditional family values, Christian morals, the monarchy, and a “blokesy version” of nationalism. John Howard has banned same-sex marriages, tailored welfare to deliver most benefits to traditional families, and reinvigorated the role of churches in social policy. The government remains strong because of the strength of the economy and the weakness of the Opposition. This was the first article that caught my eye and I was interested in this study. I gained the impression that public opinion has brought forth some liberal changes to conservative government.
The second article that I read was entitled “AWB boss dumped from trip to save Iraq wheat exports.” The AWB chairman, Brendan Stewart, is set to be dumped from Deputy Prime Minister Mark Vaile’s emergency mission to Iraq aimed at saving wheat exports. Murray Jones, who is the chairman of the Grains Council of Australia, is likely to go on the high-level delegation to protect contracts worth about $200 million. After reading this article, I gained the impression that this was a decision made in order to secure future wheat exports and that AWB’s involvement could undermine this effort. I believe that after reading this article it appears that AWB has some critics. It will be interesting to see the outcome of this delegation.
The last article discussed Ross Turnbull and was titled “Remorse Turnbull: His new life in a charity hostel.” One-time corporate Turnbell has had a rough year, the bankrupt former NRMA president now lives in a charity-run hostel for the homeless. This article reports that he has $1.8 million in debt. For the past nine months, Turnbell has resided rent-free in this hostel in return for his volunteer work. The article went on to detail his money-trail. I think this is an article that explains how a high-class individual has certain advantages over others.

Theo Said:

...they begin receiving shellfire from the entrenched Turks. The men do not know what to make of this, as they are simply not used to the European ideal of war. They turn to drinking, having fun, and splashing in the water on the beach while getting shelled.
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I haven't seen the film (yet) but I might some insight here. This one time a bunch of us were standing around just inside the border of our camp near Tikrit, Iraq, and a mortar or rocket or something detonated a few hundred meters away. Most of just casually turned our heads and thought, "Hmm, thats nice." A few of the jumpier people actually got down and started hiding under the trucks...we laughed at them. Another day at like 3 in the morning we had 5-6 rockets came in pretty close. big bangs, buldings shake, the whole deal and my main concern was not spilling my coffee (Yes, I was awake at 3 am...probably for 2-3 hours already which explains the coffee). I guess what I'm trying to say is people react to that kind of stuff very differently than you might imagine. There is also just a little bit of excitement (and sometimes alot of queasiness) that comes from the knowledge that you might be about to die and there is very little you can do about it, so why not enjoy yourself?

-Dylan C

I am doing some research for 390, and i came across an interesting story of Australian POW's. I have a book that talks about certain events during the War in the Pacific and one story was particularly interesting. The Chapter is titled The Horror of Sandakan and it goes into terrific detail of the horrors that undergo the Australian and British POW's. Many were forced to build what became known as the "Death Railway" which went from Thailand to Burma. Throughout the chapter, the reader sees just how cruel the Japanese soldiers are as they let the POW's starve and labor for days on end. If one could not work or keep up, they would shoot or stab them. In the intense jungles, men suffered from ulcers which festered from being left untreated. I was surprised and upset that this would go on and in the same light this is the first story I have heard that involves Australians in World War II in depth.

I find the colonization of Australia very interesting.
At first all that Great Britain thought of was, wow what a great place to stick our incorrigibles they will be out of the country and out of our prisons and generally out of mind. When they decided to turn them into colonies didn't it cross someone's mind that, hey these are the people we wanted to go and now they are the leading force in establishing new colonies? I for one would have been a little worried about the general outcome.

I think what I found most amusing about this whole situation was once people in Britain figured out they could possibly have a better chance at a life in Australia that they tried to get transported.

New Zealand was planned better but thinking that everything would follow the plan perfectly was shortsighted. What can go wrong will go wrong. People were using land they did not own, but rented it which was not at all what was envisioned, and from there everything just kind of falls apart. If there weren't landowners to pay sufficient wages to farm workers they could never buy their own land and continue the cycle.

Also the gold rushes to Otago and Westland did not help at all. When people in general think, get rich with minimal work I think most would jump at the chance. It's like the lottery today in America, the jackpot was huge recently and I am willing to bet people were buying tickets that never bought one before. But in the case of the gold rush people go where the gold rushes are causing unplanned growth. Which helped in destroying the perfect planned settlement of New Zealand.

The Last Wave by Peter Weir was a very strange movie, and I barely understood it at all. I think this might be in part because it is made in a different culture at a very different time in society so it is hard to relate to what the characters are thinking. The movie starts out with a few examples of extremely weird weather in Australia. Then the movie starts to focus on David Burton a financial lawyer who gets a phone call to represent five aborigines in a murder trial for legal aid. The night he agrees to help them he starts having strange dreams about Chris one of the aborigines men who are on trial for murder. He also starts having weird dreams about water. David starts to talk to Chris about these dreams he is having and it is akin to Alice in wonderland and David gets to see how deep the rabbit hole was.


During one part of the movie that really irked me was while a storm was tearing apart the, David’s house instead of checking to see if his wife and kids are ok he runs out the door following Chris, the main aborigines character in the movie. I also believe that the ending of that movie was the worst ending to a movie I have seen in a long time. It was scattered hard to follow little lone understand what happens. Then to end it all it ends something like how planet of the apes ends were you have a good idea what happened but it doesn’t end really.

Something that I found very interesting was the mythology of the aborigine’s people. I think that the mythology was the best thing to get out of this movie. The show was kind of sci-fi so I am not sure how much of the mythology was real aborigine mythology and how much was added for the movie.

It's nighttime in a Sydney pub. People are laughing, singing, and generally having a good time. Then a fight breaks out between a group of Aborigines. They take their fight outside, and one of them ends up dead. It seems like such a straightforward case: they had a little too much to drink, got a little too rough, and one of the men ended up dead. In steps lawyer David Burton. After talking to the Aborigines, however, Burton becomes convinced that the man was not killed in a bar fight, but rather for violating some sacred Aborigine law. No one will admit to it, however. In fact, the aborigines won’t even admit to being 'tribal', so Burton has nothing but his own instincts to build his case on. So begins Burton’s search, through Aborigine law, tradition, and myth, for the truth behind this death.

This main story line is superimposed over several other stories: one environmental, one deeply personal. Australia has been experiencing huge rainstorms and other disturbing weather-related phenomena that officials are hard pressed to explain. In conjunction with these storms, Burton has been experiencing disconcerting dreams. He dreams of people and things that he later comes across in real life, and also dreams of water and drowning. The man he dreams of is Chris, a young Aborigine, and one of the men that he is defending. With the help of Chris and a tribal spiritual leader named Charlie, Burton begins to understand the spirituality of the Aborigines, especially the importance of dreams, the Dream Time, and Mulkurul.

Aborigines believe in two 'ribbons' of time: the one that we live in, and a circular one known as the Dream Time, which dictates what happens in the time we live in. As Chris said, a "dream is a shadow ... of something real." They are often used to communicate between our time and the Dream Time. Mulkurul are spirit beings who often use human vehicles to communicate their desires, and they are also intertwined with the Dream Time. This is one of the things that was important and interesting about the movie: it really took the time to explore Aboriginal myth and tradition.

However, I found this movie rather difficult to follow and understand. As it progressed, the movie got more and more disjointed, almost as if Burton's dreams were taking over his reality, and taking the movie to hell with them. However, this movie was made in the 1970s, which was an age of fascination with the paranormal, so perhaps the ambiguousness can be blamed on the time of its creation.

Lecture four was about the settlement of Australia and New Zealand. We talked about the transportation of convicts from England to Australia. The first fleet did not know how to make a living off the land and as a result starvation approached. It was a mix of willful criminals making their living through crime and petty criminals, political dissenters, and people just down on their luck. We also were given a list of convict vocabulary. Some include bushhangers, which were Australian outlaws. A blunter and a mollie is considered a prostitute. I personally found this funny as I have a best friend/roommate with the name Mollie (spelled the same and all). I told her that her name means prostitute. haha. The government had the convicts working 10 hours a day for a 56 hour week. If the convicts didn’t behave they were sent to distant lands such as Norfolk, Botany Bay etc. This transportation of convicts was eventually stopped as the country wanted to get respectable people to build the nation. I feel that having a history of convicts that started your nation puts a strain on the growth.

The colonization of New Zealand on the other hand was a planned society. They wanted to have a nation of high ethics to prevent the crime like Australia. The role of Edward Gibbon Wakefield was interesting. His story of kidnapping girls and paying off the family sounds all too familiar with Michael Jackson in the US. hmm? The gold rush to Otago and Westland produced unplanned growth for NZ. I found this lecture very interesting; I enjoyed learning about the unique beginnings of these two nations. I was also very amazed to learn that convicts were once shipped to America. I did not know this.

So, I was watching Animal Planet, and they had a show about the most extreme houses, but anyway, they mentioned a town in Australia known as Coober Pedy. Half of this town is made of underground houses. The people living here create their own natural air conditioning systems that keep their homes about 77 degrees even though they live in the desert. I thought it was pretty cool. I found a website on it if anyone wants to check it out. The adress is http://www.opalcapitaloftheworld.com.au/ Enjoy!

Lecture 4 starts out talking about the settlement of convicts and pilgrims. You talked about Sidney being a convict settlement, the slide show of the opera house was awesome it makes me want to travel there even more. The lecture continues to talk about the Mythistory in Australia and New Zealand. William McNeil talked about historians being myth meters. Somewhat Australia and New Zealand’s history is based in myth. Next was the way Great Brittan went about transporting convicts to other places. (Cook) There was known potential off Botany Bay for settlement. Due to the American revolution Great Britain couldn't bring their convicts to USA now. So some colonies were founded as a result. They were: New South Wales (est. 1788), Van Diemen's Land (1812), and Western Australia (1829). Most of the convicts were Irish republicans; they worked up to 56 hrs a week. Next the lecture talks about the transition and abolition of the convict settlements and the last transport to be sent in 1868 to Western Australia. Next is the planned colonization of New Zealand. The idea of a reproduction of English life, only better. Some of the colonies were Nelson (1841), Caterbury (1850), Otago. (1848). my overall question was why the Australians take pride in their criminal/convict backgrounds.

This film was about three Aboriginal girls that were forcibly removed from their families by the government and sent to a substandard boarding school that was far from their home. The mothers of the girls were shown grieving throughout the movie. Eventually, the girls decided to run away from the school and return home. They met strangers along the way that gave them food and guidance. While they were on the run, an Aboriginal man from the school and numerous government officials were searching for them and their plight was known throughout the continent. Eventually, one of the girls was captured as she attempted to catch a train.

The two remaining girls were able to locate a fence that stretched across the barren interior of Australia. The fence was intended to keep out rabbits and the girls knew that if they followed it, the fence would lead them home. After walking hundreds of miles the girls were at the point of exhaustion and almost gave up hope. It was at this point that they realized that they were almost there. When they arrived home, their mothers were waiting for them and hid them from the government.

This film graphically depicted the treatment of Aboriginal families by the government of Australia and its white citizens during that time period. It clearly showed the intentional destruction of Aboriginal culture and the forced assimilation of native children into white society. I thought the movie was excellent but felt that it lacked an explanation as to why the government was doing this as well as the effect that it had on Aboriginal culture and identity.

I enjoyed the picture show on Australia, particularly the Sydney opera house and the Sydney bridge. Though the opera house was described as looking like a "bunch of clams crammed in a manual typewriter" I felt it resembled a fleet of ship sails clustered in a harbor.

Overall, i felt that the colonization of Australia was poorly planned. The initial fleet that arrived at Sydney had a dearth of skilled labor and tools. Foresight could have prevented this problem, as white-collar criminals, prostitutes, pimps and other pet criminals don't usually make the best farmers, foragers, or construction workers. The later arrival of the New South Wales Corps led to the obvious conclusion of a caste-like system of aristocracy, criminals, and near-slaves.

The planned colonization of New Zealand was a good idea, but clearly doomed from the start, especially when one considers the tendency towards self-satisfaction inherent in human nature. While demand for workers should have guaranteed fair wages for the working class, isolation gave power to the landholders. Eventually, the desire for more land, the suppression of the workers, and the discovery of gold led to unplanned expansion and the arrival of "undesirables".

I would like to address the comment about the phrase "invasion of New Zealand" being overly harsh, or an exaggeration. I have to disagree. New Zealand was the property, and home, of the Maori until Europeans arrived and claimed the land for themselves. Over time, the biological introduction of different plants and animals changed the New Zealand landscape so that it wasn't even the land that was once theirs. Their world was turned upside down by the "invasion" of Europeans. I find A.H. Clark's use of the word to be too subtle, rather than too harsh.

The main focus of this lecture was to compare and contrast the colonization of Australia and New Zealand. The most obvious similarity was that both countries were colonized mainly by the British. Although there were a few notable exceptions, Australian settlers were initially convicts and soldiers. It was a common myth that many convicts were transported for petty offences, some of which were described in the song "Botany Bay". In reality, those that were sentenced to transportation were usually hardened criminals.

In contrast, the settlements that were erected throughout New Zealand were planned colonies in order to establish a better British lifestyle. The British government and religious officials wished to create an environment of high moral standards in order to prevent the problems of crime and indecency that Australia was experiencing. Some of these colonies, such as the one that is now the city of Wellington, were created by the British government. Both the Church of Scotland and the Church of England created colonies which are now the areas of Otago and Canterbury respectively.

The most interesting aspect of this lecture was the point that many Australians take pride in their criminal heritage as long as it is far enough removed from them by time. Although this seemed odd to me at first, I realized that I have done this in my own life as well and I can certainly see how it might make for an intriguing conversation starter. I was left wondering however, what the New Zealanders thought of their beginnings. Do they feel that their society is somehow better than Australia's due to their origins of a higher moral society?

Lecture four starts out talking about convicts and pilgrims. The Sydney settlement was talked about and I found it interesting how Australians turned the city from a convict settlement into their showcase. From the lecture, Sydney sounds like a nice city, with their world famous opera house, beautiful harbor, and their highly developed mall, which sits on the grounds of the original convict prison. The mythistory in Australia and New Zealand was talked about and then the lecture went back to the convict colony topic. The transportation of the convicts was talked about and I found it particularly interesting that being sent to Australia as a convict was really not that bad of a punishment. After their stay in the prison, they had more opportunities available for them than they had in their home country. I also liked the Botany Bay song that we went over in class. I found the message of the song very interesting. We then went on to talk about the colonization of New Zealand, and how they had their scheme of planned colonization. I found it interesting how they wanted to reproduce English life, only make it better. They were not entirely successful with this however, and their land settlement plan did not work very well. The different planned colonies were listed and talked about and pastoralism was also talked about. All in all, lecture four interested me. I found the section on Mythistory to be the only one I had any questions about. Australian and New Zealand historians are more like story tellers than historians in other parts of the world and I just wonder why that is. Maybe this was covered in class, but if so, I didn’t catch it.

Lecture 4 discussed a variety of topics including myth, convicts and colonization. Australia and New Zealand both have a mythical sense to their history. Historians have often held a role similar to storytellers, in that they are keeping the native accounts of history alive. The role of the convicts transported to the region is also of importance to the history of Australia. As in the Botany Bay song discussed in class, it appeared to address the all criminals classifying them all as one group. This group was labeled convicts and sent away. However there was a twist in the song that seemed to almost rationalize criminal acts of the poor or down trodden. The song then seemed to point out that it should only be the willful career criminals that should be punished, and that you can’t catch everyone. The song begins to point out other crimes that should be “sent to the bay” like store owners and farmers. It seems that these convicts “sent to the bay” were simply lower class individuals that were guilty of trivial offenses, but the English wanted to clean up their streets hence, the transfer to places like Botany Bay.
Once these convicts arrived in Australia, it was believed that there could be could be a sense social order in Australia as well as New Zealand. It was thought these areas could be modeled after England. But, these attempts seemed useless with the growing numbers of convicts being transported there, and the discovery of gold. Which brings to question, why would England transport all of these convicts and then try to create a sense of social order?

Lecture 4 Topics included the red deer population and how people tried to kill them off. However, once they became rare, people tried to capture them when they found a use for them. We talked about the sheep and how the Scotts came in with their sheep dogs to herd them. We also discussed the Convicts who were shipped to Australia and how most of them were transported for petty crimes. Once the convicts served their time they might want to start over again and get a respectable woman or political career but their jail time stained their reputation. They were not welcomed into the society of Australia. Lastly, we discussed the colonization and how the government would only sell people small pieces of land. The goal was to force people to value the land they had and to help ensure that the land properties didn’t get so big that they would need slaves.

I think that the people can be quick to action and slow to think. I conclude this idea because of the deer; they started to kill them off and then realized that they could be useful. This idea is also supported with the boat life of the convicts. The corrupt government would send prisoners to another land to punish them without taking into account what effect that might have on the prisoner’s reputation or society in the new land. The government should have tried to help the people in trouble, not ship them off so they didn’t have to deal with them.

If it got to ask a question, I would like to know how many years of training the average sheep dog goes through so that the owner could just whistle to indicate when the dogs should start or stop barking.

Lecture 4 told us about the settlement of New Zealand and Australia by Europeans. New Zealand was settled by pilgrims while Australia is known for its settlement with convict labor.

England suffered from increasing crime and the overfilling of Hulks to store prisoners, so there became an idea to transport these convicts to Australia and use them for labor in constructing a new colony. Convicts were often Irish republicans, Canadian revolutionaries, and petty criminals. The First Fleet arrived in Australia and what to follow was known as the starvation years. The officers had very negative reactions upon their sight of the land.

New Zealand had a systematic method for colonization. In New Zealand, only small parcels of land would be available to the settlers, and it would be sold at a sufficient price. New Zealand would be a cultured class of landowners, and some people would be laborers on the farms, but only for a temporary time. New Zealand was in hopes to be a reproduction of English life, but better. There were gold rushes to Otago and Westland that produced unplanned growth from American, Chinese, and Australian immigrants.

To me, the idea of New Zealand to be a planned society of noble people was the result of some people’s feelings that their fellow man had failed at colonizing Australia. Since New Zealand was a planned colonization, did they have a plan for the Maori people that were already inhabiting the land?

The poor New Zealand curling team has no Olympic wins (0-9). I wonder if it has something to do with the weather?

In lecture 4, we looked at the origins of settlement in Australia and New Zealand. The key to this lecture was identifying the differences between the settlement of Australia and New Zealand. Australia's convict origin came about as a result of crime problems in Great Britain. The area was chosen specifically because of the recommendations of James Cook. The first fleet came to New South Wales in 1788, and the settlers were exposed to the challenges of starvation and survival on a difficult landscape with a difficult group of citizens (convicts). New Zealand's origins, in contrast, appear at first to be more orderly with the ideal of planned colonization. This civil and well-structured view of New Zealand's early growth (from Edward Gibbon Wakefield) has been challenged, however, as problems such as violence, drunkenness, and general "frontier chaos" have been suggested by Miles Fairburn. This frontier chaos was supplemented by the gold rush, which produced unplanned growth and the presence of undesirable people. In New Zealand especially, then, we see the crossing and conflict of mythistory and revisionism.
Whether the "true version" of history is what we are studying was of interest to me. I wonder how much of the accepted origins of Australia and New Zealand are the result of stories versus revisionism. This topic makes for an interesting discussion of any historical topic. In the end, I believe general ideas and themes can be agreed upon, but details are never truly definitive.
Also, as much as the differences between the settlements of these nations are emphasized, I find the commonalities interesting. A couple striking similarities are the influence of gold mining and pastoralism, as well as the influence of British institutions (political, as emphasized by Clark, in Australia, social stratification in New Zealand).
Again, I would like to know more about the issue of mythistory versus revisionism in the two nations. Which historians accept which views? Or is there general consensus? Who is most influential among those we studied?

Lecture four fit in great with my favorite chapter Clark. The lecture told us how Australia and New Zealand were colonized. Australia, as we all know even before this class, started as something like a big prison. Apparently England was overflowing with criminals so they needed to start a new country to hold them all. Like we read in Clark, the criminals had a hard time to start facing starvation, hard labor, and home sickness. However, I would venture to say that I would rather be in some warm foreign country with alcohol and some free time then in a prison for the rest of my life. New Zealand was a different story however. That colony was started by wealthy second and third sons who had nothing for them in their home country.

I also find it funny that people in Australia today are proud that they come from a line of convicts. Maybe it is one of those things were you only have two choices, to be ashamed of who and were you come from or you can embrace it and pretend you are proud of it. I guess it is better to be happy with your roots then try to deny them.

Like others I did not know that England tried to use America in the same way it did Australia, for convicts. I guess my question is did the convicts in America find such hard times as the first convicts in Australia?

Lecture three focused on discovery and exploration in Australia and New Zealand. The first person we talked about was J.C. Beaglehole who was an English historian that had three criteria for heroic exploration. He felt that seamanship, leadership, and knowledge were at the core of any great discovery. We talked about many different explorers that made a difference in the discovery of the new lands. Ferdinand Magellan began the exploration of the South Pacific, followed by Abel Tasman in the mid 1600s which brought more detailed information about Australia and New Zealand. James Cook voyage in the late 1700s was important because it resulted in English colonization and fulfilled Beaglehole’s theme of heroic exploration.

I agree with others that said the most interesting part of the class was the discussion about how it is hard to report history without bias. Personally I think it is important for a historian to first give the facts and tell the history with little or no emotion first. Then once the audience has a background of the story being told, and has their own opinion it is important for that historian to tell their own opinion. For example, when reading about the Holocaust, the facts should be given like how many were killed, by who, and when it took place. Once the reader has all the important information it is ok for the writer to say it was a horrible event in history.

Another week and another lecture (Yippy). Besides taking on the daunting task of limiting and simplifying the early history of both New Zealand and Australia, the lecture comes across as providing a glimpse of what it means to be either an Australian or a New Zealander.

Australia had started off being a reform colony for the excess criminals from the Mother Country. It failed as more non-convicts settled and wanted to build a more respectable colony. Yet, the mystique of this criminal background would continue but more as something to be proud about.

On the other hand, New Zealand was colonized as a model colony, where the best of English society could flourish. Yet, this too failed as the need for large tracts of land for pastoral usages was limited by the severe lack of land on an island. This in turn limited people who could live off the land.

Because of these stories of early settlement, it is perhaps easier to understand the rebellious nature of Australia compared to the loyal New Zealand. Finally, with this lecture, the line of thought of “myth history” comes up again. What is intriguing is the notion that history needs to be constantly revised. In general, most historians are dry and boring as the books they’ve written and read. Now add a dash of myth and spice things up. With that in recipe in mind, history is not dead.

This lecture showed the beginnings of European settlement in Australia. Ironically, Australia started out as a place for convict deportation. The first fleet that arrived struggled to survive and constantly fought off starvation. They were angry because they thought Cook’s report was extremely misleading. The convicts weren’t all that terrible. Many people were transported to Australia because of petty crimes and political deviation. Convict transportation was finally done away with because immigrants desired respectability.

We also learned that New Zealand was developed as an “ideal” settlement. They wanted a place where the wealthy started the civilization but then anyone could come and work their way into the upper class. This plan didn’t pan out because of many reasons. These two causes were the nature of pastoralism in and the discovery of gold in New Zealand.

I thought this lecture was very interesting. I was amazed at the contrast in New Zealand and Australia’s beginnings. I first learned of Australia’s humble beginnings while reading Clark’s novel and was shocked that this was how Australia was started. I was equally surprised that people thought an “ideal” civilization could be started on New Zealand, especially after the British had read Cook’s report of the Maori. It surprised me because Australia was viewed as excellent land by Cook and New Zealand was not very favorable. One would think that the British would then choose Australia for the “perfect” settlement and New Zealand as the convict colony.

One thing that I’m curious about is convict transportation to America. Transportation was started to Australia because they couldn’t do it to America anymore. Where were these transportation destinations in America before the revolutionary war?

Lecture 4 described the way that Australian and New Zealand were colonized from the very beginning. Also how these different types of colonization formed different myth histories for Australia and New Zealand. It was cool how in Australia the fact that you have a original convict in your bloodline is a badge of honor, in a lot of society's today it would be considered a blemish and you would try and hide it to the best of your ability. But there they proudly display it and say look at us look how far we have come.

In New Zealand it was very different kind of settlement with wealthy second sons coming to. The planned settlement was one of those plans that sound really good on paper but fall apart in the real world. Even as I look at this and see that it would never work in the real world I still wish that it would the systematic colonization of New Zealand and the way it was planed out makes it sound like a beautiful society to live in will the perpetual ability to advance if you are hard working and prudent with your money.

I was thinking about the revisionist and the myth history part of the lecture and I was wondering if maybe this is one of the reasons some people lose faith in historians? Some people believe that history should be static and never changing but Dr. Isern said that Myth history has to be constantly revised so that it is still relevant.

Lecture four was entitled "Settlement: Convicts and Pilgrims." Dr. Isern discussed the settlement of both Australia and New Zealand, which were settled in quite different ways. Australia was originally a convict colony, because the hulks in England where they kept criminals were overflowing, and they could no longer ship them to America. Thus a colony was made in Australia under military rule. The colony was originally going to be located at Botany Bay, but the area was less than desirable for living, so they moved the colony to Sydney Harbor. Interestingly enough, Sydney Harbor, and more especially 'The Rocks', the original convict settlements, are now Australia’s cultural showcase, housing such things as the iconic Sydney Opera House and an up-scale shopping area.

New Zealand, however, was not a convict colony. The settlement of New Zealand was carefully planned. The settlers were law-abiding and of a good social class, often the second and third sons of wealthy families who had no hope of land of their own if they remained in England.

Dr. Isern also discussed the idea of foundations having a profound influence on the values, culture, and identity of a nation. For example, in the United States, revolution is an important value. It is a vital part of the founding of our nation, and we celebrate it on July 4th, one of our most important holidays. Australia and New Zealand are inevitably influenced by their foundations, and indeed Australia almost seems to celebrate its past as a convict colony (as is evinced by the Sydney Harbor of then and now). Another thing that I found interesting was the Ballad of Botany Bay that was shared in class. There was such a variety of people who the author thought should be sent to Botany Bay, from the mundane to the hardened criminal. It struck me as interesting peek into the ideas of the English people of the time.

Lecture four talked about the way Australia and New Zealand were settled. The settlement of the two countries counldn't be more different. Australia was a planned penal colony. It's nice to think that the convicts shipped to Australia were political activists, but most of them were criminals. The first few years of Australian settlement were very hard, but eventually things got better. Shipment of criminals to all the Australian territories was eventually stopped. This lecture complemented the Clark text really well. One thing that Clark mentioned and the lecture didn't to much was the ratio of males to females in Australia. The lack of women in Australia was the cause of many problems.

The settlement of New Zealand was very different from that of Australia. New Zealand was a planned colony. This new colony was supposed to be just like England only better. Convicts were never shipped to New Zealand. Most of the people that went there were younger sons of wealthy families. Each person was only supposed to get a small section of land to farm because larger areas would promote slavery. The plan failed miserably and some people got huge parcels of land that they turned into sheep stations. I find that idea of planning a settlement a little absurd. No matter how hard they tried officials couldn't keep people from acquiring large parcels of land. It is human nature to want to acquire more land.

I found it very interesting that Southern Australia was a planned settlement rather than a convict settlement. Why was Southern Auatralia different from all the other territories?

I have just finished watching the movie Gallipoli, and all I can say is WOW. Before this movie, all I have been exposed to is extremely introductory information on Australian culture, but this movie changes everything, as far as I am concerned.

The movie is about several young men who run sprint races in Western Australia. They live to run, and it is what they do. It is their cultural identity. At one time, they challenge a horseman that one of them running barefoot could outrun the horseman riding bareback. The horseman is restricted to the dirt road, while the runner takes the most direct path home. The runner wins, despite his almost endangering himself. This is his identity – the runner, the athlete.

Unfortunately, these young men are alive in Australia in 1915, at the time the English army is heavily recruiting for the Great War. They needs troops to attack Turkey, so that Turkey may be forced out of the war and the Triple Entente may win the war. Traditional of the time, mass cultural beliefs of the glory and romanticism of war run rampant, and the runners wish to remain together so that they may enjoy themselves together, joining in Australia’s attempt to find a sense of nationalism and cultural identity.

The film shows the original landing, in which the Australian Imperial Force establishes a beachhead at Gallipoli, and they begin receiving shellfire from the entrenched Turks. The men do not know what to make of this, as they are simply not used to the European ideal of war. They turn to drinking, having fun, and splashing in the water on the beach while getting shelled. This is amazing, the shells are creating a national identity, so they need to enjoy it! They are war heroes! Even as one man is shot in the water, men are cheering as they carry him to an aid station. He is the first to take a bullet for his country, the first Australian hero.

Warning: I am about to spoil the ending.

Ultimately, the film reaches a climax when the men are split up, and one is a runner while the other is a front-line attacker. The attackers are mowed down by the Turks, and the runner has to carry the message to the front that the attack is to stop, as no more bloodshed is needed. The young men hang their personal possessions in the trench, so that they will not get lost in the gunfire. This is to prove that these men are battle heroes, and they want that piece of Turkish land to remain Australian to prove it. It could not be done in Australia, after all.

I apologize if this review ran a bit long, but I feel that this is a very important phase in Australian Cultural Identity. Cheers!

p.s. I am amazed at how young Mel Gibson once was...be prepared for this as well.

In this lecture we learned about how Australia and New Zealand were settled. the two countries were settled in very different ways.

Australia began as a convict colony. England had been transporting convicts to North America for some time, but when the American revolution happened, they wouldn't stand for it any more. For a short time, decommissioned Navy ships were used to house convicts, but they filled up quickly. Soon, convicts were transported to "botony bay." The first group of convicts arrived in New South Wales in 1788.

These were difficult years as very few of the convicts were skilled laborers. Convict colonies expanded to Van Diemens Land and Western Australia. They were seen as the botony bays of botony bay.

New Zealand was settled in a very different way. In the beginning, New Zealand was to be a planned colony. The "good" members of society would be chosen to settle in New Zealand. Often time it would be someone like the second or third son of a wealthy family-who would not get a land inheritance.

There was a very structured scheme for planning this colonization. To discourage using hard laborers or slaves to tend to the land, only small parcels of land would be sold. It would be sold at a price that would make it difficult, but not impossible to obtain enough of. This was to be English life, only better. Edward Gibbon Wakefield was the father of the planned settlement and led 4 of them.

What I found interesting was that convicts were once shipped to America. I did not know that. I can't believe that an entire country could be colonized through shipping convicts there. It was interesting that the hardest convicts were sent away to even harder lands. New Zealand being a planned colony was very interesting to me. It is difficult to believe that they thought it would work. Maybe they didnt think it would last forever, but I wonder how long they did expect it to last.

Over the weekend some friends of mine were looking up slang terms on the net and one of the ones they found was Australian. I was wondering if anyone would like to venture a guess as to what it means when someone is "as camp as a row of tents" is refering to? (I know what it is referring to, but I would just like to see some of the guesses that people have.)

Heavenly Creatures is a movie by Peter Jackson who is also the producer of Lord of the Ring. This film is set in Canterbury New Zealand between 1953-1954. The film is about two young teenage girls, Pauline Parker played by Melaine Lynskey and Juliet Hulme played by Kate Winslet, who form an iseparable bond with one another. The two girls create their own imaginative world which they call the fourth world. Go girls go to this fourth world to escape their own lives which they considerd too dull. The girls imaginations soon get out of control for they begin to mix together their real lives and their imaginative world. The parents of the girls begin to worry about the growing intensity of their friendship, and doing what they think is best try to break the two girls apart. The retaliation to their parents attempts, the girls conjure up a shocking plan to get back at them. The plan is carried out, and the conse