TY - BOOK
T1 - Myths and memories: re-reading space and people in southern Western Australia through the lenses of travellers, 1850-1914
AU - Lane, Cynthia Margaret
PY - 2011
Y1 - 2011
N2 - This thesis examines the perceptions of European travellers about southern Western Australia between 1850 and 1914. Theirs was a narrow vision of space and people in the region, shaped by their individual personalities, their position in society, and the prevailing discourses and ideologies of the age. Christian, Enlightenment, and Romantic philosophies had a major influence on their responses to the land—its cultivation and conservation, and its aesthetic qualities—and on their views of colonial society—its class and ethnicity. The travellers perpetuated an idealised view of a colonised landscape, and a ‘pioneer’ community that eliminated class struggle and inequality, even though an analysis of their observations revealed otherwise. Nevertheless, although limited, their narratives are invaluable as a reflection of opinions, attitudes and knowledge prevalent during an age of imperialism. These travellers were economically secure, literate and educated: foundations which provide an insight into the way power and privilege, implicit in their writings, governed the way they imagined Western Australia in the colonial and immediate post-federation period. In total, the diaries, letters, journals and memoirs of forty-one travellers are analysed. The British travellers (including a Canadian, an Anglo-Indian, and three eastern-Australian colonists) toured with typical colonial attitudes towards overseas ‘possessions', their observations influenced by British opinions and policies.
AB - This thesis examines the perceptions of European travellers about southern Western Australia between 1850 and 1914. Theirs was a narrow vision of space and people in the region, shaped by their individual personalities, their position in society, and the prevailing discourses and ideologies of the age. Christian, Enlightenment, and Romantic philosophies had a major influence on their responses to the land—its cultivation and conservation, and its aesthetic qualities—and on their views of colonial society—its class and ethnicity. The travellers perpetuated an idealised view of a colonised landscape, and a ‘pioneer’ community that eliminated class struggle and inequality, even though an analysis of their observations revealed otherwise. Nevertheless, although limited, their narratives are invaluable as a reflection of opinions, attitudes and knowledge prevalent during an age of imperialism. These travellers were economically secure, literate and educated: foundations which provide an insight into the way power and privilege, implicit in their writings, governed the way they imagined Western Australia in the colonial and immediate post-federation period. In total, the diaries, letters, journals and memoirs of forty-one travellers are analysed. The British travellers (including a Canadian, an Anglo-Indian, and three eastern-Australian colonists) toured with typical colonial attitudes towards overseas ‘possessions', their observations influenced by British opinions and policies.
KW - Colonialism
KW - Imperialism
KW - Social aspects
KW - Western Australia
KW - History
KW - Popular culture
KW - Voyages and travels
KW - 19th century
KW - Travelers' writings, English
KW - Travelers
KW - Attitudes
KW - Travelers' writings, European
KW - History and criticism
KW - Social conditions
KW - 1901-1945
KW - Western Australia, South-west
KW - Description and travel
KW - Travel writing
M3 - Doctoral Thesis
ER -