Description
Book SynopsisThis international collection of eleven original essays on Australian Aboriginal literature provides a comprehensive critical companion that contextualizes the Aboriginal canon for scholars, researchers, students, and general readers. Australian Aboriginal literature, once relegated to the margins of Australian literary studies, now receives both national and international attention. Not only has the number of published texts by contemporary Australian Aboriginals risen sharply, but scholars and publishers have also recently begun recovering earlier published and unpublished Indigenous works. Writing by Australian Aboriginals is making a decisive impression in fiction, autobiography, biography, poetry, film, drama, and music, and has recently been anthologized in Oceania and North America. Until now, however, there has been no comprehensive critical companion that contextualizes the Aboriginal canon for scholars, researchers, students, and general readers. This international collection of eleven original essays fills this gap by discussing crucial aspects of Australian Aboriginal literature and tracing the development of Aboriginalliteracy from the oral tradition up until today, contextualizing the work of Aboriginal artists and writers and exploring aspects of Aboriginal life writing such as obstacles toward publishing, questions of editorial control (orthe lack thereof), intergenerational and interracial collaborations combining oral history and life writing, and the pros and cons of translation into European languages. Contributors: Katrin Althans, Maryrose Casey, Danica Cerce, Stuart Cooke, Paula Anca Farca, Michael R. Griffiths, Oliver Haag, Martina Horakova, Jennifer Jones, Nicholas Jose, Andrew King, Jeanine Leane, Theodore F. Sheckels, Belinda Wheeler. Belinda Wheeler is Associate Professor of English at Claflin University, Orangeburg, SC.
Trade Review[The editor] and the contributors have used the book's position as one of the only international introductory texts on Australian Aboriginal literature as a gateway to understanding Aboriginal output more broadly. . . . * WASAFIRI *
[C]hallenges the very notion of literature itself. . . . [I]nsist[s] on the literary quality and seriousness of Australian Aboriginal texts. . . . [H]ighly recommended. . . . [F]ills a large gap in Asia-Pacific literary and cultural studies. It will be of benefit to teachers and students, artists and critics, scholars and general readers, the indigenous and non-indigenous. * PACIFIC ASIA INQUIRY *
This comprehensive anthology gives students and beginning researchers a clear overview of the issues at play in indigenous Australian literature today. . . . Handsomely produced and well indexed, this volume is a substantial contribution to the literature. . . . Highly recommended. * CHOICE *
Table of ContentsForeword - Nichola Jose Acknowledgments Introduction: The Emerging Canon - Belinda Wheeler Chronology Indigenous Life Writing: Rethinking Poetics and Practice - Michael R. Griffiths Australian Aboriginal Life Writers and Their Editors: Cross-Cultural Collaboration, Authorial Intention, and the Impact of Editorial Choices - Jennifer Jones Contemporary Life Writing: Inscribing Double Voice in Intergenerational Collaborative Life-Writing Projects - Martina Horakova European Translations of Australian Aboriginal Texts - Danica Cerce and Oliver Haag Tracing a Trajectory from Songpoetry to Contemporary Aboriginal Poetry - Stuart Cooke Rites/Rights/Writes of Passage: Identity Construction in Australian Aboriginal Young Adult Fiction - Jeanine Leane Humor in Contemporary Aboriginal Adult Fiction - Paula Anca Farca White Shadows: The Gothic Tradition in Australian Aboriginal Literature - Katrin Althans Bold, Black, and Brilliant: Aboriginal Australian Drama - Maryrose Casey The "Stolen Generations" in Feature Film: The Approach of Aboriginal Director Rachel Perkins and Others - Theodore F. Scheckels A History of Popular Indigenous Music - Andrew King Notes on the Contributors Note on the Cover Artist Index
