Teaching Australian and New Zealand Literature
- Editors: Nicholas Birns, Nicole Moore, Sarah Shieff
- Pages: vii & 329 pp.
- Published: 2017
- ISBN: 9781603292887 (Paperback)
- ISBN: 9781603292870 (Hardcover)
“This volume provides resources and contexts for teaching Australian and New Zealand literatures for those increasingly worlded literature classrooms outside Australia and New Zealand.”
—Philip Mead, University of Western Australia
Australia and New Zealand, united geographically by their location in the South Pacific and linguistically by their English-speaking inhabitants, share the strong bond of hope for cultural diversity and social equality—one often challenged by history, starting with the appropriation of land from their indigenous peoples. This volume explores significant themes and topics in Australian and New Zealand literature. In their introduction, the editors address both the commonalities and differences between the two nations’ literatures by considering literary and historical contexts and by making nuanced connections between the global and the local. Contributors share their experiences teaching literature on the iconic landscape and ecological fragility; stories and perspectives of convicts, migrants, and refugees; and Maori and Aboriginal texts, which add much to the transnational turn.
This volume presents a wide array of writers—such as Patrick White, Janet Frame, Katherine Mansfield, Frank Sargeson, Witi Ihimaera, Christina Stead, Allen Curnow, David Malouf, Les Murray, Nam Le, Miles Franklin, Kim Scott, and Sally Morgan—and offers pedagogical tools for teachers to consider issues that include colonial and racial violence, performance traditions, and the role of language and translation. Concluding with a list of resources, this volume serves to support new and experienced instructors alike.
Chadwick Allen
Claire Bazin
Anna Boswell
Alex Calder
David Carter
Tanya Dalziell
Hilary Emmett
Claire Jones
Melissa Kennedy
Roseanne Kennedy
Julieanne Lamond
Jeanine Leane
Claudia Marquis
Elizabeth McMahon
Rod McRae
Roger Nicholson
Maggie Nolan
Brigitta Olubas
Wenche Ommundsen
Bridget Orr
Susan Sheridan
Rebecca Weaver-Hightower
Russell West-Pavlov
Lydia Wevers
Contents (v)
Introduction (1)
Part I: Histories and Contexts
Relocating Literary Sensibility: Colonial Australian Print Culture in the Digital Age (15)
The Making and Unmaking of New Zealand (29)
Bush Legends and Pastoral Landscapes (42)
Teaching International Postcolonialism: Witi Ihimaera and the Familiarity of Family (55)
“Terror Nullius”: Contemporary Australian Frontier Fictions in the Classroom (67)
Teaching Australian Multicultural Literature (77)
Part II: Frequently Taught Authors
Katherine Mansfield Is the Problem (89)
Frank Sargeson and “The Right Colonial Tradition” (101)
Christina Stead: Portraits of the Author as a Young Woman (111)
Blood and Water: Teaching Allen Curnow (122)
Identity, Perversity, and Literary Subjectivity: Teaching Patrick White’s The Twyborn Affair (133)
An Australian Hybridity of Dialect and Didactics in Les Murray’s Subhuman Redneck Poems (145)
Relearning Whiteness: David Malouf’s Remembering Babylon (155)
Troubling Language: Storytelling and Sovereignty in Kim Scott’s Benang (165)
Part III: Global Connections
Indigenous Juxtapositions: Teaching Maori and Aboriginal Texts in Global Contexts (179)
Literature, Literary Ethics, and the Global Contexts of Australian Literature: Teaching Nam Le’s The Boat (190)
Teaching Kate Grenville’s The Secret River in the United States: A Study (199)
Sally Morgan’s My Place: From the National to the Transnational (210)
Liberating Australian Literature: Teaching from the Postnational Space (223)
Part IV: Course Models
Aboriginal Literature in the Classroom (237)
Carrying the Voice (247)
Reading Gender: Teaching Miles Franklin’s My Brilliant Career (259)
Teaching Janet Frame’s An Angel at My Table in a Life-Writing Course (270)
Threshold Moments: Teaching the New Zealand Adolescent Novel (281)
Criminal Pursuits: Teaching Crime Fiction from New Zealand and Australia (291)
Part V: Resources
Databases and Electronic Resources (305)
Blogs (307)
Bibliographies and Dictionaries (308)
Literary Journals (308)
Anthologies (310)
General Studies and Histories (312)
Film and Multimedia (317)
Notes on Contributors (319)
Index (323)
