Conference: Gallipoli to Coniston: Remembering Frontiers
This two day FREE conference will ask the big questions about war and how we remember it.
On the 86th Anniversary of the 1928 Massacre at Coniston in Central Australia, can the Frontier Wars be recognised at the same time as Australians commemorate overseas battles like Gallipoli and Flanders? Can ANZAC Day mourning recognise also the violence of the Frontiers in Australia and New Zealand?
The Frontier Wars went on for at least 150 years and can be argued to continue to this day. Can we recognise the terrible wars inside as well as outside Australia at the same time?
Can the Black Diggers in Australia's armies be acknowledged? Along with the Maori who fought in the New Zealand Forces and the Indian troops who were at Gallipoli? They made great sacrifices and were undoubtedly courageous - but did they have dilemmas as well as bravery?
Can Gallipoli be recognised as an invasion? Can we mourn the loss of all those young lives - Aboriginal, Maori, settler Australasians, Indians at the same time as we recognise the devestating impact on Turkey, its soldiers and its civilians?
Women and civilians have borne the highest cost in war everywhere. The Frontier Wars in Australia often targetted women and settlers used rape as a weapon of war. The First World War was the same: how did the violence of war affect the invaded civilians of Turkey as well as France? How have women tried to bring the gendered violence of war to the foreground? What is happening as war rages today in Central Africa? Are there parallels with Frontier warfare but also with WW1 and beyond?
Program
Thursday, 28 August
Session 1: 9.30-10.00am
Chair: Ray Jackson
Welcome to Country/Acknowledgement by Pastor Ray Minniecon (Kinchela Boys Home Committee)
Conference introduction and goals: Meredith Walker and Heather Goodall
Session 2: 10.00-11.30am
Chair: Amala Groom
Theme: Politics of commemorations
1. Professor John Maynard (Wollotuka Institute, University of Newcastle)
2. Frances Jupurrulla Kelly on Coniston
3. Meredith Walker: Recognising War in Australia: the evolution of Anzac day and moves to acknowledge frontier conflicts
4. Paddy Gibson (Senior Researcher Jumbunna Indigenous House of Learning): Imperialism and Aboriginal Soldiers from the Australian 'frontier' to WW1
MORNING TEA
Session 3: 11.45-1.00pm
Chair: Olivia Nigro
Theme: Frontiers, Nationalisms and Resistance
1. Aunty Jenny Munro (Redfern Aboriginal Tent Embassy)
2. Robyne Bancroft (Bundjalung/Thungatti historian): History of Violence in Northern NSW
3. Ray Kerkhove: Historian on Aboriginal Resistance
LUNCH
Session 4: 1.30-3.00pm
Chair: Devleena Ghosh (UTS)
Theme: ANZAC Commemmoration
1. Turkish community representative
2. Paul Smith: RSL, Memorial Mullimbimby
3. Burcu Cevik: Gallipoli in Turkish memory
4. Andrew Jakubowicz & Ahmet İçduygu: After Gallipoli: empire nation and diversity in multicultural Turkey and Australia
AFTERNOON TEA
Session 5: 3.30-5.00pm
Chair: Heather Goodall (UTS)
Theme: Indians, Australians and 'colonial' armies
1. Devleena Ghosh (UTS): Indians in Europe WW1
2. Sekhar Bandyopadhyay (Victoria University, NZ): Consequences of WW1 for India
3. Sikh community representative: Perspectives on commemoration
Friday, 29 August
Session 6: 9.00-10.30am
Chair: Aunty Juanita Sherwood (UTS)
Theme: Women and War
1. Lucy Fiske (UTS): Warfare and Gender Vulnerability - Congo case study
2. Burcu Cevik (UTS): Turkish Women at Gallipoli
3. Meredith Burgmann/Heather Goodall: Interventions: Women against Rape in War
MORNING TEA
Session 7: 11.00am-12.15pm
Chair: Burcu Cevik (UTS)
Panel Discussion: Commemorations of Warfare
1. Strategies for greater inclusivity in commemorations, including ANZAC Day: Amala Groom (artist/activist) - continuing presence of frontier violence
2. Alison Wishart (Australian War Memorial): commemorations in Australia
3. James Goodman (UTS): Representations of nation and cosmopolitanisms
LUNCH
Session 8: 1.00-4.00pm
Chair: Uncle Ray Jackson
Coniston Commemoration
Documentary Film Screening: Coniston by Francis Jupurrulla Kelly (57 minutes)
Talk by Ray Jackson on Frontier Violence
