Volume One, Van Diemen's Land, 1803-1847
This is the first volume in a series that re-appraises the now widely accepted story about conflict between colonists and Aborigines in Australian history. Beginning in Tasmania, and eventually covering the whole of the Australian mainland, the volumes find that the academic historians of the last thirty years have greatly exaggerated the degree of violence that occurred.
In a close re-examination of the primary sources used by historians, Keith Windschuttle concludes that much of their case is poorly founded, other parts are seriously mistaken, and some of it is outright fabrication.
The author finds the British colonization of the Australia was the least violent of all Europe's encounters with the New World. It did not meet any organized resistance. Conflict was sporadic rather than systematic. The notion of ‘frontier warfare' is fictional. To describe the process as ‘genocide' is to use hyperbole that is unsupported by the historical evidence.
" ... his book will ultimately be recognized as one of the most important and devastating written on Australian history in recent decades." Geoffrey Blainey, The New Criterion, New York, April 2003
" ... labourers in this vineyard must henceforth meet standards of honesty and accuracy quite unfamiliar to the credulous, the sentimental and the political activists who have ruled too long. Truth, it seems, may yet win out in the marketplace of ideas." Neil McInnes, The National Interest, Washington, Summer 2004
Publication information
Publication date: December 1, 2002
Recommended retail price: $49.95 (inc.GST)
Hard cover, dust jacket, 240 x 155 mm, 472 pages, footnotes, bibliography, index
ISBN 1 876492 05 8
Publisher:
Macleay Press, PO Box 477, Paddington NSW 2021
Telephone 02 9360 2534 Fax 02 9331 7368
email:
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