What we were told: Responses to 65,000 years of Aboriginal history

Abstract

In July 2017, a new date was published from archaeological excavations in western Arnhem Land that pushed the opening chapters of Australian history back to 65,000 years ago.1 It is the latest development in a time revolution that has gripped the nation over the past half century. Stimulated by this new research, the authors of this article, together with geochronologist Bert Roberts, held a forum in Wollongong to explore the ways in which the Australian public have made sense of the deep Aboriginal history of Australia. A distillation of this discussion was published in The Conversation in November 2017 with the title, 'When Did Australia's Human History Begin?'