Australian National Maritime Museum Research Articles

Exhibiting slavery in Australia: Personal narratives and legacies

AbstractThe history of slavery has often been located on the same continuum as that of incarceration. This article explores the development of an exhibition representing the legacies of slavery in Australia, analysing Australian and international exhibitions alongside theories of museology, historiography and memory. It begins by considering the growth of slavery memory since the latter twentieth century, and Australia's own slavery heritage. The second half of the article focuses on curatorial directions and decisions taken in the exhibition, which our research team is currently developing in partnership with the Australian National Maritime Museum as part of an Australian Research Council project. Much of the project's research to date has been biographical, investigating the lives of individual slavers and colonists to explore colonial and racial frameworks still underpinning contemporary Australia. For the exhibition, we are investigating ways of expanding the scope to represent the lives and experiences of enslaved individuals. We are also exploring the challenges of retracing past lives, the potential limits of empathy, and the politics of ownership when telling stories about the past. This includes considering community participation, the biases and silences of the archives, and the use of art in representing the past.

Unearthing South Australia’s Oldest Known Shipwreck: The Bark South Australian (1837)

In early 2018, a collaborative team composed of maritime archaeologists, museum specialists, and volunteers from the South Australian Department for Environment and Water, South Australian Maritime Museum, Silentworld Foundation, Australian National Maritime Museum, MaP Fund, and Flinders University surveyed for and located the shipwreck site of the bark South Australian. Lost at Rosetta Harbor (at the western end of modern-day Encounter Bay) in December 1837, South Australian is South Australia’s oldest documented shipwreck. Its significance also derives from its use as one of the earliest immigration ships to ferry European settlers to the colony of South Australia, as well as careers as a postal packet and “cutting-in” vessel for shore-based whaling activities. South Australian’s historical background is addressed, as are efforts to locate and confirm the identity of its wreck site via archaeological investigation.

Using Ancient DNA Analysis and Radiocarbon Dating to Determine the Provenance of an Unusual Whaling Artifact

Natural history collections provide a critical temporal view of past biodiversity and are instrumental in the study of extinct populations. However, the value of historical specimens relies on correct species identification, collection date and collection locality. The Australian National Maritime Museum (ANMM) holds an unusual artefact – an electric lamp made from a dried whale penis – with unknown age, species-of-origin and collection locality. We used ancient DNA methods to generate a partial mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) genome sequence to establish the identity and provenance of the whale, and accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) radiocarbon dating to determine the approximate year of death. Mitochondrial DNA sequences from the 16S rRNA gene and the control region indicate that the specimen belonged to a sperm whale (Physeter macrocephalus) and a modern radiocarbon age suggests it was collected post-1950’s. We were unable to determine the collection locality of the whale due to the very broad geographic distribution of its mtDNA haplotype. Our results suggest the specimen was possibly collected as a souvenir during post-war whaling, where nearly 30,000 male sperm whales were killed annually. This study supports and extends previous research that applies ancient DNA and radiocarbon dating techniques to enhance the value of natural history collections, by identifying the species of origin and age of historical specimens.

Rapid identification of cellulose nitrate and cellulose acetate film in historic photograph collections

Cellulose nitrate transparent plastic film was used by photographers and movie filmmakers from its release in the 1880s to the 1950s. The storage of this material is a challenge for cultural institutions because of its instability and hazardous nature, as nitrate is highly flammable and deteriorates over time. Historically, cellulose acetate gradually began to replace cellulose nitrate as it is not flammable. Despite its non-flammable properties, leading to cellulose acetate being called ‘safety’ film, over time it became clear that it also deteriorates in hazardous ways. Identification of cellulose nitrate and cellulose acetate in collections is necessary for preservation and risk management to collections and humans. Both cellulose nitrate and cellulose acetate are found in gallery, library, archive and museum photographic collections. As a result, identification and management of this material might be the responsibility of curators, librarians, archivists, collection managers, registrars or conservators, depending on the institution staffing and structure. Currently, there is no single identification method readily available to heritage institutions that meets the requirements to identify and distinguish between cellulose nitrate and cellulose acetate reliably, non-destructively and rapidly. In this study samples from both the Sydney University Museums and Australian National Maritime Museum collections have been analysed using infrared total reflectance spectroscopy, a novel approach which demonstrates great potential for rapid and non-invasive identification particularly when combined with multivariate statistical analysis methods. Principal component analysis (PCA) allowed for non-subjective data mining and the development of a model which is hoped to be used in the future for predicting sample identification. After calculation of the PCA model, the novel application of the Parsimax orthogonal rotation method potentially provides a means of determining the level of chemical deterioration in the cellulose nitrate film.

The Australian National Maritime Museum’s view from the ship and view from the shore

Next year, the Australian National Maritime Museum’s replica of Captain Cook’s ship, HMS Endeavour, will circumnavigate Australia to commemorate 250 years of Cook landing on Australian shores. I was excited to visit the museum to hear their rationale behind this – something that I have heard very mixed responses to, and which I myself thought sounded inconsiderate (and ignorant) of Australia’s Indigenous history prior to my visit.

Gapu-Monak Saltwater: Journey to Sea Country Exhibition Site Visit to the Australian National Maritime Museum

Community. One of the key words that resonated with me during my site visit to the Australian National Maritime Museum for the Gapu-Monuk Saltwater: Journey to Sea Country Exhibition. As I walked towards the entrance of the building, the image of Djambawa Marawili Am, renowned Indigenous artist and elder, immediately caught my attention. A quote above his image read:It is time for non-Aboriginal people to learn about this land, learn about the waters. So if we are living the way of reconciliation, you must learn about Native Title and Sea Right. It was my time to be educated and informed, and the right time was now.

On Their Own: Reflections on a Traveling Exhibition About Britain's Child Migrants

Between 2010 and 2016, the Australian National Maritime Museum's traveling exhibition On Their Own—Britain's Child Migrants visited seven Australian and two British venues and reached more than 850,000 visitors, making it the most successful show in the museum's history. Why did an exhibition about British child migrants resonate so strongly with audiences? Using the On Their Own tour as a case study, this article examines the methodological challenges of representing contested childhood histories in museums, the power of personal narratives and children's cultural heritage to engage audiences, and the rich scholarly legacies created by the exhibition.

Nawi—Exploring Australia's Indigenous Watercraft: Cultural resurgence through museums and Indigenous communities

This paper describes the Australian National Maritime Museum's Indigenous watercraft project, conceived by its curators due to the lacking presence of Australia's first mariners and their vessels in cultural institutions and academic scholarship. The Nawi project aims to align with best-practice in Indigenous Australian museological policy to better facilitate strong Indigenous cultural futures, rather than dwell in an Indigenous past. Nawi participants built a dynamic picture of Indigenous watercraft culture today that is open to all nuances and complexities in Indigenous Australian (post)colonial experiences and identity, without privileging authenticity of unbroken connection over cultural resurgence. This paper also raises issues about authenticity faced by cultural institutions regarding Indigenous watercraft replicas. It concludes with a discussion about the concept of “community”, and how the Nawi project emphasizes its importance in cultural practice today through the lens of the amazing array of watercraft of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

Are We There Yet? Youth Transitions in Australia

This article provides an overview of youth longitudinal surveys in Australia and introduces five papers from the Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth research forum ‘Are We There Yet? Youth Transitions in Australia’, held at the Australian National Maritime Museum, Sydney, on 11 April 2013. Youth longitudinal surveys have a long history in Australia, dating back to the Youth in Transition study, which commenced with a cohort of young people born in 1961. The latest incarnation is the Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth, which has tracked cohorts of Year 9 students selected in 1995 and 1998 and 15-year olds in 2003, 2006 and 2009. These young people are interviewed up to the age of 25 years as they move from school into further study and work.

Macassan/Indigenous Australian ‘sites of memory’ in the National Museum of Australia and Australian National Maritime Museum

For over two centuries people from Makassar on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi came to northern Australia with the onset of the northeast monsoon winds. They came in search of trepang that, with the help of Indigenous Australians, they collected and traded on to China. Their impact on the Indigenous communities in Arnhem Land was considerable. Along with sharing language, technology and culture, they built relationships, many ongoing, that are celebrated in Yolngu art, song and stories. These stories of contact are well known to many archaeologists and anthropologists but for many Australians the only place where they come into contact with these stories is in a museum display. In this paper I examine the ways in which these stories are disseminated by two national museums, the Australian National Maritime Museum in Sydney and the National Museum of Australia in Canberra. As important ‘lieux de mémoire’ or ‘sites of memory’, they tell of Macassan visits to northern Australia as part of Australian history. In both cases not only are the stories situated in the past but both Macassan and Indigenous Australian voices are largely absent.

Galaxy Metabolism

‘Galaxy Metabolism' was the second in the annual ‘Southern Cross Astrophysics Conference Series’ (http://www.aao.gov.au/AAO/southerncross/), supported by the Anglo-Australian Observatory and the Australia Telescope National Facility. It was held at the Australian National Maritime Museum in Darling Harbour, Sydney, from 22 to 26 June 2009, and was attended by 91 delegates from around the world.Over the past decade, both the star formation history and stellar mass density in galaxies spanning most of cosmic history have been well constrained. This provides the backdrop and framework within which many detailed investigations of galaxy growth are now placed. The mass-dependent and environment-dependent evolution of galaxies over cosmic history is now the focus of several surveys. Many studies are also exploring the role of gas infall and outflow in driving galaxy evolution, and the connection of these processes to massive star formation within galaxies.The aims of ‘Galaxy Metabolism’ were to bring together the global constraints on galaxy evolution, at both low and high redshift, with detailed studies of well-resolved systems, to define a clear picture of our understanding of galaxy metabolism: How do the processes of ingestion (infall), digestion (ISM physics, star formation) and excretion (outflow) govern the global properties of galaxies; how do these change over a galaxy's lifetime; and are the constraints from nearby well resolved studies consistent with those from large population surveys at low and high redshift?The conference was a great success, with an extensive variety of topics covered spanning many aspects of galaxy evolution, and brought together eloquently in a comprehensive conference summary by Warrick Couch. The four papers by De Lucia (2010), Cole (2010), Vlajić (2010) and Stocke et al. (2010) presented in this special collection of PASA are just a sampling of the depth and variety of the resentations given during the conference.

Light Fading of the Painted Deck of Australia II in a Museum Environment

The long-term loan of Australia II to the Australian National Maritime Museum predicated a detailed condition report on the spruced up vessel prior to its transport from Perth to Sydney. Since the deck of the vessel had been subjected to several repainting episodes, it was deemed prudent to measure the colour of the areas with a chromameter, since it is virtually impossible to measure subtle changes in colour over prolonged periods without the aid of such devices. Results were obtained from a study of the colour changes to the green deck surfaces eight years after the vessel was placed on exhibition under standard museum exhibition conditions. After up to 3.34 million lux hours, there is significant colour change in the newer painted regions and minimal change in the older original painted areas.

Who were bennelong and Pemulwuy? Museums in Sydney and interpretation of eora aboriginal culture

The Eora Aboriginal People are the original inhabitants of the Sydney region [in NSW, Australia]. There are an estimated 2, 000 Aboriginal rock engravings in Sydney. Some museums in Sydney now acknowledge the traditional Aboriginal owners and use Eora words to name their exhibitions. These include: Ngaramang bayumi – music & dance (Powerhouse Museum); Merana Eora Nora – first people (Australian National Maritime Museum); Yiribana (Art Gallery of New South Wales); and Cadi Eora Birrung: Under the Sydney Stars (Sydney Observatory). The Aboriginal history of Sydney, however, is only told at the Museum of Sydney with installations, videos and spoken exhibits about Eora, the indigenous peoples of Sydney. This paper reviews the Eora Aboriginal exhibits at the Museum of Sydney. It questions whether visitors to Sydney learn about Bennelong and Pemulwuy, two key Aboriginal figures in the the early European settlement around Sydney Harbour. Sydney Aboriginal Discoveries on their Dreamtime cruise of Sydney Harbour provide another interpretation of Eora history and culture. The paper suggests the Eora heritage of Sydney should be more widely interpreted in Museums, National Parks and other public venues to rightfully acknowledge this Aboriginal history.

The Royal Society and the voyage of HMS Endeavour 1768-71

On Thursday 9 December 1993 a splendid full-scale replica of HMS Endeavour was launched in the Fishing Boat Harbour, Fremantle, Western Australia, and towed to its fitting-out berth in the Port of Fremantle’s Inner Harbour. Its first sea trial, fully rigged, was on Thursday 16 March 1994. Though registered in Australia it now sails under the red ensign, as did the original Endeavour . It will be the centrepiece of the floating collection held by the Australian National Maritime Museum at Sydney, N.S.W., as one of the most complete and thorough reconstructions of an 18th-century ship and one of the largest wooden sailing vessels ever built in Australia. The project was initiated in 1987 by the Trustees of the Australian National Maritime Museum, and work began on the replica in January 1988, 200 years after the first British settlement was established at Port Jackson, Sydney, N.S.W. After five years of remarkably dedicated workmanship it was completed under a charitable Trust formed in August 1991 as HM Bark Endeavour Foundation. After a series of voyages round the Australian coast with periods as a museum display in some of the major ports, the ship will retrace the original homeward voyage through the East Indies and the Cape of Good Hope to berth at the King’s Landing by the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, in Spring 1997. Various views of the replica are shown in figures 1-3. In the history of British exploration the names of HMS Endeavour and Captain James Cook R.N., F.R.S., are forever linked, tending to obscure other ideas as to the origin and purpose of the voyage which brought the ship and the man together for those three seminal years in the 18th century, 1768-71. Now that the Endeavour sails again, albeit as a museum replica but a very fine one, it is appropriate to look again at the record of how the original voyage to the South Sea came to be mounted and how it emerged from the thoughts of individual Fellows and the Council decisions of the Royal Society.

The Earth Mother from Northern Waters

Previous articleNext article No AccessThe Earth Mother from Northern WatersTony SwainTony Swain Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by History of Religions Volume 30, Number 3Feb., 1991 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/463227 Views: 5Total views on this site Citations: 1Citations are reported from Crossref Copyright 1991 The University of ChicagoPDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Rebecca H. Bilous Macassan/Indigenous Australian ‘sites of memory’ in the National Museum of Australia and Australian National Maritime Museum, Australian Geographer 42, no.44 (Dec 2011): 371–386.https://doi.org/10.1080/00049182.2012.619953