Two rescues, one History: everyday racism in Australia

On the same day, at different ends of Australia, two extraordinary rescues of men from extreme hardship took place. The two miners, both white and of Anglo-Celtic origin, were feted, appeared on television chat shows and became celebrities so sought after that they had to employ an agent. The three...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Stratton, Jon
Format: Journal Article
Published: Routledge 2006
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/17773
_version_ 1848749554065735680
author Stratton, Jon
author_facet Stratton, Jon
author_sort Stratton, Jon
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description On the same day, at different ends of Australia, two extraordinary rescues of men from extreme hardship took place. The two miners, both white and of Anglo-Celtic origin, were feted, appeared on television chat shows and became celebrities so sought after that they had to employ an agent. The three Torres Strait Islanders, members of a grouping identified as 'indigenous' in the Australian social order, who had survived 22 days at sea in an open dinghy, were, to all intents and purposes, ignored by the mainstream Australian media. They would appear to have simply gone back to their families and got on with their lives. This article tracks the discursive histories in which each event was embedded to examine how this distinction could happen and how it could be so naturalised that hardly anybody commented on the disparity of treatment. It is this taken-for-granted disparity that I am describing here as everyday racism.
first_indexed 2025-11-14T07:22:47Z
format Journal Article
id curtin-20.500.11937-17773
institution Curtin University Malaysia
institution_category Local University
last_indexed 2025-11-14T07:22:47Z
publishDate 2006
publisher Routledge
recordtype eprints
repository_type Digital Repository
spelling curtin-20.500.11937-177732017-10-02T02:28:15Z Two rescues, one History: everyday racism in Australia Stratton, Jon On the same day, at different ends of Australia, two extraordinary rescues of men from extreme hardship took place. The two miners, both white and of Anglo-Celtic origin, were feted, appeared on television chat shows and became celebrities so sought after that they had to employ an agent. The three Torres Strait Islanders, members of a grouping identified as 'indigenous' in the Australian social order, who had survived 22 days at sea in an open dinghy, were, to all intents and purposes, ignored by the mainstream Australian media. They would appear to have simply gone back to their families and got on with their lives. This article tracks the discursive histories in which each event was embedded to examine how this distinction could happen and how it could be so naturalised that hardly anybody commented on the disparity of treatment. It is this taken-for-granted disparity that I am describing here as everyday racism. 2006 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/17773 10.1080/13504630601030867 Routledge fulltext
spellingShingle Stratton, Jon
Two rescues, one History: everyday racism in Australia
title Two rescues, one History: everyday racism in Australia
title_full Two rescues, one History: everyday racism in Australia
title_fullStr Two rescues, one History: everyday racism in Australia
title_full_unstemmed Two rescues, one History: everyday racism in Australia
title_short Two rescues, one History: everyday racism in Australia
title_sort two rescues, one history: everyday racism in australia
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/17773