Issue Details: First known date: 2018... 2018 Liminality and Communitas in Literary Representations of Aboriginal and Asian Encounters
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'The dynamic relationship between Aboriginal groups and ethnic immigrants in Australia remains theoretically unconstructed as it largely falls outside the binaries of race and ethnicity. Historically, Aboriginal people have developed longstanding contacts with Asian groups, traversing national, cultural, sexual and legislative boundaries. Although indigeneity and diaspora embody disparate and even opposite meanings, there are synergies between diasporic identities and Aboriginal people who suffer from dislocation due to the enduring impact of colonisation and migration. The postcolonial adaptation of liminality or threshold may provide an apt framework for theorising the literary representation of a convergence of border-crossing and diasporic experiences of Aboriginal and Asian Australians in the marginal, interstitial and in-between spaces. Due to a shared predicament and a sense of comradeship, AboriginalAsian encounters forge communitas, which does not suggest inherent subversiveness or unproblematic co-option. This paper considers Ubby’s Underdogs (2011, 2013) by Brenton E. McKenna and A Most Peculiar Act (2014) by Marie Munkara to explore AboriginalAsian relations under the White Australia policy. Through the recurrent theme of Japanese and imaginary Chinese invasions, these novels complicate the crossings in the porous and precarious borderlands, remap the intersecting power relations and reroute Aboriginal characters back to the centre.'  (Publication abstract)

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

  • Appears in:
    y separately published work icon Journal of Australian Studies vol. 43 no. 4 2018 15406747 2018 periodical issue

    'This issue offers a detailed exploration of the ways in which blind spots can prevent us from seeing the different stories, experiences and representations that constitute who we are as Australians, whether we like it or not.' (Maggie NolaJames KeatingJulie Kimber and Ellen SmithHistorical Blind Spots

    2018
    pg. 475-490
Last amended 15 Oct 2020 13:32:35
475-490 Liminality and Communitas in Literary Representations of Aboriginal and Asian Encounterssmall AustLit logo Journal of Australian Studies
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