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Source 6.24. Frontier Conflicts extract from Australia in world history volume 1
(Logue et al., 1965, p. 352)
From reading this extract, a number of issues become immediately obvious. First, there is a
sense of inevitability of history that is being overtly communicated to students. The first line
of this extract reads, “In the spread of settlement, the Aboriginal inevitably lost his traditional
hunting grounds...” (Logue et al., 1965, p. 352). A problematic analysis of this so-called
inevitability does not take place, and instead historical events are presented to students as
though no other course of events could have been possible. This neutralisation of history
presents as a broad sweeping stroke of events in the nation’s past.
The second issue is the acts of violence committed by both Indigenous and non-Indigenous
Australians. Here, rather than solely positioning the Indigenous population as victims, this
group is presented in multiple ways. One way is receiving justice for atrocities committed in
the case of the Myall Creek massacre. Although not mentioned in the textbook, this massacre
is widely noted as the first instance of a guilty verdict against non-Indigenous people for the
murder of Indigenous Australians. The textbook represents the massacre in the following
way:
The Myall Creek murders of more than twenty Aborigines aroused a public outcry
and seven shepherds were hanged in spite of their claim that they ‘were not aware
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