Early Australian History
Aboriginal Australia and European Exploration
Presented by Elenora Shenton

Australia is a very old land. It has been continuously inhabited for at least 40,000 years. Back then many o-

Anyway, yes. Back then the neighbouring islands of Indonesia and Malaysia were all connected together and Australia itself was a single landmass with Tasmania and Timor connected to it. Historians believe the ancestors of the Aboriginal Australians island hopped to the landmass from South East Asia, making them one of the earliest seafarers in history. In all this time the people developed hundreds of hunter-gatherer societies with their own languages and interpretations of mythology and rock art can be found all over the country from ancient Aboriginal clans and cultures.
There's no living memory amongst Aboriginal Australia of life outside of the land, however they were not totally isolated, records and evidence show that Aboriginals met and traded with other people even as late as 4000 BCE. With the sea level rising to its current day Aboriginal culture was cut off from the rest of the world, the people created hundreds of sophisticated tribal structures with deep cultural influence through music and dance and wherever possible rock art unique to all other forms. To put this into some perspective historians suggest that 50,000 years ago homo sapiens entered a period called the Cognitive Revolution where prehistoric cultures suddenly became more sophisticated technologically and became the proto-cultures of the early Stone Age.

Therefore by 1788 Aboriginal Australia evolved without interference for millennia. By contrast Europe was in full swing into the Colonial Period. The first European to discover Australia was Dutch navigator Willem Janszoon in 1606; twenty-nine other Dutch explorers mapped out the western and southern coastlines of the continent and as a result called this new land Nieuw Holland - New Holland. Eventually in 1770 James Cook claimed the land for the British Empire and after an intermission lobbied to colonise Australia. Arthur Phillip established the first colony in Australia in 1788, a penal colony in what is now New South Wales. He was tasked as governor of the colony amongst other duties to establish friendly contact with the Aboriginal Australians, relations between the two peoples varied wildly but eventually as all such encounters tend to play out tensions boiled over and violence and wars sprung up near frontier towns.

The Nation's Pastime
Australian Sport and the AFL
Presented by Natsu Kumada

More or less the entire time Europeans landed in Australia everyone was into some kind of sport. As they did back then the British imported their culture as well as their materials, before 1800 the colonists already started playing sport such as cricket and horseracing. However this was just recreation, life in the last part of the New World was scarcely peaceful for a long time. Sport was properly introduced to Australia in 1810 when athletic competitions were held, this quickly opened the floodgates and in the space of about 20 years professional competitions for cricket, horseracing and sailing were established. Early forms of Rugby were played just before 1830, however the greatest achievement for sport in Australia was in 1858.
In that year the development of Australia's own sport began, Australian Rules Football. Tom Wills, the then captain of Victoria's cricket team called for the formation of a football game to maintain the fitness of his men during winter. Later that year two schools from Melbourne played an experimental match of the game and they played all afternoon for two Saturdays. The game ended in a draw but the event was immortalized at the Melbourne Cricket Ground as a bronze statue just outside the stadium. Wills helped to codify the first rules of the game in the following year and the first football clubs for the sport were established. By 1897 the very first VFL - Victorian Football League - was held between the eight founded teams, the Essendon Football Club won the very first premiership; it shares the title of being one of two teams with the most grand final victories in the history of the league. The VFL quickly expanded out into more states and turned into a national game rather than just a Victorian game; eventually in the 1980s when the then twelve teams were scattered all over the country and the introduction of the West Coast Eagles from Western Australia the VFL rebranded itself into the AFL - the Australian Football League.
Today the AFL has eighteen teams and has at least two teams in the large states but Victoria is still the home of the sport with ten teams alone. Other iconic competitions in sport arose; the Melbourne Cup was established in 1861. Australia's first cricket team to play internationally did so in 1868 and was an all Aboriginal team. The Ashes cricket series between Australia and England began after the 1882 defeat of the English team. Imported by America basketball was first played in Adelaide in 1900. After much development the Australian Rugby League was created in 1924 to oversee the national team. On Boxing Day 1945 the first Sydney to Hobart yacht race was held. The Australian Open was the first international tennis tournament in 1969. In 1970 the National basketball League began, the following year the State of Origin rugby series also started. With the exception of the Aboriginal cricket team every one of these sporting competitions, leagues and teams remain today as highly valued and aspired professional athletes.

the Lucky Country
Immigration and Multiculturalism
Presented by Elenora Shenton

Most people tend to think of Australia as a far away place full of English and mostly European people everywhere. That's mostly true, the English outnumber born and bred Australians today in fact, but while there is a significant fraction of the population coming from Europe there are just as many from Asia, maybe more even. In fact there are heaps of different people from all over the world. Every culture came in waves of migration and each one brought with them their culture and injected it into Australian life. Of course it started with the very first migration, the British establishing their colonies and building their new lives on the land. There was a period of bias against migrating to Australia initially since originally Britain used Australia as a way to relieve pressure in its prison system and sent convicts there, however this abated just ten years after the establishment of Sydney.
For the most part of Australia's history there was a strong push to only allow Europeans and during the World Wars Americans into the country, during the gold rush period in the 1850s onward an explosion of immigrants came to cities such as Sydney and Melbourne to go to the gold fields. Once again tensions simmered amongst European and at that time Asian prospectors and with protests this led to a restriction of the latter taking residency in the country. World War II was perhaps the most unusual turning point on this stance.

After the war there was much more of a want to populate the country with Europeans. However in 1949 Prime Minister Harold Holt began to relax the some of the strict restrictions, 800 refugees gained entry into Australia and through Europe encouraged a wave of Mediterranean people, mostly Italians and Greeks. Slowly but surely the once tightly guarded borders into Australia were opening up to the rest of the world. Students from China could move to further their studies in Australian universities and non-Europeans were granted citizenship after living in Australia for five years to name some of these changes. It took until 1973 when the last of the original policies were dismantled and the country truly adopted multiculturalism, as a result of this a wide diversity of people from all parts of the world share themselves and their cultures with us and we do the same. Since 2010 people from over 200 countries have come to live here from quite literally everywhere; Malays, Pakistani, Lebanese, Egyptian, Congolese, American, Croatian, Danish, Irish just to name only a few of the broad culture of Australians.

Foodies and Funnies
Australia's Love of Food and Comedy
Presented by Natsu Kumada

With our multiculturalism it was inevitable that cuisine in Australia would expand, perhaps what was not anticipated was the fact that so many cuisines would become favorites amongst the population. It's important to point out that food from virtually every region of the world is present in one form or another; there are known Moroccan, Jamaican, Iranian and Philippine eateries in some major cities, Melbourne is known as the culinary capital of the country and has the more and highest quality restaurants. Asian cuisines are the most popular amongst Australians; Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Indian food is eaten regularly everyday, but the nation's favorite food is by far and away Thai cuisine. Red and green curry, Pad Thai, Khoa Phat, Penang curry, Thai food is massive in Australia. Other very popular cuisines include Korean barbecue, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, Lebanese and Greek.
This love of so much diversity in food has translated into celebrity chefs and cooking shows in the past decade. Popular television shows such as My Kitchen Rules showcases the capacity of the average Australian to cook a variety of dishes, however the zenith of this culture is MasterChef - a show that has created the most professional chefs in Australia. The show's positive nature and supportive culture has aided in making the Australian version of MasterChef arguably the best iteration of the franchise and one of the best cooking shows available, unlike similar shows the chefs help and support each other even when they cook against each other.
Another part of Australian culture today is our love of a good laugh. Australians don't take ourselves very seriously and laugh at ourselves all the time. Our laid back look at most things has developed a good humour for the most part, this in turn creates many comedians. Some of our best funny buggers include Wil Anderson, Kitty Flanagan, Laurence Mooney and Adam Hills - noteworthy comedians awarded for their shows and comedy. As well as stand up gigs comedians host popular television shows, notable examples of current shows include; Have You Been Paying Attention? - a quiz show focused around the weekly news and quick fire one liners, Gruen - a show about marketing and how people are being sold to, and The Project - a news show with a comedic bent at the daily news.

However our relaxed view has also affected our lexicon and vernacular. Australians are more relaxed with vulgarity and profanity, as a result the people often swear and say unsavory words to each other. People unfamiliar with this can get quite shocked and offended hearing it. All things considered the people are very relaxed and mean no harm or malice, we are simply less inhibited with our words.

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