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Full-Text Articles in History
Revisiting A Struggle: Port Kembla, 1938, Rowan Cahill
Revisiting A Struggle: Port Kembla, 1938, Rowan Cahill
Rowan Cahill
A review and discussion of the 2015 documentary film 'Pig Iron Bob' (Producer/Director Sandra Pires). The focus of this film is the dramatic 2-month long boycott by Australian waterside workers in Port Kembla (NSW), 1938/39, of a cargo of Australian pig-iron bound for Japan. The workers took their action in protest against Japanese militarism and the Sino-Japanese War. The boycott enraged the conservative Australian government of the day which pulled out all stops to maintain its policy of appeasement towards Japan.
"Never Neutral": On Labour History / Radical History, Rowan Cahill
"Never Neutral": On Labour History / Radical History, Rowan Cahill
Rowan Cahill
Eric Fry, one of the founders of the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History (ASSLH), wrote about radical history in the ‘Introduction’ to his neglected Rebels & Radicals (1983). The book is not listed in Greg Patmore’s comprehensive listing of labour history publications (1991), rates no mention in the 1992 tribute to Fry’s work edited by Jim Hagan and Andrew Wells, and receives only brief mentions in the Labour History tribute issue to Eric Fry and fellow ASSLH pioneer Bob Gollan (2008). Arguably with good reason, since the book was exploring a different way of writing dissident history, …
Review - Michael Tubbs, Asio: The Enemy Within, Rowan Cahill
Review - Michael Tubbs, Asio: The Enemy Within, Rowan Cahill
Rowan Cahill
ASIO: The Enemy Within is a combative book. Based on his research and experience, Michael Tubbs argues that the Australian Intelligence Security Organisation (ASIO) has no place in Australia’s democracy. According to Tubbs ASIO has, since its formation in 1949, acted as a partisan political secret police force, ridden roughshod over civil liberties, engaged in illegal activities, all with the aim of creating and managing a docile, tranquil public.
Review: People And Politics In Regional New South Wales, Rowan Cahill
Review: People And Politics In Regional New South Wales, Rowan Cahill
Rowan Cahill
Histories of Australian towns and local areas abound, usually the work of enthusiastic local residents distributed through community based museum and historical society networks. Aimed at local audiences, these histories tend to be triumphalist, cataloguing ‘progress’ in terms of population changes and infrastructure growth. There is little in the way of explanation or analysis; local identities appear as a ‘cast of characters’ rather than as flesh and blood historical agents; politics is noticeably absent. For one state, the two volume People & Politics in Regional New South Wales, 1856 to 2006, addresses this political absence. Given the huge size of …
Review - Pete Thomas, And Greg Mallory (Editor), The Coalminers Of Queensland: A Narrative History Of The Queensland Colliery Employees Union, Volume 2: The Pete Thomas Essays, Rowan Cahill
Rowan Cahill
In 1986 journalist Pete Thomas published the first volume of his proposed two-volume narrative history of the Queensland Colliery Employees Union, The Coalminers of Queensland. But he died before completing the task. With the support of the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU), Mining and Energy Division (Queensland District Branch), labour historian Greg Mallory has edited Volume 2 from Pete’s unpublished manuscripts.
On Winning The 40 Hour Week, Rowan Cahill
On Winning The 40 Hour Week, Rowan Cahill
Rowan Cahill
The 40-hour week was approved by the Commonwealth Arbitration Court on 8 September 1947, to take effect from 1 January 1948. The 40-hour campaign, the 35-hour campaign that followed in the late 1950s, the 44-hour campaign that preceded these, and union attempts between all three to fix the working week at either 30 or 33 hours, were parts of a long movement for the codification and reduction of Australian working hours that began in the mid 1850s with struggles by workers to establish the principle of the 8-hour day. Stonemasons in Sydney and Melbourne gained the first successes during 1855 …
Len Fox, 1905-2004, Rowan Cahill
Len Fox, 1905-2004, Rowan Cahill
Rowan Cahill
Obituary on the life of Australian author, journalist, historian, and Left activist Len Fox.
Military Madness, Rowan Cahill
Military Madness, Rowan Cahill
Rowan Cahill
A brief historical overview of the use of military, and ex-military, personnel, against Australian trade unionists, 1890-1997.
Another View Of The Sixties, Rowan Cahill
Another View Of The Sixties, Rowan Cahill
Rowan Cahill
A contribution to ongoing discussion about the 1960s, in which author Cahill challenges the idea popular at the time of writing, that being a radical during the period was simply an adolescent/youth role one fashionably and easily slipped into.
A 'Potted History' Of The Seamen's Union Of Australia, 1872-1972: Articles From 'The Seamen's Journal', 1972, Rowan Cahill
A 'Potted History' Of The Seamen's Union Of Australia, 1872-1972: Articles From 'The Seamen's Journal', 1972, Rowan Cahill
Rowan Cahill
This is a collection of brief articles covering the century of history of the militant Seamen's Union of Australia (SUA), 1872-1972. The articles were published over nine-months in the SUA journal 'The Seamen's Journal' as part of the union's commemoration of a century of organisation in 1972. The articles are of historiographical interest in that they were ahead of the time in some respects, discussing 'racism' in the union, and attempting to redress the historical neglect of the sea and maritime workers in Australian history, a neglect described and documented later by historian Frank Broeze in his acclaimed study 'Island …
The Student Mood: Sydney University, Rowan Cahill, Terry Irving
The Student Mood: Sydney University, Rowan Cahill, Terry Irving
Rowan Cahill
A discussion published in 1968 by Cahill and Irving about student unrest in the universities of Australia, with specific reference to the situation existing at the time in Sydney University. At the time, Cahill was a prominent student radical completing his BA (Honours) degree and Irving was an activist-academic.