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The Evolution Of 'Malay' Labour Activism, 1870-1947: Protest Among Pearling Crews In Dutch East Indies-Australian Waters, Julia T. Martinez

Faculty of Arts - Papers (Archive)

The history of Indonesian labour activism as seen from an Australianperspective is best known in the context of World War Two when the presenceof Asian seamen in Australia sparked a flourish of internationalism and anticolonialprotest under the umbrella organization of the Seamen's Union ofAustralia. But the story of Malay maritime worker protest has a deeper history,reaching back to the early years of the pearl-shelling and trepang industrieswhen Malay workers from the Dutch East Indies were brought to work off thenorthern Australian coast. Before the advent of a seamen's union, these workersfaced harsh working conditions and had little recourse to legal …