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Ann McGrath Professor, BA (Hons), PhD, Director ACIH

Ann McGrath, inaugural Director of the Australian Centre for Indigenous History, has worked for many years in the field of Indigenous Australian history and the history of colonialism. Her best-known publications are Born in the Cattle: Aborigines in Cattle Country (1987) and edited volumes such as Contested Ground: Australian Aborigines under the British Crown (1994) and (with Kay Saunders and Jacky Huggins) Aboriginal Workers (1995). After working in Darwin and at Monash, she became a Lecturer in History at the University of New South Wales, where she worked as Associate Professor for many years before taking up a Senior Fellowship at the Centre for Cross Cultural Research at the Australian National University. She was Program Director of Society & Nation at the National Museum of Australia during its opening years, 2000-02. She has worked on a range of significant public enquiries and legal cases, including Northern Territory Land Claims, the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission and the Gunner & Cubillo case. She was Advisor to Hilton Cordell Productions for The Colony reality television series.

Areas of Research
Areas of Supervision
Publications
Professional Associations

 

Areas of Research

• Gender and colonialism
• Australian Indigenous history
• Comparative and trans-national history of frontiers in Australia and North America
• Birth, marriage and intermarriage
• Law, justice and history
• Museums, museology and public history
• Art and visual evidence in history

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Areas of Supervision

• Australian and North American Indigenous history and colonialism
• gender and imperialism; gender and nation; comparative histories
• frontier and pastoral history; museums and material culture, heritage and tourism
• history and the law
• human rights

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Publications

 

Books

• McGrath, A. 'Born in the Cattle': Aborigines in Cattle Country, Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1987
• McGrath, A. (with Pat Grimshaw, Marilyn Lake, Marian Quartly) Creating a Nation, McPhee Gribble/Penguin, Melbourne, 1994
• McGrath, A. (ed.) Contested Ground: A History of Australian Aborigines under the British Crown, Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1995
• McGrath, A., Huggins, J., and Saunders, K. (eds) Aboriginal Workers, special edition of Labour History, November 1995
• Curthoys, A., McGrath, A. (eds) Writing Histories: Imagination and Narration, Monash Publications in History, Melbourne, 2000
• McGrath, A. and McCalman, I. (eds) Proof and Truth: the Humanist as Expert, Australian Academy of Humanities, Canberra, 2003

Chapters in books

• McGrath, A. " 'Spinifex Fairies': Aboriginal Workers in the Northern Territory, 1911-1939", in E. Windschuttle (ed.) Women, Class and History, Fontana, Sydney, 1980 (An earlier version published in Hecate, Vol. IV, July 1978)
• McGrath, A. "Before Grog, Before Wages, Before the Japanese War", in W. Gammage and A. Markus (eds) All That Dirt: Aborigines 1938, An Australia 1938 Monograph, Canberra, 1982
• McGrath, A. " 'Black Velvet': Aboriginal Women and Their Relationships with White Men in the Northern Territory 1910-40", in K. Daniels (ed.) So Much Hard Work, Fontana/Collins, Sydney, 1984
• McGrath, A. "I Once was a Drover Myself: The Story of Amy Laurie", in D. Barwick, S. White and B. Meehan (eds) Fighters and Singers, George Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1985
• McGrath, A. "Mirror of the North", in W. Gammage and P. Spearritt (eds) Australians 1938, Fairfax, Syme & Weldon, Sydney, 1987
• McGrath, A. and A. Markus "Europeans and Aborigines", in D. Borchardt (ed.) Australians: Sources, Fairfax, Syme & Weldon, Sydney, 1987
• McGrath, A. "History and Land Rights", in I. Duncanson and D. Kirkby (eds) Law and History in Australia, La Trobe University, Melbourne, 1987
• McGrath, A. "Aborigines and the pastoral industry" in J. Jupp (ed.) An Encyclopedia of the Australian People, Sydney, 1988
• McGrath, A. "Aboriginal and Australian Culture" in N. Meaney (ed.) Under New Heavens, Melbourne, 1989
• McGrath, A. "Trespassing on Male Territory: Women on Men" in S. Magarey with Paula Hamilton (eds) Writing Women's Lives, Biography and Autobiography, Adelaide, Australian Feminist Studies, 1992
• McGrath, A. 'What is oral history?' and 'Pointers for doing oral histories' in Diane Plater (ed.) Other Boundaries: Inner-city Aboriginal stories: An Aboriginal history of the Leichardt municipality of Sydney. Leichardt Municipal Council in association with Jumbunna Aboriginal Education Centre, University of Technology, Sydney, 1993
• McGrath, A., Frances, R., Scates, B. 'Broken Silences? Labour History and Aboriginal Workers', in T. Irving (ed.) Challenges to Labour History, Kensington, New South Wales University Press, 1994
• McGrath, A. 'Introduction', Contested Ground
• McGrath, A. 'A national story', Chapter 1,Contested Ground
• McGrath, A. 'Tasmania', Chapter 9, Contested Ground
• McGrath, A. 'What is Aboriginal History?' Contested Ground
• McGrath, A. and Saunders, K. 'Introduction', Aboriginal Workers
• McGrath, A. 'Modern Stone Age Slavery: Images of Aboriginal Labour and Sexuality', Aboriginal Workers
• McGrath, A. 'Interview with Boomalli Art Workers', Aboriginal Workers
• McGrath, A., 'Birthplaces Revisited' in R. Gibson (ed.) Exchanges, Museum of Sydney, 1996
• McGrath, A. 'Sexuality' in W. Hudson and G. Bolton (eds) Creating Australian Identities, Sydney, Allen & Unwin, 1997
• McGrath, A. 'Arabanoo', in G. Davison, J. Hirst, S. Macintyre (eds) Oxford Companion to Australian History, 1998
• McGrath, A. 'Reflexivity and the Self-line', in A. Curthoys and A. McGrath, Writing Histories: Imagination and Narration, Monash Publications, Melbourne, 2000, pp. 54-63
• McGrath, A. and Curthoys, A. 'Introduction' in A. Curthoys and A. McGrath, Writing Histories: Imagination and Narration, Monash Publications, Melbourne, 2000, pp. vii-xiv
• McGrath, A. and Curthoys, A. 'Gallery, museum and other exercises for writing history' in A. Curthoys and A. McGrath, Writing Histories: Imagination and Narration, Monash Publications, Melbourne, 2000, pp. 82-85
• McGrath, A. and Curthoys, A. 'How to workshop your writing' in A. Curthoys and A. McGrath, Writing Histories: Imagination and Narration, Monash Publications, Melbourne, 2000, pp. 86-89
• McGrath, A. 'The Golden Thread of Kinship: Mixed Marriages between Asians and Aboriginals during Australia's federation Era', P. Edwards et al (eds) Lost in the Whitewash, Humanities Research Centre, Canberra, 2003
• McGrath, A. and McCalman, I. 'Introduction' in McGrath, A. and McCalman, I. (eds) Proof and Truth: the Humanist as Expert, Australian Academy of Humanities, Canberra, 2003
• McGrath, A. 'History and Land Rights' in McGrath and McCalman, 2003; pp. 233-251
• McGrath, A. '"Stories for Country": Aboriginal History and Land Claims' in McGrath and McCalman, 2003; pp. 251-262
• McGrath, A. 'The History Phoenix? Inventing a History Tradition in the Northern Territory' in D. Carment (ed.) Northern Encounters: New Directions in North Australian History, Darwin, Northern Territory University Press, 2004

Articles in academic journals

• McGrath, A. 1988 "Born or Reborn in the Cattle?", Meanjin, No. 2
• McGrath, A. 1988 " 'Stories for Country': Oral History and Aboriginal Land Claims", Journal of the Oral History Association of Australia, 1988
• McGrath, A. 1988 "Colouring In our Blind Spots: Integrating Families and Aborigines into History", Locality, Vol. 2, No. 4
• McGrath, A. 1990 "The White Man's Looking Glass: Aboriginal Colonial Gender Relations at Port Jackson", Australian Historical Studies, Vol. 95, October 1990 (A revised version of this article with an introduction by the author appeared in a forthcoming collection of seminal articles on Australian history in R. White and P. Russell (eds) Arguing Australian History. Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1994.)
• McGrath, A. 1991 "Travels to a Distant Past: Mythologies of the Outback" in Australian Cultural History, 1991
• McGrath, A. 1993 'Colonialism, Crime and Civilization' in Australian Cultural History, June 1993
• McGrath, A. 1993 'Beneath the Skin: Australian Citizenship, Rights and Aboriginal Women', in R. Howe (ed.) Women & the State. The Australian Experience, a special edition of the Journal of Australian Studies, June 1993
• McGrath, A. 1994 'Contested Ground. Que'est-ce que l'histoire aborigene?' for Le Mouvement Social, special edition, 1994
• McGrath, A. 1994 'Working for the Royal Commission: the History Project of Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody' in Public History Review
• McGrath, A. and Stevenson, W. 'Gender, Race and Policy: Aboriginal Women and the State in Canada and Australia' in Gregory S. Kealey and Greg Patmore (eds) Australia and Canada: Labour Compared, a special edition of Labour/Le Travail 38, Fall 1996 and Labour History, No. 71, November 1996
• McGrath, A. 'Survival of the Fittest?, Journal of Australian Studies, No. 52, 1997
• McGrath, A. 'The Female Eunuch in the Suburbs: Reflections on Adolescence, Autobiography and History Writing', Journal of Popular Culture, Vol. 33.1, Summer 1999
• McGrath, A. 'A Historian's View', Newsletter of the Australian Cultural Studies Association, No. 1, 1999 (and another short contribution, No. 2 1999)
• McGrath, A. Challenging Australian History: Discovering New Narratives, Bulletin of the Australian Historical Association, No. 90, 2000
• McGrath, A. Entries, 'Massacres' and 'Guerilla Warfare' in S. Kleinert and Margo Neale, The Oxford Companion to Aboriginal Art and Culture, Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 2000
• McGrath, A. 'White Brides: Images of Marriage Across Colonising Boundaries', Frontiers: A Women's Interdisciplinary Journal, Vol. 21, Spring 2002

Conference proceedings

• Women, Colonialism, Birth Black Stumps of Australian History
  Proceedings of Second National Nursing Conference: Beyond the Black Stump, Royal College of Nursing, Australia, September 1996 (ACN 004 271 103)

Reviews and shorter pieces published in the following

• Aboriginal Studies
• Aboriginal Law Bulletin
• Northern Perspective
• The Age
• Oceania
• Arena
• Aboriginal History
• Cultural Studies Newsletter
• Labour History
• Australian Historical Studies
• Mankind
• Newsletter of the Victorian History Institute
• Australian Historical Association Bulletin
• Journal of Australian Studies
• Australian Journal of Politics and History
• Fabrications
• Sydney Morning Herald
• Australian Book Review
• Habitat
• Courier Mail

Official reports

• (i) Stolen Children Litigation Historical Report for Stolen Children Litigation, Gunner and Cubillo v Commonwealth, August 1999; appeared as expert witness September 1999 Human Rights Commission 'The History of Pastoral Co-existence' in Annual Report of Human Rights Commission -Aboriginal Social Justice Commissioner, by Mick Dodson, AGPS, Canberra, 1997
• (ii) Submissions used as formal exhibits before the Aboriginal Land Commissioner, Commonwealth of Australia hearings McGrath, A. and Coltheart, L. 1983 "Intruders, Work and Land", in P. Sutton, L. Coltheart and A. McGrath, The Murranji Land Claim, Northern Land Council, Darwin McGrath, A. 1983 Aborigines and Colonialism in the Upper Daly Basin region, Northern Land Council, Darwin McGrath, A. 1986 A Meeting Place: Historical Submission for the Mataranka Land Claim, Northern Land Council, Darwin
• (iii) The following substantive papers were prepared for the Report of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody: 1991 'The Legacy of History', substantially reproduced and my authorship acknowledged. Commissioner E. Johnston, The National Report of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, Canberra, Underlying Issues, Vol. 2, Chapter 2 (44 pp.) Unpublished but circulated widely throughout the Commission: McGrath, A 1990 'Some Historical Issues Relating to the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody', Report of the RCIADIC History Project, August Numerous contributions to other sections and chapters.
• McGrath, A. 1990 Historical Survey of Aborigines and Alcohol, November 1990
• McGrath, A. 1990 Detention Rates, October
• McGrath, A. 1990 Racism, Gender and the Labour Market, October
• McGrath, A. 1990 Colonialism and Gender, July
• McGrath, A. 1990 An Analysis of Aboriginal Policy up to 1967, January 1991

 

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Professional Associations

 

Professional associations and community outreach

• Professor McGrath has worked as a historical advisor and/or co-ordinator on projects for the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, for the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, for the Northern Land Council, the Gunner & Cubillo case and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Service. She worked as script advisor for Hilton Cordell productions for the reality television show 'The Colony'.
• Member, Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies
• Member, Australian Historical Association

Editorial

• Vice President and Editorial Board member, Aboriginal History journal
• Editorial Board member, Public History Review journal
• International Editorial Board member, Journal of Australian Studies

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