The representation of trauma in the Australian War Memorial (AWM) and Sydney Jewish Museum (SJM) are governed by the cultural context in which they reside. Both institutions offer insightful and deeply moving historical recounts, commemorating those who lost their lives during conflict. Patent parallels can be draw between Charles Bean and John Saunders, founders of the commemorative monuments, as their experiences enabled the remembrance of human loss and trauma. “The only memorial which could be worthy of them was the bare and uncoloured story of their part in the war.” – Charles Bean c. 1917 Elected as Australian’s official World War One correspondent, Charles Edwin Woodrow Bean witnessed the most significant battles in Australian history. Deployed in Egypt 1915, infantries were relocated to Gallipoli where he documented his observations on trench warfare. Revising Bean’s literature, the life of a soldier was difficult and abrasive; “the place was terribly thick with dead bodies – and those of Australians couldn’t be told from those of Turks because the faces go so black” . After eight harrowing months in Gallipoli, Bean migrated to the Western Front in France until armistice was declared. During this time Bean had gradually been collecting artefacts, with the hope to create a museum acknowledging the efforts of Australians at war. The Australian War Memorial opened in Canberra on the 11th of November 1941 where all the “collections grew from the foresight of C.E.W. Bean” . Thousands of relics were collected for the museum, however the most striking objects were the dioramas of warfare, which soon became the museums most treasured series. On Beans request early dioramas were constructed on the site of battlefields,... ... middle of paper ... ...ng Anzac: The Digger And National Mythology, University of Queensland Press, 2004, p. 117 - Smith, Ian, Records of War, Australian War Memorial, 1996, p. 5 - Tatz, Colin, Genocide Perspectives II, Brandl & Schlesinger, 2003 - Van der Kolk, Bessel, Traumatic Memories in Trauma and Memory: Clinical and Legal Controversies, Theses Grinblat, Rebecca, The Future of Memory in Australian Jewish Museums, M.A. Thesis, Monash University, 1998, p. 21 Websites - Garth O'Connell, 2009, Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies, accessed April 28, - Author unknown, 2010, Australian War Memorial, accessed March 29, - Author unknown, 2010, Sydney Jewish Museum, accessed March 29,
Hypothesis: The Australian public made a significant contribution to the war efforts from 1939 to 1945, through sacrifices on a personal and national level. The determination of the Australian people in bringing their loved ones home safely, created strong relationships between the community, which in many cases, are still prevalent in Australian society to this day.
The Anzac Legend is the source of the Aussie Fight and bravery that will live on for future generations to understand and to acknowledge their courage and bravery.
Although, most of it is accounted by the war itself, the suffering of many Australian veterans had much to do with...
...kins , T. (2012). History Alive 10 for the Australian Curriculum. Milton, Qld, Australia. Retrieved March 28, 2014
Seal, G. ( 2007). ANZAC: The scared in the secular. Journal of Australian Studies, 31(91), 135-144. doi: 10.1080/14443050709388135
"Jewish Resistance". United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, n.d. Web. 19 May 2014.
Peter Weir’s 1981 film Gallipoli can in every sense of the phrase be called an ‘Australian classic’. The impact and effect this film has had upon the psyche and perspective of several generations of Australians has been significant. Whilst it can be argued that every Australian is aware of the ANZAC legend, and the events that occurred on the Turkish beaches in 1915, Weir’s film encapsulates and embodies a cultural myth which is now propagated as fact and embraced as part of the contemporary Australian identity. The film projects a sense of Australian nationalism that grew out of the 1970’s, and focuses on what it ‘means’ to be an Australian in a post-colonial country. In this way Gallipoli embodies a sense of ‘Australian-ness’ through the depiction of mateship and through the stark contrast of Australia to Britain. A sense of the mythic Australia is further projected through the cinematic portrayal of the outback, and the way in which Australia is presented in isolation from the rest of the world. These features combined create not only a sense of nationalism, but also a mythology stemming from the ANZAC legend as depicted within the film.
As Bertrand Russell once said “War does not determine who is right - only who is left.” No one ever truly wins a wart. The horrors of war are devastating; both mentally and physically. The horror is not only ever present during life on the Frontline, it lives on in the survivors guilt. I believe that althought the horror of war is represented in the soldiers, we are all too quick to forget about the feelings of those at home, the friends and families, and the effects the war had on them. The effects of war are prominent throughtout the Novels “Regeneration” and “All quiet on the Western Front” and is also explored deeply in Wilfred Owen’s “Selected War Poetry”. Throughout these works we discover that war was inescapable for these men, they had no choice, and it+++++s events were also inescapable. We discover that the men would rather die defending their country as a hero than live with the flashbacks, the guilt, the both mental and physical scarring. They would rather lose their lives than their limbs. I find these works encompass this question fully, as it covers all angles. Pat Barker never really shows her opinion in the novel, it is more factual, and as it is based upon real events and real people it’s a reliable source of information on the horror of war and it’s effects, without bias. Erich Maria Remarque had first hand experience in the First World War, and he gives us an insight into what life on the frontline was really like. Althought fictional, I believe his suffering would have still haunted him years later, compelli...
ed. Arad, Yitzhak, Yisrael Gutman and Abraham Margaliot. Documents on the Holocaust. Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1981.
Each soldiers experience in the war was devastating in its own way. The men would go home carrying the pictures and memories of their dead companions, as well as the enemy soldiers they killed. “They all carried emotional baggage of men who might die. Grief, terror, love, longing- these were intangibles, but the intangibles had their own mass and specific gravity, they had tangible weight.” These were the things that weighed the most, the burdens that the men wanted to put down the most, but were the things that they would forever carry, they would never find relief from the emotional baggage no matter where they went.
...ode 800 miles in the bush after he was demobilised and never applied for his service medals and refused for almost 40 years to admit that he had fought at war. Men like him were trying to forget, to blot out the gruesome sights and the waste of a horrible past.” (Gammage, B. 1974 p272).
Holocaust museums are in numerous places around the world. These museums hold countless artifacts, testimonials, art, and architecture. Each of these items are related to the horrifying details of the Holocaust. A few of the popular museums are the The US Holocaust Memorial Museum, The Ghetto’s Fighter House Institution, and The Yad Vashem.
The Gallipoli campaign was a military disaster but it is still one of the most important conflicts in which Australia was involved. On 25th April 1915 between 4:30 and 6:30 am the Gallipoli Peninsula was invaded by British, Australian and New Zealand forces. This was to start the long, hard weeks in which the troops were fighting for ground that the enemy controlled in Turkey. They were attempting to gain a supply route to Russia to aid them in repelling the German and Turkish soldiers from their country. I will be discussing the willingness of Australians to volunteer for the war effort and the love and respect they had for their Mother Country, England. I will also discuss how the young, naive soldiers arrived at war not knowing what warfare entailed. They were shocked by the conditions and casualties. I will also discuss the bravery that was shown by the ANZACS in the most dangerous conditions. I will conclude with my reasons of why the Gallipoli campaign holds such value and importance in Australian history and ideology.
Autobiographies, diaries, letters, official records, photographs and poems are examples of primary sources from World War One. The two primary sources analyzed in this essay are the poems, “Anthem for Doomed Youth” by Wilfred Owen and “In Flanders Fields” by John McCrae. Primary sources are often personal, written from the limited perspective of a single individual. It is very difficult for the author to capture their own personal experience, while incorporating the involvement and effects of other events happening at the same time. Each piece of writing studied describes the author’s perception of the war. Both of the poems intend to show to grave reality of war, which often was not realized until the soldiers reach the frontlines. The poems were both written at battle within two years of each other. However, the stark difference between the two poems is astonishing. “Anthem for Doomed Youth” gives a much different impression than “In Flanders Field” despite the fact that both authors were in the same war and similar circumstances. The first two lines in “In Flanders Fields” “…the poppies blow, Between the crosses, row on row.” are an image o...
Commemoration is a time to reflect on the fact that our entire way of life is predicated on the sacrifices and courage of those that came before us and fought for our respective nations. It takes more courage than most of us can imagine risking ones life for an intangible goal such as victory for a nation. It has long been held that we should honour our past soldiers, to that honour I say that we should add thanks and deference.