Writing history in pictures

Volume 11 Number 2 February 9 - March 8 2015

Michael Jenson’s ‘Two children on the boat from Vietnam, Darwin, November 1977’ from the National Library of Australia’s digital collections (vn3209943)
Michael Jenson’s ‘Two children on the boat from Vietnam, Darwin, November 1977’ from the National Library of Australia’s digital collections (vn3209943)

 

With the question of treatment of child refugees continuing to prick our national conscience, a new historical study explores how visual imagery of this vexed and divisive issue has changed over time and continues to impact government policy. By Gabrielle Murphy.

Mary Tomsic traces her specialist interest in imagery as an avenue of historical discovery to the early eighties when, as a child of five, her adored grandmother took her to the city to see the film version of The Man from Snowy River

“It was the first film I remember being taken to,” says Dr Tomsic, “and I was totally captivated.”

After also having Banjo Patterson’s poems read to her by her mother, Dr Tomsic recalls that although her appreciation of history was undoubtedly limited at that time, she understood this was an important story about Australia.

“I’ve thought about this film-going memory over the years and I think it demonstrates how cultural meanings can be made outside of actual texts,” Dr Tomsic says. “I came to that film with a learned knowledge about its significance and with a meaning particular to a child of that age.”

Now, as a post-doctoral researcher in the University of Melbourne’s School of Historical and Philosophical Studies, Dr Tomsic is working on a five-year, $2.4 million Australian Laureate Fellowship project investigating child refugees and Australian internationalism from 1920 to the present day. Her mentor and colleague Professor Joy Damousi heads the project, within which Dr Tomsic is focusing her academic interest in film-making and film culture on an examination of how child refugees and displaced children have been portrayed in photographs, film, newsreel and television footage. 

“When considering visual sources about the past, we need to examine them and accompanying materials carefully while also being attentive to the context of their creation and circulation, following how people use them and the stories they tell with them,” Dr Tomsic says.

The aim of the laureate fellowship, funded by the Australian Research Council, is to generate new and powerful understanding of the impact and experience of child refugees in Australia throughout the 20th and early 21st century, explore how this history is tied to Australia’s international role on refugee and migration issues and, according to Professor Damousi, inform us about current and future approaches to humanitarian immigration.

“We’re aiming to understand the impact of child refugees in Australia in cultural, social and economic terms and provide an historical and contemporary framework for current discussions on this aspect of migration and humanitarian policy,” Professor Damousi says.

As such, two investigations still in an embryonic phase in this early period of the extensive research project are being conducted by Dr Tomsic. They concentrate on an examination of photographs and the visual sources that child refugees have created themselves.

“I am starting by looking at how arrivals are announced, celebrated and circulated with visual representations,” says Dr Tomsic, “and tracing how this changes over time. 

“From there, we’re hoping to gauge the influence of the visual medium in mobilising support or opposition to child refugees, and as a corollary to this, trace the history of child refugees who are not photographed and not included in official visual records, and examine what these absences may mean.”

In terms of child refugees’ own visualisations, Dr Tomsic will scour international collections for drawings such as those by displaced children during the Spanish Civil war and, more recently and locally, drawings by children in detention submitted to the Australian Human Rights Commission’s National Inquiry into Children in Immigration Detention. 

“By looking at collections of drawings, how they have been collected and used over time, we will be able to consider children’s own voices and forms of expression, as well as see how these voices are understood and valued – or not – by others,” Dr Tomsic says.

According to Dr Tomsic, changing technologies for sharing images also impact on how historical images are seen and used.

“With social media and other online environments, visual materials are readily displayed and circulated,” she says. 

“This presents opportunities for scholars to engage with the increased presence of visual sources in daily life, along with responsibilities for sharing knowledge about images, also reflecting on ethical issues involved with their display.”

 

www.shaps.unimelb.edu.au