Australia – Education
Australia’s six states, the Northern Territory and the overseas possessions each have their own state school system, but they are very similar. The system usually consists of a voluntary preschool, a six-year elementary school, and a high school that is either a 4-6-year vocational or a six-year general, preparatory school; there is compulsory schooling until the age of 15. Tuition is free at public schools, but more than 25% of the schools are private paid schools; by far the vast majority of these are Catholic, and several have gendered education.
The English colonial power left the teaching to private individuals, mainly to the Anglican and the Catholic Church. In 1862, the colony of Victoria introduced free, compulsory education regardless of church affiliation. The other states followed suit over the course of the century.
There are several private elite schools, but also the state system has programs for particularly gifted children. Disabled people are integrated into the regular system as far as possible. The difficult access to schools of the large sparsely populated areas has been sought early on through the establishment of correspondence schools (approximately 20,000 pupils), since 1950 also through the School of the Air using radio, television and fax (since 1985 via satellite communications and since the 2000’s internet based). However, the vast majority of Australian students go to a metropolitan school.
Since 1988, the Federal Government has taken over the planning and financing of higher education in collaboration with the individual states. The educational institutions are concentrated in the big cities along the coast, where in addition to the prestigious old universities, a number of new universities and higher education institutions have sprung up, a total of 41 universities and over 150 higher education institutions (2009). The development from an elite university following the English model to a mass university is reflected in the legislation. The distinction between universities with and other higher education institutions without a research obligation was abolished in 1988 and replaced by a uniform national system that would better meet the needs of business. Of the approximately 900,000 students are half women, who to a large extent choose educations in the humanities as well as in the social and health care system.
ETYMOLOGY: The word Australia comes from the Latin australis ‘southern’.
ALSO KNOWN AS: Commonwealth of Australia
OFFICIAL NAME: Australia
CAPITAL CITY: Canberra
POPULATION: 23,755,400 (Source: COUNTRYaah)
AREA: 7,692,000 km²
OFFICIAL LANGUAGE (S): English
RELIGION: Catholics 27%, Anglicans 24%, other Protestants 19%, other Christians 4%, Buddhists 1%, Muslims 1%, others 24%
COIN: Australian dollars
CURRENCY CODE: AUD
ENGLISH NAME: Commonwealth of Australia
INDEPENDENCE: 1901
POPULATION COMPOSITION: of European origin 91%, of Asian origin 7%, Aboriginal 2%
GDP PER residents: $ 46,631 (2014)
LIFE EXPECTANCY: men 79.7 years, women 84.2 years (2011)
INDEX OF LIVING CONDITIONS, HDI: 0.933
INDEX OF LIVING CONDITIONS, POSITION: 2
INTERNET DOMAIN NAME: .au
Australia is a federal state in Oceania; the country consists of the Australian continent with Tasmania and other surrounding islands. The so-called external territories include the Cocos Islands, Christmas Island and the uninhabited nature reserve Ashmore and Cartier Islands, all located in the Indian Ocean; furthermore Norfolk and Lord Howe east of the mainland and the isolated Heard and McDonalds. The Coral Sea Islands Territory encompasses a large sea area with scattered coral islands and reefs off the northeast coast; the area is uninhabited.
- AbbreviationFinder.org: Find two-letter abbreviation for each independent country and territory, such as AU which stands for Australia.
Together with New Zealand, Papua New Guinea and a large number of islands in the Pacific Ocean, Australia forms the continent of Oceania.
Australia – religion
Still in the mid-1900’s. the Anglican Church was undisputedly the largest denomination, and the country’s British background could also be traced in large Presbyterian and Methodist congregations. The later immigration is changing the church conditions radically. In 1991, approximately 1/4 of the population declared Anglicans, small groups are unerede and Presbyterians. Practical church work and personal piety continue to take precedence over theological reflection. Check youremailverifier for Australia social condition facts.
At the colonization in 1788, there were Catholics among the convicts, and the Catholic share of the population increased in the 1800’s. by deportation of Irish rebels. Catholics make up in the 1990’s around 1/4 of the population.
The Christian churches carry out a great deal of social work in the big cities, among the Aborigines. The challenge of multiculturalism has led to an increased emphasis on the purely Australian character of the churches, in practical terms through the formation of, for example, Vietnamese-Anglican congregations. No denomination is supported by the state.
Australia – Constitution
The Constitution of the Federal Republic of Australia is from 1900. The Central Legislature has two chambers, the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Senate has 76 members elected by proportional representation; there are 12 representatives from each of the six states plus two from the federal capital, Canberra, and two from the Northern Territory, which have special status. The members sit for six years with half on re-election every three years. The House of Representatives has 148 members elected in proportion to the states’ population, but with a minimum representation of five. They are elected by a form of majority voting in single-member constituencies (see alternative voting)) and sits for a maximum of three years. The executive power is formally vested in the British monarch, represented by the Governor-General. He can, in principle, appoint and dismiss the Prime Minister and the Government, but in reality the power lies with the Government and the Prime Minister as long as they have the confidence of Parliament. Up to 1975, the concentration of power in the federal government increased, but since then the states have succeeded in increasing their powers and strengthening their influence on parts of economic policy. Several of the states have independent representations in a number of major countries.
Australia – legal system
The judicial system has followed British common law since 1788-model. In 1828, the British Parliament passed a law making all British law applicable in Australia. Since the mid-1800’s. However, the individual colonies also had their own legislation, and when the federal state was established in 1900, each of the six states had its own legal system, as the Federal Parliament’s legislative competence primarily applies to external matters as well as military, monetary, customs, insurance and banking, negotiable documents, bankruptcy., trade protection and family law. Furthermore, the Federal Parliament has the power to legislate in other areas, fsv. they are related to those listed above, eg treaties on environmental protection are considered to be covered by the concept of external conditions. Other private and commercial law as well as criminal law are determined in the individual Länder. Both the federal state and the states have over time developed solutions that deviate from the rules that apply in other common law countries. This applies, for example, to the family law rules and the registration system. Nevertheless, the common law model is largely preserved in all states. British law continues to be followed or emulated, just as individual Australian courts still show great respect for the case law developed in the UK. The same applies to the Australian High Court, which, as an appellate body in the states’ courts, contributes to the development of a uniform practice throughout the country. British law continues to be followed or emulated, just as individual Australian courts still show great respect for the case law developed in the UK. The same applies to the Australian High Court, which, as an appellate body in the states’ courts, contributes to the development of a uniform practice throughout the country. British law continues to be followed or emulated, just as individual Australian courts still show great respect for the case law developed in the UK. The same applies to the Australian High Court, which, as an appellate body in the states’ courts, contributes to the development of a uniform practice throughout the country.
Australia – Economy
The economic policy of Australia in the years after World War II was based on a high degree of self-sufficiency and significant public regulation. This protection policy was intended to secure production and employment, but the side effects were weak competitiveness and an undynamic labor market.
During the 1970’s, economic policy became more market-oriented and the degree of protectionism was reduced.
Market forces have been stimulated by e.g. by deregulating the financial sector, and since the end of 1983 the currency, austr. dollars, not pegged to other currencies.
Public companies in Australia (transport, water, electricity, etc.) are characterized by low productivity compared to similar companies in other OECD countries, but the sector has proved difficult to reform. The companies have been faced with requirements for pricing policy and earning capacity, just as a number of them, especially in the field of telecommunications, have been fully or partially privatized.
In the early 1980’s, Australia experienced one of the strongest post-war recoveries, and economic growth was above the OECD average. The recovery led to increasing balance of payments problems and external debt, and from 1985 a tighter monetary policy was pursued to bring inflationary developments under control.
In the 1990’s, unemployment temporarily reached over 10%, but nonetheless, long-term, consumption-based economic growth did not interfere much with the Asian crisis of the late 1990’s or with the post-9/11 turmoil. After 2000, inflation has and unemployment has been low and productivity has improved, not least in the significant mining sector. Lack of investment in the mining sector in particular and the global economic downturn have led to an increase in unemployment, which in August 2013 was 5.8%. Exports, which are not commensurate with imports, are gradually orienting themselves towards the Asian market, especially Japan and China. Among the challenges ahead are growth in the number of older people and income inequality, which is greater than in most industrialized countries.
Australia has in recent years strengthened its economic and political relations with the outside world; in particular to the Asian countries. On Australian initiative, APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) was formed in 1989; it is now an important body for regional trade and cooperation issues. In addition to Australia, APEC has members from Asia, the Americas and Oceania.
In 2010, Denmark’s exports to Australia were DKK 4.8 billion. DKK and imports 749 mill. kr.
The Australian coinage system was originally based on the British pound. On 14 February 1966, the equivalent of the British pound, the Australian pound, which had been introduced in 1931, was replaced by the Australian dollar, which could be included in the decimal system.
Australia – social conditions
The Australian welfare state has its roots in the formation of strong unions in the 1880’s, when it became common to consider Australia as the paradise of the working people. The crisis of the 1890’s led to a clear setback for the progressive forces of Australian society, but Australia continued as a pioneer in the social field. The first social law dates from 1901 and formed the foundation for an expanded social safety net. As early as 1909, the national pension was introduced, in 1910 the disability pension and in 1912 the maternity allowance. The social security schemes also include general health insurance, unemployment insurance, widow’s pension, child allowance and other family benefits. The schemes are funded and administered by the Federal Government. I 1960 ‘ Like the rest of the Western world, Australia experienced a welfare boom that led Australians to describe their country as “the happy country”. Since then, the economic downturn with social austerity as a result has also spread to Australia without, however, having removed the foundation of the welfare state.
In relation to social conditions, Aborigines have a special status, being subject to special social programs to improve their integration into modern Australian society. Yet the indigenous people are still burdened by social problems such as poor housing conditions, alcohol and other abuse and the consequent higher mortality rate than the other Australians.
Australia – health conditions
Australia has a life expectancy of approximately 84.2 years for women and 79.7 years for men, just over a year higher than in Denmark (2011). In 30 years, it has increased 6-7 years for both sexes. The mortality rate is 7 ‰. Infant mortality is as in Denmark, approximately 3 pr. 1000 live births (2013).
The prolonged life expectancy is mainly due to a decrease in mortality from cardiovascular diseases as well as from traffic accidents in younger people. Mortality due to lung cancer is declining in men, but increasing in women. The number of smokers is declining, now smokers are below 30% of both sexes. The average alcohol intake is declining and is now below the Danish. There is a high incidence of skin cancer (melanoma) in Australia, which the blonde descendants of northern European immigrants are at high risk of developing due to the strong solar radiation. Morbidity and mortality are more or less developing in parallel with conditions in other developing countries.
The Aborigines differ from the rest of the population by having a poorer state of health; this turns out at a higher infant mortality rate and a lower life expectancy.
Australia spends 9.8% of its GDP on healthcare (2010), which is on a par with Denmark. The hospital system occupies almost 50% of the resources. approximately 2/3 of the costs covered by the state; the entire population is covered by public health insurance, which can be supplemented by private insurance. The hospital system has 89,000 beds, and there are approximately 70,000 active doctors.
A special element of health care is “The Royal Flying Doctor Service”, which assists isolated parts of the country.
Australia – Mass media
Australia’s only nationwide omnibus newspaper, The Australian, was founded by Rupert Murdochin 1964 as the first newspaper with the whole country as the target group. Significant regionally anchored newspapers are The Sydney Morning Herald (grdl. 1831) and The Age (grdl. 1854) from Melbourne, both edited with clear British role models from the mid-1800’s. Since its founding in 1831, The Herald has seen it as its main task to monitor government and authorities, which has given the newspaper appeal both to the elite and to a wider audience, while The Age in its role as the classic serious newspaper has a pronounced elitist touch. The tabloid newspaper The Daily Telegraph (grdl. 1879) is also published in Sydney. The concentration of ownership within the print media is rising sharply. Thus, in the early 2000’s, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp Australia controlled 75% of circulation. Increasing immigration from Asia requires a partly new press pattern,
Australia has had freedom of the press since government censorship was lifted in 1824. Many newspapers emerged early due to the large distances between cities. The newspapers could not compete with each other. Only Murdoch managed from 1964 to climb the regional dividing lines with The Australian, edited in Canberra and printed there as well as in Sydney and Melbourne.
The AAP (Australian Associated Press) was founded in Melbourne in 1935. In addition to Australia, it serves many island states and autonomous territories in Oceania.
Radio broadcasting was officially launched in 1923, and the first ten commercial stations opened in 1924-25. The public Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), with the British BBC as a model, was established in 1932 with 12 stations. Gradually more were added, and together they came to form the nationwide network. Television opened in 1955-56 on ABC and a number of private stations, several of which came within the three major commercial networks, Seven, Nine and Ten. Public television was expanded in 1979 with the Special Broadcasting Service, which serves the immigrant cultures of approximately 40 languages. It began in 1975 to send in colors to the general public; already in 1971 the television prevalence passed 90%, and in 1993 it was almost 100%. approximately 80% had video while cable broadcast satellite TV did not occur.
The television supply was initially dominated by programs from the United States and later partly from the United Kingdom. This was countered by quota schemes that gradually increased the Australian share. The first Australian television success was the 1965 variety series The Mavis Bramston Show, and Graham Kennedy, which began in 1957, became the most popular studio host over the years. Year-long comedy series and soap operas were the basis of the drama production, which had an international breakthrough in the 1980’s with miniseries such as A Town like Alice (1980), shown in Denmark in 1983 and 1993.
Australia – visual art
In Australia’s indigenous people, art was an integral part of their lives and culture, see aborigines (art).
An Australian visual art with European roots was developed in the late 18th century by the country’s new residents, who reshaped the artistic conventions of Europe in order to depict the distinctive Australian landscapes, the light, the atmosphere and the colors.
Thomas Watling (1763-?) Was, like several other early artists, a deported convict. In 1794 he painted his view of Sydney Cove in the picturesque tradition.
In the following century, a number of European-educated painters laid the foundations for a special Australian tradition of landscape painting. Among these was Eugène von Guérard (born in Vienna 1811, died in England 1901), who painted mountain landscapes; furthermore, the Swiss-born Abram Louis Buvelot (1814-88), who was a pioneer in outdoor painting in Australia. His landscape paintings inspired the artists who painted au plein air in Heidelberg outside Melbourne, among others. Tom Roberts (1856-1931), Frederick McCubbin (1855-1917), Charles Conder (1868-1909) and Arthur Streeton (1867-1943).
John Peter Russell (1859-1930) emigrated to France, where he worked with Auguste Rodin and Vincent van Gogh. The motifs of the Heidelberg painters included towns, beaches, and farm workers, but their greatest achievement was that they managed to reproduce the peculiarity of the light, the colors, and the shapes of the vegetation. The image of Australia they created was preserved well into the 20th century.
Hans Heysen (1877-1968) expanded the landscape motifs to include the desert; Margaret Preston’s (1875-1963) works were influenced by Aboriginal art, at the same time as the Aboriginal artist Albert Namatjira (1902-59) painted in the European tradition.
Modernism, which was only slowly gaining ground, was the cause of conflict in the mid-20th century, when a new generation of painters emerged. Among these were the portrait and genre painter William Dobell (1899-1970), the expressionist landscape painter Russell Drysdale (1912-81) and the figurative expressionists Sidney Nolan (1917-92), Arthur Boyd (1920-99), Albert Tucker (1914- 99) and John Perceval (1923-2000).
They adapted modern styles to Australian subjects that were often based on past legends, such as Nolan’s series of paintings inspired by legends about the “bus ranger” Ned Kelly.
Also in many of these images it is the landscape that dominates. This sustained interest in the Australian landscape culminated in the works of Fred Williams’ (1929-82) works, in which the landscape is simply depicted as fine hues that have been dotted, ironed, scraped, stained and splashed on a solid background.
Such a depiction of the landscape is also seen in, for example, John Olsen’s (b. 1928) paintings. There is an interesting similarity between these works and the ancient tradition in Aboriginal art, which thanks to The Papunya painters in Central Australia since the 1970’s have evolved so that today they occupy a significant place in Australian art.
Australia – literature
Australia’s literature has many beginnings: in the old world theories of a southern continent, in the Aboriginalgreat song cycles, there are myths, moral philosophy and precise maps at one and the same time, as well as in the stories of the first explorers. The first poem in English written in Australia (1819) is an ironic tribute to the kangaroo. It ends with seeing the continent as “an afterlife, not created in the beginning – but created by the Fall”. The first literary genre to develop a special Australian form was the ballads of the convicts. The different approaches suggest themes that have persisted in Australian literature to this day: the idea of an as yet unknown continent, where even maps and place names seem partly fictional; the singing of landscape, flora and fauna, which is viewed both scientifically and mysteriously-religiously, but often with self-irony; and an anti-authoritarian revolt against the “system”,
During colonial times, two attitudes to the continent crystallized. Some, such as the first significant Australian-born poet Charles Harpur (1813-68), attempted to capture the country’s magnificent beauty, while the English-born immigrant Marcus Clarke (1846-81) saw the landscape animated by a “strange melancholy”, deeply hostile to its alienation. This set the mood for Clarke’s novel For the Term of His Natural Life (1874), a still shocking aftermath of the brutality of the penitentiary system. Escaped convicts and bush rangers, Robin Hood-like highway robbers, were the heroes of the colonial popular ballads and novels from James Tucker Ralph Rasleigh (1844) Rolf Boldrewoods (pseud.) Robbery Under Arms(1882), while travelogues as well as diaries and letters written by educated but isolated women in the bush provide a less romantic picture of settler life. This applies, for example, to Catherine Helen Spence’s novel Clara Morrison (1854).
The 1890’s came to stand as the landmark period in which the Sydney magazine The Bulletin created a popular national revival. An Australian identity was formed, in the words of the historian Russel Ward’s The Australian Legend (1958), which, in contrast to “the American dream”, pays homage to a stoic endurance of inevitable defeats. This legend, which is egalitarian, carried by the ideal of mateship, camaraderie, stems in part from the accumulated view of life among convicts, gold diggers and the traveling land proletariat of shearers and drovers(sheep shearers and cowboys), partly by an idealization of life in the country, as it appears in AB “the Banjo” Paterson’s (1864-1941) ballads “Waltzing Mathilda” and “The Man from Snowy River”. The national poet Henry Lawson (1867-1922) is more realistic in his satirical verses and fine short story art, which together with Joseph Furphy’s (1843-1912) unique anti-novel Such Is Life (1904) (whose title comes from the bus ranger Ned Kelly’s last words on the scaffold) stands as the epitome of an Australian tone in language use: the almost overly understated, the black humor, a fantastic mix of the lofty and the down-to-earth.
Both nationalist and socialist engagement have persisted in intellectual culture through 1930’s social realism with Katharine Susannah Pritchard (1883-1969) as the strongest representative to this day, although “The Legend” since the 1970’s has been strongly criticized for, what it left out: women, Aborigines, the urban population. After the turn of the century, the most important Australian literature took another turn. John Shaw Neilson’s (1872-1942) melodic nature poetry stands outside the traditions, while Henry Handel Richardson (pseudonym for Ethel Robertson, 1870-1946) introduced a European naturalism both in the formation novel The Getting of Wisdom (1910) and the trilogy The Fortunes of Richard Mahoney(1917-29). It depicts the protagonist’s divisions between the British Isles and Australia. This introduces the theme of exile, which is found in Martin Boyd’s (1893-1972) genealogical novels and in the great left-wing radical portrayal of egomaniacal monsters Christina Stead (1902-83). Also in the lives and works of several other Australian writers, Europe often seems more real than Australia, including Nobel laureate Patrick White (1912-90), whose novels are marked by a hate-love relationship with Australia.
White is a central figure in the breakthrough of modernism in the mid-1900’s. In 1948 he returned to a Sydney, where the lyricist Kenneth Slessor (1901-71), in the great poem Five Bells about the Port of Sydney, had introduced TS Eliot’s poetic forms into an otherwise anti-modernist environment. White’s expressionist prose turned like contemporary painting and poetry towards the national past, but in a more individualistic slice than before. Explorers, bus rangers and ordinary eccentrics became key figures in a symbolist and deep psychological exploration of Australia as an existential phenomenon: “The Meaning of the Country”, as it is called in a poem by Randolph Stow (1935-2010), whose novel Tourmaline (1963) with Whites Voss(1957) and A Fringe of Leaves (1976) became the culmination of this flow. This metaphysical tradition is often seen, as opposed to the social realist, as elitist and apolitical, but it was through metaphysics that the fine lyricist and critic Judith Wright (1915-2000) found a commitment to such important political issues as the environment and Aboriginal rights..
Aborigines became increasingly visible in white Australian literature through the 1960’s and 1970’s: best known is Thomas Keneally’s (b. 1935) The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (1972), but far more important is the lyricist Les Murray (b. 1938), who managed to reconcile “translations” of the Aboriginal poetic forms and religious understanding of the country with a groundbreaking poetic use of the images and rhythms of the spoken language, which he shared with Bruce Dawe (b. 1930). Asia also moved closer, in CJ Koch’s (1932-2013) novels such as The Year of Living Dangerously (1978), while the image of Australia itself was increasingly regionalized, not least among tropical-lush Queensland writers such as Xavier Herbert (1901-84), Thea Astley (1925-2004) and David Malouf, which represents partly the poetic language treatment, partly the baroque imagination that has become characteristic of Australian fiction, perhaps most distinctly in Hal Porter (1917-84).
With the 1970’s came an explosion of experimental poetry, drama and fiction, the most enduring space of which can probably be attributed to Frank Moorhouse’s (b. 1938) short stories with their ambiguous depictions of the youth uprising, sexual liberation and strong feminism (with Germaine Greer as best known). international representative). A strong surrealistic tendency came to dominate Peter Carey’s short stories and novels, which are transferred to an international postmodernism. Of ethnic immigrant literatures, only the Greek has a distinct tradition (in Greek and English) of the same strength as it is known from North America. On the other hand, the Aborigines throughout the 1970’s and 1980’s made themselves increasingly popular in all genres, from autobiographies such as Sally Morgans My Place(1987) to novels such as Colin Johnson/ Mudrooroo Narogin’s Doctor Wooreddy’s Prescription for Enduring the Ending of the World (1983).
In 1973, Patrick White (1912-1990) became the first Australian winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature. Another Nobel Prize winner, South African JM Coetzee, became an Australian citizen in 2006 and has written several works with Australia as a framework.
Australia – Theater
Just one and a half years after the colony’s founding, the first theater performances took place in Sydney. In June 1789, George Farquahar’s comedy The Recruiting Officer (1706) was played for the governor and his officers by a dozen convicts in a primitive hut with decorations of painted cardboard, oil lamps as stage lights, and entrance fees in kind. From the 1820’s, groups of convicts performed popular melodramas and farces at the Emu Plains Theater near Penrith. 1830-50 theaters were established in Sydney, Hobart, Adelaide, Melbourne and Perth; after 1860 also in Brisbane. Sydney’s The Theater Royal was built in 1833 with room for 1000 spectators; its repertoire ranged from melodrama and farce to Shakespeare and opera.
Population growth and prosperity transformed the Australian theater industry from semi-amateurism to a fully developed and lucrative profession. Improved conditions for theater companies led to the arrival of many significant overseas producers and artists in Australia in the following decades, including the American actor and producer JC Williamson (1845-1913), whose company numbered a staff of 650 permanent staff who traveled 77,000 miles by steamship. around Australia and New Zealand with concerts and plays.
In the early 1900-t. the demand for a purely Australian drama arose, partly caused by a flaring national feeling, partly in response to JC Williamson Theaters Ltd. and its great influence, its non-Australian stars, and on the competition from the silent film.
Several small theaters showed artistically and socially engaged drama. Allan Wilkie’s Shakespearean troupe toured during and after World War I with simple performances.
The advent of radio gave a huge audience to new Australian radio drama with serials like Gwen Meredith’s Blue Hills (2250 episodes). In 1954, the Australian Elizabethan Theater Trust was formed, which further stimulated Australian theater. by providing financial support. A result of this in the following years was a series of contemporary dramas that are considered milestones in Australian theater.
In 1959, the National Institute of Dramatic Art was established with educations for actors, directors and set designers. In the 1960’s, an experimental theater emerged that put controversial themes on the program, a development that continued in group theaters such as Sydney’s Nimrod Theater and Melbourne’s Australian Performing Group. At the same time, a new cultural self-awareness emerged among Aboriginal actors and playwrights.
The Australian Council for the Arts was established in 1968, to distribute state aid to theater activities, just as a number of cultural centers were erected, e.g. Sydney Opera House 1973; Melbourne got its Victorian Arts Center in 1982. While the 1980’s were marked by increasing state support for the development of quality and versatility in the competition with commercial theater, economic decline from 1991 resulted in cuts, and theaters increasingly had to resort to sponsorship and audience-safe repertoire.
Australia – dance
Australia has a rich dance life exciting from a traditional, national dance culture with ritual tribal dance (Aboriginal dance, eg corroboree, with special emphasis on foot and hand movements) for a professional who includes both classical and new dance with a number of companies, schools and universities. A ballet life began little by little in the mid-1800’s, when schools were opened in both Melbourne and Sydney. European companies toured, and this became especially important in the 1900’s. with visits by well-known ballerinas such as the Danish-English Adeline Genée (1878-1970), first time in 1913, the Canadian Maud Allen (1883-1956) in 1914 and first and foremost with Anna Pavlova, who in 1926 and 1929 made a colossal impression. Each tour “left” a dancer or an educator. Among the most significant was the Danish dancer Helene Kirsova (b. Ellen Wittrup, 1911-62) and the Czech dancer and choreographer Edouard Borovansky (1902-59), who opened schools in resp. Sydney (1940) and Melbourne (1939). From the last spring in 1940 The Australian Ballet, which formed the basis of the present company of the same name. With headquarters in Melbourne, this was founded in 1962 with Peggy van Praagh (1910-90) as the first ballet director and with strong threads to English ballet life. In 1965-76 she led the company in collaboration with the dancer, actor and choreographer Robert Helpmann (1909-86). 1983-96, the English dancer Maina Gielgud (b. 1945) was artistic director. The Danish dancer Paul Gnatt (1923-95) also played a significant role in the construction of the new Australian ballet life. The Australian Ballet is today the leading classical company in Australia, which also has a number of other ballet ensembles.
In modern dance, it became important that Gertrud Bodenwieser (1890-1959) from Vienna in 1939 opened a school in Sydney and toured with her company. Australian Dance Theater, founded in 1965 in Adelaide by Elisabeth Dalman, is the oldest professional modern dance company.
Australia – music
Immigrants had difficulty relating to Aboriginal music, and it took a long time for Australian composers to emerge. Percy Grainger (1862-1961) was one of the first to create a special Australian music, inspired by the landscape and by a belief that cultures in the New World were rooted in a Nordic tradition. This is where his close relationship with Denmark and his collaboration with Evald Tang Kristensen come from.
Margaret Sutherland (1897-1984) rejected the folk music tradition; her renewed conception of harmony and tonality gained importance especially for chamber music. John Antill (1904-1986) borrowed from the Aboriginal music in the ballet Corroboree (1946), while a sextet for didgeridoo and the wind quintet (1971) by George Dreyfus (born Wuppertal, 1928) shows a more ambiguous understanding of the original music. Peter Sculthorpe (1929-2014) belongs to the same generation of composers who made the art of music flourish; with his innovative style in works such as Sun Music 1-4 (1965-1967), Mangrove (1979), Earth Cry(1986) he has distanced himself from European tradition and incorporated Asian and Aboriginal forms of expression. Conversely, Richard Meale (1932-2009) unites European and Asian elements in his often very complex works; his opera Voss (1988) is based on Nobel laureate Patrick White’s novel of the same name.
Australia has fostered a number of prominent artists, including sopranos Nellie Melba and Joan Sutherland.
Australia – film
As early as 1896, short reportage films began to be made in Australia, and the world’s first hour-long feature film was Australian: The Brothers Taits The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906). Audiences flocked to see the story of the famous bandit and his fight against the authorities, and the success boosted film production. The year 1911 was a highlight; approximately 50 films, of which 20 lasted more than an hour.
Competition from Hollywood quickly caused this production to decline, and proposals for import restrictions were rejected despite the persistent efforts of director Raymond Longford, known for his subtle everyday poetry in films such as A Sentimental Bloke (1919).
The costly transition to sound film created further problems for the country’s strained film industry. However, the prolific Charles Chauvel gained international success with one of his films, Forty Thousand Horsemen (1940), about three fearless war comrades. One was played by the tall and taciturn Chips Rafferty, the epitome of the Australian male ideal: bold, undisturbed, hardened by life on the plains.
A number of state-produced documentaries received honorable mention, but in addition, Australia’s own production of films was almost extinct after 1945. British and American companies still produced films in Australia, such as Harry Watts The Overlanders (1946, Under Australia’s Sky) and Fred Zinnemann’s The Sundowners (1960, Remove Horizons), both with Chips Rafferty.
In 1970, the picture changed radically. Extensive state support for films was introduced and the result was a boom; from 1970 to 1985, over 400 films were shot. In 1975 came Peter Weir’s atmospheric Picnic at Hanging Rock (The Excursion), which drew foreign attention to Australia’s cinematic boom.
Gillian Armstrong’s delicate portrayal of a woman’s development into a writer, My Brillant Career (1979, My Brilliant Career), was seen and praised everywhere, as were George Miller’s Mad Max (1979) and Bruce Beresford’s Breaker Morant (1981, Strong Wills). Weir, Armstrong, Miller, Beresford and star Mel Gibson were all brought to Hollywood. Among the directors still working in Australia is the gifted Paul Cox (b. 1940), known for his empathetic portrayals of everyday life.
In 1986 came Australia’s biggest box office success to date, Crocodile Dundee, which, like the Mad Max films, was made for an international audience. It is a humorous description of the clash between the depraved world of the townspeople and the bold, athletic wilderness Australian who still retains his innocence.
This important motif takes a tragic turn in Weirs Gallipoli (1981, The Road of Honor to Gallipoli), whose story of two brave young men sacrificed in a mad war brings together a number of the main themes of Australian film: Fellowship, distrust of authorities and authorities as well as the grandeur of the Australian landscape and the men it nurtures.
In the 1990’s, a number of Australian comedies, all with a fabulous touch, gained international attention: Baz Luhrmann’s Strictly Ballroom (1992), Stephan Elliotts (b. 1963) The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994, Desert Queen Priscilla), PJ Hogans (b.1963) Muriel’s Wedding (1994, Muriel’s wedding) and Chris Noonans (b.1952) Babe (1995, Babe – the brave pig).
In recent years, Australia has also managed to attract a number of major American film productions, such as Star Wars II-III (2002, 2005) and Superman Returns (2006).
In 2008, Baz Luhrmann’s epic Australia premiered and became one of Australia’s biggest international audience successes. Following not least Mel Gibson’s international success, Australia has continued to export acting stars to Hollywood, including Eric Bana (b.1963), Cate Blanchett, Guy Pearce, Russell Crowe, Hugh Jackman, Nicole Kidman, Heath Ledger, Naomi Watts and Chris Hemsworth.
Australia – wine
Wines from Australia have gained international recognition since 1960, as increasing local consumption led the wine industry to invest in new technology. Modern methods of temperature control of the fermentation on large stainless steel tanks provide clean and fruity wines.
Australia has been a pioneer for wines designed for specific taste preferences, including through the use of wine consultants who provide guidance in production. The production is polarized in terms of quality between large quantities, correctly made but industrial wine and small quantities of quality wine. In 2009, Australia had a market share in Denmark of 12.4%.
Australia has approximately 150,000 ha of vineyards (2012), which produces approximately 750 million liters of wine, which is roughly equivalent to the production in Bordeaux. There are over 2000 wineries, but the ten largest wineries account for about 90% of production. Wine is grown in all states and under all climatic conditions, even in the sun-drenched desert at Alice Springs, but New South Wales with 26.3%, Victoria with 17.1% and especially South Australia with 48% of the country’s vintage is dominant.
The success of Australian wines is due to quite a few grape varieties. Most red wines are made from shiraz (known as syrah in France), cabernet sauvignon and most recently pinot noir. The main white varieties are muscat, riesling, marsanne, chardonnay, sémillon and sauvignon.
The origin and type of wine are often stated on the label. Australia does not yet have an appellation system like the French AOC, but the wineries are constantly experimenting and each setting their own standard for the quality of the house. At annual competitions, the wines are blinded and judged by experts who award coveted medals. Australian wines are often made from a blend from several areas and from several grapes. If the label indicates a district, at least 80% of the wine must be grown there. The main districts of New South Wales are Hunter Valley, Riverina and Mudgee. In South Australia it is Barossa, Coonawarra, Clare, McLaren Vale and Padthaway. At Perth, the Swan River and Margaret River are new and promising areas.
Australian wines are generally good for food. Most can be drunk right away, but top wines of cabernet, shiraz and a few Riesling can last for up to 20 years.
Australia – sports
Aboriginal culture is rich in games and games, such as hunting games, long and precision throws, canoe competitions, swimming and diving. The white settlers brought and copied British sporting ideals in the new environment, but also added changes, especially in ball games.
Australian football (Australian Rules) is a mixture of football and rugby with a little inspiration from hurling, and the rather violent game is the big sport in the winter months. The dominant summer sport is cricket, and especially the test matches against England, India and Pakistan occupy the whole nation. Swimming is both a widespread leisure activity and the sport in which Australia has achieved the greatest international results. approximately half of all Olympic gold medals won are picked up in swimming. Dawn Fraser (b. 1937) won Olympic gold in the 100m freestyle three times in a row.
In tennis, Australia has topped the list of winners in major international tournaments, and Rod Laver is one of the most title-winning singles players ever. The Australian Open tennis tournament, held in Melbourne in January, is one of four Grand Slam ® tournaments. Surfing is practiced by millions of Australians, and the country has made its mark on the professional world championships since its launch in 1976. Sailing is widespread, and Australia has achieved good results in the major ocean races, including America’s Cup and Admiral’s Cup. Australia has hosted the Olympics twice with Melbourne and Sydney as host cities in respectively. 1956 and 2000.
Australia – wildlife
Of all continents, Australia has the most distinctive wildlife. However, there are common features with especially Southeast Asia (the Oriental region), and certain groups of Australian insects have their closest relatives in South Africa or southern South America. Along with New Guinea and other surrounding islands, Australia forms the Australian region of zoo geography.
Australia’s mammalian fauna is special in the absolute dominance of marsupials. Marsupials are found beyond Australia only on the American continents. De approximately 170 species of Australian marsupials show parallels to the richness of form that placental mammals exhibit in other parts of the world (in placental mammals, the fetus is nourished via a placenta, placenta). For example, kangaroos play a role similar to that of ruminants, and marsupials, marsupials, etc. correspond to predators, while the marsupial lives as moles (see marsupials).
Of the placental mammals, only bats, some species of the mouse family and the wild dog dingo, which were probably introduced by Australia’s native residents, the Aborigines, are found in Australia. The laying mammals, marsupials and platypus are found only in Australia and New Guinea. In recent times, many animal species have been introduced to Australia by humans, including the rabbit, which with its large populations has developed into a serious pest.
Several families of birds are found only in Australia or the Australian region. Among these endemic groups are, for example, emu, lyre tails and birds of paradise; the latter is also found in New Guinea. The bird fauna is also distinguished by a wealth of parrots.
Australia – Climate
Australia is the hot and dry continent. The majority are located in the subtropical climate belt with long hot summers and short mild winters. Farthest to the north is a tropical climate with summer temperatures above 30 °C on average. Tasmania and the highest parts of the Australian Alps have a mild temperate climate. Here there are areas with winter rain and a characteristic forest and maki vegetation. For the continent as a whole, the annual rainfall is less than 25 cm, and the majority is desert, bush steppe and grass steppe. In the easternmost regions, up to 200 cm of precipitation falls, and here there is subtropical forest and savannah. In the northernmost regions, a lot of summer rain falls, and here there is tropical forest and savannah.
Australia lies north of the distinctive and unbroken westerly belt of the southern hemisphere. A fairly stable high pressure over the southern Indian Ocean is the backdrop for the still windy southeast passage. This wind blows from colder to warmer regions and is therefore low in precipitation. This results in the very dry climate that characterizes the whole of Western and SW Australia. Several coastal towns in Western Australia do not receive rainfall each year.
The sea east of Australia is, especially in late summer, characterized by tropical cyclones. At intervals, the north and east coasts are hit by these willy-willies, which with hurricane winds and heavy rainfall can cause great destruction.
