A Companion to Australian Aboriginal Literature

Australian Aboriginal literature once relegated to the margins of Australian literary studies now receives both national and international attention. Not only has the number of published texts by contemporary Australian Aboriginals risen sharply but scholars and publishers have also recently begun recovering earlier published and unpublished Indigenous works. Writing by Australian Aboriginals is making a decisive impression in fiction autobiography biography poetry film drama and music and has recently been anthologized in Oceania and North America. Until now however there has been no comprehensive critical companion that contextualizes the Aboriginal canon for scholars researchers students and general readers. This international collection of eleven original essays fills this gap by discussing crucial aspects of Australian Aboriginal literature and tracing the development of Aboriginal literacy from the oral tradition up until today contextualizing the work of Aboriginal artists and writers and exploring aspects of Aboriginal life writing such as obstacles toward publishing questions of editorial control (or the lack thereof) intergenerational and interracial collaborations combining oral history and life writing and the pros and cons of translation into European languages. ~~~~ CONTRIBUTORS: Katrin Althans Maryrose Casey Danica Cerce Stuart Cooke Paula Anca Farca Michael R. Griffiths Oliver Haag Martina Horakova Jennifer Jones Nicholas Jose Andrew King Jeanine Leane Theodore F. Sheckels Belinda Wheeler. BELINDA WHEELER is Assistant Professor of English at Claflin University Orangeburg SC.