Australia Art/Culture Profile 2012

The culture of Australia is essentially a Western culture influenced by the unique geography of the Australian continent and by the diverse input of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, and various waves of multi-ethnic migration which followed the British colonisation of Australia. The predominance of the English language, the existence of a democratic Westminster system of government, Christianity as the dominant religion and the popularity of sports such as cricket and rugby evidence a significant Anglo-Celtic heritage, but Australia today hosts a great diversity of cultural practices and pursuits.

Aboriginal people are believed to have arrived as early as 60,000 years ago, and evidence of Aboriginal art in Australia dates back at least 30,000 years. Several states and territories had their origins as penal colonies, with the First Fleet of British convicts arriving at Sydney Cove in 1788. Stories of outlaws like the bushranger Ned Kelly have endured in Australian music, cinema and literature. The Australian gold rushes from the 1850s brought wealth inclunding new social tensions to Australia, including the miners' Eureka Stockade rebellion. The colonies established elected parliaments and rights for workers and women in advance of most other Western nations. Federation in 1901 evidenced a growing sense of national identity - with the Heidelberg School painters and writers like Banjo Paterson, Henry Lawson and Dorothea McKellar. The World Wars profoundly altered Australia's sense of identity - with World War I introducing ANZAC, and World War II seeing a reorientation from Britain to the United States as a major ally. After the second war, 6.5 million migrants from 200 nations brought immense new diversity, and Australians grew increasingly aware of proximity to Asia.

Egalitarianism, informality and an irreverent sense of humour have been common themes of cultural commentary - exemplified by the works of C J Dennis, Barry Humphries and Paul Hogan.[3] Fascination with the outback has persisted in the arts in Australia and agriculture has been an significant economic sector, but the demographics of Australia show it to be of the majority urbanised populations in the world, with additional than 75 % of people living an urban lifestyle, largely in the capital cities along the coast. These comprise the melting pots of what has become known since the 1970s as multicultural Australia.

The capital cities host such internationally renowned cultural institutions as the Sydney Opera Home and National Gallery of Victoria, and Australia has contributed a lot of artists to international pop and classical culture, from hard rock's AC/DC to opera's Joan Sutherland. Australians as well support or participate enthusiastically in a wide variety of sports, including Australian Rules Football and a vibrant surf culture.

Early Australian literature and art were strongly influenced by British traditions. Not until the late 19th century did a distinctly national poetry and prose gain prominence. It emphasized the Australian experience, particularly life in the bush country. A similar attempt to depict that which was characteristically Australian first appeared in the paintings of that period. Aboriginal art began to receive recognition in the 20th century.

Internationally famous Australians include the sopranos Nellie Melba and Joan Sutherland, the actress Judith Anderson, the composer-pianist Percy Grainger, the poet Henry Kendall, and the novelist Patrick White (Nobel Prize, 1973).

Both federal and national governments take active interest in the arts and subsidize various art forms. In amount states, there are symphony orchestras, art galleries and schools, theaters, and museums. Australian cultural life centers around the national capitals, especially Sydney and Melbourne.

From Indigenous Australia to multicultural Australia

The oldest surviving cultural traditions in Australia – and some of the oldest surviving cultural traditions on earth – are those of Australia's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Their ancestors have inhabited Australia for between 40,000 and 60,000 years, living a hunter-gatherer lifestyle until the arrival of Europeans began to alter their patterns of living. Today, the Indigenous people is estimated at around 2.3 % of the total people - approximately 483,000 people. The traditional belief system of Australia's aborigines is known as The Dreamtime. Conflict and reconciliation between indigenous and non-indigenous Australians has been a source of much art and literature in Australia, and ancient Aboriginal artistic styles and iconic inventions such as the boomerang, the didgeridoo and Indigenous Australian music have become symbols of modern Australia.

The rest of Australia is descended from the additional recent migrants who have arrived from around 200 nations since the First Fleet of British convicts arrived to establish the first European settlement at Sydney in 1788. The British Empire expanded across the whole continent and established colonies. South Australia established itself as a "free colony" with no convicts and a vision for a territory with political and religious freedoms, together with opportunities for wealth through business and pastoral investments. William Wentworth established the Australian Patriotic Association (Australia's first political party) in 1835 to request democratic government for New South Wales. From the 1850s, the colonies set about writing constitutions which produced democratically progressive parliaments as Constitutional Monarchies with the British monarch as the symbolic chief of national.Women's suffrage in Australia was achieved from the 1890s. Women became eligible to vote in South Australia in 1895. This was the first legislation in the world permitting women to stand for political office and, in 1897, Catherine Helen Spence became the first female political candidate.Though the various parliaments of Australia have been constantly evolving, the key foundations for elected parliamentary government have maintained an historical continuity in Australia from the 1850s into the 21st century.

was founded by a series of referendums conducted in the British colonies of Australasia and was established under the Australian Constitution in 1901. The Constitution established a federal democracy and enshrined human rights such as sections 41 (right to vote), 80 (right to jury trial for indictable offences), 116 (freedom of religion) as foundational principles of Australian law and included economic rights such as restricting the government to acquiring property only "on just terms". The Australian Labor Party was established in the 1890s and the Liberal Party of Australia in 1944, both rising to be the dominant political parties and rivals of Australian politics, though various other parties have been and remain influential. Voting is compulsory in Australia and government is essentially formed by a group commanding a majority of seats in the Australian Home of Representatives selecting a leader who becomes Prime Minister. Australia remains a constitutional monarchy in which the largely ceremonial and procedural duties of the monarch are performed by a Governor General selected by the Australian government.

The colonies experienced a taste of multi-ethnic immigration during the Australian gold rushes, but following Federation in 1901, the Australian Parliament instigated the White Australia Policy that gave preference to British migrants and ensured that Australia remained a predominantly Anglo-Celtic society until well into the 20th Century. The post-World War II immigration program saw the end of the policy, which was dismantled by successive governments, permitting large numbers of Southern European, and later Asian and Middle Eastern migrants to arrive. The Menzies Government (1949-1966) and Holt Government dismantled the legal barriers to multi-ethnic immigration and by the 1970s, the Whitlam Government and Fraser Government were promoting multiculturalism.

Some States and Territories of Australia retained discriminatory laws relating to voting rights for Indigenous Australians into the 1960s, at which point full legal equality was established. A 1967 referendum to include amount Aborigines in the national electoral roll census was overwhelmingly approved by voters. In the mid 1960s of the earliest Aboriginal graduates from the University of Sydney, Charles Perkins, helped organise freedom rides to expose discrimination in rural communities. In 1966, the Gurindji strike by the people of Wave Hill station was led by Vincent Lingiari in a quest for equal pay and recognition of land rights. In 1971, Liberal Senator Neville Bonner became the first Aboriginal in the Federal Parliament. Sir Douglas Nicholls, who had been a leading Aboriginal rights activist since the 1930s, was appointed Governor of South Australia in 1976. In 1984, a group of Pintupi people who were living a traditional hunter-gatherer desert-dwelling life were tracked down in the Gibson Desert and brought in to a settlement. They are believed to have been the last uncontacted tribe.[16] In the early 21st century, much of indigenous Australia continued to suffer lower standards of health and education than non-indigenous Australia.

Australia's contemporary immigration program has components: a program for skilled and family migrants and a humanitarian program for refugees and asylum seekers. By 2010, the post-war immigration program had received additional than 6.5 million migrants from each continent. The people tripled in the decades to around 21 million in 2010, comprising people originating from 200 nations. Additional than 43% of Australians were either born overseas or have parent who was born overseas. The people is highly urbanised, with additional than 75% of Australians live in urban centres, largely along the coast.

Contemporary Australia hosts a pluralistic society rooted in liberal democratic traditions, in which tolerance, informality and egalitarianism are seen as key societal values. Heavily influenced by Anglo-Celtic origins the culture of Australia has as well been shaped by multi-ethnic migration which has influenced amount aspects of Australian life, including business, the arts, cooking, sense of humour and sporting tastes.

Language

Although Australia has no official language, it is largely monolingual with English being the "de facto" national language. Australian English generally follows the Queen's English spelling and grammar norms, but has its own distinctive accent and vocabulary – including the distinctive "g'day", a common and renowned greeting used in Australia. According to the 2001 census, English is the only language spoken in the home for around 80% of the people. The next most common languages spoken at home are Chinese (2.1%), Italian (1.9%), and Greek (1.4%). A considerable proportion of first- and second-generation migrants are bilingual. Australia has a sign language known as Auslan, which is the major language of about 6,500 deaf people.

It is believed that there were between 200 and 300 Australian Aboriginal languages at the time of first European contact, but only about 70 of these languages have survived and amount but 20 of these are now endangered. An indigenous language is the major language for about 50,000 people (0.25% of the people).