Japan had two great infatuations with the West: in the 1870s and during the American occupation of 1945-52. Forsaking traditional isolationism, Japan welcomed Western ideas and customs with open arms, and according to Jean-Pierre Lehmann, what resulted was not an ersatz Western culture but one that retained a distinct national identity
by Edward M. Spiers
Arthur Waley describes Chinese civilization in the first and second centuries AD.
Graham Seal explores the life and legend of Ned Kelly.
by J. Jean Hecht
Popular art in the form of cartoons, caricatures and simple engravings offered great potential for political propaganda as the revolutionary leaders discovered.
"We belong to that little group of peoples destined... for a special role, the tragic role. Their anxiety is not whether they will be prosperous tomorrow, great or small, but whether they will be at all..." - Lionel Groulx, Quebec historian
The census of religious worship taken in England and Wales in 1851 gives a unique insight into the religious habits of our Victorian predecessors which, as Bruce Coleman explains, is very much at variance with the popular image of them.
Jacqueline A. Rinn on the forgotten contributors to colonial society.
When the British and Maori signed the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840, Governor Hobson declared: 'We are one people'. Today, as Professor Keith Sinclair shows, this hope has still to be realised.
