Author(s): Angela Wanhalla (ed.); Lyndall Ryan (ed.); Camille Nurka (ed.)

History | Aotearoa New Zealand Non-Fiction | The Pacific | Australia

What we choose to remember and what we choose to forget about the violent past tell us something about the society we live in now. Whether we like it or not, we’re part of each other’s story. So how do we talk about the past? —Joanna Kidman and Vincent O’Malley Aftermaths explores the life-changing intergenerational effects of colonial violence in Aotearoa New Zealand, Australia and the Pacific. The settings of these accessible, illustrated short essays range from Ōrākau pā in the Waikato to the Kimberleys in northwest Australia, from orphanages in Fiji to the ancestral lands of the Wiyot Tribe in Northern California. Story by story, this collection powerfully reveals the living legacy of historical events, showing how they have been remembered (and misremembered) within families and communities into the present day. Editors Angela Wanhalla, Lyndall Ryan and Camille Nurka have invited a group of prominent scholars to write about colonial histories by reflecting on a range of events through a variety of perspectives, including personal experiences, family stories, collaborative research, oral and literary histories, commemoration activities and contemporary artworks.

Review: 'It is a rare publication that can cross the difficult divide between academic history and accessible reading ... Every chapter is well-written and evocative. Aftermaths will open eyes ... Aftermaths makes a powerful case for ending our historical ignorance. It forces readers to confront the violence embedded in our collective colonial past and it reveals the many reverberations of that violence in our present. It also asks us to unbury the skeletons in our own closets and fairly carry our share of this ‘emotional freight’ and trauma. It asks us to be brave and unchain our dragons.' Maartje Abbenhuis - Aotearoa New Zealand Review of Books

Angela Wanhalla, Lyndall Ryan and Camille Nurka are leading scholars of colonial and Indigenous histories in Australia, the Pacific and Aotearoa New Zealand.

Contributors include established and emerging Indigenous and non-Indigenous humanities scholars: Tony Ballantyne, Rachel Burgess, Penelope Edmonds, Anaru Eketone, Stephanie Gilbert, Victoria Haskins, Anna Johnston, Joanna Kidman, Shino Konishi, Jane Lydon, Caitlin Lynch, Keri Mills, Kirstine Moffat, Grace Moore, Amanda Nettelbeck, Erica Newman, Camille Nurka, Patricia O’Brien, Vincent O’Malley, Lachy Paterson, Lyndall Ryan, Sian Smith, Kate Stevens and Angela Wanhalla.