Lot #72: 1986 History Paperback - "A New Britannia: An Argument Concerning the Social Origins of Australian Radicalism and Nationalism"

Victoria, Australia: Penguin Books Australia, 1986. 293 pp. "A New Britannia" is a seminal and controversial work of Australian historiography by the Marxist historian Humphrey McQueen. The book argues that the country’s early radicalism and the labor movement were rooted not in socialist internationalism, but in a desire to create a "petit-bourgeois" paradise defined by racism, consumerism, and a longing to be a "better Britain." McQueen utilizes a provocative, polemical style to analyze the 19th-century origins of the White Australia Policy and the Australian Labor Party, asserting that the "pioneer" identity was built on the dispossession of Aboriginal peoples and a reactionary defense of the British Empire. Dimensions: 18 cm Pickup category timeslot {A}