Book Launch: Our Story, Aboriginal Chinese People in Australia

Our Story: Aboriginal Chinese People in Australia is the outcome of a research project that focuses on the period since the gold rushes of the 1850s, when it was more common for First Nations people to come into contact with Chinese arrivals. Both groups largely lived on the margins of White Settler society and were often subject to much disdain and discrimination.

The historical information collected in this book consists of two levels. One is the history of people, places and events that have been documented and affirmed over periods of time. The historians have compiled these materials, and their work provides a backdrop to the second level of information: family stories.
 

The book also includes contemporary views by eight artists, including seven Aboriginal Chinese artists, and one Chinese-Australian artist. It provides personal stories about how descendants identify themselves and what they think of their family history.

^{Image: L-R: John A’Hang, (date unknown); Maggie A’Hang (1917); Josephine Judge-Rigney (2024) Courtesy of Josephine Judge-Rigney} 

^{An Australia Day procession In these photos, Josephine Judge-Rigney looks towards her Chinese great-great-grandfather, John A’hang, who came to Australia from Canton (Guangzhou) in about 1851. Maggie A’hang, Josephine’s great-grandmother, is the daughter of John and an Aboriginal woman known as Topsy. This image captures Maggie’s participation in the Australia Day procession at Tumby Bay in August 1917. The word on the top line of the sign she is wearing around her neck is probably ‘Dinkum’. The next two lines are illegible. The last line may be ‘Help Our Boys’.}

Zhou Xiaoping is a Melbourne based artist. Since 1988 he has been actively engaged with Aboriginal communities in Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory and the Kimberley in North Western Australia.
 

Zhou Xiaoping has been instrumental in several key Australian Aboriginal history research and exhibition projects. His collaboration with the late Jimmy Pike resulted in the first exhibition of Aboriginal artwork in China in 1996. He was the key person in the 2009 Trepang: China and the Story of Macassan-Aboriginal Trade project. He was Honorary Research Fellow, Asia Institute University of Melbourne in 2019. He has published a book titled 《从人群走向荒漠》(Chinese version) in 2023. Zhou Xiaoping is also the curator of an an exhibition based on the book, and is now exhibited at National Museum of Australia. 

The research project for Our Story: Aboriginal Chinese People in Australia was led by Zhou Xiaoping with principal supporter the Museum of Chinese Australian History, and sponsored by the National Foundation for Australia-China relations and Fortescue Ltd. The Gordon Darling Foundation is the publication sponsor. The book launch is organised and delivered by Asialink Arts and Culture at the University of Melbourne with the support of the Museum of Chinese Australian History.