Ethnic Presses
Asians and Arabs, 1980s–1990s In the second and final instalment, Barry York looks at the Library’s collection of ethnic community newspapers published in the 1980s and 1990s The ethnic press (defined in the first instalment as being newspapers and other periodicals published in Australia by or for communities whose members are from non-English-speaking backgrounds) provides insights into the development of particular communities and it also reflects broader patterns of immigration and settlement. The ethnic press exists primarily to serve its own community, as part of Australian society. The typical ethnic newspaper is published in Sydney or Melbourne; it is sponsored by businesses and professionals of the community plus supported by occasional government advertisements; it promotes the community’s social, religious, cultural and sporting events; it reports on political and cultural developments in the homeland and in Australia; and it has a lively letters page. An important role is the education of readers in their rights and responsibilities in Australian society, and in the services available to them. The typical ethnic newspaper is likely to be written in the original language of the group but with English language items in letters pages, advertisements and, less commonly, in articles.
In the first instalment of this series, the ethnic press of the 1950s and 1960s was discussed. This was a period when most migrants from non-English-speaking backgrounds were from Europe. During the 1970s, changes occurring in Europe and Australia resulted in a new pattern of migrant intake in the 1980s and 1990s. In the 1970s, Australia no longer needed workers for industrial development; indeed, ‘structural unemployment’ entered the political vocabulary and the European source countries no longer experienced the same ‘push’ factors of the immediate postwar years. Also, in 1973 the Labor Government of Gough Whitlam formally abolished the White Australia Policy by adopting a set of migrant selection criteria that did not take race into account. The old racist policy had gradually been liberalised by previous postwar immigration ministers. Following the defeat of American-backed forces in Vietnam in 1975 and the exodus from Vietnam of scores of thousands of refugees, the new policy was implemented by the coalition government of Malcolm Fraser and large numbers of Vietnamese ‘boat people’ were accepted for permanent settlement.
Since the 1980s, Australia has admitted a high proportion of settlers (including refugees) from the Asian region. In 1947, 10 per cent of Australians were born overseas and 81 per cent of those came from English-speaking countries. In 2001, 24 per cent of Australians were overseas born and less than 40 per cent of those came from the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries. Today, out of a population of more than 19 million, about a million Australians were born in countries of the Asian region. The two largest Asian communities are the Vietnamese and the Chinese. There was no Vietnamese local press in Australia before the abolition of the White Australia Policy for the simple reason that there were hardly any Vietnamese here. The Chinese, however, have a presence dating back to the nineteenth century. The Library’s holdings of early Chinese–Australian publications, such as The Tung Wah News and The Chinese Republic News, help explode one of the myths surrounding the White Australia era, namely that Australia had no Asian residents at all until the late 1970s. In fact, throughout the first 70 years of the twentieth century, there was a Chinese community numbering several thousands, mainly business people, who were mostly here on temporary permits. The Tung Wah News was published by the New South Wales Chinese Merchants’ Society and Chinese Empire Reform Association between 1898 and 1936. The Chinese Republic News, published in Sydney from 1914 to 1937, described itself as the ‘official organ of the Chinese Republican community of the Commonwealth and New Zealand’. Both are held in microform. In 1971, before the abolition of the White Australia Policy, there were 17600 China-born people in Australia and, as a result of policy liberalisations in 1956 and 1966, some were permanent residents and citizens. The Australia–China Times ran from 1954 to 1957 and the Library has a microform set and some hard copies. Chinese community newspapers re-emerged in the early 1980s. Sing Tao was the first, in 1982. Based in Sydney, it went national in 1986 and was followed by others such as The Chinese Herald, Independence Daily, Australian Chinese Daily and The Chinese Post.
Census data reveals that there were about 700 Vietnam-born people in Australia in 1971. The Vietnamese were mainly Colombo Plan students, or orphans adopted by Australian families or wives of Australian servicemen. Ten years later, the Vietnam-born had increased to 41 000 and, by 1991, stood at 122 000. In 1999, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) estimated the Vietnam-born population to be 175 000. In 1991, the China-born population was 79 000 and in 1999 the ABS estimated it as 157 000. The Newspaper Collection has about 25 Vietnamese–Australian titles and about 40 Chinese–Australian titles. The reason for a greater number of Chinese titles is because the ethnic Chinese are a much larger community than is revealed in census data on birthplace. At least 44 000 of Australia’s Vietnam-born population are ethnically Chinese. And one can add the 62 000 Hong Kong-born Australians, who are counted separately by the census. Also, many Australian residents who were born in Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Timor, Cambodia and Laos are Chinese. In Australia today, Chinese languages are the second most commonly spoken languages other than English at home, after Italian. There are more than 340 000 Australians who speak a Chinese language at home. With such numerical strength, it was only a matter of time before newspapers would flower among each community. After about a decade in Australia, the Vietnamese and Chinese presses flourished. The pioneering Vietnamese press developed in the main places of Vietnamese settlement: Cabramatta and Bankstown in Sydney and Richmond in Melbourne. The first Vietnamese newspaper in Australia, Chuông Saigon (The Bell of Saigon), commenced publication in November 1979.
The ethnic newspaper collections also reveal a truth about ethnic groups that is often not appreciated: while each shares common characteristics, there is usually a degree of diversity within the group. The Vietnamese– Australian press highlights this fact very well. There are publications for the Vietnamese and for the ethnic Chinese from Vietnam. There are separate newspapers, magazines and newsletters for Vietnamese Catholics and for Buddhists, for young people, women, students, professionals and senior citizens. And, alongside the national newspapers such as Chuông Saigon, Viêt Luân (The Vietnamese Herald) and Chiêu Duong (The Sunrise), there are also a variety of less frequently published magazines and newsletters in capital cities where Vietnamese have settled. In addition to the Vietnamese and Chinese, the Newspaper Collection also has an impressive collection of ‘ethnic press’ arising from other post-1970s groups. These include the Filipinos, Indians, Lebanese, Sri Lankans, Indonesians, Koreans, Egyptians and Turks. These groups account for nearly half a million Australians, with about 100 000 being Filipinos. The Library holds eight Filipino newspapers and newsletters: Tinig pinoy (the newsletter of the Filipino–Australian Leadership Forum), Bayanihan News, The Philippine Voice, The Philippine Times, The Philippine Herald, The Philippine Community News (which became The Philippine Community Herald in 1994), and The Pilipino Herald. Most are products of the 1990s, though The Philippine Community News commenced in 1987. Most began in Sydney’s west. The period since the abolition of the White Australia Policy has also seen the emergence of a press based on religious senses of identity. This religio-ethnicity encompasses Australian-born people as well as migrants. There are 25 titles emanating from Australian Buddhists and 12 Australian Muslim titles. The number of Australians following both religions has increased enormously since the 1970s. Today, there are about 360 000 Buddhists, double the number of a decade ago, and about 300 000 Muslims in Australia, also double the figure of 10 years ago. The Jews also have a dynamic press, which dates back to the 1840s in Australia. The Library’s catalogue lists 81 Jewish–Australian titles in the Newspaper Collection, covering every decade since the 1920s. Alongside the increase in Asian immigration, there has been a significant intake from the Middle East. Like the Chinese, Arabs have a long history in Australia though they were never as numerically significant. The first large-scale intake occurred in the late 1970s as a result of Australia’s humanitarian response to the civil war in Lebanon. In 1971, there were 24 000 Lebanon-born people in Australia. By 1981, the figure was 50 000 and in 1991, 69 000. The Newspaper Collection’s holdings reveal that the Arabic– Australian press tends to reflect religious, national and political differences among Australia’s 200 000 Arabic speakers. For example, the biggest Arabic– Australian newspaper, El Telegraph, which has been published since 1970, is strongly supported by Lebanese Christians. Other Arabic language newspapers in the collection are An Nahar: The Arabic Newspaper, which first appeared in 1978, and Al Bairak, which started up in 1986. Overall, the Library’s ethnic press collections reflect both Australia’s cultural diversity and the diversity that is part and parcel of ethnic community life. Barry York is a researcher and writer. His email address is: garocon@pcug.org.au |
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