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With overseas plans out of the picture for most part – if not all – of 2021, you might be like most of us, a reportedly growing majority channeling our passion for travelling domestically.
‘Loving Country’ is an invitation for this quest to be more than box-ticking, bucket-listing experience.
For a Greek living Down Under the authors’ names are familiar.
Bruce Pascoe, for having famously debunked the ‘hunter-gatherer’ myth for Indigenous Australians.
In his seminal book ‘Dark Emu’ Bruce Pascoe presents evidence, often from diaries of early explorers, of pre-colonial Aboriginal Australians’ advanced systems in governance and agriculture. Photo: National Library of Australia
I think change is on the way: Bruce Pascoe
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When I meet Bruce Pascoe before Christmas for lunch, it’s a late one, as he’s flown in from Mallacoota, where he lives on his 65-hectare farm. But even at 3pm, the City Wine Shop and the CBD are bustling, post-lockdown.
“It’s a bit busier than Mallacoota,” Pascoe remarks. “Melbourne seems to be enjoying itself already.”
Pascoe is in the big smoke to talk about his new book,
Loving Country, A Guide To Sacred Australia, which he co-authored with artist and photographer Vicky Shukuroglou; after lunch he’s off to Readings for a book launch – over Zoom. He’s well-accustomed to the medium, having sometimes done three a day during lockdown, promoting other books he released in 2020, and attending online board meetings with his local Aboriginal community.
Dark Emu in his introduction to his new book,
Loving Country – a guide to sacred Australia, co-authored with Vicky Shukuroglou, an extract of which appears below.
Perhaps 2021 can be the year then, to at least start to change that, as, in the face of closures and international border restrictions, we satiate the travel bug by exploring our own backyards more enthusiastically than ever before.
Everywhere we go, from Broome to Bass Strait, we can be mindful of the Aboriginal culture there, past, present and future. And we can make this an endeavour not of token deference, but of real personal enlightenment and even national conciliation.
Lapsed bookworm? How you can get back into the habit of reading
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Are you reluctant to curl up with a good book? Were you once an avid reader, but you’ve lost the habit? Is there always something more important to do, or more TV series to binge watch, or more social media to scroll?
You are not alone. A UK study in 2015 revealed that almost a third of the population, about 16 million people, were lapsed readers. They had not read since leaving formal education, or because their reading habits had been interrupted by illness or a major life event, such as having a child. Nearly half said that lack of time was the reason they didn’t read, or didn’t read more frequently. We can assume similar figures for Australia.
Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 7:55 am, December 17th, 2020 - 66 comments
These are in remarkably good shape. Who would have predicted that dealing properly with a global pandemic would have had better results for the economy than timidly dealing with it and trying to ensure that economic activity continued?
And that making baby boomers stay home and spend their wealth on new kitchens or meals out or local holidays would be much better for the economy than spending the money on overseas holidays or overseas luxuries?
Whatever the reason the country’s figures are looking remarkably good.
A faster and stronger economic rebound from the Covid-19 pandemic will see the government’s finances headed back to surplus sooner than expected, according to the Treasury.