For centuries, various new media technologies have provided individuals with a set of powerful tools to affect their audiences. Among these the magic lantern show was perhaps the most pervasive, and persuasive. Around the world audiences gathered together in darkened rooms to see a sequence of projected images transition one into another as they listened to personal stories or scripted narrations. Through the power of the magic lantern audiences, for the first time, became the direct witnesses to distant, often traumatic, political events; they visually learned new scientific and medical knowledge, virtually experienced distant places, and collectively experienced strange, often uncanny, phenomena. Although relatively neglected until recently, the apparatus of the magic lantern is now receiving the attention it deserves from historians, curators and artists. Through a set of case studies focusing on the use of the magic lantern by very different, but equally fascinating individuals, a team of international scholars analyses the emerging power of the lantern show in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries within politics, religion, travel, science, health, marketing and entertainment. The magic lantern’s connections to today’s multimedia environments are explored through the intertwined themes of connecting, experiencing, witnessing and persuading.

This book examines the flight of young Australian writers to London in the decades before and after Federation in 1901. Peter Morton studies how their careers were shaped by shifting their country of residence, the expatriate experience, and how the loss of these expatriates affected the evolving literary culture of Australia.

Between 1870 and 1940 thousands of Australian women were drawn to London, their imperial metropolis and the centre of the art, publishing, theatrical and educational worlds. This study examines connections between whiteness, colonial status and modernity.

During World War II and the years immediately following, several men were seen by the Australian Security Service as the most dangerous men in the Commonwealth. This history book uncovers the facts to invite readers to make up their own minds.

For the ten years from 1902, when Australia’s suffrage campaigners won the vote for white women, the world looked to this trailblazing young democracy for inspiration. Clare Wright’s epic new history tells the story of that victory—and of Australia’s role in the subsequent international struggle—through the eyes of five remarkable players: the redoubtable Vida Goldstein, the flamboyant Nellie Martel, indomitable Dora Montefiore, daring Muriel Matters, and artist Dora Meeson Coates, who painted the controversial Australian banner carried in the British suffragettes’ monster marches of 1908 and 1911. Clare Wright’s Stella Prize-winning The Forgotten Rebels of Eureka retold one of Australia’s foundation stories from a fresh new perspective. With You Daughters of Freedom she brings to life a time when Australian democracy was the envy of the world—and the standard bearer for progress in a shining new century. Dr Clare Wright is an award-winning historian and author who has worked as an academic, political speechwriter, historical consultant and radio and television broadcaster. Her most recent book, The Forgotten Rebels of Eureka, won the 2014 Stella Prize and the 2014 NIB Award for Literature and was shortlisted for many other awards. ‘You Daughters of Freedom brings some forgotten women into the public discourse again, and we are all the richer for it.’ Australian ‘A celebration of leadership, inspiration, education and sheer individual cheek.’ Sydney Morning Herald ‘Clare Wright’s You Daughters of Freedom is the uplifting story of a time Australia led the world in including women in our democratic project. It is a reminder of our proud legacy and a clarion call for who we can be.’ Penny Wong ‘The essential story of our greatest reformers, and one of our proudest achievements as a nation.’ George Megalogenis ‘A thrilling tale, superbly told, of brave Australian women with a passion for politics.’ Judith Brett ‘A rare achievement. Grand, bold and brilliantly written.’ Mark McKenna ‘This book will be brilliant.’ Annabel Crabb, Chat 10 Looks 3 ‘One of the country’s most accomplished story-tellers relates Australian women’s fight for the vote in all of its passion, intensity and drama.’ Frank Bongiorno, Professor of History, ANU ‘You Daughters of Freedom relates with sparkle and wit the largely untold story of the trailblazing women who not only dragged recalcitrant male leaders into the new century and won the right to vote but also were at the forefront of the struggle for women’s enfranchisement internationally.’ Inside Story ‘Her story of Australian suffragists winning the vote and then running for parliament in 1903 should be required reading in this time of angst over the ‘women problem’ in the federal Liberal Party.’ Weekend Australian Magazine

As the publishing, film and music industries are dominated by Big Media conglomerates, there is often recourse to simplistic ideological and conspiratorial readings of industry dynamics. Copyright, Creativity, Big Media and Cultural Value: Incorporating the Author explains why copyright is much more than a creator’s private property right or a mechanism through which corporations control cultural production and influence mass consumption choices. The volume is grounded in extensive, painstakingly detailed and colourful original archival research into business histories of major successful artists including Conan Doyle, Hall Caine, Margaret Atwood, Dame Nellie Melba, Radiohead and Banksy, and the industries and genres that grew up around their activities. Chapters address big questions about how copyright generates income and how distributions of profits are allocated in the publishing, film and music industries. It includes discussion of the creation of new formats, the interplay between old media and new technologies, international copyright reform and cross-industry relations. Copyright, Creativity, Big Media and Cultural Value is a wide-ranging and important resource for students and practitioners of law and policy, media studies, cultural studies and literary history.