Discursive Journeys: visual identities from 19th century Tasmania

Much has been written about the formation of contemporary Indigenous identity in Australia. Discourse analysis drawing on the work of Stuart Hall has pointed to the power of historical narratives in influencing not only structural relations of power impacting on minority peoples and perceptions of their culture in the twentieth century, but also on individual conceptions of self-identity. Hall established the importance of visual representations, strongly influencing approaches to critical examination of popular media. My recent research on the visual representation of Tasmanian Aboriginal people in colonial art points to the need to extend this examination to include early nineteenth-century images of Indigenous people and culture in Australia. This paper will discuss several examples of how depictions of Tasmanian Aboriginal people across multiple genres during this period have influenced an emotional landscape of discursive identities in Aboriginal Tasmania.