What do you think?
Rate this book
Mateship: A Very Australian History
A ‘mate’ is a mate, right? Wrong, argues Nick Dyrenfurth in this provocative new look at one of Australia’s most talked-about beliefs.
In the first book-length exploration of our secular creed, one of Australia’s leading young historians and public commentators turns mateship’s history upside down. Did you know that the first Australians to call each other ‘mate’ were business partners? Or that many others thought that mateship would be the basis for creating an entirely new society, namely a ‘socialist’ one? For some, the term ‘mate’ is ‘the nicest word in the English language’; while for others it represents the very worst features in our nation’s culture: conformity, bullying, corruption, racism, and misogyny. So what does mateship really mean?
In Mateship: a very Australian history, Dyrenfurth explains why Australians from all walks of life have been so fixated on mateship and repeatedly claimed it as a uniquely national value. He brings to life mateship’s extraordinarily rich and paradoxical history, showing how over more than 200 years of white settler history, shearers and soldiers, brickies and bankers, poets and politicians, and even the odd feminist, including the former prime minister Julia Gillard, have all identified with the national creed.
As Dyrenfurth shows, if there is one aspect of Australian mateship that is unique in global terms, it is the inordinate time we have devoted to talking about it.
In the first book-length exploration of our secular creed, one of Australia’s leading young historians and public commentators turns mateship’s history upside down. Did you know that the first Australians to call each other ‘mate’ were business partners? Or that many others thought that mateship would be the basis for creating an entirely new society, namely a ‘socialist’ one? For some, the term ‘mate’ is ‘the nicest word in the English language’; while for others it represents the very worst features in our nation’s culture: conformity, bullying, corruption, racism, and misogyny. So what does mateship really mean?
In Mateship: a very Australian history, Dyrenfurth explains why Australians from all walks of life have been so fixated on mateship and repeatedly claimed it as a uniquely national value. He brings to life mateship’s extraordinarily rich and paradoxical history, showing how over more than 200 years of white settler history, shearers and soldiers, brickies and bankers, poets and politicians, and even the odd feminist, including the former prime minister Julia Gillard, have all identified with the national creed.
As Dyrenfurth shows, if there is one aspect of Australian mateship that is unique in global terms, it is the inordinate time we have devoted to talking about it.
243 pages, Paperback
First published January 5, 2015
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
August 30, 2018
"Mateship" is one of those generic terms that can mean all sorts of things even in expression: it can be off-hand and perfunctory, informal, friendly, aggressive and other things besides. A user of the term possesses the whole repertoire. Sometimes it's used to imply that the attributes implied by the term are unique to Australia, as though other cultures don't collaborate, help each other and so on.
In this somewhat stodgily written book, Nick Dyrenfurth provides an interesting history of the term and what it has meant regarding friendship and masculinity (the cover design is that of a beer bottle label), as propaganda, political and otherwise. inclusionary and exclusionary in application, depending on what you waht to emphasise with it, as it's one of those terms that can't be criticised, or investigated either, as you're supposed to know what it means without having to delve into it.
Dyrenfurth is from what some might call the left of politics, although that shows how that kind of label has shifted over the years. His political excursions and assessments are particularly objective and well-critiqued. Having said that, this book was a tough read and it took me several weeks to get though it, notwithstanding the topic being of great personal interest..
In this somewhat stodgily written book, Nick Dyrenfurth provides an interesting history of the term and what it has meant regarding friendship and masculinity (the cover design is that of a beer bottle label), as propaganda, political and otherwise. inclusionary and exclusionary in application, depending on what you waht to emphasise with it, as it's one of those terms that can't be criticised, or investigated either, as you're supposed to know what it means without having to delve into it.
Dyrenfurth is from what some might call the left of politics, although that shows how that kind of label has shifted over the years. His political excursions and assessments are particularly objective and well-critiqued. Having said that, this book was a tough read and it took me several weeks to get though it, notwithstanding the topic being of great personal interest..
January 7, 2015
MATESHIP cleverly and concisely chronicles the colorful Australian colloquialism from it's early iteration and kindred-spirit like inception in early settler outback folklore through to the patriotism-inspired political wordplay commonplace in the Hawke and Howard Governments.
Author Nick Dtrenfurth goes to great lengths, extensively researching and unearthing propaganda material from WWI, poetry, literature, and film references to mateship - what it means, how it's perceived, how it segregates and units gender/races.
I found a lot of the material interesting and insightful. Mateship is ambiguous and can hold differing meaning for individuals all varying by their independent association of the word largely driven by their predicament and/or walk(s) of life.
MATESHIP details the broad and at times over-inflated use of the term for both the honest (support a mate who is down on his luck) and slightly skewed (war time propaganda or as a mechanism to dredge early Union membership drives) purpose though maintaining a neutral stance.
Clocking in at a tick over 200pgs, MATESHIP is easily readable, coming across more like a series of essays with linked themes segued from chapter to chapter. Readers curious about the history and Australian adaptation of mateship should pick this up.
Review first appeared on my blog: http://justaguythatlikes2read.blogspo...
Author Nick Dtrenfurth goes to great lengths, extensively researching and unearthing propaganda material from WWI, poetry, literature, and film references to mateship - what it means, how it's perceived, how it segregates and units gender/races.
I found a lot of the material interesting and insightful. Mateship is ambiguous and can hold differing meaning for individuals all varying by their independent association of the word largely driven by their predicament and/or walk(s) of life.
MATESHIP details the broad and at times over-inflated use of the term for both the honest (support a mate who is down on his luck) and slightly skewed (war time propaganda or as a mechanism to dredge early Union membership drives) purpose though maintaining a neutral stance.
Clocking in at a tick over 200pgs, MATESHIP is easily readable, coming across more like a series of essays with linked themes segued from chapter to chapter. Readers curious about the history and Australian adaptation of mateship should pick this up.
Review first appeared on my blog: http://justaguythatlikes2read.blogspo...
October 25, 2016
Well worth the read for folks interested in the creation of mateship mythology in Australian history.. a story that is not over yet.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews