Contents

Introduction………………………………………………….……….………….…3

Chapter I: The British Empire - Overview…………………………………………4

Chapter II: Malta…………………………………………………………………...9

Chapter III: South

Africa…………………………………………………………..13

Chapter IV: Australia……………………………………………………………...17

Conclusion

Appendix

References
 Introduction

In the 16th Century, Britain began to build its empire, spreading the country’s rule and power
beyond its borders through a process called ‘imperialism‘. This brought huge changes to
societies, industries, cultures and the lives of people all around the world. Spanning over 400
years, historians continue to research and discover new things about the British Empire. And
today more than ever, people are recognising, questioning and understanding the full
story behind this important part of world history.

I decided to write about this subject because of my fascination with cultures, languages and
history, and what better way to incorporate them all if not discussing about a worldwide empire
that had an impact on everyone at those times, but also in the now. It’s worth mentioning that
while researching this topic, I realised how many gaps were in my knowledge regarding
imperialism and world powers in past times, but through this paper I was able to learn new things
that were sufficient to bring enough arguments on the theme of colony establishment and
afterwards, advancement of certain territories throughout the Commonwealth.

The purpose of my work is to give insight on the history of the British Empire, with more regard
towards the colonies, but also on the evolution and development of the former now-rising
modern powers. This paper will also discuss in the followings the key reasons why any
acquisition of land, people or resources is a double-edge sword in the face of time and change.
 Chapter I: The British Empire – Overview
Origins of the British Empire

Great Britain made its first tentative efforts to establish overseas settlements in the 16th century.
Maritime expansion, driven by commercial ambitions and by competition with France,
accelerated in the 17th century and resulted in the establishment of settlements in North
America and the West Indies. By 1670 there were British American colonies in New England,
Virginia, and Maryland and settlements in the Bermudas, Honduras, Antigua, Barbados,
and Nova Scotia. Jamaica was obtained by conquest in 1655, and the Hudson’s Bay
Company established itself in what became northwestern Canada from the 1670s on. The East
India Company began establishing trading posts in India in 1600, and the Straits
Settlements (Penang, Singapore, Malacca, and Labuan) became British through an extension of
that company’s activities. The first permanent British settlement on the African continent was
made at James Island in the Gambia River in 1661. Slave trading had begun earlier in Sierra
Leone, but that region did not become a British possession until 1787. Britain acquired the Cape
of Good Hope (now in South Africa) in 1806, and the South African interior was opened up
by Boer and British pioneers under British control.

Nearly all these early settlements arose from the enterprise of particular companies and magnates
rather than from any effort on the part of the English crown. The crown exercised some rights of
appointment and supervision, but the colonies were essentially self-managing enterprises. The
formation of the empire was thus an unorganized process based on gradual acquisition,
sometimes with the British government being the least willing partner in the enterprise.

In the 17th and 18th centuries, the crown exercised control over its colonies chiefly in the areas
of trade and shipping. In accordance with the mercantilist philosophy of the time, the colonies
were regarded as a source of necessary raw materials for England and were granted monopolies
for their products, such as tobacco and sugar, in the British market. In return, they were expected
to conduct all their trade by means of English ships and to serve as markets for British
manufactured goods. The Navigation Act of 1651 and subsequent acts set up a closed economy
between Britain and its colonies; all colonial exports had to be shipped on English ships to the
British market, and all colonial imports had to come by way of England. This arrangement lasted
until the combined effects of the loss of the American colonies and the growth of a free-trade
movement in Britain, which slowly brought it to an end in the first half of the 19th century.

The slave trade acquired a peculiar importance to Britain’s colonial economy in the Americas,

and it became an economic necessity for the Caribbean colonies and for the southern parts of the
future United States. Movements for the end of slavery came to fruition in British colonial
possessions long before the similar movement in the United States; the trade was abolished in
1807 and slavery itself in Britain’s dominions in 1833.

Competition with France

British military and naval power, under the leadership of

such men as Robert Clive, James Wolfe, and Eyre Coote,
gained for Britain two of the most important parts of its
empire—Canada and India. Fighting between the British
and French colonies in North America was predominant in
the first half of the 18th century, but the Treaty of Paris of
1763, which ended the Seven Years’ War (known as the French and Indian War in North
America), left Britain dominant in Canada. In India, the East India Company was confronted by
the French “Compagnie des Indes”, but Robert Clive’s military victories against the French and
the rulers of Bengal in the 1750s provided the British with a massive accession of territory and
ensured their future supremacy in India.

The loss of Britain’s 13 American colonies in 1776–83 was compensated by new settlements
in Australia from 1788 and by the spectacular growth of Upper Canada (now Ontario) after the
emigration of loyalists from what had become the United States. The Napoleonic Wars provided
further additions to the empire; the Treaty of Amiens (1802) made Trinidad and Ceylon (now Sri
Lanka) officially British, and in the Treaty of Paris (1814)
France ceded Tobago, Mauritius, Saint Lucia, and Malta. Malacca joined the empire in 1795, and
Sir Stamford Raffles acquired Singapore in 1819. Canadian settlements in Alberta, Manitoba,
and British Columbia extended British influence to the Pacific, while further British conquests in
India brought in the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh and the Central Provinces, East Bengal,
and Assam.
Dominance and
dominions

The 19th century marked the

full flower of the British
Empire. Administration and
policy changed during the
century from the haphazard
arrangements of the 17th and
18th centuries to the
sophisticated system
characteristic of Joseph
Chamberlain’s manner (1895–
1900) in the Colonial Office. That office, which began in 1801, was first an appendage of the
Home Office and the Board of Trade, but by the 1850s it had become a separate department with
a growing staff and a continuing policy; it was the means by which discipline and pressure were
exerted on the colonial governments when such action was considered necessary.

New Zealand became officially British in 1840, after which systematic colonization there
followed rapidly. Partly owing to pressure from missionaries, British control was extended
to Fiji, Tonga, Papua, and other islands in the Pacific Ocean, and in 1877 the British High
Commission for the Western Pacific Islands was created. In the wake of the Indian
Mutiny (1857), the British crown assumed the East India Company’s governmental authority
in India. Britain’s acquisition of Burma (Myanmar) was completed in 1886, while its conquest of
the Punjab (1849) and of Balochistān (1854–76) provided substantial new territory in the Indian
subcontinent itself. The French completion of the Suez Canal (1869) provided Britain with a
much shorter sea route to India. Britain responded to this opportunity by expanding its port
at Aden, establishing a protectorate in Somaliland (now Somalia), and extending its influence in
the sheikhdoms of southern Arabia and the Persian Gulf. Cyprus, which was,
like Gibraltar and Malta, a link in the chain of communication with India through the
Mediterranean, was occupied in 1878. Elsewhere, British influence in the Far East expanded
with the development of the Straits Settlements and the federated Malay states, and in the 1880s
protectorates were formed over Brunei and Sarawak. Hong Kong island became British in 1841,
and an “informal empire” operated in China by way of British treaty ports and the great trading
city of Shanghai.

The greatest 19th-century extension of British power took place in Africa, however. Britain was
the acknowledged ruling force in Egypt from 1882 and in the Sudan from 1899. In the second
half of the century, the Royal Niger Company began to extend British influence in Nigeria, and
the Gold Coast (now Ghana) and The Gambia also became British possessions. The
Imperial British East Africa Company operated in what are now Kenya and Uganda, and the
British South Africa Company operated in what are now Zimbabwe (formerly Southern
Rhodesia), Zambia (formerly Northern Rhodesia), and Malawi. Britain’s victory in the South
African War (1899–1902) enabled it to annex the Transvaal and the Orange Free State in 1902
and to create the Union of South Africa in 1910. The resulting chain of British territories
stretching from South Africa northward to Egypt realized an enthusiastic British public’s idea of
an African empire extending “from the Cape to Cairo.” By the end of the 19th century, the
British Empire comprised nearly one-quarter of the world’s land surface and more than one-
quarter of its total population.

The idea of limited self-government for some of Britain’s colonies was first recommended
for Canada by Lord Durham in 1839. This report proposed “responsible self-government” for
Canada, so that a cabinet of ministers chosen by the Canadians could exercise executive powers
instead of officials chosen by the British government. The cabinet would depend primarily on
support by the colonial legislative assembly for its tenure of ministerial office. Decisions
on foreign affairs and defense, however, would still be made by a governor-general acting on
orders from the British government in London. The system whereby some colonies were allowed
largely to manage their own affairs under governors appointed by the mother country spread
rapidly. In 1847 it was put into effect in the colonies in Canada, and it was later extended to
the Australian colonies, New Zealand, and to the Cape Colony and Natal in southern Africa.
These colonies obtained such complete control over their internal affairs that in 1907 they were
granted the new status of dominions. In 1910 another dominion, the Union of South Africa, was
formed from the Cape Colony, Natal, and the former Boer republics of the Transvaal and the
Orange Free State.

This select group of nations within the empire, with substantial European populations and long
experience of British forms and practices, was often referred to as the British Commonwealth.
The demands and stresses of World War I and its aftermath led to a more formal recognition of
the special status of the dominions. When Britain had declared war on Germany in 1914 it was
on behalf of the entire empire, the dominions as well as the colonies. But after World War I
ended in 1918, the dominions signed the peace treaties for themselves and joined the newly
formed League of Nations as independent states equal to Britain. In 1931 the Statute of
Westminster recognized them as independent countries “within the British Empire, equal in
status” to the United Kingdom. The statute referred specifically to the “British Commonwealth
of Nations.” When World War II broke out in 1939, the dominions made their own declarations
of war.

Nationalism and the Commonwealth

Nationalist sentiment developed rapidly in many of these areas

after World War I and even more so after World War II, with the
result that, beginning with India in 1947, independence was granted
them, along with the option of retaining an association with Great
Britain and other former dependencies in the Commonwealth of
Nations (the adjective “British” was not used officially after 1946).
Indian and Pakistani independence was followed by that
of Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) and Burma (Myanmar) in 1948. The
Gold Coast became the first sub-Saharan African colony to reach
independence (as Ghana) in 1957. The movement of Britain’s remaining colonies in
Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean toward self-government gained speed in the years after 1960 as
international pressure mounted (especially at the United Nations), as the notion of independence
spread in the colonies themselves, and as the British public, which was no longer actively
imperial in its sentiments, accepted the idea of independence as a foregone conclusion.
The last significant British colony, Hong Kong, was returned to Chinese sovereignty in 1997. By
then, virtually nothing remained of the empire. The Commonwealth, however, remained a
remarkably flexible and durable institution

Chapter II: Malta

Introduction & Quick facts

Malta, island country located in the

central Mediterranean Sea. A small but
strategically important group of islands,
the archipelago has through its long and
turbulent history played a vital role in the
struggles of a succession of powers for
domination of the Mediterranean and in
the interplay between emerging Europe and the older cultures of Africa and the Middle East. As
a result, Maltese society has been molded by centuries of foreign rule by various powers,
including the Phoenicians, Romans, Greeks, Arabs, Normans, Sicilians, Swabians, Aragonese,
Hospitallers, French, and British.

The island of Malta specifically played a vital strategic role in World War II as a base for
the Allied Powers. It was heavily bombarded by German and Italian aircraft, and by the end of
the war Malta was devastated. In 1942 the island of Malta was presented with the George Cross,
a British award for great gallantry, in recognition of the wartime bravery of the Maltese people.
After the war, the movement for self-governance became stronger. The country of Malta became
independent from Britain and joined the Commonwealth in 1964 and was declared a republic on
December 13, 1974. It was admitted to the European Union (EU) in 2004. A European
atmosphere predominates in Malta as a result of close association with the Continent, particularly
with southern Europe. The Maltese are renowned for their warmth, hospitality, and generosity to
strangers, a trait that was noted in the Acts of the Apostles, with respect to the experience of St.
Paul, the Apostle, who was said to have been shipwrecked off Malta in 60 CE.Roman
Catholicism is a major influence on Maltese culture. Various traditions have evolved around
religious celebrations, notably those honouring the patron saints of towns and villages. The
eight-pointed, or Maltese, cross, adopted by the Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem in 1126, is
commonly linked with Malta’s identity and is printed on the country’s euro coin. Valletta is the
capital city.

Land
The country comprises five islands—Malta (the largest), Gozo (Għawdex), and the uninhabited
islets of Comino (Kemmunett) and Filfla—lying some 93 km south of Sicily, 290 km north
of Libya, and about 290 km east of Tunisia, at the eastern end of the constricted portion of the
Mediterranean Sea separating Italy from the African coast.

Tourism

Malta has a long and rich history, and this is reflected in the island's cultural attractions.
The Phoenicians, the Carthaginians, the Romans and the Byzantines have all occupied Malta at
some point in history, leaving a mix of many different architectural styles and artifacts to
explore. The sovereignty of the Knights Hospitaller over Malta from 1530 to 1798 resulted in a
legacy of elaborate artistry and architecture throughout Malta. The country's modern museums
and art galleries feature relics from Malta's history for tourists and Maltese residents alike to
enjoy.

There are also a number of aquatic activities to enjoy on Malta as well as Gozo and Comino.
Northern Malta is home to the country's beach resorts and holiday areas, with the beaches most
popular with holiday-makers being Mellieha Bay, Ghajn Tuffieha and Golden Bay. These
beaches are large enough to be able to house cafes, restaurants and kiosks, but small enough to
rarely be crowded. Malta's northwest is home to the island's quietest beaches, and it is on these
that the main island's neighbouring two are nearest. Gozo and Comino are also popular beach
spots for holiday-makers, although these are much more likely to be quieter, rockier and more
suitable for snorkelling. The Mediterranean Sea surrounding Malta is popular for diving - while
shallow dips may be attractive to beginning divers, more experienced divers may be able to dive
deeper to find historical artifacts from World War II or earlier.

Major event tourism, especially events centred on Catholicism, is an important segment of the
Maltese tourism sector. During Holy Week, processions and religious services dominate the
country and food stalls are set up in the village squares of Malta. Another popular major event
is Carnival, a five centuries-old traditional celebration lasting for the five days preceding Ash
Wednesday. Celebrations for Carnival involve float-based pageants, street parties and street food
stalls. They are mostly Roman Catholic.

One of the biggest sporting events held on the island is the Malta Marathon. Held every year in
late February or early March, the race attracts a number of international competitors and has
been sponsored by Land Rover since 2009, BMW from 2003 to 2008, GoMobile in 2002 and
Flora Malta in 2001 and prior.

Language

Semitic in origin Maltese is a

language that is Semitic in its
origins, but is the only one of its
type that is written in a Latin
script as opposed to Arabic
lettering. The language was first
mentioned in a ballad written by
Pietro Caxaro in the 1400's and the Knights of Malta also attempted to script it as well. Although
it was only a spoken language until the later part of the 19th Century when its rules and grammar
were defined and written, its roots and origins go back much further. It's believed that the
Phoenicians, who arrived in Malta in 750 BC, brought the basis of the Maltese language with
them which was then further developed through the influence of the many invaders and ruling
civilisations that followed.

In the 9th Century AD, Malta was home to a ruling Arab population who spent over 400 years
making their mark on the island. Everything from food to architecture was influenced by their
stay, but their influences on Maltese language remains as their biggest legacy. Most notably,
place names, numbers, days of the week, and basic conversational words provide the clearest
links to the language's Arabic influence.

Some common phrases in Maltese:

 ENGLISH MALTI (MALTESE)

Welcome! (greeting) Merħba! [mɛrħ.bɐ]

How are you? Kif int/intom? [kif int/in.tɔm]

Reply to “How are you?” Jien tajjeb grazzi. U int? (m) [jiɛn ta.jɛb
grɐ.t͡si/ʊ: int]
Jiena tajba grazzi. U int? (f) [jiɛ.nɐ taj.bɐ
grɐ.t͡si/ʊ: int]

What's your name? X’jismek? [ʃjis.mek]

Goodbye Saħħa [sɐ:. ħɐ]

Please Jekk jogħġbok [jɛk jɔ:d͡ʒ.bɔk]

Thank you Grazzi [grɐ.t͡si]

Valletta
Valletta [vɐˈlːɛtːɐ] is the administrative unit and capital of Malta. Located on the main island,
between Marsamxett Harbour to the west and the Grand Harbour to the east, its population
within administrative limits in 2014 was 6,444. According to the data from 2020 by Eurostat, the
Functional Urban Area and metropolitan region covered the whole island and has a population of
480,134. Valletta is the southernmost capital of Europe, and at just 0.61 square kilometres it is
the European Union's smallest capital city.

Valletta's 16th-century buildings were constructed by the Knights Hospitaller. The city was
named after Jean Parisot de Valette, who succeeded in defending the island from an Ottoman
invasion during the Great Siege of Malta. The city is Baroque in character, with elements
of Mannerist, Neo-Classical and Modern architecture, though the Second World War left major
scars on the city, particularly the destruction of the Royal Opera House. The city was officially
recognised as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1980. Today, with 320 monuments, is one
of the most dense monuments areas in the world. Sometimes called an "open-air
museum", Valletta was chosen as the European Capital of Culture in 2018. Valletta is also the
sunniest city in Europe.

The city is noted for its fortifications, consisting of bastions, curtains and cavaliers, along with

the beauty of its Baroque palaces, gardens and churches.
 Chapter III: South Africa
Introduction & Quick facts

South Africa, the

southernmost country on the
African continent, renowned for its
varied topography, great natural
beauty, and cultural diversity.

The San people were the first

settlers; the Khoikhoi and Bantu-
speaking tribes followed. The
Dutch East India Company landed
the first European settlers on the Cape of Good Hope in 1652, launching a colony that by the end
of the 18th century numbered only about 15,000. Known as Boers or Afrikaners, and speaking a
Dutch dialect known as Afrikaans, the settlers as early as 1795 tried to establish an independent
republic.

After occupying the Cape Colony in that year, Britain took permanent possession in 1815 at the
end of the Napoleonic Wars, bringing in 5,000 settlers. Anglicization of government and the
freeing of slaves in 1833 drove about 12,000 Afrikaners to make the “great trek” north and east
into African tribal territory, where they established the republics of the Transvaal and the Orange
Free State.

The discovery of diamonds in 1867 and gold nine years later brought an influx of “outlanders”
into the republics and spurred Cape Colony prime minister Cecil Rhodes to plot annexation.
Rhodes's scheme of sparking an “outlander” rebellion, to which an armed party under Leander
Starr Jameson would ride to the rescue, misfired in 1895, forcing Rhodes to resign. What British
expansionists called the “inevitable” war with the Boers broke out on Oct. 11, 1899. The defeat
of the Boers in 1902 led in 1910 to the Union of South Africa, composed of four provinces, the
two former republics, and the old Cape and Natal colonies. Louis Botha, a Boer, became the first
prime minister. Organized political activity among Africans started with the establishment of the
African National Congress in 1912.

Jan Christiaan Smuts brought the nation into World War II on the Allied side against Nationalist
opposition, and South Africa became a charter member of the United Nations in 1945, but he
refused to sign the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Apartheid—racial separation—
dominated domestic politics as the Nationalists gained power and imposed greater restrictions on
Bantus (black Africans), Asians, and Coloreds (in South Africa the term meant any nonwhite
person). Black voters were removed from the voter rolls in 1936. Over the next half-century, the
nonwhite population of South Africa was forced out of designated white areas. The Group Areas
Acts of 1950 and 1986 forced about 1.5 million Africans to move from cities to rural townships,
where they lived in abject poverty under repressive laws.

South Africa declared itself a republic in 1961 and severed its ties with the Commonwealth,
which strongly objected to the country's racist policies. The white supremacist National Party,
which had first come to power in 1948, would continue its rule for the next three decades.

In 1960, 70 black protesters were killed during a peaceful demonstration in Sharpesville. The
African National Congress (ANC), the principal antiapartheid organization, was banned that
year, and in 1964 its leader, Nelson Mandela, was sentenced to life imprisonment. Black protests
against apartheid grew stronger and more violent. In 1976, an uprising in the black township of
Soweto spread to other black townships and left 600 dead. Beginning in the 1960s, international
opposition to apartheid intensified. The UN imposed sanctions, and many countries divested
their South African holdings.

Apartheid's grip on South Africa began to give way when F. W. de Klerk replaced P. W. Botha
as president in 1989. De Klerk removed the ban on the ANC and released its leader, Nelson
Mandela, after 27 years of imprisonment. The Inkatha Freedom Party, a black opposition group
led by Mangosuthu Buthelezi, which was seen as
collaborating with the apartheid system, frequently
clashed with the ANC during this period.

Tourism
South Africa offers both domestic and international tourists a wide variety of options, among
others the picturesque natural landscape and game reserves, diverse cultural heritage and highly
regarded wines. Some of the most popular destinations include several national parks, such as the
expansive Kruger National Park in the north of the country, the coastlines and beaches of
the KwaZulu-Natal and Western Cape provinces, and the major cities like Cape
Town, Johannesburg and Durban.

South Africa is ranked sixth out of the world's seventeen megadiverse countries, being home to a
large variety of animal life. Among the large mammals found in the northern bushveld include
lions, leopards, cheetahs, white rhinoceroses, blue wildebeest, kudus, impalas, hyenas,
hippopotamuses and giraffes. A significant extent of the bushveld exists in the north-east,
including the Kruger National Park, one of the largest game reserves in Africa, and the Sabi Sand
Game Reserve. The Kruger National Park, established in 1926, is one of the most visited national
parks in the country, with a total of 1 659 793 visitors in the 2014/15 period. The region is also
home to nearly 80 percent of the world’s rhino population. Due to covid-19 restrictions impeding
tourism and movement in the region, the killings of rhino species in South Africa have fallen by
53 percent in 2020.

Languages

Until the mid-1990s, the official languages of

South Africa were Dutch, Afrikaans and English—
despite African languages being spoken by more
than 80% of the population. Fortunately, 1996
brought a new constitution, which changed all of
that. Now, there are 11 official languages in South
Africa, nine of which are African languages from
the Bantu family. They were brought from West Africa as early as 3000 BCE. As part of the
larger Niger-Congo language family, all the African languages of South Africa are tonal: Using a
high or low tone changes the meaning of a word.  
The 11 official languages of South Africa, in the frequency order, are: Zulu (isiZulu), Xhosa
(isiXhosa), Afrikaans, English, Sesotho sa Leboa (Northern Sotho), Setswana, Sesotho (Southern
Sotho), Xitsonga (Tsonga), siSwati (Swazi), Tshivenda (Venda), Ndebele.
Afrikaans language, also called Cape Dutch, West Germanic language of South Africa,
developed from 17th-century Dutch, sometimes called Netherlandic, by the descendants of
European (Dutch, German, and French) colonists, indigenous Khoisan peoples, and African and
Asian slaves in the Dutch colony at the Cape of Good Hope. Afrikaans and English are the
only Indo-European languages among the many official languages of South Africa. Although
Afrikaans is very similar to Dutch, it is clearly a separate language, differing from Standard
Dutch in its sound system and its loss of case and gender distinctions.
Some common phrases in Afrikaans:

ENGLISH AFRIKAANS

Welcome! (greeting) Welkom! [væ:l.kɔm]

Hello! (general greeting) Goeie dag! [χuj dɐχ]

How are you? Hoe gaan dit met jou? [ɦu χɑːn dit mət jɵw]

Reply to ‘How are you?’ Goed, dankie, en met jou? [χut dan.ki ɛn mət
jɵw]
Where are you from? Waarvandaan kom jy? [vɑːrfɐndɑːn kɔm jəj]

Goodbye! Totsiens! [tɔt.sins]

Please Asseblief [ɐsə.blif]

Excuse me Verskoon my [fər.skoən məj]

Thank you Baie dankie [bɐ.jə dan.ki]

Reply to ‘Thank you’ Dis ‘n plesier [dis ə plə.sir]

Bon apepetit Smaaklike ete [smɑːk.li.kə æ:tɛ]

 Chapter IV: Australia
Introduction & Quick Facts
Australia, the smallest continent and one of
the largest countries on Earth, lying between
the Pacific and Indian oceans in the Southern
Hemisphere. Australia’s capital is Canberra,
located in the southeast between the larger
and more important economic and cultural
centres of Sydney and Melbourne.
The Australian mainland extends from west
to east for nearly 2,500 miles (4,000 km) and from Cape York Peninsula in the northeast to
Wilsons Promontory in the southeast for nearly 2,000 miles (3,200 km). To the south, Australian
jurisdiction extends a further 310 miles (500 km) to the southern extremity of the island of
Tasmania, and in the north it extends to the southern shores of Papua New Guinea. Australia is
separated from Indonesia to the northwest by the Timor and Arafura seas, from Papua New
Guinea to the northeast by the Coral Sea and the Torres Strait, from the Coral Sea Islands
Territory by the Great Barrier Reef, from New Zealand to the southeast by the Tasman Sea, and
from Antarctica in the far south by the Indian Ocean.
The Dutch first sighted Australia in 1606 before Captain Cook colonised the land for Great
Britain in 1770. The First Fleet of 11 boats arrived at Botany Bay in 1788 to establish New South
Wales as a penal colony (receiving convicts until 1848). Convicts were later sent to the other
states, with the exception of South Australia, which was established as a free colony in 1836.
Over 162,000 convicts were transported to Australia from Great Britain, the majority to New
South Wales and Tasmania.
The discovery of gold in Australia (in Bathurst first, then Ballarat in 1851) kickstarted the
economy and created the idea of Australia as a desirable location. The year 1854 saw the Eureka
Stockade in Ballarat, a rebellion against taxation that some see as a crucial event in the evolution
of Australia’s democracy. This is also the first period of Chinese immigration, with 50,000
Chinese arriving and the establishment of many Chinatowns.
The Commonwealth of Australia was created in 1901 with the Federation of all the states. It was
agreed that the capital could be in NSW but no closer than 100 kilometres from Sydney. This led
to the creation of Canberra, with a temporary parliament set up in Melbourne for 27 years. Both
New Zealand and Fiji were invited to join the Federation of the states but declined the
invitations.
In April 1915, the Australian and New Zealand Anzac Corps (ANZACs) took part in the World
War I Gallipoli Campaign. Despite the defeat, this battle has great relevance in defining the
characteristics of Australians. April 25, the date of the first landing at Gallipoli, is ANZAC Day
– the date Australians remember and pay respects for the sacrifice of our Armed Forces, both
past and present, in conflicts around the world. Almost 39% of Australia’s male population
between 18 and 44 enlisted to fight in World War I.
The end of World War II, and then subsequently the Vietnam War, led to an influx of migrants to
Australia. The Snowy Mountains Scheme (1949 – 1974) employed 100,000 people, with 70%
being migrants from 30 different nations. Steady Asian migration began in the 1970s, and now
people from all over the world call Australia home. This is reflected in many aspects of
Australian life, with Australian society known for its equality and lack of clear class distinctions.
Tourism
Tourism in Australia is an important part of the
Australian economy, and comprises domestic and
international visitors. Popular Australian
destinations include the coastal cities of Sydney,
Brisbane and Melbourne, as well as other high-
profile destinations including regional Queensland,
the Gold Coast and the Great Barrier Reef, the world’s largest reef. Uluru and the Australian
outback are other popular locations, as is the Tasmanian wilderness. The unique Australian
wildlife is also another significant point of interest in the country's tourism.
The Great Barrier Reef attracts up to two million visitors every year. Careful management, which
includes permits for camping and all commercial marine tourism within the Great Barrier Reef
Marine Park, has so far ensured that tourists have a very minimal impact on the reef. Uluru,
Kakadu National Park and Fraser Island are major natural attractions. Uluru won the 2013
Qantas Australian Tourism Awards and was named Australia’s best major tourist attraction.
In December 2013, Greg Hunt, the Australian environment minister, approved a plan for
dredging to create three shipping terminals as part of the construction of a coal port. According
to corresponding approval documents, the process will create around 3 million cubic metres of
dredged seabed that will be dumped within the Great Barrier Reef marine park area.
Language
Even though there is no official
constitution, Australian English is one more
English variant spoken in Australia. It’s also
the first language of the majority, as well as
de facto language on this continent. It
diverged from the British English right after
the first settlers set up the colony. Very soon,
many recognized it as the speech that became
different from British English. And the rest is
pure history. Over time, this English variant,
even though it remained faithful to the
British English, created its own words, phrases and adopted some other spelling rules.