Bushman or Boer – Australian Identity in a ‘White Man’s War’, 1899–1902
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.25602/GOLD.bjmh.v7i1.1468Abstract
This article considers Australian articulations of identity and representations of Boer soldiers in the South African War. Examining accounts from Australian war correspondents and military personnel, we make three observations. First, that widespread expressions of British Empire loyalty shaped rather than excluded expressions of nascent Australian nationalism. Second, that emergent Australian nationalism, particularly the notion of the ‘bushman’, was central to positive and negative comparisons to Boer soldiers. Finally, that transnational discourses of settler colonialism and whiteness enabled such comparisons, which simultaneously facilitated claims about Australian martial superiority and deceptive Boer indolence, despite noted similarities between bushman and Boer.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2021 British Journal for Military History
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.