Land Settlement In Early Tasmania - Creating An Antipodean England
By Sharon Morgan
Published by Cambridge University Press: Cambridge 1992 1st Edition
"Sharon Morgan's Land Settlement in Early Tasmania: Creating an Antipodean England (Cambridge University Press, 1992, First Edition) offers a rigorous and deeply researched examination of how British settlers sought to transplant familiar systems of land ownership, agriculture, and social order into the unfamiliar landscape of Van Diemen's Land. Focusing on the early decades of colonisation, Morgan explores the processes of land alienation and allocation, revealing how imperial ideals were imposed upon both the environment and its original inhabitants. The work stands as one of the first comprehensive studies to connect land policy with the shaping of colonial society in Tasmania.
Drawing on an impressive range of primary sources—including diaries, letters, government records, and contemporary reports—Morgan reconstructs the lived experience of settlement with clarity and nuance. She examines the rapid transformation of the Tasmanian landscape through farming, grazing, and resource extraction, while also confronting the profound consequences of European expansion on Aboriginal communities. The narrative brings to life a society marked by rigid hierarchies of class, race, and gender, where ambition, hardship, and violence coexisted within the framework of an emerging colonial economy.
At once an environmental history, a social study, and a critical account of imperial ambition, this volume situates Tasmania within the broader context of nineteenth-century European expansion. Morgan's scholarship not only deepens our understanding of early Australian colonial development but also challenges simplified narratives of settlement by revealing its complexities and contradictions. This authoritative and thought-provoking work will appeal to collectors of Australian history, scholars of colonial and environmental studies, and readers interested in the foundations of Tasmanian society.
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General wear, minor chipping and fading to dustjacket. No inscriptions. A nice clean copy in very good condition overall. Please study photos to further understand condition.
