Australian Research Immigration Museum

Question: How does the Immigration Museum present the history of cultural diversity in Australia? Answer: The immigration history of Australia is primarily displayed in the Immigration Museum. The museum is located in the Old Customs House in Melbourne Victoria, on the Flinders Street (Victoria, 2017). The Immigration Museum is famous for its significant space, which is the Long room, and this is considered as one of the notable pieces of Renaissance Revival architecture. This is a cultural museum and hence, it presents the history of the cultural diversity in this nation. In the following parts, the background of this museum, along with how this museum illustrates the history and society of Australia, has been elucidated. (Source: Museums Victoria, 2017a) In 1988, the immigration museum was initially opened in the Old Customs House in Melbourne (City of Melbourne, 2017). And it is considered as one of the most important public buildings of the 19th century of Melbourne. This museum is a division of the Museum Victoria, which is responsible for the administration of the cultural, as well as, the scientific collections of Victoria. The sister museums of immigration museum are Scienceworks Museum, Melbourne Museum, and also includes the Royal Exhibition Building (Museums Victoria, 2017). The guiding principle behind this museum is that in the family history or the life of all the non-Indigenous Australians, there is an immigration experience. The activities and the museum facilities are comprised of public and educational programs, touring exhibitions, discovery centre and a community gallery. These also include exhibitions, community engagement activities and community festivals. The immigration history of Victoria is explored through permanent exhibitions by global motivations for personal stories of immigrants from different nations, as well as time periods, for leaving the homeland, for the over time journey of ship and for the history of the policies and processes of the immigration of Australia. Recently, the museum had launched an exhibition which explored the complexity of the personal identity, and it also explored how such diversity has in the past, and continues to inform the society of Australia, along with the present and past experiences of belonging or not belonging. The presentation of such subjects are presented in different manners, some of which include the object and image based displays, the presentation in audio-visual manner, on site computer information outlets, interactive theatre, and the immersive experiences, for instance, a series of recreated ship environments (McFadzean, 2012). (Source: Museums Victoria, 2017b) The exhibitions display thousands and hundreds of objects from the collection of museum which relates to popular culture, customs and quarantine, cultural diversity, migration and transport technology. The collection consists of 6000 objects and over, which document the Victorians experiences regarding migration since the 1830s. And the long history since then, of the cultural diversity of the broader Australian population, and of the Victorian population is also covered in this museum. This museum connects with an assorted range of families, organizations, individuals and communities, in order to increase its exhibitions and collections. By following this manner, the museum tries to represent a number of individual vices and the personal stories, to a great extent, so as to present some real experiences which are seen or interpreted as empathetic, moving, thought-provoking, and relevant as well (McFadzean, 2012). Victorians are natives of over 200 nations and speak over 260 languages, as well as, dialects. The religious faith followed in this state of Australia is over 165 (Immigration Museum, 2017). This museum shows why the people left their nations and resided in Victoria and how their arrival as molded Victoria as a state. Immigration, in itself, has been a topic surrounded by huge controversies in contemporary Australia. And this begs the question that whether or not this museum is able to display the history in a proper and accurate manner (McLean, 2014). (Source: Museums Victoria, 2017c) The immigration museum provides a timeline, as highlighted in the picture above, which consists of a concise outline about the key moments in the immigration history of Victoria, as it highlights the important social and policy developments, along with how the demographics and populations have shifted, in addition to showing the impact of the immigration over the Indigenous Australians. The timeline provides a decade by decade summary by showing the important initiation points for the exploration of a range of themes, which relate to the immigration, for instance the debates and schemes on immigration, along with the national identity. The historical images for each of such periods, along with the statistics which show the growth of population on Victoria and Australia since the year of 1830 have also been highlighted. This display is thorough, and successfully highlights changes in the immigration history of Victoria (Museums Victoria, 2017c). Australia has undergone a period of great change in the early 1970s. Through a referendum of 1967, the Indigenous Australians were recognized as the citizens in their own nation. Vietnam War resulted in a lot of refugees coming to Australia and this led to the change of the ethnic mix in the nation (Griffin and Paroissien, 2011). This phase of migration has also been highlighted in the Immigration Museum. A significant part of the immigration history of Australia, is how the custom officers had collected the import duties, controlled the entry into Victoria and Australia, inspected the ships for smuggled goods, put a stop over illegal trade of banned films and books, prevented the importation of illegal drugs, and put a stop over the importation of contaminated and endangered products. The museum covers a number of pictures which depict how the immigrants retained their culture and their way of life when they came to Victoria. Moreover, the issues of adapting to the new landscape and climate, in addition to a new language, have also been shown. The first picture below shows the arrival of the immigrants at the Melbourne Docklands; the second one shows the arrival of the Dutch migrants in 1950s in Melbourne; and the third picture shows the arrival of the early Malteze immigrants in 1940s at Port Philip Bay. The museum explores how these people came and settled and how they began a new phase of life in Victoria; each one having its own unique story (Family Getaways Melbourne, 2017). (Source: Family Getaways Melbourne, 2017) (Source: Family Getaways Melbourne, 2017) (Source: Family Getaways Melbourne, 2017) It is often said that even after the growing recognition of the contribution which is made by the immigrants to Australia; the one museum within the country of Australia is the immigration museum, which is completely devoted to the immigrants and their culture. Some of the celebratory aspects of the immigration history have been easier to present, in comparison to some of the complex or more difficult issues. There have been quite a few number of museum programs of the immigration museum that have dared to touch the aspects which are unsafe and go beyond the superficial. Yet, the Getting In program of this museum, along with the exhibitions it portrays, does cover and explore the inception, as well as, the consequences of racism at the Chinese and Jewish museums (Griffin and Paroissien, 2011). Though, a continuous problem in such museums is the limit of matter which can be revealed. This is because the community groups and the individuals trust the museums with such stories which are secrets. And so, the internal divisions which are present within the communities, along with the centuries-old antagonisms stay hidden and silent and survive in such museums. Often the generational differences, which can be established in a majority of the cultures, are kept out of sight. Viv Szekeres, in his write ups regarding the immigration museums has revealed the manner in which the major shifts in Australian societys composition has brought the immigration, along with the diversity of such immigrants who have visited and settled in this country. All this is revealed in a comparable richness of communal experiences, which are covered in the latest museum programs, as well as, in the dedicated institutions along with their collections. The exhibitions which are displayed on the 20th century are based upon the material lent or donated by the migrants of postwar, the persons who were displaced, ten pound Poms, and refugees. And it also consists of the accounts from Hong Hai, which was a ship on which the refugees of Vietnam, in 1970s, had fled the war torn homeland (Szekeres, 2011). From the above analysis, it can be concluded that the Immigration Museum successfully presents the history of cultural diversity in Australia. This is done as the museum shows a timeline covering the various phases of immigration in Australia. This is done in interactive manners of holding exhibitions and audio visual programs. The displays in the museums show how unique each of the community, which arrived in Australia, is and how they have contributed to the present day culture of Australia. The question has been raised regarding the accuracy of the displays of the countrys history, as immigration has been a controversial topic. But the range of details that the museum offers, along with the proofs of displays, solidifies the accuracy of the history depicted in the museum. To sum up this discussion, the immigration museum shows how diverse the immigration history of Victoria, Australia has been. References City of Melbourne. (2017) Immigration Museum. [Online] City of Melbourne. Available from: https://www.thatsmelbourne.com.au/Placestogo/MuseumsandLibraries/Museums/Pages/1428.aspx [Accessed on 23/01/17] Family Getaways Melbourne. (2017) Australia Immigration History: The Immigration Museum. [Online] Family Getaways Melbourne. Available from: https://www.family-getaways-melbourne.com/australia-immigration-history.html [Accessed on 23/01/17] Griffin, D., and Paroissien, L. (2011) Understanding Museums: Australian museums and museology. [Online] National Museum Australia. Available from: https://nma.gov.au/research/understanding-museums/_lib/pdf/Understanding-Museums_Museums_and_history.pdf [Accessed on 23/01/17] Immigration Museum. (2017) About us. [Online] Immigration Museum. Available from: https://museumvictoria.com.au/immigrationmuseum/about-us/ [Accessed on 23/01/17] McFadzean, M. (2012) Immigration Museum. [Online] Museums Victoria Collections. Available from: https://collections.museumvictoria.com.au/articles/10648 [Accessed on 23/01/17] McLean, T. (2014) You Decide: The Immigration Museum, Melbourne. [Online] The Migrationist. Available from: https://themigrationist.net/2014/02/20/you-decide-the-immigration-museum-melbourne/ [Accessed on 23/01/17] Museums Victoria. (2017) Museums Victoria. [Online] Museums Victoria. Available from: https://museumvictoria.com.au/ [Accessed on 23/01/17] Museums Victoria. (2017a) Tickets. [Online] Museums Victoria. Available from: https://museumvictoria.com.au/immigrationmuseum/whats-on/tickets/ [Accessed on 23/01/17] Museums Victoria. (2017b) Getting In. [Online] Museums Victoria. Available from: https://museumvictoria.com.au/immigrationmuseum/whats-on/getting-in/ [Accessed on 23/01/17] Museums Victoria. (2017c) Immigration to Victoria - a Timeline. [Online] Museums Victoria. Available from: https://museumvictoria.com.au/discoverycentre/websites-mini/immigration-timeline/ [Accessed on 23/01/17] Szekeres, V. (2011) Museums and multiculturalism: too vague to understand, too important to ignores. In Griffin, D., and Paroissien, L. (eds) Understanding Museums: Australian Museums and Museology. [Online] National Museum of Australia. Available from: nma.gov.au/research/understanding-museums/VSzekeres_2011.html ISBN 978-1-876944-92-6 [Accessed on 23/01/17] Victoria. (2017) Immigration Museum. [Online] Victoria. Available from: https://www.visitmelbourne.com/regions/Melbourne/Things-to-do/Art-theatre-and-culture/Museums/Immigration-Museum.aspx [Accessed on 23/01/17]