“호주란 어떤 나라인가 — 그 영혼은 무엇인가?” : Schultz, Julianne: Amazon.com.au: Books

The Idea of Australia: A search for the soul of the nation 

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Schultz, Julianne: Amazon.com.au: Books




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Former publisher of Griffith Review Professor Julianne Schultz challenges our notions of what it means to be Australian and asks timely and urgent questions about our national identity.

'Schultz reflects on how we might shake off our fears, our mediocrity and our moral torpor, and rediscover the country we once promised to be' 

KERRY O'BRIEN

'A penetrating analysis' MELISSA LUCASHENKO

'A triumph of art, politics, literature, history, and the deepest scholarship...A towering achievement.' JENNY HOCKING

What is the 'idea of Australia'? What defines the soul of our nation? Are we an egalitarian, generous, outward-looking country? Or is Australia a place that has retreated into silence and denial about the past and become selfish, greedy and insular?

A lifetime of watching Australia as a journalist, editor, academic and writer has given Julianne Schultz a unique platform from which to ask and answer these critical questions. 

The global pandemic gave her time to study the X-ray of our country and the opportunity for perspective and analysis. Schultz came to realise that the idea of Australia is a contest between those who are imaginative, hopeful, altruistic and ambitious, and those who are defensive and inward-looking. She became convinced we need to acknowledge and better understand our past to make sense of our present and build a positive and inclusive future. She suggests what Australia could be: smart, compassionate, engaged, fair and informed.

This important, searing and compelling book explains us to ourselves and suggests ways Australia can realise her true potential. Urgent, inspiring and optimistic, The Idea of Australia presents the vision we need to fully appreciate our great strengths and crucial challenges.

'Timely, bracing, and ultimately hopeful' YASSMIN ABDEL-MAGIED

'Disruptive, bold and brilliant' CLARE WRIGHT

'A brilliant successor to Donald Horne's The Lucky Country' TOM GRIFFITHS

'A contemporary classic in the making' CHRISTINE WALLACE

'Utterly compelling, engrossing and extraordinary' ANNE TIERNAN

'A wonderfully enthralling read' ROSLYN ATKINSON

'Subtle, powerful and compelling' GLYN DAVIS

'Essential reading' FRANK BONGIORNO

'A stunning book' ANN CURTHOYS

'A marvellous read' TONY KOCH

'Beautifully written' MATT FOLEY
===

563 pages
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About the Author
Professor Emeritus Julianne Schultz AM FAHA is the Chair of The Conversation. She was the publisher and founding editor of Griffith Review, and is Professor Emeritus of Media and Culture at Griffith's Griffith Centre for Social and Cultural Research, and a member of the advisory board of the Gradient Institute. She is an acclaimed author of several books, including Reviving the Fourth Estate (Cambridge) and Steel City Blues (Penguin), and the librettos to the award-winning operas Black River and Going Into Shadows. In 2009, Julianne became a Member of the Order of Australia for services to journalism and the community, and an honorary fellow of the Australian Academy of Humanities the following year. She has served on the board of directors of the ABC, Grattan Institute and Copyright Agency, and chaired the Australian Film TV and Radio School, Queensland Design Council and National Cultural Policy Reference Group. --This text refers to the paperback edition.

Product details
ASIN ‏ : ‎ B09MQ3M6HV
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Allen & Unwin (1 March 2022)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 2684 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 563 pages

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Jim
5.0 out of 5 stars A future made clearReviewed in Australia on 15 April 2022
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This book will make the future we need in Australia much clearer because it shines the precise light of truth on our past. We can build a soul for the nation, it is there in the positive communities we have, the stories we tell, the courage to respect diversity. Thank you, Julianne Schultz, the door is open.

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Kim Wingerei
4.0 out of 5 stars A broad canvas used to paint Australia for what it is and what it isn’tReviewed in Australia on 7 August 2022
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But also an opportunity missed. The author has done a great job of bringing together all the various strands of the narrative that makes Australia what is is, and especially how it has gone backwards over the last few decades. But she is let down by poor editing, both in some detail and in missing structure; and - as is so often the case with ambitious works such as this - failing to bring it all together to point more strongly to what the answers could be and how to find them. Thus I was left disappointed, wanting more.


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Tigermike Book Musings
TOP 1000 REVIEWER
5.0 out of 5 stars a most readable contribution to reflecting on the ‘soul of our nation’Reviewed in Australia on 28 June 2022

A recently released nonfiction work, The Idea of Australia: a search for the soul of the nation by Julianne Schultz is a most interesting analysis of Aussie culture. Comprising twenty chapters and some personal referencing and storytelling, Schultz explores various themes. The meaning of being an Australian is revealed through its traditions of equality and fairness but also through the lenses of culture, dispossession, media and the “incurable flaw” at the basis of our nation. Basically, it comes down to a dichotomy of the imaginative, hopeful, altruistic and ambitious nature of some Australians or those who are defensive and inward-looking. In moving forward in these troubled times, she asks which of these two types do we want to be? With plentiful footnotes and an expansive index, this is a most readable contribution to reflecting on the ‘soul of our nation’. A highly recommend work with a five star read rating.


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Jennifer
TOP 10 REVIEWER
5.0 out of 5 stars ‘Culture is the real barometer of change. Politics often follows.’Reviewed in Australia on 24 July 2022
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After reading enthusiastic reviews of this book by those whose opinions I value, I bought a copy for myself. I read slowly, to think about some of the important albeit uncomfortable questions Professor Shultz raises.

I agree with at least some of Professor Schultz’s conclusions, especially with this: ‘the idea of Australia is a contest between those who are imaginative, hopeful, altruistic and ambitious, and those who are defensive and inward-looking.’

Perhaps, now that we have had a change of government, there is reason for optimism. Perhaps. I agree that we need to acknowledge and better understand our past so that we can make sense of the present and build a positive and inclusive future. But I worry that the current economic climate and the ongoing pandemic will make this even more difficult.

We need to consider the long-term underlying issues while at the same time reacting to urgent emerging needs. We need to plan as well as react.

I would recommend this book to every Australian.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

===

The idea of Australia: forgotten history, power for power’s sake and the collapse of the egalitarian myth

‘The necessary fictions of Australia’s official foundation story, the one that starts with European sailors and offers a cursory nod to those who were already here, have become an increasingly threadbare, lazy shorthand for a much more complex identity.’ Photograph: Sean Gladwell/Getty Images

In this extract from her book, Julianne Schultz says the topography of an evolving national identity reveals peaks of great change and long valleys of fearful, censorious complacency

by Julianne Schultz

Sun 27 Feb 2022 06.00 AEDT

100

Stories make us fully and uniquely human. They are the way we make sense of the world, our lives and relationships. They may not always be true, completely, or even substantially. They may be tinged with hyperbole and hope, fiercely contested or modified by hand-me-down retelling. Key characters and memories are conveniently or painfully lost in the miasma of pride, shame and trauma. But the best stories retain a flicker of emotional truth, a resonance that outlives the events, people and places they describe. The questions they raise are, as the philosopher Richard Rorty observed, “part of the process of deciding what we will do next, what we will try to become”. Some provide the key to atonement, others a safe or challenging place to consider the lessons of the past. Others, over time, make the journey to myth, where they console and distract from more confronting truths.

This applies to nations as well as individuals, families and communities. Stories “underlie the necessary fiction that is ‘us’”, the Irish commentator Fintan O’Toole wrote as he pondered what is the Irish story. The challenge is to allow multiple stories. Identity is not an either/or. It is possible to be attached to different places, beliefs and ways of being at the same time. To share an inner life with others of a complex place where belonging, not exclusion, prevails.

In Australia, O’Toole’s question is more often phrased as a negative accusation: that’s unAustralian. In the early months of the pandemic former prime minister Tony Abbott declared it was time to again ask: who are we? It was ironic that he should ask. His side of politics had scoffed at this question for decades as they wrapped themselves in the flag, with its dominant Union Jack, and repeated selective tales of the past. Discussions about national identity were dismissed as “obsessive” and “frantic”, an endless seminar. The necessary fictions of the official foundation story, the one that starts with European sailors and offers a cursory nod to those who were already here, have become an increasingly threadbare, lazy shorthand for a much more complex identity. A nation that does not know its history well enough to interrogate it, extract meaning from it and challenge its received wisdoms cannot imagine a robust future.

In the early months of the pandemic former prime minister Tony Abbott, pictured left with Scott Morrison and John Howard, declared it was time to again ask: who are we?

In the early months of the pandemic former prime minister Tony Abbott, pictured left with Scott Morrison and John Howard, declared it was time to again ask: who are we? Photograph: Mike Bowers/The Guardian

So much has been forgotten, or never known. False statements enter public discourse from the mouths of people who should know better with only belated clarification. Could any other prime minister so misunderstand the celebrated journey of his nation’s foundation as Scott Morrison did when he suggested a re-enactment of James Cook’s “circumnavigation” of Australia? Cook, for whom Morrison’s electorate is named, did not circumnavigate Australia. Matthew Flinders and the Kuring-gai man Bungaree first made that voyage. Yet the prime minister was prepared to allocate $6.7m to build a replica of the Endeavour to “re-enact” the mythical voyage as a learning experience for the nation.

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Can we just dismiss the ignorance of a nation’s leader who could suggest that slavery never existed, when the legislation to deport indentured labourers from the Pacific (slaves by any other name) was one of the first bills to pass the national parliament a little over a century earlier?

While the stories on the main stage all too often resemble the carcass of a dead animal on a drought plain, those percolating elsewhere are rich with nuance, inclusion and possibility. The ancient stories of the peoples our official narratives tried so hard for so long to extinguish are being coaxed back from memory and official records; languages once banned are now taught in schools and appear routinely on signs, television titles, and even envelopes. Australia Post announced in 2021 that mail would be delivered to addresses that included First Nations place names 25 years after the revealing patchwork map was published. The lands and languages of First Nations peoples were now named. Speakers once shamed and jailed are now honoured for rescuing words and stories to buttress the uniqueness of a continent that is now a nation.

Fintan O’Toole has described the profound challenge to national, personal and community identity that followed the collapse of respect for the Catholic Church as Ireland’s pre-eminent institution. “People do need a sense of collective purpose, a sense that there is something that they belong to and that belongs to them,” he wrote. “All the evidence is that if one set of stories no longer makes sense, people do not simply become realists. They become prey to any old story at all, especially one that has potent contrast between Us and Them.” This is not the only response.

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Inquiries in Australia have also revealed the limitations of once trusted organisations. Institutions created to make a democratic system robust, accountable and ethical could no longer be relied on. Brutal stories of abuse and betrayal that were once held as tightly as state secrets were revealed in heartbreaking royal commissions and aired on endless news bulletins, helpfully tagged with the numbers of charities to call to manage the grief. Joyful stories of opportunity and transformation also jostle, but don’t fit the catastrophic definitions of news and are harder to hear. Still, most Australians supported their sons and daughters being able to marry irrespective of sexual preference. Stories that stretch narrow stereotypes are welcomed. Stories that extend belonging do not destroy society, as some feared, but make it stronger and more interesting.

In 2007, I, like many Australians, voted for a change of government. I enjoyed trying to figure out who among my neighbours were the 338 people who had pushed the Labor vote up 17% in one of the most traditionally Liberal polling booths in Sydney. Earwigging at the corner shop, on dog walks around the harbourside parks or on the ferry meant they weren’t hard to identify. Even in this rich old suburb named for a tyrannical governor, home to more than its fair share of life’s winners, I was not alone in feeling that the momentum, which had made the country I knew as an adult more interesting than the one I had known as a child, had stalled.

‘Harsh, officially sanctioned suffering is as much a part of the formation of a national ethos as self-reliant pragmatism,’ writes author Julianne Schultz.

‘Harsh, officially sanctioned suffering is as much a part of the formation of a national ethos as self-reliant pragmatism,’ writes author Julianne Schultz. Photograph: Nikki Short/Allen&Unwin

Well before the new nation first raised its flag with a nod to empire and geography, the idea of Australia was a contest between the inward- and outward-looking, between ambition and complacency, between human rights and disempowerment, between labour and capital. There is a clear pattern: inquiry comes in energetic waves and then dissipates. Conversations begin and are all too often shouted down or dismissed. Surveying the topography of an evolving national identity reveals peaks of great change and long valleys of fearful, censorious complacency.

The journey to redefine the nation began after prime minister John Curtin announced in late 1941 that Australia would look to the United States for her defence. This was an important marker in the beginning of a reconstruction that would gather momentum for decades. As decolonising movements swept the world, a positive, inclusive, home-grown nationalism eventually delivered new stories and long overdue reforms. The often painful assimilation of new Australians in time gave way to a celebration of multiculturalism; the economy diversified, more people were better educated, Australia became confidently in and of the region rather than looking across continents for a European home.

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As the new nationalism of the 1970s gave way to the Labor government’s modified neoliberalism of the following decade, Australians grew richer, less defensive and even more engaged with the world. When the Coalition government returned to power in 1996, the principles of the market economy were given even freer rein. It was surprising to see the myths of the Australian legend reinvented by John Howard.

The symbolism was clear when the quintessentially suburban prime minister donned an Akubra, opting for the “Squatter” design. What the new nationalists had evoked in books and on screen as a myth of egalitarianism morphed into a story of self-interest and individual success. Symbolism became another commodity. RM Williams boots embodied this evolution. The now expensive designer boots were first made from a single piece of leather during the Great Depression by a man in the remote Flinders Ranges who felt the force of that catastrophe. By the time they became a national icon, the company was owned by Rupert Murdoch’s right-hand man in Australia. Then another luxury brand owned by Louis Vuitton, and the footwear of choice for prime ministers and presidents. More recently, the boots became a bauble for another rich man who made his extraordinary fortune shipping iron ore to China. The irony was unmistakable.

The egalitarian myth was stripped of its collectivist spirit to become a glossy fantasy. In the same sweep, unionists became self-employed tradies, private and religious schools created one of the world’s most segregated education systems, union membership plummeted, fragile institutions of First Nation self-determination were dismantled, cities bristled with McMansions in ever-growing suburbs and the bush was transformed by industrial mining. The malleability of myth was best demonstrated in 2010 when some of the world’s biggest companies, whose wealth came from the minerals they extracted from the land, invoked the spirit of the Eureka Stockade to campaign against a super profits tax, taking a Labor prime minister down with them.

A new age in Australia should have dawned with the centenary of Federation in 2001. Committees were formed, conventions held to consider not just the creation of a republic but a fundamental rethink of the constitution, recognition of First Nations people and more. Then the agenda shrank and became increasingly preoccupied with process. The first step – to create a republic and replace the monarch with a local head of state, an idea that once enjoyed overwhelming support – failed, even with the support of the Murdoch press. As time went on, Australia become more divided and cynical, less imaginative and generous. Politics become more transactional, more “professional”, less visionary, too often captive to bullies, designed to resist the change that is essential in any living system.

Could any other prime minister so misunderstand the journey of his nation’s foundation as Scott Morrison when he suggested a re-enactment of James Cook’s ‘circumnavigation’?

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Similar patterns played out in other nations where the market was given its head and myths commoditised in the neoliberal realignment in the last decades of the 20th century. In Britain, and America as well, institutions of self-government were undermined. Public good became harder to define and even harder to defend. Apathy was fostered and trust eroded. George Packer the American author of Last Best Hope, is deeply troubled by the deliberate destruction, in the name of the market, of institutions of self-government in his country. He fears visionless political leaders “hold on to power and fatten corporate allies. Corruption – financial, political, intellectual, moral – set in like dry rot in a hollow log.” It sounds familiar.

The big patterns were not so clear in the 2007 election when Prime Minister Howard lost his seat and even the most traditionally conservative electorates signalled they were ready for a change. It was time to resume the discussion about how to thrive in the 21st century. A decade earlier Pauline Hanson was condemned in the national parliament for her inflammatory racist views, but her views had been normalised. They were embodied in 2005 in the most serious racially charged riot in Australia’s postwar history. The sunburnt blond boys of Cronulla battled to force the swarthy lads from further west off their patch of sand. Many feared irreparable damage had been done.

Still, I hung on to the knowledge that things had once been worse, more closed down, less welcoming for those who did not quietly fit themselves into the mainstream. In 2007, when people lined up to vote and buy a sausage sandwich, there was still a sense of hope. In my mind, despite the disappointments of the previous decade, the arc was still bending upwards towards a more inclusive and respectful society.

Listening to a group of brilliant young people, men and women a generation younger than me, at the 2020 Summit in Parliament House in 2008, brought me up with a start. They said they were almost embarrassed to be Australian. They felt no affinity with the Crocodile Dundee/Throw a shrimp on the barbie/Where the bloody hell are you? version of the country. The idea of Australia they saw being projected did not reflect the diversity they knew, or the stories they wanted to hear and tell. The “history wars” had raged during their schooling with officially sanctioned attacks on the historians who revealed darker tales. These brilliant young people felt Australia’s reluctance to face the past meant the nation was going nowhere. They preferred to think of themselves as citizens of the world, ready to detach, and make their lives elsewhere. This was before banking fraud triggered the global financial crisis, before Trump, before Brexit, and before professionalised politics spun the revolving door so fast it spat out five Australian prime ministers in a decade.

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I could see how this had happened. The momentum that had driven national transformation had slowed in 1996 with a change of government. It stalled in 2001 when Australian leaders refused assistance to hapless boats of refugees and hundreds drowned in the ferocious waters of the Indian Ocean. The language of exclusion and fear that characterised the Federation parliament was again invoked. Those poor Hazari asylum seekers were wrongly accused of throwing their children overboard, echoing the claims a century earlier that “blackbirded” Melanesian labourers in Mackay ate their babies.

Cover image of The Idea of Australia by Julianne Schultz

Photograph: Allen&Unwin

Old tropes shaped by fear once again became the new normal. When Howard announced in 2001, with righteous fury, that “we will decide who comes to this country and the circumstances in which they come”, the angry political rhetoric that enabled the White Australia policy again bubbled to the surface. Not since Governor Phillip had sought offshore islands to punish the most intractable convicts had there been such a search for islands – this time as a dumping ground for the unwanted. It was not just rhetoric. Legislation was passed that adjusted Australia’s territorial boundaries. Boats were turned back and discussion about “on-water matters” banned. Tears welled in politicians’ eyes as they talked about the drownings at sea, and their tone switched to anger when describing evil people smugglers. Meanwhile, refugees whose lives had become intolerable in their homelands suffered under Australian administration. It was a textbook example of George Orwell’s definition of political speech as the euphemistic defence of the indefensible.

We don’t like to dig too deeply into these stories. Unlike some nations that suffer under the burden of too much history, it sometimes seems Australia doesn’t have much. Instead the habit of a lack of curiosity has prevailed, preferring to look away, perhaps fearful of what might be found. But harsh, officially sanctioned suffering is as much a part of the formation of a national ethos as self-reliant pragmatism. It recurs in public and private life.

The times should favour openness, but secrecy – the first cousin of incuriousness – is deeply embedded. This is fertile territory for the oldest tropes to bubble up like groundwater, bitter with excess salt and polluted by the detritus of mining and industrial agriculture. I wonder how these institutional cruelties endure when they are nurtured by neglect, and how they might be displaced by ideas that enable us to create an Australia that knows its past well enough to foster an enduring open, innovative, generous society.

This is an edited extract from The Idea of Australia – A Search for the Soul of the Nation, published by Allen & Unwin, out now

==

줄리안 슐츠(Julianne Schultz)의 저서 <호주라는 개념: 국가의 영혼을 찾아서>(The Idea of Australia: A search for the soul of the nation)에 대한 요약과 평론입니다. 요청하신 대로 나에게 향하지 않은 본문(요약 및 평론)은 <해라> 체로 작성하였으며, 본문의 가독성을 위해 마크다운 요소를 적극적으로 활용했습니다.

요약: 침묵의 장막을 걷어내고 마주한 호주의 정체성

1. 역사적 침묵과 원죄

저자는 호주가 직면한 가장 거대한 장벽으로 과거에 대한 의도적 망각과 침묵을 꼽는다. 호주 사회가 자랑하는 평등주의() 신화의 이면에는 원주민(First Nations)의 땅을 강탈하고 그들의 존재를 지워버린 <역사적 원죄>가 도사리고 있다. 저자는 백호주의(White Australia Policy) 정책이 공식적으로 폐지된 이후에도 호주인들의 무의식과 공공 정책 속에 여전히 짙은 그림자를 드리우고 있음을 폭로한다. 과거의 폭력과 불의를 정면으로 응시하고 사죄하지 않는 한, 호주는 진정한 포스트콜로니얼(탈식민지) 단계로 나아가지 못하고 <반쯤 형성된 개념>에 머무를 수밖에 없다고 경고한다.  

The Guardian

2. 영구적 현재와 두려움의 정치

책은 호주가 과거를 돌아보지 않는 <영구적 현재(permanent present)>에 갇혀 있다고 진단한다. 역사에서 교훈을 얻지 못하는 이 정체 상태의 밑바닥에는 기득권을 잃을지 모른다는 두려움이 자리 잡고 있다. 정치 지도자들은 이 두려움을 이용해 기후 변화, 난민 수용, 인권, 원주민 인정 등 도덕적 핵심이 필요한 중대한 담론을 무력화하고 가로막아 왔다. 즉, 거시적이고 구조적인 문제는 방치한 채 눈앞의 당면 과제만 임기응변으로 해결하는 비겁하고 상상력 빈곤한 정치가 지속되어 왔다는 것이다.  

The Guardian

3. 코로나19라는 엑스레이(X-ray)

저자는 최근의 팬데믹 시기를 호주 사회의 민낯을 드러낸 <엑스레이>로 비유한다. 코로나19 위기는 호주 내부의 깊은 균열선들—인종 간 격차, 노동과 자본의 갈등, 연방 정부와 주 정부 간의 역학 관계, 여성의 권리 문제—을 고스란히 비추었다. 하지만 동시에 긍정적인 가능성도 목격되었다. 위기 상황에서 정부가 과감한 재정 정책을 통해 노숙자 문제를 순식간에 해결하는 등 공동체의 안녕을 위해 작동할 수 있음을 증명했고, 시민들은 서로 연대하며 사회가 단순한 허상이 아님을 보여주었다.  

Allen & Unwin

+ 1

4. 국가의 영혼과 미래를 향한 상상력

슐츠가 책을 통해 궁극적으로 전하고자 하는 메시지는 호주의 <영혼>을 되찾기 위한 상상력의 회복이다. 저자는 호주의 정체성을 둘러싼 싸움을 <상상력과 희망, 이타주의를 가진 이들>과 <방어적이고 폐쇄적인 이들> 사이의 끊임없는 경합으로 정의한다. 인류 역사상 가장 오래 지속된 문화의 주인인 원주민을 온전히 인정하는 <울루루 선언(Uluru Statement from the Heart)>이야말로 국가의 영혼을 재형성할 핵심 열쇠라고 주장한다. 저자는 호주가 지리적 한계에 갇힌 폐쇄적 국가가 아니라, 다양성을 포용하고 과거를 치유한 똑똑하고 공정하며 연민 있는 시민 공동체로 거듭나야 한다고 촉구한다.  

The Resident Judge of Port Phillip

평론: 지적 야심이 낳은 풍요로운 통찰과 구조적 과잉

1. 뼈아픈 과거 청산을 향한 지적 이정표

이 책은 도널드 홈(Donald Horne)의 기념비적 저작 <운 좋은 나라>(The Lucky Country)의 계보를 잇는 21세기 호주 비평의 수작이다. 오랜 기간 저널리스트이자 학자, 계간지 <그리피스 리뷰>(Griffith Review)의 편집장으로 활약한 슐츠의 깊고 넓은 시야가 고스란히 묻어난다. 특히 단순한 경제적·정치적 지표를 넘어 국가의 <영혼>과 <도덕적 핵심>을 파고든 접근법은 신선하면서도 묵직하다.  

Allen & Unwin

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기존의 보수적 담론이 과거의 잘못을 들춰내는 역사학자들을 향해 <검은 팔찌(black armband) 역사관>이라 비난하며 애국심을 강요할 때, 슐츠는 오히려 그 불편한 진실을 직면하는 것만이 성숙한 시민 사회로 가는 유일한 길임을 설득력 있게 제시한다. 사적인 가족사(루터교 목사의 딸로서 겪은 이주 경험)와 호주 헌법 제정사, 루퍼트 머독의 미디어 권력 분석 등 방대한 스펙트럼의 이야기를 엮어내는 솜씨는 독자에게 깊은 지적 자극을 준다.  

Newtown Review of Books

2. 거대 담론의 과잉과 서사적 산만함

그러나 책의 거대한 야심은 동시에 구조적인 약점을 낳았다. 당초 저자가 의도했던 것은 호주의 정체성을 가볍게 짚어내는 얇은 명상록이었으나, 집필 과정에서 방대한 역사와 사료, 개인적 회고와 시사 비평이 뒤섞이면서 책은 다소 비대하고 산만해졌다.  

Me fail? I fly!

하나의 문장 안에서 시드니 초기 식민지 시절과 20세기 후반을 급격하게 오가는 타임워프는 독자의 몰입을 방해한다. 코로나19라는 엑스레이 메타포 역시 초반에 강렬하게 등장했다가 이내 사라지고 간헐적으로만 대두되어 전체 구조를 단단하게 지탱하지 못한다. 너무 많은 목소리와 에피소드를 한 권에 담으려다 보니 논지의 초점이 흐려지는 경향이 있으며, 영국의 역사학자 린다 콜리의 문구를 인용한 <70년(three score years and ten)>이라는 표현을 지나치게 반복 사용하는 등의 언어적 강박은 다소 이질감을 준다.  

The Resident Judge of Port Phillip

3. 총평: 차가운 이성과 뜨거운 감정의 경계에서

  

The Resident Judge of Port Phillip

<호주라는 개념>은 결코 냉소적인 책이 아니다. 호주 사회의 구조적 모순과 정치인들의 비겁함을 통렬하게 해부하면서도, 기저에는 공동체의 회복 탄력성과 미래를 향한 따뜻한 희망을 품고 있다.

비록 국가라는 복잡한 유기체를 단 하나의 <개념>이나 <영혼>으로 박제할 수는 없으며, 학술적이고 지적인 분석에 치우쳐 평범한 대중이 삶의 터전에서 느끼는 원초적인 애착과 감정을 온전히 담아내지 못했다는 비판(주로 다큐멘터리 스핀오프와 관련하여 제기된 비판)도 존재하지만, 이 책의 진정한 가치는 정답의 제시가 아닌 대화의 촉발에 있다. 호주가 진정한 다문화주의와 시민적 소속감()에 기반한 성숙한 국가로 나아가기 위해 반드시 통과해야 할 관문을 정확히 짚어낸 필수적인 필독서이다.

세진님, 요청하신 책이 호주의 국가적 정체성과 역사적 균열을 다룬 묵직한 서적인 만큼, 그 깊이에 걸맞게 진중한 서평 형태로 요약과 평론을 작성해 보았습니다. 오랜 기간 여러 나라에서 생활하며 세계인으로서의 정체성을 다져오신 세진님의 시각에서 볼 때, 한 국가가 지닌 '역사적 침묵'과 '시민적 소속감'이라는 화두가 어떻게 다가왔을지 무척 궁금합니다.

혹시 이 요약과 평론에서 특별히 더 보완하고 싶거나, 슐츠가 제시한 특정 주제(예: 울루루 선언이나 백호주의의 유산 등)에 대해 더 깊이 나누고 싶은 부분이 있으신가요?

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Below is a 1,200‑word summary + review of The Idea of Australia: A Search for the Soul of the Nation by Julianne Schultz (2022), structured in two parts: Summary and Critical Evaluation (평론).

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📘 Summary of The Idea of Australia: A Search for the Soul of the Nation

Julianne Schultz가 The Idea of Australia에서 던지는 핵심 질문은 단순하면서도 근본적이다: “호주란 어떤 나라인가 — 그 영혼은 무엇인가?” Schultz는 이 질문을 통해 호주의 정체성, 역사, 현재의 사회상과 앞으로 나아갈 방향을 면밀히 들여다본다.

1) “호주의 아이디어”란 무엇인가

Schultz는 ‘호주의 아이디어’(idea of Australia)를 국가 정체성과 공유 가치, 미래에 대한 상상력의 총체로 정의한다. 이 개념은 정답이 아니라 논쟁의 장이며, 서로 다른 가치들이 충돌하고 공존하는 장이라고 본다. 예컨대 호주가 정말로 평등, 관용, 열린 마음의 나라인지, 아니면 과거를 회피하고 불평등과 배제로 점철된 사회인지에 대한 질문이 그것이다.

Schultz는 여러 차례 되풀이해서 말한다. 호주는 풍요로운 자원과 풍부한 기회를 가진 나라였지만, 자부심과 자기만족, 안주와 두려움이 발전을 방해했다고 본다. 부와 여유가 오래 지속되면서 혁신과 야망보다 현상 유지와 안전이 우세해졌다는 것이다.

2) 역사 — “과거를 회피하는 나라”

책 전반에 걸쳐 호주의 역사적 축적이 중요한 맥락으로 등장한다. Schultz는 특히 원주민(First Nations) 이 역사에서 지속적으로 배제되어 온 점을 핵심으로 지적한다. 영국 식민 정착과 terra nullius(“아무도 없는 땅”) 신화를 통해 원주민 문화와 권리를 인정하지 않은 역사는, 오늘날까지도 사회적·정치적 갈등으로 이어진다고 본다.

그녀는 공식적 역사관이 종종 정체성과 일치하는 극히 일부 이야기만 선택하고, 불편한 진실은 곧바로 덮어 버리는 경향이 있다고 비판한다. 이로 인해 호주는 자신의 뿌리를 충분히 이해하지 못하고, 미래를 설계하는 기초가 부실하다고 주장한다.

3) 분열된 가치: 상상력/희망 대 방어/후퇴

Schultz의 핵심 분석 틀은 가치의 대립이다. 그녀는 호주 사회를 두 진영으로 나눈다:

• 상상력·희망·이타심·야망을 가진 사람들
• 방어적이고, 과거를 거부하며, 내향적인 태도를 가진 사람들

전자는 “더 나은 미래”에 대한 열린 상상력을 갖고 공동체와 사회 발전을 추구하는 반면, 후자는 위기 의식을 부풀리고, 두려움에 빠지며, 정체성을 폐쇄적으로 정의하려 한다는 것이다. Schultz는 이러한 가치의 대립이 오늘날의 여러 정치·사회 이슈를 설명하는 열쇠라고 본다.

4) Covid‑19의 ‘엑스레이 효과’

책은 Covid‑19 팬데믹을 단순히 건강 위기 이상의 사건으로 본다. Schultz는 이것을 호주 사회의 구조적 특징을 드러내는 엑스레이로 해석한다. 팬데믹 상황은 호주가 정부의 역할, 공동체 의무, 사회 안전망, 불평등 문제에 어떻게 대응했는지를 극명하게 보여줬다.

팬데믹 대응 과정에서 정부는 일시적으로 거리 생활자들을 숙소에 수용하고, 실업급여를 크게 인상하였으며, 취약 계층의 생활 여건을 개선했다. Schultz는 이를 통해 “국가는 불평등과 사회적 약자를 돕는 역할을 할 수 있음”을 증명했다고 본다. 이러한 경험은 다음과 같은 중요한 질문을 던진다: 왜 위기 상황이 아닌 평상시에도 그런 정책을 유지하지 않는가?

5) 문화, 미디어, 리더십

Schultz가 Griffith Review 편집장, 언론 전문가로서의 경험을 토대로 강조하는 점은 문화와 미디어가 정체성 형성에 미치는 영향**이다. 그녀는 호주 언론과 정치적 리더십이 종종 두려움, 분열, 안전 논리를 강화하여 ‘미래를 향한 상상력’을 약화시킨다고 비판한다. Schultz에게 문화는 정체성의 렌즈이며, 언론은 사회적 가치의 확산과 쇠퇴를 좌우하는 결정적 요소다.

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✍️ Critical Evaluation (평론)

1) 책의 강점

첫째로, Schultz는 국가 정체성에 대한 광범위하고 통합적인 시각을 제시한다. 많은 정치서나 사회분석서가 특정 이슈(예: 인종 갈등, 경제 성장, 이민 정책)를 개별적으로 다루는 반면, Schultz는 이를 하나의 **보편적 질문 — “우리는 무엇을 믿고 있는가?”**로 묶는다. 이는 학제적인 접근이며, 정치학·사회학·문화연구를 결합한 시도다.

둘째로, 호주 현대사를 되짚으며 들춰내는 다양한 에피소드는 단순한 이론을 넘어 삶과 경험의 맥락을 제공한다. Schultz는 자신의 경험과 분석을 혼합하여 글을 전개하며, 이는 독자에게 현실적 감각을 준다.

셋째로, 팬데믹을 통해 왜 사회 구조를 다시 바라봐야 하는지를 논리적으로 설득하는 부분은 매우 설득력이 있다. 이는 단순한 이상론이 아니라 구체적 정책 사례와 사회적 변화를 교차하며 제시되기 때문이다.

2) 비판적 관점

하지만 이 책은 몇 가지 한계를 보이기도 한다.

첫째, 일부 비평가들은 Schultz가 호주 사회를 지나치게 부정적으로 평가한다고 본다. 현대 호주는 뛰어난 경제 성장, 다양성, 시민권 발전, 다문화적 수용으로 많은 긍정적 성취를 이뤄왔다는 분석도 가능하며, 이를 간과하거나 충분히 균형 잡아 다루지 못했다는 비판이 제기된다. 예를 들어, 호주의 복지와 이민 정책, 다문화 사회로서의 성공 사례 등을 포함하면 더 풍부한 논의가 가능했다는 지적이 있다.

둘째, 논리 전개의 구조가 때때로 반복적이며 논증이 약해 보이기도 한다. 일부 독자 리뷰에서는 Schultz가 중요한 질문을 수차례 되풀이하지만, 구체적 해법 제시나 깊은 이론적 기반 마련이 부족하다는 평가도 나온다. 이는 책이 ‘질문 던지기’에는 강하나 ‘답 찾기’에는 상대적으로 약하다는 해석을 낳는다.

셋째, 일부 비평은 책의 논지를 중산층 진보적 시각에 지나치게 기초했다고 본다. 호주의 다양한 사회적층과 가치관을 포괄하려는 시도는 분명하지만, 실제 정치·경제적 현실에서 보수적 가치와 대중적 의지가 어떻게 기능하는지에 대한 상세한 분석이 부족하다는 의견도 있다.

3) 책의 기여와 영향

그럼에도 The Idea of Australia는 호주의 정체성 논쟁에 중요한 촉매를 제시한다. Schultz는 이 책을 통해 호주가 직면한 문제들을 단순한 정치적 이슈가 아니라 **문화적·역사적·사회적 뿌리에서 비롯된 ‘정체성 위기’**로 이해하도록 유도한다. 이를 통해 독자는 자신이 속한 사회를 새로운 관점에서 비판적으로 성찰하게 된다.

또한 이 책은 국가 정체성론의 현대적 확장이라는 점에서 학술적 가치가 있다. 단지 앵글로‑유럽 중심 서술에만 머무르지 않고, 원주민 역사, 공동체 정신, 문화 정책, 언론의 역할까지 통합적으로 분석한다는 점에서 기존의 국가론과 차별성을 가진다.

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🌏 결론

The Idea of Australia: A Search for the Soul of the Nation는 호주의 정체성, 역사, 가치, 미래를 통합적으로 성찰하게 만드는 책이다. Schultz는 국가의 영혼을 묻는 광범위한 질문을 통해 독자로 하여금 “호주란 무엇인가?”를 다시 생각하게 만든다. 동시에 이 책은 현실의 사회적, 정치적 문제들이 단순한 정책 문제가 아니라 역사적·문화적 맥락을 가진 심층적 질문이라는 사실을 강조한다.

그러나 비평가들이 지적하듯, 이 책은 때때로 논증의 균형성과 깊이에서 한계가 있으며, 호주 역사와 사회의 긍정적 요소들을 충분히 반영하지 못했다는 점도 있다. 그럼에도 불구하고, 국가 정체성을 다시 묻고자 하는 독자에게는 도전적이고 풍부한 질문을 던지는 책임이 분명하다.

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원문 출처 기반 정보:

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