Portal:Australia
Portal:Australia
Portal maintenance status: (July 2018)
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Introduction
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. Australia is the largest country by area in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country. Australia is the oldest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It is a megadiverse country, and its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes and climates, with deserts in the centre, tropical rainforests in the north-east, tropical savannas in the north, and mountain ranges in the south-east.
The ancestors of Aboriginal Australians began arriving from south-east Asia 50,000 to 65,000 years ago, during the last glacial period. They settled the continent and had formed approximately 250 distinct language groups by the time of European settlement, maintaining some of the longest known continuing artistic and religious traditions in the world. Australia's written history commenced with European maritime exploration. The Dutch were the first known Europeans to reach Australia, in 1606. British colonisation began in 1788 with the establishment of the penal colony of New South Wales. By the mid-19th century, most of the continent had been explored by European settlers and five additional self-governing British colonies were established, each gaining responsible government by 1890. The colonies federated in 1901, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. This continued a process of increasing autonomy from the United Kingdom, highlighted by the Statute of Westminster Adoption Act 1942, and culminating in the Australia Acts of 1986.
Australia is a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy comprising six states and ten territories: the states of New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, Tasmania, South Australia and Western Australia; the major mainland Australian Capital Territory and Northern Territory; and other minor or external territories. Its population of nearly 27 million is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Canberra is the nation's capital, while its most populous cities are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide. Australian governments have promoted multiculturalism since the 1970s. Australia is culturally diverse and has one of the highest foreign-born populations in the world. Its abundant natural resources and well-developed international trade relations are crucial to the country's economy, which generates its income from various sources: predominantly services (including banking, real estate and international education) as well as mining, manufacturing and agriculture. It ranks highly for quality of life, health, education, economic freedom, civil liberties and political rights.
Featured article - show another
Bodyline, also known as fast leg theory bowling, was a cricketing tactic devised by the English cricket team for their 1932–33 Ashes tour of Australia. It was designed to combat the extraordinary batting skill of Australia's leading batsman, Don Bradman. A bodyline delivery was one in which the cricket ball was bowled at pace, aimed at the body of the batsman in the expectation that when he defended himself with his bat, a resulting deflection could be caught by one of several fielders deliberately placed nearby on the leg side. (Full article...)
Selected biography - show another
Daisy Jugadai Napaltjarri (c. 1955–2008) was a Pintupi-Luritja-speaking Indigenous artist from Australia's Western Desert region, and sister of artist Molly Jugadai Napaltjarri. Daisy Jugadai lived and painted at Haasts Bluff, Northern Territory. There she played a significant role in the establishment of Ikuntji Women's Centre, where many artists of the region have worked. (Full article...)
Did you know (auto-generated) - load new batch
- ... that the first imported copies of Norman Lindsay's Age of Consent were confiscated by Australian customs authorities?
- ... that in the 1980s, Amanda Villepastour, now an ethnomusicologist at Cardiff University, was the keyboardist in Australian new wave band Eurogliders?
- ... that Nick Goiran, a member of the Western Australian Legislative Council, proposed 357 amendments to a voluntary assisted dying bill?
- ... that Holly Ringland wrote her second book while stuck in Australia for three years during the COVID-19 pandemic?
- ... that when Australian Brihony Dawson debuted as the first non-binary host of reality TV franchise The Challenge, they decided not to imitate the "ominous" style of the U.S. host?
- ... that Australia-born rugby union player Jason Jones-Hughes was the subject of a protracted legal battle over his international eligibility after Wales called him up for the 1999 Rugby World Cup?
- ... that South Australian Labor premier Des Corcoran was mentioned in despatches for courage and skill in evacuating casualties during the Korean War?
- ... that the first judgement of 2022 from the High Court of Australia was considered a loss for a labour hire organisation, but a win for labour hire organisations?
In the news
- 19 April 2024 – 2024 Iran–Israel conflict
- The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade of Australia tells its citizens to leave Israel, citing a high threat of military reprisals and terrorist attacks. (Times of Israel)
- 16 April 2024 – 2024 Wakeley church stabbing
- Australian police say that the stabbing attack at an Assyrian church in Sydney was an Islamic terrorist act. (Reuters)
- 15 April 2024 – 2021 Australian Parliament House sexual misconduct allegations
- Former Australian political staffer Bruce Lehrmann loses his defamation case against Network 10 and journalist Lisa Wilkinson for broadcasting an interview with Lehrmann's former coworker Brittany Higgins in which she claimed that Lehrmann raped her. (The Guardian)
- 15 April 2024 – 2024 Wakeley church stabbing
- Four people are injured, including bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel, in a mass stabbing at a church in Sydney, Australia. The perpetrator is arrested. A mob clashes with police outside the church while trying to attack the detained suspect. (Sky News Australia)
- 13 April 2024 – 2024 Bondi Junction stabbings
- Six people are killed and seven others are injured in a mass stabbing at a shopping center in Sydney, Australia. The perpetrator is shot and killed by police. (The Guardian) (The Sydney Morning Herald)
- 13 April 2024 – 2024 Cook by-election
- Simon Kennedy of the Liberal Party of Australia wins the by-election in the seat of Cook, succeeding former Prime Minister Scott Morrison. (ABC News Australia)
Selected pictures - show another
- Image 1Photo: Fir0002A Eurocopter AS350 "Squirrel" helicopter flown by 723 Squadron of the Fleet Air Arm (FAA), the section of the Royal Australian Navy responsible for the operation of aircraft. The FAA is currently an all-helicopter force, operating four separate models in the anti-submarine warfare and maritime support roles.
- Image 2Photo: JJ HarrisonThe Tawny Frogmouth (Podargus strigoides) is a nocturnal species of Australian frogmouth commonly mistaken for an owl. Males and females look similar, growing to 35–53 cm (14–21 in) long and up to 680 g (1.5 lb) in weight. The Tawny Frogmouth is almost exclusively insectivorous, feeding rarely on frogs and other small prey. It generally sits very still on a low perch and catches food with its beak.
- Image 3Photo credit: Frank HurleyA group of Australian infantry wearing Small Box Respirators (SBRs) at the Third Battle of Ypres in September 1917. After the introduction of poison gas in World War I, countermeasures were developed. SBRs represented the pinnacle of gas mask development during the war, a mouthpiece connected via a hose to a box filter (hanging around the wearer's neck in this picture), which in turn contained granules of chemicals that neutralised the gas. The SBR was the prized possession of the ordinary infantryman; when the British were forced to retreat during the German Spring Offensive of 1918, it was found that while some troops had discarded their rifles, hardly any had left behind their respirators.
- Image 4Photo credit: Noodle snacksThe 26-metre (85 ft) radio telescope at Mount Pleasant Radio Observatory, located 20 kilometres (12 mi) east of Hobart, Tasmania, is the southernmost antenna used in Australia's Very Long Baseline Interferometry network. The facility is owned and operated by the University of Tasmania.
- Image 5Photo credit: Fir0002Two whole Cripps Pink apples and a cross-section of a third. More commonly known by the trademarked name "Pink Lady", this apple cultivar was originally bred by John Cripps by crossing the Australian apple Lady Williams with a Golden Delicious. The apple shape is ellipsoid, it has a distinctive pink hue mixed with a green "background," and taste is tart.
- Image 6
Coffin Bay is a national park in on the Eyre Peninsula of South Australia, 301 kilometres west of Adelaide, and 46 kilometres west of Port Lincoln. The township of Coffin Bay is near the entrance to the National Park. The National Park features a long peninsula with a sheltered bay, coastal dunes, swamps and a spectacular coastline of islands, reefs, limestone cliffs and white surf beaches.
Photo credit: Takver - Image 7Photo credit: Fir0002The Common bluetail (Ischnura heterosticta) is a small Australian damselfly of the family Coenagrionidae. Most males have blue eyes, blue thorax and a blue ringed tail. The females are green or light brown.
- Image 8Photo: John O'NeillAn officer of the Victoria Police, the primary law enforcement agency of the Australian state of Victoria. The agency was founded in 1835 from an existing colonial police force of 875 men. As of 2011, the Victoria Police has over 12,190 sworn members, and over 2,900 civilian staff across 393 police stations.
- Image 9
The Common Eastern Froglet (Crinia signifera) is a very common, Australian ground-dwelling frog, of the family Myobatrachidae. It ranges from south-eastern Australia, from Adelaide to Melbourne, up the eastern coast to Brisbane. It also inhabits a majority of Tasmania. It is a small frog (3 centimetres), of brown or grey colour of various shades. It has extremely variable markings, with great variety usually found within confined populations
Photo credit: LiquidGhoul - Image 10
The Australian War Memorial is the national memorial in Australia for the members of all its armed forces and supporting organisations who have died in wars. The memorial includes an extensive national military museum and is located in the capital Canberra. It is the northern terminus of the city's ceremonial land axis, which stretches from Parliament House on Capital Hill along a line passing through the summit of the cone-shaped Mt Ainslie to the northeast.
Photo credit: Fir0002 - Image 12Photo: John O'Neill; edit: JJ HarrisonBrian Nankervis (b. 1956), an Australian comedian and writer, shown here during a live performance. Nankervis rose to popularity while playing Raymond J. Bartholomeuz on Hey Hey It's Saturday; since 2005 he has been a host of the gameshow RocKwiz.
- Image 13A Beautiful Firetail (Stagonopleura bella) male (top) and female. In this common Australian species of estrildid finch, nest-building and raising children is done collaboratively.
- Image 14
Nitmiluk National Park is a protected area in the Northern Territory of Australia. It is located 244 kilometres southeast of Darwin. Established around a series of gorges on the Katherine River and Edith Falls, the park has great ceremonial significance to the local Jawoyn people, who are custodians of Nitmiluk National Park. In Jawoyn, Nitmiluk means place of the cicada dreaming.
Photo credit: Brian Voon Yee Yap - Image 15
Mount Lofty at 727 metres is the highest point in the Mount Lofty Ranges east of Adelaide in South Australia. It was first climbed by a European when explorer Collet Barker climbed it in April 1831, almost seven years before Adelaide was settled. It had been named by Matthew Flinders on his circumnavigation of Australia in 1802.
Photo credit: Mel Mazzone - Image 16Photo credit: James Francis HurleySoldiers of an Australian 4th Division field artillery brigade on a duckboard track passing through Chateau Wood, near Hooge in the Ypres salient, October 29, 1917. The photo was taken in the vicinity of the Battle of Passchendaele, also known as the Third Battle of Ypres, which was one of the major battles of World War I.
- Image 17Photo credit: John O'NeillA panoramic view across the interior of the Australian Synchrotron (a subatomic particle accelerator) in Clayton, Victoria. Dominating the image is the storage ring, showing the optical diagnostic beamline at front right. In the middle of the storage ring is the booster synchrotron and linac. The yellow, green and red magnets on the trolley (front left) are a demonstration of the bending and focusing magnets used in the storage ring to produce the synchrotron radiation and maintain the electron beam.
- Image 18Photo credit: Noodle snacksA view of the greater Hobart area, as seen from Mount Wellington. The state capital and most populous city of the Australian island state of Tasmania, Hobart is located in the state's south-east, on the estuary of the River Derwent.
- Image 19Photo credit: Noodle snacksThe Tasmanian Native-hen (Gallinula mortierii) is a flightless rail between 43 to 51 cm (17 to 20 in) in length, one of twelve species of birds endemic to the Australian island of Tasmania. Although flightless, it is capable of running quickly and has been recorded running at speeds up to 30 miles per hour (48 km/h).
- Image 20
The Gold Coast is a coastal region approximately 70 kilometres south of Brisbane, Australia that, over the past 50 years, has coalesced from a collection of scattered villages into a city of approximately 480,000 people - currently Australia's seventh largest city - and Australia's largest tourist resort. - Image 21Photo: Sport the LibraryJeremy Doyle (1983–2011) was an Australian wheelchair basketball player. Left paraplegic after a car accident, he was classified as a 1 point player. While representing his country Doyle won two gold medals, first at the 2009 Paralympic World Cup and again at the 2010 Wheelchair Basketball World Championship.
- Image 22Photo credit: John O'NeillA Common Grass Blue (Zizina labradus), a small Australian butterfly. This specimen, perched on a rose, is approximately 10 millimetres (0.4 in) in size. Females generally have a larger wingspan compared to males (23 and 20 mm or 0.9 and 0.8 in respectively).
On this day
- 1770 – HM Bark Endeavour, and her captain, James Cook, first sight the eastern coast of the continent of Australia.
- 1836 – John Batman (pictured) and his family arrive at Port Phillip, in present-day Victoria, and settle on Batman Hill.
- 1908 – Forty-four people are killed and 400 injured after two trains collide at the Sunshine railway station, the junction of the Ballarat and Bendigo railway lines.
- 1919 – Richard Hillary, future Royal Australian Air Force pilot and author of the autobiographical The Last Enemy, is born in Sydney, New South Wales.
- 1954 – In the Petrov Affair, Evdokia Petrova seeks political asylum after the plane carrying her back to the Soviet Union lands at Darwin, with her escorts disarmed by Commonwealth police.
General images
- Image 2A Luritja man demonstrating method of attack with boomerang under cover of shield (1920) (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 4Corroboree at Newcastle by convict artist Joseph Lycett, ca. 1818. Aboriginal Australian religious practices associated with the Dreamtime have been practised for tens of thousands of years. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 5The Bulletin, founded by J. F. Archibald (left), nurtured bush poets such as Henry Lawson (right). (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 7Golden Wattle, Australia's floral emblem and the source of Australia's national colours, green and gold (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 9An Aboriginal encampment near the Adelaide foothills in an 1854 painting by Alexander Schramm (from Aboriginal Australians)
- Image 13A swagman in bushman's apparel, wearing a brimmed hat and carrying swag, and billy can. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 16Actor playing the bushranger Ned Kelly in The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906), the world's first feature film (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 17A group of Australian men wearing speedos. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 20William Wentworth was among the first advocates for Australian nationhood, supporting the rights of emancipists and leading the creation of Australia's first parliament (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 22Nan Tien Temple, a Buddhist temple in Wollongong. Multicultural immigration has increased Australia's religious diversity. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 24Historical image of Aboriginal Australian women and children, Maloga, New South Wales around 1900 (in European dress) (from Aboriginal Australians)
- Image 26The SBS building in Melbourne's Federation Square. SBS is Australia's multicultural broadcaster. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 27The initial human settlement of Oceania is estimated to have been between 60,000 and 40,000 years ago. Archaeogenetic results indicate a colonisation of southern Sahul (Australia) before 37,000 years ago and an incubation period in northern Sahul (Papua New Guinea) followed by westward expansions within Australia after about 28,000 years ago. (from Aboriginal Australians)
- Image 28Cover of Old Bush Songs, Banjo Paterson's 1905 collection of bush ballads (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 30Donald Bradman is often cited as statistically the greatest sportsman of any major sport. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 31Anzac Day dawn services are held throughout Australia every April. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 34Skiing in Australia began in Kiandra, a goldmining town in the Snowy Mountains of New South Wales, in the 1860s. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 35Statue in Fremantle of an Australian rules footballer taking a spectacular mark (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 37An Eastern Arrernte man of the Arltunga district, Northern Territory, in 1923. His hut is decked with porcupine grass. (from Aboriginal Australians)
- Image 38Kylie Minogue is hailed as one of Australia's most successful pop musicians (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 39The surf lifesaving movement originated in Australia. (Pictured: surf lifesavers, Bondi Beach, 1930s). (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 43Dwellings accommodating Aboriginal families at Hermannsburg Mission, Northern Territory, 1923 (from Aboriginal Australians)
- Image 44Governor Arthur Phillip hoists the British flag over the new colony at Sydney Cove in 1788. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 45Founded in 1993, Sydney's Tropfest is the world's largest short film festival. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 47Sheep grazing in rural Australia. Early British settlers introduced Western stock and crops and Australian agriculture now produces an abundance of fresh produce. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 48A commemorative statue of John Simpson Kirkpatrick, a famous stretcher bearer who was killed in the Gallipoli Campaign. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 49Phar Lap winning the Melbourne Cup, "the race that stops a nation" (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 50St Mary Mackillop established an extensive network of schools and is Australia's first canonised saint of the Catholic Church. (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 51PCA of Orang Asli (Semang) and Andamanese, with worldwide populations in HGDP. (from Aboriginal Australians)
- Image 53Countries of birth of Australian estimated resident population, 2006 (from Culture of Australia)
- Image 54South Australian suffragette Catherine Helen Spence (1825–1910). The Australian colonies established democratic parliaments from the 1850s and began to grant women the vote in the 1890s. (from Culture of Australia)
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