Opening the Multilingual Archive of Australia brings together historical materials from national and international collections in languages other than English. We seek to rethink and enlarge narratives about Australia that come solely from English-language sources, by showing modern Australia to be a complex multilingual creation. This project is funded by an Australian Research Council Discovery Project grant.
The site consists of collections of text-based articles, newspapers, images and interviews. You can explore these and carry out searches through the 'go to archive' button and clicking on the different categories.
We acknowledge the First Nations peoples of Australia and other sites referred to in this collection of documents. The University of Sydney, where we are based, is on the unceded land of the Gadigal People of the Eora Nation, and we pay particular respect to them.
Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are advised that this site may contain or link to material which could be culturally sensitive, including records of people who have passed away.
News
The Opening the Multilingual Archive Conference
The Opening the Multilingual Archive (OMAA) Conference was held over two days in the Quad Refectory on 2-3 December 2024. The program opened with a keynote address by Professor Joy Damousi who talked about the importance of digitising migrant archives, and how these provide new perspectives on the migration experience and transnational histories of migration. This was followed by 18 presentations over two days. Highlights included the presentations by ICLS 1200 Bachelor of Languages students showcasing how they used material from OMAA to create teaching material to engage high-school language learners and the launch of a special issue of Australian Historical Studies dedicated to multilingual Australia by Professor Joseph Lo Bianco. The conference concluded with a Roundtable considering how language diversity can equip scholars, policymakers and the public to confront the challenge of cultural pluralism today.
Pictured: The Roundtable discussion chaired by Professor Charles Forsdick (left) with Elizabeth Rechniewski, Francesco Ricatti and Mei-Fen Kuo