In quite a few ways, Australia is very much like another version (albeit smaller as far as population is concerned) of the United States of America. She is a migrant country and diversely multi-cultural.

For the last 50,000 years until 1788, Australia only had ONE race of people � the Aboriginals. [more on Aboriginal Australia] Then came the British Anglo-Celtic (simpler known as the British, Scottish and Irish) convicts and pioneering settlers who came and built modern Australia. [more on settlement of Australia] Then there were migrants from Germany who came to South Australia and founded the wine-growing areas such as the now-world-famous Barossa Valley.

In 1939, a survey showed that 98 percent of Australian population was Anglo-Celtic stock. Local Australian newspapers even proudly proclaimed that Australia was the most �British� country on earth � even more so that England herself! All that changed after 1945 when Australia embarked on one of the most ambitious and successful immigration programmes in world history. Aussie life will never be the same again, just like in 1788.

The first New Australians � Southern Europeans. The first wave of non-British migrants were drawn from the Mediterranean and Baltic countries of Europe in the 1950s and 1960s. They were mostly from Greece and Italy. Some 275,000 of �New Australians� came in those years. Today in 2001, 5% of Australians are of Italian descent, while Melbourne is often called the third-largest Greek city in the world!

These early Italian and Greek migrants had to face the challenges of social integration into the Anglo-Australian world. Anglo-Australians, on the other hand, feared that their up-to-then Aussie way of life will be threatened by the newcomers � who they called �dagos�, �wogs� and �Ities�. Today, try take away from Anglo-Aussies their rights to Italian cappuccino, lasagne, pizza, spaghetti or Greek souvlaki � and they�ll cry �pure murder� and clobber you, mate! For the early migrants, all their hard work has produced the promised comforts despite their tough, impoverished beginnings. Nothing like a win-win situation, mate.

The New Asian Australians The Chinese had first arrived in Australia during the Gold Rush in the 1850s. Cities and towns like Ballarat had a community of the Chinese, just like San Francisco in the USA. But Asian migration to Australia did not make much of a dent due to the �White Australia� migration policy until the 1970s when that policy was lifted and Australia opened its doors to Asian migration. Again, life would never be the same again. Also, Australian cuisine would also never be the same again! By the 1990s, one-third of all new migrants were from Asian countries. Asian migrants came from Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Hong Kong, the Phillipines, China, India etc. In addition, there were also migrants from the Middle-East which further added to the rich cultural melting pot!

Again, there were tough hardship towards social integration for the Asian newcomers. The Chinese were called �chings� just like the days when the early Greeks were called �wogs� in the 1950s. Now take away things like the Australian dim sim and yum-cha from Anglo-Australians, and they�ll also scream �pure murder�!

Australia�s Special Broadcasting Service (SBS) As a result of the immigration waves, 2 million (10 percent) Australians today speak a language other than English when they are at home. In the 1980s, an ethnic radio and television broadcasting network was established to transmit in a �Babel� of multi-languages (but with English subtitle) for the multi-cultural society fabric of Australia. This was the Special Broadcasting Service (SBS). Throughout the main cities, SBS Television�s evening news is regarded as the most wide-ranging and balanced coverage over Australian newswaves. Many Australian viewers stay tuned to catch a rich potporri of programmes: variety shows from Brazil, films from Israel, comedies from China etc. Today, SBS has become perhaps the most public manifestation of Australia�s cultural diversity.

Australia�s People Asset Overall, the Australian experience of immigration has been one of the most successful in world history: the influx has been absorbed into society with remarkably little friction (e.g. there were no civil wars, mate). Indeed, it has been widely accepted as the key to Australia�s vitality. As Professor Jerzy Zubzycki � himself a Polish-born professor at the Australian National University summed it: ��immigration has become the most dynamic and constructive and self-renewing feature of Australian society. We need to share our country with others, but also unashamedly want the talent, energy and industry of diverse groups of immigrants, to help us develop a potential which is plainly abundant. The tolerance of our ethnic diversity is the principal means available to us to reach this goal.�

Aboriginal boy
Aussie out fishing
Skippy-the-Kangaroo
Crocodile Aussieman
Aussie Farmer
Aussie mates
Surfers Paradise girl
Aussie Lifesaver
Aussie �Digger� (soldier)
Rural Aussies
Bush country musician
Urban Aussie teenagers
Urban Aussies