Australia is a unique and diverse country in every way – in culture, population, climate, geography, and history. For articles on specific topics about Australian history and culture visit our Australian Stories index5.
Culture
Australian culture is as broad and varied as the country’s landscape. Australia is multicultural and multiracial and this is reflected in the country’s food, lifestyle and cultural practices and experience.
Australia has an important heritage from its indigenous people, which plays a defining role in the cultural landscape.
This diversity of influences creates a cultural environment in Australia that is lively, energised, innovative and outward looking.
Population
As of October 2012, Australia’s population is roughly 22.7 million people. The most populous states are New South Wales and Victoria, with their respective capitals, Sydney and Melbourne, the largest cities in Australia.
Australia’s population is concentrated along the coastal region of Australia from Adelaide to Cairns, with a small concentration around Perth, Western Australia. The centre of Australia is sparsely populated.
Climate
The majority of Australia experiences temperate weather for most of the year.
The northern states of Australia are typically warm all the time, with the southern states experiencing cool winters but rarely sub-zero temperatures.
Snow falls on the higher mountains during the winter months, enabling skiing in southern New South Wales and Victorian ski resorts, as well as the smaller resorts in Australia’s island state, Tasmania.
Geography
Australia is an island continent and the world’s sixth largest country (7,682,300 sq km).
Lying between the Indian and Pacific oceans, the country is approximately 4,000 km from east to west and 3,200 km from north to south, with a coastline 36,735 km long.
Canberra is Australia’s capital city. With a population of approximately 320,000 people and situated in the Australian Capital Territory, Canberra is roughly half way between the two largest cities Melbourne and Sydney.
Australia has 19 listed World Heritage properties. Australia is also famous for its landmark buildings including the Sydney Harbour Bridge; its ancient geology, as well as for its high country.
History
Australia’s first inhabitants, the Aboriginal people, are believed to have migrated from some unknown point in Asia to Australia between 50,000 and 60,000 years ago.
While Captain James Cook is credited with Australia’s European discovery in 1770, a Portuguese possibly first sighted the country, while the Dutch are known to have explored the coastal regions in the 1640s.
The first European settlement of Australia was in January 1788, when the First Fleet sailed into Botany Bay under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip. Originally established as a penal colony, by the 1830s the number of free settlers was increasing. Transportation of convicts to the eastern colonies was abolished in 1852 and to the western colonies in 1868.
Legal system
Australia follows a Westminster system of government and law inherited from the British who originally colonised the country.
There are two main political parties and a number of minor parties, which make up the Commonwealth Parliament. Each state and territory also has its own government.
Australia’s land mass
Australia comprises a land area of about 7.692 million square kilometres.
Although this is just five per cent of the world’s land mass (149.45 million square kilometres), Australia is the planet’s sixth largest country after Russia, Canada, China, the United States of America and Brazil. It is also the only one of the largest six nations that is completely surrounded by water.
Australia’s land mass is:
- almost as great as that of the United States of America
- about 50 per cent greater than Europe, and
- 32 times greater than the United Kingdom.
Geographical and climatic features
Australia is the smallest of the world’s continents. It is also the lowest, the flattest and (apart from Antarctica) the driest.
The highest point on the Australian mainland is Mount Kosciuszko, New South Wales, at 2228 metres above sea level. The lowest point is the dry bed of Lake Eyre, South Australia, which is 15 metres below sea level.
The mainland and Tasmania are surrounded by many thousands of small islands and numerous larger ones. Nearly 40 per cent of the total coastline length comprises island coastlines. As an island nation, coastlines play an important role in defining national, state and territory boundaries.
Nearly 20 per cent of Australia’s land mass is classified as desert. As well as having a low average annual rainfall, rainfall across Australia is also variable. The rainfall pattern is concentric around the extensive arid core of the continent, with rainfall intensity high in the tropics and some coastal areas.
Climatic zones range from tropical rainforests, deserts and cool temperature forests to snow covered mountains.
Within this climate, our plants and animals have evolved on a geographically isolated continent, through a time of a slowly drying climate, combined with continuing high variability. The uniqueness of much of Australia’s flora and fauna is thus at least partly due to these features of our climate.
Australian people
Australia is one of the most ethnically diverse societies in the world today.
Almost one in four Australian residents were born outside of Australia and many more are first or second generation Australians, the children and grandchildren of recently arrived migrants and refugees.
This wide variety of backgrounds, together with the culture of Indigenous Australians who have lived on the Australian continent for more than 50,000 years, have helped create a uniquely Australian identity and spirit.
Indigenous peoples and cultures
Before the arrival of British colonisers in 1788, Australia was inhabited by the Indigenous peoples – Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders, sometimes referred to as the First Australians. Aboriginal people inhabited the whole of Australia and Torres Strait Islanders lived on the islands between Australia and Papua New Guinea, in what is now called the Torres Strait.
There were over 500 different clan groups or ‘nations’ around the continent, many with distinctive cultures, beliefs and languages.
Today, Indigenous people make up 2.4 per cent of the total Australian population (about 460,000 out of 22 million people).
The first colony
New South Wales was settled as a penal colony – a place where Britain could send convicted criminals because her prisons were overcrowded. Many convicts had grown up in poverty and committed only minor offences, such as the theft of a loaf of bread. Conditions in the new colony were little better than at home – it took many years for British settlers to understand the different environment of the new colony, and disease and malnutrition were widespread during the first decades of settlement.
Convicts formed the majority of the colony’s population for the first few decades of settlement. Convicts continued being sent to New South Wales until 1823, although as time went by, convicts were increasingly seen as a source of labour to build the colony, rather than just being sent away from Britain as punishment for their crimes.
Free settlers
The first wave of migrants to Australia included men of capital who were attracted by the colony’s agricultural prospects and the availability of convict labour. Their enthusiasm, together with the Gold Rushes era of the mid-nineteenth century, pushed out the boundaries of the new settlement and by the end of the 1850s there were six separate Australian colonies:
- New South Wales
- Tasmania (originally settled in 1803, but separated from New South Wales in 1825)
- Western Australia (established in 1829)
- South Australia, including the Northern Territory (established in 1834)
- Victoria (detached from New South Wales in 1851)
- Queensland (detached from New South Wales in 1859)
Settlers living in Australia in the nineteenth century lived at the frontier of not only a new land, but of a new society.
Becoming Australians
The six Australian colonies were governed independently of each other, but during the second half of the 19th century there was a growing sense of an Australian identity and a push towards establishing Australia as an independent nation under a Federation.
The new nation remained loyal to Britain, and retained its identity as part of the British Empire. Many people thought of themselves as British people, living in a different land. However, substantial migration from Ireland enhanced an Australian identity that was increasingly independent of Britain.
Non-white immigrants were essentially excluded by the restrictions of the new Immigration Restriction Act, which required that they take a dictation test in a specific language with which they were not necessarily familiar. Non-white immigrants were often seen as a threat to working conditions in Australia and to Australia’s ‘British’ character.
Policies such as this were to remain in place until after World War Two, when the government implemented migration schemes that actively sought first British, then European, migrants. Since then, the face of Australia has changed remarkably. While large numbers of migrants have continued to come from traditional sources like the United Kingdom and New Zealand, there have been large numbers of people from countries as diverse as Italy, Greece, China, Vietnam and Lebanon. Their contribution to Australian society, culture and prosperity has been an important factor in shaping the modern Australia.
Population today
Australia’s population today is roughly 22 million people. The country’s vast openness means it has the lowest population density in the world – only two people per square kilometre.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) produces population estimates for the Australian Government and people. The ABS Population clock5 displays the current estimate of the resident population of Australia.
Australian National Flag
When the Australian colonies federated to form the Commonwealth of Australia on 1 January 1901, there was an urgent demand for a new national flag as an emblem for the new country. An official competition for a design was arranged, which attracted 32,823 entries. Five of these contained almost identical designs and were placed equal first. Apart from later changes in the size of the stars and the number of points, they had produced the present Australian National Flag.
The Australian National Flag consists of three parts set on a blue field. The first part is the Union Jack, acknowledging the historical link with Britain. The second part is the Southern Cross (a constellation of stars only visible in the Southern Hemisphere), representing Australia’s geographical location in the world. Finally, the Commonwealth Star represents Australia’s federal system of government. Originally, the Commonwealth Star had six points (for the six states), but in 1908 a seventh point was added to represent the Territories of the Commonwealth of Australia.
Australian National Anthem
Advance Australia Fair was one of many Australian nationalistic songs written in the late-nineteenth century as debates about the creation of the new nation were taking place in the different colonies.
Although it is thought to have been first performed in 1878 by Mr Andrew Fairfax in Sydney, possibly the most significant early performance of Advance Australia Fair was at the inauguration of the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901, where it was sung by a choir of 10,000. Advance Australia Fair was not considered the national anthem, however, with this role going to the British anthem God Save the Queen [or King] for most of the twentieth century.
A determined search for a truly Australian national anthem did not begin in earnest until the Melbourne Olympic Games in 1956. The Australian Bureau of Statistics conducted a national opinion poll of 60,000 people in 1974 and in 1977 the Australian Electoral Office ran a poll for a tune for a national song in conjunction with a referendum.
In the 1977 plebiscite, four songs were in contention for the official title:
- Advance Australia Fair
- God save the Queen [or King] (the British anthem)
- Waltzing Matilda (one of Australia’s best-known national songs), and
- Song of Australia (a popular national song written in 1859)
The results of the plebiscite were conclusive with 43.2 per cent (or 2,940,854 votes) going to Advance Australia Fair. Next most popular was Waltzing Matilda with 28.3 per cent, despite its arguable status as the best-known, best-loved and most iconic national song.
In 1984 the government announced that the tune of Advance Australia Fair together with modifications to two verses of the lyrics would become the Australian National Anthem.
Commonwealth Coat of Arms
The Commonwealth Coat of Arms is the formal symbol of the Commonwealth of Australia and its ownership and authority. King Edward VII made the first official grant of a coat of arms to the Commonwealth of Australia in a Royal Warrant dated 7 May 1908.
The absence of specific references to the states in the shield in the 1908 Arms led to a number of alterations approved on the recommendation of the Commonwealth Government by King George V. King George V granted the second Commonwealth Coat of Arms in a Royal Warrant dated 19 September 1912.
Symbols of Australia’s six states appear together on the shield, which is the central feature of a coat of arms. The border of the shield symbolises federation. The kangaroo and emu are the native animals that hold the shield with pride.
A gold Commonwealth Star sits above the shield. Six of the star’s points represent the Australian states. The seventh point represents the territories. A wreath of gold and blue sits under the Commonwealth Star. Gold and blue are the Commonwealth Coat of Arms’ livery or identifying colours.
Australia’s floral emblem, the golden wattle, frames the shield and supporters. A scroll contains the word Australia’.
Australia’s national colours
Australia’s national colours, green and gold, were popular and well loved by Australians long before they were officially proclaimed by the Governor-General on 19 April 1984.
At international sporting events since before Federation, and of course at many since, the colours have been associated with the achievements of many great Australian sports men and women.
As well as instilling national pride on the field, spectators often also don the official colours and cheer their team waving green and gold boxing kangaroo flags. Back home in Australia, the green triangle and gold kangaroo of the Australian Made logo is the most recognised country of origin symbol on Australian shop shelves.
Prior to proclamation, Australia had no official colours and different combinations vied for the honour: red, white and blue; blue and gold; and green and gold. The colours red, white and blue featured in the first Coat of Arms of the Commonwealth in 1908 and are the colours of the Australian National Flag. Blue and gold have heraldic significance, as the colours of the crest in the 1912 (present) Commonwealth Coat of Arms.
But it was the green and gold of Australia’s landscape, principally of many species of wattle, which won the day. Green and gold is also represented on the Commonwealth Coat of Arms by the wattle which is an ornamental accessory to the shield.
Australia’s floral emblem
The golden wattle, Acacia pycnantha, Australia’s national floral emblem, encapsulates the spirit of the Australian bush. The shrub or small tree grows in the understorey of open forest, woodland and in open scrub in South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory.
Like all emblems and symbols, the golden wattle captures an essence of Australia that brings the colours, smells and textures of the Australian bush alive.
The flower has long been recognised as Australia’s premier floral symbol and was officially proclaimed in 1988. In 1912, on the recommendation of the Prime Minister, the Hon. Andrew Fisher MP, wattle was included as the decoration surrounding the Commonwealth Coat of Arms and it has also been used in the design of Australian stamps and many awards in the Australian honours system.
Golden wattle was honoured further with the proclamation in 1992 that 1 September in each year be observed as National Wattle Day. This day provides an opportunity for all Australians to celebrate our floral heritage, particularly through the planting of an Acacia species suitable for the area in which they live.
Australia’s national gemstone
The opal is a rare and beautiful precious stone.
A very special series of geographical and climatic phenomena need to coincide for the opal to form. The great desert regions of central Australia provide such conditions and Australia produces over 90 per cent of the world’s precious opal.
Australia ‘s precious opals include the black opal (produced in Lightning Ridge, New South Wales), white opal (majority of the world’s production occurs in Coober Pedy, South Australia), crystal opal and boulder opal (mined in Central Queensland). The precious stone was proclaimed Australia’s national gemstone on 28 July 1993.
In Aboriginal legend, the mesmerising opal was a gift from the sky, from a rainbow that had touched the earth and created the colours of the opal.
Information sourced from: http://australia.gov.au
© Commonwealth of Australia 2014