Talk:Australian diaspora

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The claim that there are 100,000 Australians in California is staggering. Is there any evidence to back this up? Not doubting, just wondering. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 118.92.234.127 (talk) 10:25, 30 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I believe that wasn't correct, unless you go by the number of Australian descendants. There are only 68,000 Australian expats in the USA, then one can mention Americans who have a parent/grand-parent of Australian birth, the figures could well be higher at 200,000 or a quarter of a million (250,000). I came to believe Part-time residents and resident aliens from Australia may been the reason why the figure is so high for the state of California. + 71.102.7.77 (talk) 21:12, 31 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

This is not a diaspora —The preceding

• According to the Wikipedia article on
  talk 21:52, 25 October 2006 (UTC)[reply
  ]
  • Added to that, it is a term which is understood in such terms (i.e. people will talk about the Australian Diaspora completely understanding the voluntary nature of the dispersal).Johno 07:22, 14 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Agreed. It is a bit cheap to consider Aussies on $200k in London fleeing HECS debts in the same league as genuine refugees or deportees. However I accept definitions can evolveKransky 04:16, 10 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Not a diaspora, not even an article. To add to the political aspect of the way the word 'diaspora' is being misused to refer to Australian emigration, there is also some sense in which a 'diaspora' means 'becoming spread out' - and what we have in Australian emigration is people moving from a country with the third lowest population density in the world to, well... London!, with hundreds of thousands of other Australians, or in any case to places with higher population densities, so in fact they are becoming closer together, not more spread out. Calling Australian emigration a 'diaspora' is
        weasel words and undermines the word 'diaspora'.

        There only appear to be a few authors, (if the author is indeed plural and not just one person re-logging in to popularise a public image for some thesis topic), the author/s haven't posted anything on the discussion page or even corrected the obvious glaring Elton John / Ben Elton mistake. Author/s: could you please at least make a post on this discussion page justifying the existence of this page? Otherwise, how do we start proceedings to give this article the kybush? SeventhHell (talk) 07:26, 17 October 2008 (UTC)[reply

        ]

However many pseudonymous Wikipedia editors band together and say "I don't think that this is a diaspora.", they are all trumped by the presence of a source that says, unequivocally, that there is an Australian diaspora and that it is "a meaningful and distinctive group and represents an important subject of serious study". This is what verifiability is all about. We trust sources, not pseudonymous Wikipedia editors. Remember that readers don't trust you. If one has a problem with the sources all using "diaspora" as the name for something that one would personally call by another name, then one must take that problem up with those sources directly, not adjust Wikipedia to describe the world as one personally wants it to be. This is, in part, what no original research is all about. Uncle G (talk) 00:35, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hello Uncle G, thanks for your response and work in locating a reference for the definition used for this article, which with thanks I will check out whenever I can get to a library. I am a newcomer, I had never edited wikipedia before the last 6 weeks or so, so I am sorry for seemingly having caused you offence by proposing this article for deletion. However I thought that this was the appropriate course of action as i) the original definition was unreferenced, ii) it had first been disputed in the talk page two years ago in Oct 2006 , and nobody had responded to that editor's query, (which query did reference the definition used in the main Diaspora article). I did go through the entire edit history of the article and noted that it was written almost entirely by the one author, with only minor changes by subsequent editors. I thought 'if that author can make an unreferenced claim and then not respond to enquiries about it for two by years then that warrants some decisive action'. Anyway, obviously (at least judging from your response) you think I should have contacted that author before proposing the article for deletion - I think otherwise, but I expect I will learn about the etiquette of editing.

Speaking of etiquette, I am interested in your repeated use of the word 'pseudonymous' to refer to editors. Could you kindly clarify what you mean? I could not find your name on your user page, are you a 'pseudonymous editor'? If you are accusing me of being a sock puppet, or of somehow being of dubious legitimacy because I'm a newcomer, well I don't know how to counter that - I guess I can only refer you to my user page... and privacy policy: of course, whilst I stand by my opinions I am not keen to be an identity theft victim - like you, I assume. Regarding your tip 'Remember that readers don't trust you' - thanks for that - that's a useful tip, which I in any case think supports my actions. Okay, so you think I should have contacted the author, I think the author has already exhibited wanton disregard for the article already by not attending to it for two years, so thanks for the tips, I'm interested in basic Wikipedia policy such as ignore all rules: "If a rule prevents you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore it".

It appears that a few public servants, academics, and business consultants have used the phrase "Australian diaspora" metaphorically or figuratively speaking (and not always meaning the same thing), however the phrase is not in common usage and I argue that the existence of this article is unrepresentative and ideologically-oriented - why else do you think it is that you will not find another encyclopedia in the world with an article so named? This so-called "Australian diaspora" article is about Australian emigration - pure and simple, 'diaspora' is used to conjure up the implication that Australian emigration is happening in large numbers, is bad, and is caused by big trouble/problems in Australia from which people are retreating which require correction. To use the phrase 'Australian diaspora' is ideologically driven, is highly dubious and is certainly not in common usage. Even John Hugo's 2006 article "An Australian Diaspora?" (which I am trying to get a copy of) bears the question mark in its title - seemingly precisely because it acknowledges that the term is an argument only and an un-established one at that - the abstract^[1] says that it attempts "...to assess the extent to which Australia's expatriate community fulfils the four defining criteria of contemporary diasporas advanced by Butler (2001)" i.e. it is trying to establish the argument, but in doing so acknowledges that the argument isn't yet established. At least some of the usage of the phrase 'Australian diaspora' is referring to that component of people involved in genuine diasporas who have migrated to Australia^[2]. I would not be surprised to find that a lot of the usage of the term is confined to consultants who have a financial (and academics a status-related) interest in establishing Australian emigration as a serious and weighty topic which is worse than migration, which therefore requires much further 'research' (yes, that may require some overseas trips, and travel expenses, hotels, laundry...). For example this article:[1] by a business consortium basically says that 'Australians are moving overseas, there's this many, it's really bad, there's so many overseas its a diaspora, we need to keep them here'... and then lo and behold proposes: 'what we need to keep them here is greater tax breaks for high income earners and businesses, and research concessions'.

So the article is hyperbole and

weasel words

, if there is any group with a genuine claim to the term "Australian diaspora" it is Indigenous Australians who have been displaced within Australia from their traditional homelands by British colonisation - I think if you and I both looked hard enough we'd find a reference using the phrase in that context, and then, (by the logic that a few usages warrants an article) we'd need a disambiguation page. What little I know about facts, I do know that there are few things that can be called 'unequivocal' in the sphere of social studies, and I expect there will be other poles of opinion, conjecture and debate about any 'topic' and about its underpinnings and the validity of its terms of reference.

So, I argue (and think I have established) that this article is not a neutral point of view, it is hardly notable, I have identified at least three different groups to which the term "Australian diaspora" may apply so it doesn't meet your 'distinctive ' criterion, the article is quite possibly offensive to persons displaced by genuine diasporas, and I argue it has major problems going against its inclusion. I know that one reference does not make a case for an article; I hope your reference checks out, but in any case I think something quite big needs to change here - either:

• i) a move to 'Australian emigration' with accompanying redirections and 'fettling' (i think that's the word for adjusting the wording to the new context),
• ii) a complete rewrite of two different articles with disambiguation page (to disambiguate from people involved in genuine diasporas who have migrated to Australia - and I am confident I will be able to turn up credible references saying that Australian emigration is not a diaspora, so this perspective will need to be written in)

For neither of these jobs am I volunteering as I think these are fatal flaws and I recommend:

• iii) deletion.

Thank you again, kind regards, SeventhHell (talk) 07:43, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

On second thoughts, in the cold light of day, I have struck through my above recommendation for deletion , pending further discussion from other users, request for comments, and referencing etc. SeventhHell (talk) 23:12, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See pseudonym. And yes, readers don't trust me, either. I'm pseudonymous, too. That's the point. They trust the sources, not us the editors. See the risk disclaimer that is linked to at the bottom of every page. Uncle G (talk) 22:10, 26 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• The suggestion any group with a genuine claim to the term "Australian diaspora" it is Indigenous Australians who have been displaced within Australia from their traditional homelands by British colonisation is
  reliable sources are cited. --Matilda ^talk 06:39, 28 October 2008 (UTC)[reply
  ]

• The Pain of Unbelonging: Alienation and Identity in Australasian Literature By Sheila Collingwood-Whittick, Germaine Greer Published by Rodopi, 2007
  ISBN 904202187X
  , 9789042021877
• 2003 The archaeology of ‘lost places’: ruin, memory and the heritage of the Aboriginal diaspora in Australia. By Rodney Harrison Historic Environment 17(1): 18-23.

This argument - that the use of diaspora in this article is not distinctive - is one of a few arguments extended above against the article. Many thanks SeventhHell (talk) 11:49, 28 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The reference to Elton John being a Briton who has come to Australia should be changed to '''Ben Elton'''.

Given the interdisciplinarity, requests for comment have been added across several different topic areas - noted above is how 'Australian diaspora' has been used by a business consortium, it also has historical & geographical, political, and social components.

Debate above covers areas including whether the term 'Australian diaspora' fits the criteria for use of the term 'diaspora', whether a proposal for deletion breaches '

(Query: may be more appropriately discussed under a general article on 'Australian emigration' or even 'Australian migration' generally).

With many thanks, 00:19, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

The article is sourced--not thoroughly, yet, but it shows promise--so I wouldn't go for deletion. If there are sources that question the use of the term "diaspora," then cite them, too. And feel free to point out the ways in which they question the term. If you have published material in

Firstly, full credit and hats off to you for writing the article. My arguments for change run mainly along three lines: verifiability, notability, neutrality.

reliable sources - nearly all of first several pages of hits (in the migration-from-Australia sense) that had any bibliography cited a publication by just one author - Graeme Hugo. Graeme Hugo of course has a long association with CEDA, and has done work for CEDA. CEDA, (for everyone else, this is the Committee for Economic Development of Australia) is an independent think tank which has an expressed aim to "promote (Australian) national economic development" is essentially a lobby group for middle-class Australia, which is fine if you're a white middle-class Australian, but most of the Wikipedia community are not, and whilst CEDA may hire academics to conduct funded research, it isn't a peer-reviewed publisher. The Senate Committee enquiry itself - as I'm sure you are aware - was on "Australian emigration" and NOT "Australian diaspora" (though parts of the media may have later beat it up that way in reporting it). So, the article lacks verifiability

.

Notability The article lacks a distintive claim to the term 'Australian Disapora". Graeme Hugo, incidentally, also wrote the paper on an 'Australian diaspora' referring to that component of people involved in the Greek Diaspora who migrated to Australia substantial proportion of these google hits would come from a) Australian Aboriginal diasporas and b) people escaping actual diasporas migrating to Australia. As you are also aware Wikipedia is not a guide to google hits, we do not write an article on "Australian thing" even though that gets >12,000 google hits.

NeutralityThis article title is at a certain pole of a debate. I have noted above an instance of it being used as an argument for tax concessions for high income earners to return to Australia. It would be disappointing if a Wikipedia article were a sandwich board for Australian business lobby groups including CEDA - the article lacks neutrality. In another sense, the final problem is that the article risks offending and hurting people, particularly survivors of genuine diasporas - no large group of Australian emigrants have en masse are leaving because they have been threatened and/or hurt, the 'tax-haven-refugee-diaspora' story may not wash with genuine diaspora survivors and may of course be insulted by this. As well of course, as Aboriginal Australians, (whose claim to a genuine & different sense of the term I have provided references for above). Look at the List of diasporas - these are people escaping terrible horrors, ethnic cleansing, and disasters, look on some of their talk pages and you will see debate about whether they meet the criteria for a 'diaspora' - it makes anglo Australians look like pathetic whingers to the rest of the world to claim that there is an diasapora of Australian emigrants. (I mean, seriously we only just invaded the place, we caused Aboriginal diasporas, and then we choose to rack off on a working holiday and we seriously expect the world to award us the phrase 'Australian Disapora'? I think the phrase is "Come off it!")

I suggest we either:

i) rewrite and move this article as an article on "Australian emigration" in which the phrase 'Australian diaspora' (in the Graeme Hugo sense) may warrant a section (when adjusting for undue weight), or

ii) rewrite the article saying it is the title of a paper by Graeme Hugo

Anyway, thanks if you have read this far, obviously I have not volunteered to go the hard yards and do the re-writing myself, so full credit to you for writing the article.SeventhHell (talk) 15:21, 28 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Dot points in response to points made above:

• I acknowledge that the term was promoted by Graeme Hugo and that fact is mentioned in the article. The term has been picked up by others than Hugo. However he is a significant Australian demographer. A more recent article of his "An Australian diaspora?" is in the journal of International Migration - apparently according to Google Scholar it is in turn cited 10 times. A Google scholar search shows the term has been picked up by others than Hugo.

• For example, Dr Michael Fullilove, Director, Global Issues Program, Lowy Institute for International Policy hosted a round table discussion promoted by Google in Paris on "World Wide Webs: Dissecting the Aussie Diaspora"

• A lack of an article on Australian emigration is no reason for a lack of an article on this topic - just means it is waiting to be written. It is also possible that the two articles could be merged, I have no strong views on that possibility.
• The use that some lobbyists might make of this article, while interesting, does not suggest that the article lacks neutrality.
• The term diaspora does not necessarily imply "people escaping terrible horrors, ethnic cleansing, and disasters". The wikipedia article on Diaspora encompasses voluntary departures within the definition in the lead.
• All articles are within scope for improvement, both for additional sources and material, this one is no exception. However, I believe it meets our policies on verifiability as it does cite sources that meet our criteria for reliable sources and it also meets our policy of no original research - as the original author of the article, it isn't my research that is being published, it is the research of Hugo and others. I don't think there is significant bias in the article (beyond of course the fact that it is of a particular scope as per the article title) but am happy to discuss bias if any is drawn to my attention. I don't even think it is of undue weight - 5% of the Australian population living overseas is of some weight - we have articles on ethnic groups living in Australia who are significantly less than 5% of the population.

--Matilda ^talk 22:40, 28 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"Many well-educated Australians, including scientists, find unique employment opportunities overseas, particularly in the United States of America."

Why is there a special section on Aussies in America? By your own figures there are many more in the United Kingdom. Even after filtering out those young Aussies on their Overseas Experience there would still be more Australians in the UK than in the US. If more of the Aussies in America are scientists etc, please can we see the statistics! Do you think s aspecial mention is due to the Aussies in America because in your eye America is worthy of special mention for some other reason? - signed by anon IP

Australia, has a cultural connection with the US as well with the British, and the two countries' contributions to Australia are well noted, studied and received. The article mentioned how present the Australians are in (North) America, but the Australian ties with Great Britain is much stronger as a member country of the British Commonwealth and they are much closer to New Zealand than the US. + 71.102.7.77 (talk) 21:14, 31 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The figure of 400k skippies living in the UK appears to be not altogether fair dinkum. The ref appears to be link spam or at least not entirely reliable. See this ABS doc which gives the figure (2003) as less than 100k. Anybody got anything up to date? Silent Billy (talk) 01:22, 26 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that the referencing & sources used in this article are poor. Using a travel website with unsourced figures as a reference is unverifiable and just weird. This ABS article looks like a good source. It would make sense for all the populations abroad quoted to come from the same source - would anyone like to volunteer to fill in the gaps? (Having said that I have heard much larger unsourced' figures bandied about of a million or more).

In any case I still think the entire premiss of this article is dubious (as per above debates) - that it should go the way of the dodo and be put out of its illogical misery - but to do that someone needs to write the article on Australian Emigration (which strangely still doesn't exist) and merge the siginificant points from this article into Australian Emigration. Big words, but I haven't been brave enough to tackle that task - anyone is welcome to it. SeventhHell (talk) 23:56, 2 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have taken the liberty of changing the figure for Australian expatriates in the UK only. This has led to the inconsistency that Greece is the number one destination which is nothing compared to the other inconsistencies of this article - anyone should please feel free to fix up the infobox (and article generally) citing credible sources. I have also made changes to reflect the usage of the term for internally displaced indigenous Australians as discussed extensively above and as per references. An Australian Bureau of Statistics source trumps a Boots travel article.SeventhHell (talk) 02:45, 3 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

How do you account for people who attain Australian citizenship and also hold onto another citizenship and then return to their original country? This would not count as a diaspora but would skew the figures quoted here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.216.227.125 (talk) 22:40, 7 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Just reading and I thought a list of notable Australian diaspora would be good. People like Germaine Greer, maybe Mel Gibson, maybe Mark Schwartzer people like that?--TinTin (talk) 02:14, 5 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]