During the 1830s, white settlers in the Australian colonies sought to consolidate their possession of Aboriginal land, prompting tension between colonists and Aboriginal people, and between settlers and British humanitarian interests. In this essay, I examine competing representations of frontier clashes, and particularly the 1838 Myall Creek massacre, and their links to larger imperial debates. At the height of their influence, British humanitarians drew upon the discursive strategies of the antislavery movement in seeking to mobilize concern for Indigenous Australians. In a context where Aboriginal people were stereotyped as primitive and non-human, counter-images and strategies drawn from antislavery discourse might constitute them as objects of white compassion. Focusing blame upon the convict perpetrators allowed elite humanitarians to displace responsibility from the system of colonization itself.

中文翻译：

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澳大利亚的反奴隶制：描绘1838年Myall Creek大屠杀

在1830年代，澳大利亚殖民地的白人定居者试图巩固他们对原住民土地的所有权，从而加剧了殖民者与原住民之间以及定居者与英国人道主义利益之间的紧张关系。在本文中，我研究了边界冲突的相互竞争的表现形式，尤其是1838年Myall Creek大屠杀，以及它们与更大范围的帝国辩论的联系。在影响最大的时候，英国人道主义者利用反奴隶运动的话语策略，试图动员对澳大利亚原住民的关注。在原住民被定型为原始人和非人的情况下，从反奴隶主义话语中汲取的反像和策略可能将他们构成白色同情的对象。