Remembering and misremembering television

Authors

Kate Darian-Smith, University of Melbourne
Sue Turnbull, University of WollongongFollow

RIS ID

65630

Publication Details

Darian-Smith, K. & Turnbull, S. E. 2012, 'Remembering and misremembering television', in K. Darian-Smith & S. E. Turnbull (eds), Remembering Television: Histories, Technologies, Memories, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom. pp. 1

Abstract

When asked "What is History?", one of the schoolboy characters in the award-winning novella The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes offers the following definition attributed to a fictitious French scholar: "History is that certainty produced at the point where the imperfections of memory meet the inadequacies of documentation.' (Barnes 2011, 7). As the essays gathered in this volume reveal, the history .of televlslon 10 AustralIa is indeed an uncertain matter, constructed as it often has been on patchy documentation and limited archival sources. These sources frequently have been accompanied by the memories-sometimes solicited by scholars-from individuals and communities about the "coming" of television to Australia and its subsequent personal, collective and national significance.