Pain, passion and faith : revisiting the place of Charles Wesley in early Methodism

Pain, Passion and Faith: Revisiting the Place of Charles Wesley in Early Methodism is a significant study of the 18th-century poet and preacher Charles Wesley. Wesley was an influential figure in 18th-century English culture and society; he was co-founder of the Methodist revival movement and one of the most prolific hymn-writers in the English language. His hymns depict the Christian life as characterized by a range of intense emotions, from ecstatic joy to profound suffering.

'The suffering members sympathise' : constructing the sympathetic self in the hymns of Charles Wesley

For the first time in history, this timely landmark volume brings together contributions from the leading scholars working on the life and work of Charles Wesley.

Macmillan, Menzies, history and empire

In response to the rapidly changing nature of the British Commonwealth and Empire in the early 1960s Harold Macmillan and Robert Menzies exchanged correspondence which reflected upon the history of the British Empire and the world. In this article I argue that in their exchanges and other writings over this history we can identify, to use William Appleman Williams' formulation, the 'common assumptions about reality' which were crucial in shaping their understanding of world affairs.

History and attributes of selected Australian multi-tenure reserve networks

The need for conservation planning across the landscape, regardless of tenure, is widely recognised. In Australia, attempts to coordinate the management of conservation lands are characterised by models such as Biosphere Reserves and Conservation Management Networks. This paper outlines the history behind the formation and development of three networks in Australia—the Bookmark Biosphere Reserve, the Gippsland Plains Conservation Management Network, and the Grassy Box Woodlands Conservation Management Network—with particular emphasis on the tenure and protection attributes of the various components within these networks. Despite having a similar number of components, the total area represented in the networks varied markedly. There were few similarities in the proportion of components of various tenures and protection mechanisms among networks. Composition of networks is likely to be strongly influenced by both historical factors (degree of subdivision, land ownership and remaining vegetation) and contemporary factors (aims of the network and willingness of landowners to participate). Continued research into both the evolution and the physical and social dynamics of multi-tenure reserve networks enables a better understanding of their operation, and will ultimately assist in improved conservation planning across the landscape.

Education, state and agency in dystopian children's texts

The manifestation of dystopian and utopian discourses in children's texts, are inflected by questions of agency, often played out through narratives in which protagonists forge identities as members of communities and citizens of nations. Education shapes not merely what children know but how they regard themselves and the possibilities open to them.

The impossible infinite: Les Murray, poetry, and the sacred

In 1983, the provocative and idiosyncratic Australian poet Les Murray published a volume entitled The People's Otherworld. At the heart of that middle volume of Murray's work is a poem about grace entitled Equanimity. Here, McCredden examines how does the poetry of Murray seek to represent the sacred.

Evidence-based mental health nursing in Australia: our history and our future

This paper will develop a discussion related to evidence-based knowledge for mental health nursing, arguing for a historical component to be included in the comprehensive degree programme that will offer significant insights into mental health nursing knowledge from historical information and constructing implications for contemporary practice. Our understanding of the present is clearer by this looking back and forth and by adding meaning (and what the meanings mean) to what historically preceded. It allows the history of psychiatry to be a much more productive, useful, and a continual source of wisdom for the here and now. This blending of past knowledge with contemporary inquiry can offer depth in mental health nursing practices by forming a context for practice for the beginning nurse practitioner.

Playing with time: history and the extended present

In this paper we consider how the concept of time is developed in schools. We argue that the teaching and learning of history (despite the emergence of the new history in the 1970s) is still taught and learnt with a temporal bias and it is often positioned in the past. So too, history/SOSE1 student-teachers are exposed to temporal bias in their tertiary education (as is evidenced in ‘Arts Faculty’ history courses). We suggest that there needs to be greater connectedness and balance between the dimensions of time in the teaching of SOSE with specific reference to the teaching of history and futures perspectives. We offer a new conceptualisation of history which we refer to as ‘history as the extended present’ this conceptualisation positions history in multiple temporal domains (the past, present and possible, probable and preferable futures) and emphasises the relevance of teaching and learning history to students life worlds.