Sir George Simpson : 19th century fur trade governor and precursor of systematic management

Purpose – Sir George Simpson, the Governor of the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) from 1821 to his death in 1860, was the subject of numerous biographical works that described various facets of the man including his managerial abilities, literary prowess, physical stamina, abundant energy, extensive art collection and ethnological specimens. Two related aspects of his outstanding management style have been overlooked: the genesis of his management style and where it can be placed in the evolution of management practices during the 19th century.

Design/methodology/approach – Primary data from the Hudson's Bay Company archives plus secondary sources.

Findings – Simpson's management abilities came from his grammar school education and his apprenticeship to a counting house. More importantly, it can be attributed to his association with his mentor Andrew Wedderburn, his dedication to the HBC, and his high level of physical and intellectual energy. His information intensive management style was also a significant precursor to systematic management, which occurred later in the 19th century.

Research limitations/implications – Future research should examine other examples of the evolution of management during the 19th century, particularly the transition from sub-unit accountability to systematic management.

Originality/value – The paper emphasizes the importance of managers in making management systems work.

Sir, can x equal x plus two?

Technology in classrooms has brought opportunities to develop new ways of teaching and learning, as well as new ways of thinking and communicating. The author describes a lesson which aimed to have the grade four children in the class construct on the computer screen images of rectangles. The lesson provided the opportunity to learn about some powerful generalisations about rectangles as well to learn about their geometric and algebraic understandings.

Mourning and commemoration in Australia : the case of Sir W. T. Bridges and the unknown Australian soldier

The bodies of only two of 60,000 Australians who died in the Great War have been repatriated. The first - Sir W. l Bridges - is known; the other is unknown: the body of an unknown Australian soldier was returned in 1993 and entombed in the Australian War Memorial. The return of each offers insight into the ways in which the experience of death in the Great War was changing modes of grief and commemoration. While Bridges' return allowed public expression of private grief under new and terrible circumstances, an evolving culture of commemoration in the Great War made the public celebration of the one, known, man largely incompatible with the private grief of thousands.

Letter to a dead playwright : daily grind, Vicki Reynolds and archive fever, part 2

'Nothing is less reliable, nothing is less clear today than the word "archive",' observed Jacques Derrida in his book Archive Fever, a Freudian Impression (1996). This paper reflects on the unsettling process of establishing (or commencing) the Melbourne Workers Theatre archive, which is part of the ARC funded AusStage project. It does so with reference to Derrida's account of archive fever, which he characterises as an 'irrepressible desire to return to the origin, a homesickness, a nostalgia for the return to the most archaic place of absolute commencement' (91). In short, the paper uses Derrida's commentary on questions of memory, authority, inscription, hauntology and heritage to identify some of the philosophical and ethical aporias I have enountered while working on the AusStage project. The paper pays particular attention to what Derrida calls the spectral structure of the archive, and stages a conversation with the ghosts that haunt the digitised Melbourne Workers Theatre documents. It also unpacks the logic of Derrida's so-called messianic account of the archive, which 'opens out of the future' thereby affirming the future-to-come, and unsettling the normative notion of the archive as a repository for what has passed.

Letter to a dead playwright : daily grind, Vicki Reynolds, and archive fever

’Nothing is less reliable, nothing is less clear today than the word “archive”,’ observed Jacques Derrida in his book Archive Fever: a Freudian Impression (1996). This paper reflects on the unsettling process of establishing (or commencing) an archive for the Melbourne Workers Theatre, to form part of the AusStage digital archive which records information on live performance in Australia. Glenn D'Cruz's paper juxtaposes two disparate but connected registers of writing: an open letter to a deceased Australian playwright, Vicki Reynolds, and a critical reflection on the politics of the archive with reference to Derrida's account of archive fever, which he characterizes as an ‘irrepressible desire to return to the origin, a homesickness, a nostalgia for the return to the most archaic place of absolute commencement’. Using Derrida's commentary on questions of memory, authority, inscription, hauntology, and heritage to identify some of the philosophical and ethical aporias he encountered while working on the project, D’Cruz pays particular attention to what Derrida calls the spectral structure of the archive, and stages a conversation with the ghosts that haunt the digitized Melbourne Workers Theatre documents. He also unpacks the logic of Derrida's so-called messianic account of the archive, which ‘opens out of the future’, thereby affirming the future-to-come, and unsettling the normative notion of the archive as a repository for what has passed. Glenn D’Cruz teaches at Deakin University, Australia. He is the author of Midnight's Orphans: Anglo-Indians in Post/Colonial Literature (Peter Lang, 2006) and editor of Class Act: Melbourne Workers Theatre 1987–2007 (Vulgar Press, 2007).

Sir Walter Scott in the western district, 1836-1851

A survey of 30 early settlement squatters in Victoria, using their letters, diaries and memoirs to compile a regional history of colonial readers. The resulting reader-responses support the emerging interpretations of Affective Reading, rather than more conventional strategies of literary criticism (New Historicism and Discourse Analysis).