Re-storying monuments: forum introduction

Statues, monuments and memorials have been key sites of protest in recent years in communities around the world. Local demands for racial justice and historical truth-telling interacted with transnational movements and concerns. Responding to these urgent demands, some historians counsel re-interpretation of monuments, some eagerly push to topple statues, and others embrace the core of their discipline: to tell the truth about the past, seeking out the voices of forgotten and marginalised peoples and bringing to light forgotten events. This forum presents research and perspectives on a range of Australian monuments, their creation and the performances around them. The aim is to ‘re-story’ these monuments, to unearth lost histories, meanings and performances in the context of current concerns around racial and social justice, climate change and the Anthropocene and eroding working rights and conditions.