ABSTRACT
This chapter explores different representations of migration through the prism of contemporary Australian literature. David Carter, for one, makes a distinction between pre-structuralist and post-structuralist readings of migrant literature. An interesting component of Australian migration literature is those texts that recount the experiences of children. This impersonal social narrative focuses on the politics of Australian immigration in charting the major events such as street protests against Australia's involvement in the Vietnam War and the change in migration policy in the 1970s that precipitated larger numbers of non-Europeans to settle in Australia. There is little room for sentimentality in Liverani's account and she does not dwell on describing her feelings in any elaborate way. Instead, she reports on daily encounters and uses the Glaswegian dialect to portray her upbringing in Scotland and Australia. The Australian scenes depict life in the hostel and her family's new home in Wollongong.
