ABSTRACT
This chapter explores how nation, law and territory may be mediated by the intercession of bodily sacrifice, and how in the recording and aesthetic commemoration of death, the body becomes part of a national archival performance. The chapter weaves together two narratives of the origins of the Australian nation – the recognition of native title in Mabo [No 2] and the ANZAC legend. It gives contemporary valence to the conflicts between these two accounts by drawing on Australian government efforts to resituate the ANZAC myth of national sacrifice from Gallipoli to the Villers-Bretonneux region in France, another site of intense Australian losses during the Great War. The extra-territorial projection of the Australian nation into the sovereign territory of France is supported by a multilateral treaty between former World War One allies, legitimated by reference to commemorative practices that construct a sacred space, and given material presence by the mass graves of Australian soldiers. The commemorative space around the recently dedicated Sir John Monash Centre and National Memorial supports a ‘mainstream nationalism’, which is yet to expunge the memory of frontier conflicts and violence that attended the colonisation of Australia – despite the absence of commemorative practice in the Australian body politick.
