| Book Review | The American Historical Review, 111.4

You have not been recognized as a subscriber to the AHR online. About 224 words from this article are provided below; about 584 words remain.

If you are a individual member of the American Historical Association, you may:: • login here if you have already registered for online access.; • Or if you're already logged in register your subscription.
• Set up your online account for the first time. AHA members can go to the AHA individual membership section to locate their member numbers.
If you are not a member of the American Historical Association, you can:: • Join the AHA and receive many member benefits including print and electronic issues of the American Historical Review.
• Purchase a research pass to gain two hour access to the entire History Cooperative web site. You will have full access to current issues of the American Historical Review (104.3-present). Note: the Research Pass does not provide access to JSTOR's holdings of the American Historical Review.
Instititutions can:: • Subscribe to this journal and receive print and electronic issues.
• Activate your existing subscription so that we recognize your IP number ranges.

| Book Review | The American Historical Review, 111.4 | The History Cooperative

Alan Atkinson. The Europeans in Australia: A History. Volume 2, Democracy. New York: Oxford University Press. 2004. Pp. xxiii, 440. $55.00.
If you read one book about the Australian colonies in the nineteenth century, choose this one. Focused on the emergence of "democracy," this second volume of The Europeans in Australia is a work of historical insight, imaginatively conceived and beautifully written. "Among any people, in any degree of civilisation there is glory in material well wrought," writes Alan Atkinson about the vast bureaucratic labor of census-taking and statistics that developed in the mid-nineteenth century. Such glory attaches to his own fine work.	1
Atkinson's history is an account of the forging of democratic communities in which the constitution of sexual and racial difference—and similarity—are key dynamics. His attention to the distinctive experiences of women from all backgrounds is striking: women's opinions, women's speech, women's loyalty to bushrangers are noted and interrogated. And as an account of the establishment of European civilization through the dispossession of indigenous peoples, so are the trauma and tragedy that underpinned the process of settlement. Writing of the Port Phillip district, Atkinson notes that the Europeans spread as usual with overwhelming speed and that the state-appointed protectors "were a feeble shield between invaders and invaded" (p. 203).	. . .

There are about 584 more words in this article. Please log in (or, if you are not yet an authorized user, please go to the User Setup page) to gain full access rights. Or if you're already logged in register your subscription.