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Lesson ideas

Myth of the Western Man

Students identify ways in which history and culture influence identity.

Diversity- A Celebration of Art &Culture An Education Kit for the Yiribana Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Gallery (AGNSW) provides the basis for a variety of teaching activities related to history and identity. Most can be adapted for different age groups.

Adapted from Diversity-A Celebration of Art & Culture
An Education Kit for the Yiribana Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Gallery

• Find and describe the figure in this work.
• Describe the qualities of this work. Look at the swirling lines
• Identify the numbers in Gordon Bennett's work.
  1788 1795 1799
  1802 1803 1804 1813 1824 1838 1857 1861 1869 1876
  1917 1928 1972 1976 1992
  What are their significance? What do you think they might represent? Make a timeline and research dates to identify their significance.
• Create a timeline of dates significant to your personal, family or cultural identity.
• Create a self portrait pictorially or verbally, that explores the complexity of identity.

• Research in detail the dates in the painting. Write a report about one of them.
• Write a biography of a 'hero of the resistance'.
• Compare and contrast this painting with Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri's Warlugulung.
• Consider symbols, colour, composition, process and purpose.
• Consider where knowledge comes from. Who writes history? How are historical images collected and presented? Who authorises historical images and accompanying texts?

• History
• Progress
• Paul W. Newbury 1999, Aboriginal Heroes of the Resistance- from Pemulwuy to Mabo, Action for World Development