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Dr Tony Moore

Director, National Centre for Australian Studies

Senior Lecturer, Communications and Media Studies

BA (hons) (Syd); PhD (Syd)

View contact details in Monash Staff Directory

Recent Grants and Awards

NSW History Fellowship of $20,000 awarded in 2007 to assist with the researching and writing of Death or Liberty: Rebels and Radicals Transported to Australia, 1788-1868. The Fellowship is administered by Arts NSW as part of the premier’s History Awards, and was judged by Dr Erik Eklund, Dr Alison Holland and Associate Professor Melanie Oppenheimer.

Latest Works

Death or Liberty: Rebels and Radicals Transported to Australia, 1788-1868

Death or Liberty is the first narrative history that brings together the stories of the political prisoners sent as convicts to Australia from all over Britain and her vast Empire, spanning the early days of the penal settlement at Sydney Cove until transportation ended in 1868. Most Australians are aware of the nation's convict roots, but few realise that transportation was a common punishment for protest, agitation, rebellion, dissent and riot directed against the British Crown and its representatives.

"While no revolution occurred in Australia, early revolutionaries and radicals profoundly influenced the emergence of a distinctive political culture in colonial society that still lingers today. Tony Moore has revived some crucial stories from our past in a most enlivening and enlightening way."

--Hon. Lindsay Tanner, MP, Federal Minister for Finance and Deregulation

"This important and dramatic era of Australian, Irish and British Empire history has been too often only partially told. Now we have the whole vivid tale, told by an excellent historian and engrossing narrator. Here we become fascinated by the lives of patriots and prisoners, and of those who try to contain and punish them-all in terms which light up the past and have an unexpected relevance to the present."

--Thomas Keneally, author of The Great Shame and Australians: Origins to Eureka.

For further information, please click Murdoch Books.

Australian Encounters

Book covers of Australian Encounters series

Dr Tony Moore is Commissioning Editor of the Australian Encounters series, a partnership between Cambridge University Press and the National Centre for Australian Studies, Monash University.

Combining original scholarly research and elegant, accessible prose, this series engages with important Australian issues that span current society, politics, culture, economics and historical debates. The essence of the series is to bring new thinking and fresh perspectives to issues vital to Australian society.

More about the Australian Encounters series.

Power Crisis, by former minister and Labor historian Rodney Cavalier, is the latest volume in the Australian Encounters series (jointly published by Cambridge University Press and the National Centre for Australian Studies (NCAS), Monash University).

Power Crisis is an explosive account of the self-destruction of the New South Wales Labor government, which has seen a turnover of four premiers in five years. Cavalier exposes the backstage dramas of the ALP and tells the story not told by the media. He draws on history to illuminate the crisis. Featuring interviews with ex-premiers Iemma and Rees, this book contrasts the current turmoil and self-indulgence within New South Wales Labor over generations before, and asks, "What went wrong?"

"This is a forensic and penetrating analysis of the crisis facing modern Labor. Cavalier is unrivalled in his ability to identify the dilemmas of the present but locate them in historical context."

-- Paul Kelly, The Australian

View details and purchase book from Cambridge University Press.

Biography

Dr Tony Moore joined the Communications and Media Studies Program as a Lecturer in February 2009, following careers in book publishing and as a program maker at ABC Television. Tony completed his doctorate in Australian cultural history at the University of Sydney, and writes regularly on communications, history and politics in the press and scholarly publications. Through his journalism and publishing projects Tony maintains close industry links with professionals working in the media and policy sectors, which are drawn upon to enhance the vocational depth of the Communications and Media Studies Postgraduate program.

Tony has taught at the University of NSW and the University of Sydney. He believes that postgraduate coursework in communications should equip students with the skills and knowledge to think critically and creatively throughout their professional careers.

Tony’s research interests include cinema, independent media and creative industries, public broadcasting, popular music, radical political movements and their use of media, youth subcultures and artistic bohemia. Tony’s doctoral thesis examined Australia’s bohemian tradition, a century-long history of creative iconoclasts spanning Marcus Clarke to Nick Cave, Dulcie Deamer to Germaine Greer. His first book, The Barry McKenzie Movies, analysed the cultural significance of the ‘Ocker’ cinema genre of the 1970s. In 2007 Tony was awarded the NSW History Fellowship to research and write Death or Liberty, a history of political prisoners transported to the Australian colonies in the convict era, to be published in 2010. Tony’s scholarly articles have been published in the Journal of Australian Studies, History Australia and Meanjin.

Tony’s professional engagement with the media extends back to the mid 1980s when he was NSW community representative on the ABC National Advisory Council. In nine years as an ABC program-maker he worked on seminal feature length documentaries as a researcher, writer, associate producer and later a producer/director. His documentary credits include Nobody’s Children, The Devil You Know, Lost In Space, So Help Me God and Bohemian Rhapsody. As a journalist producer in ABC Current Affairs Tony worked at Four Corners, 7.30 Report and Foreign Correspondent. Combining his journalistic skills and scholarly research Tony is a commentator in the print and electronic media, including the Australian, the Sydney Morning Herald and ABC Radio.

For over a decade from the late 1990s Tony was publisher for Pluto Press, where he commissioned titles in the areas of political science, history, economics, cultural studies and media. These include important works by scholars such as Ghassan Hage, McKenzie Wark and Judith Brett, and by policy leaders such as Lindsay Tanner. He has been especially committed to working with young emerging writers and postgraduates to get their research published. Most recently Tony was academic Commissioning Editor for Cambridge University Press, for whom he edits an issues series.

Tony is committed to channelling innovative research and theory through a variety of media to challenge orthodox thinking, stimulate creative public debate, and provide evidence for policy reform. This notion of ‘ideas entrepreneurship’ connects his careers in academia, broadcasting, journalism and publishing. As an historian he believes knowledge of our cultural traditions enables critical engagement with present problems and opportunities.

Research Interests

Keywords

Media/Culture, Cinema, independent Media, Creative Industries, Public Broadcasting, Popular Music, Radical Political Movements and their Use of Media, Youth Subcultures, Artistic Bohemia, Media Policy, Documentary and Current Affairs, Journalism, Australian Social, Political and Cultural History, British Social, Political and Cultural History, Australian Politics, Labour and Social History

Areas of Supervision

Tony brings to his academic and professional media research expertise over a decade’s experience as an academic publisher working with PhD candidates and established scholars transforming their research into published books. Tony’s areas of supervision expertise include:

Australian social, cultural and political history
Australian media history
radical movements and use of media
bohemia and avant-gardes
Australian cinema and television
documentary and current affairs
youth subcultures and popular cultures
public broadcasting
creative industries

Publications

Books

Death or Liberty: Rebels and Radicals Transported to Australia, 1788-1868, Pier Nine (Pier Nine/Murdoch), 2010

The Barry McKenzie Movies, Australian Screen Classics Series, Currency Press/Australian Film Commission, Strawberry Hills, Sydney, 2005

Edited Books

(Series Editor) Reclaiming Patriotism: Nation-Building for Australian Progressives by Tim Soutphommasane, Cambridge University Press, Port Melbourne

Books Chapters

‘The Art of Risk in an Age of Anxiety’, in K. Oakley & L. Anderson, eds, Making Meaning, Making Money. Directions for the Arts and Cultural Industries in the Creative Age, Cambridge Scholars Press, 2009.
Article republished as ‘Urban Iconoclast’ in R. Dessaix, Best Australian Essays 2005, Black Inc, 2005
'Hawke's Big Tent: Elite Pluralism and the Politics of Inclusion', Chapter in T. Bramston and S. Ryan, eds, The Hawke Government: A Critical Retrospective, Pluto Press, North Melbourne, 2003
‘Unchaining Aunty’, in D. Glover and G. Patmore, eds, Labor Essays 2001, Pluto Press, Annandale, 2001
‘Australia’s Bohemian Tradition’, in R. Nile, The Australian Legend and its Discontents, University of Queensland Press, in Association with the API Network, St. Lucia, 2000
‘To Praise Youth or to Bury It’, New Voices for Social Democracy, Labor Essays, 1999-2000, Pluto Press, Annandale, 1999
‘Triumph in the Labyrinth’, in L. Finch and C. McConville, eds, Gritty Cities, Images of the Urban, Pluto Press, Annandale, 1999

Refereed Journal Articles

‘Does the Left Need a Sense of Humour?’, The Sydney Papers, Volume 19 Number 3, Winter, 2007
‘Urban Iconoclast. New Light on Marcus Clarke’, Meanjin, Carlton, Vol. 64, Nos 1-2, 2005
‘Australia's Bohemian Carnival’, History Australia, Vol 2, No. 1, Dec., 2004
‘Re-imagining Aunty: Remodelling the ABC', Arena Magazine, Number 73, Oct-Nov 2004
‘Romancing the City – Australia’s Bohemian Tradition, Take One’, Journal of Australian Studies, Number 57, 1998
‘Romancing the City – Australia’s Bohemian Tradition’, Take One’, Journal of Australian Studies, Number 58, 1998

Film, Television, Documentaries

Producer/Director. Timeframe series episodes The Door Never Closes and War Against Dissent, 1997
Producer/Director: Bohemian Rhapsody: Rebels Of Australian Culture, 1996
Producer: Four Corners East Timor special Shadow Boxing, 1995
Producer: Stories for 7.30 Report, Bottom Line and Foreign Correspondent
Field Producer and Researcher: Four Corners including Fire, ASIS: Code Name Mantra, The Feminist Debate, Bishop’s Move, Hawke, The Big Stack, The Newman Killing, and Gareth The Second Coming, 1994
Associate Producer and Researcher: Hard Lessons – an examination of the institution of secondary school in a rapidly changing economy, 1993
Associate Producer and Researcher: Growing Up Fast, 1993
Associate Producer and Researcher: So Help Me God, 1992
Associate Producer and Researcher: Lost In Space: Australians in their Cities, 1991
Researcher: One Australia? 1990
Writer and Researcher: Nobody’s Children, 1989
Researcher: In Real Life series, 1989
Researcher: The Devil You Know

Media

Guest Commentator, Critical Mass, ABC Television

Reports

The New Youth Underclass, Developmental Youth Services Association, 1988
Paper presented as evidence to the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Inquiry into Our Homeless Children
Counting the Costs, Youth Income Transfers, Developmental Youth Services Association, 1988
Attracting a Youth Audience, ABC National Advisory Council, 1987
T. Moore and NSW International Youth Year Steering Committee, Youth on Youth Policies, IYY Secretariat, 1986
Youth on Youth: Post Compulsory School Options, NSW Education Commission, 1985

Submissions

ABC/SBS Review 2008, Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy

Professional Memberships and Editorial Positions

Series Editor, Australian Encounters, Cambridge University Press
Fellow of the Centre for Policy Development
Commissioning editor, Pluto Press Australia, 1997 to 2008
MEAA (Journalist) 1994 to 2009

Community Engagement

Member of National Executive, Australian Fabian Society
Past Member, ABC National Advisory Council
Past Executive Member, Evatt Foundation