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This Day Tonight: Chinese Australians and the Moon Festival, 1978

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This Day Tonight: Chinese Australians and the Moon Festival, 1978

SUBJECTS:  History

YEARS:  9–10


How have the cultural traditions of people from Asia enriched Australian society?

The Moon Festival is one such tradition.

In this clip from 1978, an ABC reporter visits Dixon Street in Sydney's Chinatown to discover what this celebration means to Chinese Australians and the wider community.


Things to think about

  1. 1.Have you ever participated in or watched an Asian festival? The Chinese New Year is probably the best known example. It is celebrated in Chinese communities in every city in Australia. The annual Moon Festival is not as well known but it is celebrated in Australia by over half a million people from a variety of Asian cultures.
  2. 2.How does the clip's opening image suggest that it's about a Chinese festival? How many Asian nationalities are expected to take part in the festival? According to the Chinese woman interviewed in the clip, why are Chinese businesspeople less likely to be integrated into Australian society than Chinese students? Why is the festival important for Chinese Australians and for the wider Australian community?
  3. 3.Australia's immigration policies were influenced by racist attitudes and beliefs until the early 1970s, when the federal government moved to adopt a policy of multiculturalism. However, racist attitudes persisted in some sections of Australian society. How do you think celebrations like the Moon Festival and programs like the one from which this clip was taken might have influenced perspectives in the wider Australian community?
  4. 4.In many Asian countries, the Moon Festival traditionally celebrates the end of the harvest in the middle of autumn, which corresponds with spring in the southern hemisphere. Find an appropriate source to investigate what the celebration has to do with moon worship and what roles are played in the celebration by lanterns, romance and moon cakes.



Date of broadcast: 1 Jan 1978


Copyright

Metadata © Australian Broadcasting Corporation and Education Services Australia Ltd 2012 (except where otherwise indicated). Digital content © Australian Broadcasting Corporation (except where otherwise indicated). Video © Australian Broadcasting Corporation (except where otherwise indicated). All images copyright their respective owners. Text © Australian Broadcasting Corporation and Education Services Australia is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License (CC BY-SA 4.0).

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