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In his postmodern novel Homesickness (1980), Australian novelist Murray Bail depicts a group of Australian tourists on a package tour through diverse countries--including an unnamed African country, the UK and Ecuador--and cities of London, New York and Moscow. In addressing the archetype of the tourist, for which the mobile Australian is judged suitably representative, Bail explores the various perspectives of his diverse group in their picaresque encounters with unfamiliar, Other landscapes and people. In particular he focusses on the nature of their descriptions of such encounters in an increasingly virtual or curated world of global tourism (its museums, guides, exhibitions). This is seen in the dialogic, arguably appropriating, acts of naming, identifying, epistolary accounts (notably in postcards) and also photography, including by the group's tellingly blind photographer. From a postcolonial perspective, Bail's tourist group can be considered akin to the settler, albeit in a global situation in which places visited and their people are viewed as Other. This article primarily addresses Bail's examination of the nature of human apprehension of unfamiliar and familiar worlds through the binaries of distance/closeness, as well as though ratiocinative, visual, classifying, collecting impulses as distinct from a more chaotic, random indeterminate acceptance. A central anchoring, comparative reference point is the familiar (the Australian home, landscape, vegetation and its various stereotypes including in unfamiliar places) and the alternative counter viewpoints of non-travellers. Consideration is given to themes concerning consciousness and the visual, including perspectives of philosopher Maurice Blanchot and postmodern theorist Ihab Hassan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a complex geography to Aboriginal-dingo-settler-dog relationships in Australia. This paper examines aspects of that geography in a world heritage area, heavily contested by multiple stakeholders for whom the dingo has come to represent resource and identity, as well as a powerful symbol of nature. The Butchulla people were recently recognised in Australian law as holding native title to world-heritage listed K’gari-Fraser Island, a decision that confers recognition and consultation rights; however, genuine ownership and control of the island is denied through a lack of joint management of the island. This paper reviews evidence from some Butchulla people who declare their ongoing dispossession through various discourses and actions that attempt to circumvent extinguishment of their title to territory. They implied that dingoes have equally endured dispossession and extinguishment of territory through common colonial discourses that subjugate the ‘other’, albeit Butchulla people and dingoes have different forms of resistance and agency. Butchulla people in our study parallel their treatment under colonial structures of governance with those of the dingo in that both have endured limited freedom of movement and expressions of sovereignty. We argue some Butchulla people liken notions of dingo agency and resistance with their own attempts to assert sovereignty and responses to displacement. Aligning with the dingo (and broader discourses and politics that surround the dingo) may afford Butchulla people a greater entitlement to be a major voice in dingo 'management' specifically, and management of the island more broadly, than their native title resolution confers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]