This paper presents the outlines of a new collaborative project on Enlightenment in Australia. The project has two strands, one grounded in contemporary history, the other in the Enlightenment era itself. The contemporary strand examines how the concept of Enlightenment is understood in today’s Australia. Our paper will discuss Australian usages particularly through the 2023 Voice Referendum, which demonstrate most neatly how Enlightenment carries great persuasive weight in Australian discourse but with little consensus about what it actually means. How can so many public figures agree that the Enlightenment is central to Australian structures and tenets yet, so few concur on what it is? The late 18^th-century strand will deepen ongoing research into Australia’s role in both expressing and forging key practices of the Enlightenment era. Our paper will survey how settler Australia figures in a field that has undergone notable revision over the last generation – mostly in terms of its singularity and its mode of diffusion. How did the activities of the colonial state and population reflect or challenge recent scholarly understandings of the Enlightenment?

 

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