Governor Arthur Phillip regarded sodomy as one of the worst offences that convicts under his charge could commit. But sex between men and between women flourished in convict Australia.
Gone since 1936, and ailing since long before that.
Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery
The new Tasmanian tiger genome reveals some fascinating facts about this extinct marsupial, including why they were so similar to dogs, and how they were growing more vulnerable to genetic disease.
Heaven only knows what sort of excursion Wooredy and Truganini thought they had embarked upon on when G.A. Robinson took them to Recherche Bay in 1830 to make an overland trek to the Tasmanian west coast.
Cassandra Pybus
Wooredy and his second wife Truganini set off into the Tasmanian wilderness with settler George Robinson in 1830, on a “conciliatory” mission to find other original Tasmanians. Their stories bear witness to a psychological and cultural transition without parallel in modern colonialism.
Without help, Tasmania’s swift parrots could be wiped out within three generations.
JJ Harrison/Wikimedia Commmons
Tasmania’s swift parrots are in trouble. Scientists are aiming to help them by keeping them safe from predators, but without better habitat protection, the species may go extinct.
Bob Brown was arrested under an anti-protest law after refusing to obey police directions to leave a forestry coup at Lapoinya State Forest.
AAP
The egalitarian myth behind the great Australian dream of home ownership is at odds with the first rules of land granting in the colonies. Even then, property ownership depended on wealth and status.
Like its Tasmanian predecessor, the marriage plebiscite has been engineered by the leader’s intransigent opponents.
AAP/Lukas Coch
Energy security requires both short and long planning. Recent gas and hydro announcements are a promising start towards some proper joined-up thinking.
Bob Brown was arrested in January 2016 at a forestry protest in Tasmania; charges were later dropped.
AAP Image/Forests of Lapoinya Action Group
Following his 2016 arrest, former Greens leader Bob Brown aims to show that Tasmania’s anti-protest laws are in conflict with the constitution’s implied right to political communication.
Hobart’s Museum of Old and New Art: a must-see tourist destination, but for whom?
Lukas Cooch/AAP
The acclaimed Museum of Old and New Art is located in one of Tasmania’s most disadvantaged municipalities. But new research has found that locals have mixed feelings about the gallery.
A new book tells a detailed story of how policy decisions about pokies are actually made.
AAP/Mick Tsikas
In Tasmania, a changing cast of actors has colluded to grant extreme riches to a single family, extracted in large part from the state’s most disadvantaged citizens.
If you live near a pokie venue, you are more likely to gamble and suffer harm.
from shutterstock.com
Allowing pokies to continue to be concentrated in Tasmania’s most stressed local areas will continue to cause preventable harm to tens of thousands of Tasmanians every year.
Green shoots: a mangrove in Cairns enjoys the wet. Not all of Australia was so lucky.
Guillaume Blanchard/Wikimedia Commons
Rain made a welcome comeback to Australia in 2016 after several years of deepening drought. But Tasmania and the Top End were among several places that did not fare so well.
The emotional and physical experiences of fatigue, stress, anxiety, and isolation are almost never seen in the popular images of pregnancy.
reebob/flickr
Unlike Beyoncé, a group of Australian women documenting their own pregnancies captured mundane images of track pants, barren wardrobes and self-portraits in a bathroom mirror.
Wildfires in Tasmania in 2016 were in part the result of an extended dry period beginning in 2015.
Rob Blakers
the end of the mining boom has breathed new life into parts of the Tasmanian economy. But there are also several worrying indicators – like population growth and unemployment – to be addressed.
Eastern quolls face an uphill battle to recover after climate change drove wild populations closer to extinction.
Bronwyn Fancourt
A comprehensive analysis of Tasmania’s natural disaster risks has identified bushfire as the biggest threat, alongside emerging issues such as disease epidemics and heatwaves.
Mortgage stress is still a risk for low-income earners, particularly in the country, new analysis from Roy Morgan shows.
Dan Peled/AAP