Bruce Dawe and the Cultural Identity of Post-World War II Australia Josh Green 12th Grade

Australian poet, Bruce Dawe, is renowned for the social commentary present in his poetic work, which so often addresses culturally sensitive societal themes. Dawe’s “Enter Without So Much as Knocking” (1962) follows the consumerist experiences of a man’s life growing up and eventually perishing in a society founded upon materialism. “Demons” (1976) encapsulates the defining xenophobia of Cold War society through an exploration of the societal concept of the cultural ‘enemy’. The Australian cultural identity in the 1960s and 70s was characterized by the proliferation of materialistic consumerism and widespread cultural intolerance and xenophobia. Dawe’s manipulation of language and poetic form in his poems, “Enter Without So Much as Knocking” and “Demons”, reflected the mainstream cultural attributes of the 1960s and 70s. In doing so, a sense of the defining cultural ideas, values and moods of the time surfaced in these works.

Post-World War II Australia was defined by the birth of the traditional ‘suburban family dream’, which propagated as a product of the affluent economic conditions of the time. Australia experienced expansive economic growth throughout the 1950s and 60s, reflected in a nadir of unemployment at 1.0% in 1965...