[This article from The Asia-Pacific Journal is re-posted here under a Creative Commons license – it originally appeared HERE]

The Asia-Pacific Journal, Vol. 13, Issue 6, No. 1, February 10, 2015.

Australia’s “Asian Century”: Time, Space and Public Culture

Authors: Fran Martin, Chris Healy, Koichi Iwabuchi, Olivia Khoo, Claire Maree, Keren Yi and Audrey Yue

Introduction

In late September 2013, Australian news media reported on two very different events related to journeys across the ocean straits that separate Australia from Indonesia. On the evening of September 26^th, an Indonesian fishing boat carrying eighty refugees from northern Lebanon who intended to seek asylum in Australia foundered off a West Java beach. The boat sank the following day. Thirty-one people who had been onboard drowned. Some of those who survived claimed that when the boat’s engine failed, passengers had contacted Australian authorities, but according to official reports, the Border…