Books | UNSW Press

The Best Australian Science Writing 2015

Edited by Bianca Nogrady, foreword by Adam Spencer

The annual collection celebrating the finest Australian science writing of the year.

Minding Her Own Business

Catherine Bishop

A history that populates the streets of colonial Sydney with entrepreneurial businesswomen earning their living in a variety of small – and sometimes surprising – enterprises.

The National Tertiary Education Union

John Michael O'Brien

The G20 and the Future of International Economic Governance

Edited by Mike Callaghan, Tristram Sainsbury

The G20 needs to be bold and pragmatic if it is to deal effectively with the global economy's big issues.

The Art of Free Travel

Patrick Jones, Meg Ulman

Patrick, Meg and their family had built a happy, sustainable life in regional Victoria. But in late 2013, they found themselves craving an adventure: a road trip.

Australian Women War Reporters

Jeannine Baker

Why do Australians know the names of Charles Bean, Alan Moorehead and Chester Wilmot, but not Agnes Macready, Anne Matheson and Lorraine Stumm?

The Australian Schoolkids' Guide to Debating and Public Speaking

Age range 10+ Welcome to the world of school debating and public speaking, the best training ground for speaking, reasoning, arguing and looking critically at the big issues of today.

Key Concepts in Military Ethics

Edited by Dr Deane-Peter Baker

Can war be morally justified? What is the philosophy behind armed conflict? How do you conduct an ethical war? And what guides military action as the nature of conflict changes over time?

On Track: Searching out the Bundian Way

On Track tells the story of John Blay's long-distance search for the Bundian Way, an important Aboriginal pathway between Mt Kosciuszko and Twofold Bay near Eden on the New South Wales far south coast. The 360-kilometre route traverses some of the nation's most remarkable landscapes, from the highest place on the continent to the ocean.

The Changi Book

Edited by Dr Lachlan Grant

The story of Changi, told by those who lived through it.

The Idea of Art

Curator Anthony Bond began building a contemporary international art collection at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney in 1984. The collection now features many important artists, including Anselm Kiefer, Antony Gormley, Francis Bacon, Anish Kapoor and Doris Salcedo.

'When I was a kid my mum used to say I'd either be very successful or end up in jail.'

Gay Men Pursuing Parenthood through Surrogacy

Mr Dean A. Murphy

Dean Murphy analyses how relatedness is enacted in the context of gay men pursuing parenthood and a 'child of one's own' through both domestic and transnational surrogacy arrangements.

Australia's Boldest Experiment

Stuart Macintyre

This book shows the 1940s to be a pivotal decade in Australia. At the height of his powers, Macintyre reminds us that key components of the society we take for granted – work, welfare, health, education, immigration, housing – are not the result of military endeavour but policy, planning, politics and popular resolve.

Paul Davey

Unfolding like a political thriller, Joh for PM reveals for the first time the details of the campaign that rocked Australian politics.

I'm Not Racist But ... 40 Years of the Racial Discrimination Act

Tim Soutphommasane

Is Australia a 'racist' country? Why do issues of race and culture seem to ignite public debate so readily?

The Martin Presence

Peter Beilharz, Trevor Hogan, Sheila Shaver

Jean Martin was a pioneer of sociology, inventing a version of the discipline that was uniquely suited to Australia in the post-war period.

Letters to my Grandchildren

Edited by Phillipa McGuinness

Writers, musicians, filmmakers, gamers, lawyers and academics talk about why copyright matters to them – or doesn't.

Mark Bahnisch

Everyone has heard the clichés about Queensland politics: Queensland is 'different'. It's the 'Deep North'. Its state elections exemplify Pineapple Party Time. But what if those clichés are in fact looking more like the state of affairs in the rest of Australia? Does the Sunshine State represent the new normal in Australian politics?

Nancy Underhill

Digging through the myths around Australia's most famous artist, many of which he created himself as a masterful self-promoter, this book is the biography that Sidney Nolan deserves.

Boycotting Israel is Wrong

Philip Mendes, Nick Dyrenfurth

This is the first progressive book to argue that the BDS movement (boycott, divestment and sanctions) against Israel is the wrong way to broker peace in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; rather, it argues that peace will come ony when both Israelis' and Palestinians' legitimate claims to statehood are recognised – by both sides.

Hugh Dolan, Adrian Threlfall

View the Reg Saunders teaching resource on the Reading Australia website

Fractured Families

Most convicts arriving in New South Wales didn't expect to make their fortunes. Some went on to great success, but countless convicts and free migrants struggled with limited prospects, discrimination and misfortune. Many desperate people turned to The Benevolent Society, Australia's first charity founded in 1813, for assistance and sustenance.

Radical Newcastle

Edited by James Bennett, Nancy Cushing, Erik Eklund

Radical Newcastle brings together short illustrated essays from leading scholars, local historians and present day radicals to document both the iconic events of the region's radical past, and less well known actions seeking social justice for workers, women, Aboriginal people and the environment

Inside Australia's Anti-Terrorism Laws and Trials

Andrew Lynch, Nicola McGarrity, George Williams

Most tellingly, the book asks whether seeing these anti-terror laws as normal is a danger in itself.

Van Diemen's Land

Mr Murray Johnson, Mr Ian McFarlane

Carefully researched, using the findings of archaeologists and extensive documentary evidence, some only recently uncovered, this important book fills a long-time gap in Tasmanian history.

Being a carer is not unlike being an interpreter. The task is to listen intently, to catch not only the words but the spirit of the message, and then to immediately pass that on. So too the carer, who is required to listen, to catch the spirit of what is needed, and then to set about to have those needs met.

The Story of Australian English

Kel Richards

Kel Richards talks about The Story of Australian English on the Today Show

Everything you Need to Know About the Referendum to Recognise Indigenous Australians

Megan Davis, George Williams

This book explains everything that Australians need to know about the proposal to recognise Aboriginal peoples in the Constitution.

The Rise and Fall of Gunns Ltd

Quentin Beresford

Fearless and forensic in its analysis, the book shows that Tasmania's decades-long quest to industrialise nature fails every time. But the collapse of Gunns is the most telling of them all.

Transport Fuels from Australia's Gas Resources

Professor Robert Clark, Mr Mark J Thomson Dr

The transport sector in Australia depends heavily on imported oil-based fuels. With this comes the ever-present risk of oil supply shortages. But Australia is gas-rich and oil-poor, so it makes practical sense to assess how our own gas resources can be used to produce these fuels.

Adelaide Remember When

Adelaide Remember When is the city we remember, in pictures and words.

The Melbourne Tram Book

Randall Wilson, Dale Budd

Melbourne's trams are more than a mode of transport. They are a symbol of the city.

Curating Sydney

Jill Bennett, Saskia Beudel

What happens when artists are asked the questions usually addressed to planners and administrators?

Hugh Dolan, artist Mal Gardiner

The truth about the assault on Gallipoli is finally being told – panel by panel. Gallipoli: The Landing