Sophie Couchman

Curator and Historian

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Publications

I am an Honorary Research Fellow at La Trobe University. Below is a selection of my publications. A full list can be found on Google scholar or Academia. My ORCID is 0000-0002-8794-3532.

Edited Books and Monographs

With K. Bagnall, New Perspectives in Chinese-Australian History and Heritage, special issue of Chinese Southern Disapora Studies, vol.8, 2019.

Journeys into Chinese Australian Family History, Chinese Australian Family Historians of Victoria: Melbourne, Vic, 2019 (received Commendation, Victorian Community History Awards, 2020)

Chinese Australians: Politics, Engagement and Resistance, Brill: Leiden, The Netherlands, 2015.

Secrets, Silences and Sources: Five Chinese-Australian Family Histories, Chinese Australian Family Historians of Victoria, Melbourne, Vic, 2015 (Reprint 2019)

With K. Bagnall, Language, Sources and Approaches in Chinese Australian History, special issue of Chinese Southern Disapora Studies, vol.6, 2013.

With J. Fitzgerald and P. Macgregor, After the Rush: Regulation, Participation and Chinese Communities in Australia 1860-1940, special issue of Otherland, vol.9, December 2004.

Book Chapters (selected)

‘”Not substantially of European origin or descent”: How race came to shape Australian enlistment during World War One in Kate Bagnall and Peter Prince (eds), Subjects and Aliens: Histories of Nationality, Law and Belonging in Australia and New Zealand, ANU Press (in press).

‘Chinese Australian Brides, Photography and the White Wedding’ in K. Bagnall and J. Martinez (eds), Locating Chinese Women, 2021.

With K. Bagnall, ‘Memory and meaning in the search for Chinese Australian families’ in K. Darian-Smith and P. Hamilton (eds), Remembering Migration: Oral History and Heritage in Australia, Palgrave Macmillan Memory Studies, 2019

‘Chinese-Australian commercial photographers in Australia’s north‘ in G. Grimwade, K. Rains & M. Dunk (eds), Rediscovered Past: Chinese Networks, CHINA Inc: East Ipswich, Qld, 2016

‘Introduction’ in S. Couchman and K. Bagnall (eds), Chinese Australians: Politics, Engagement and Resistance, Brill: Leiden, The Netherlands, 2015

‘Chang Woo Gow: The Man and the Giant‘, in M. Butcher, An Angel by the Water: Essays in honour of Dennis Reginald O’Hoy, Holland House Publishing: Kennington, Victoria, 2015

‘Tales of Little Bourke Street‘ in A. Zable (ed), Stories from the Heart of Melbourne: Lygon St, Little Bourke St, Lonsdale St: The Vibrant History of Melbourne’s Italian, Chinese and Greek Cultural Precincts, City of Melbourne: Carlton, Vic, 2012

‘Riding with the best of them: Chinese Australians and cycling in Australia‘ in C.S. Simpson (ed), Scorchers, Ramblers and Rovers: Australasian Cycling Histories, Australian Society for Sports History Studies Series, no.21, 2006

Journal articles (selected)

With K. Bagnall, ‘Identification photography and the surveillance of Chinese mobility in colonial Australasia’, Australian Historical Studies (in press).

With K. Bagnall, ‘The Chungking Legation: Australia’s first diplomatic mission to China, 80 years ago‘, The Conversation, 28 October 2021.

‘Reflections on Cultural and Linguistic Diversity in a Chinese Australian Community Museum‘, Journal of the Australian Library and Information Association, vol.70, no.1, 2021, pp.​84-89.

‘‘Reconsidering Race’: How far has Barry McGowan’s ‘refreshing sea breeze’ blown?‘, Southern Chinese Diaspora Studies, vol.8, 2019, pp.236-248

‘Melbourne’s See Yup Kuan Ti temple: A historical overview‘, Southern Chinese Diaspora Studies, vol.8, 2019, pp.50-81

‘Telling Chinese-Australian stories‘, Historic Environment, vol.24, no.1, 2012, pp.8-16

‘Making the “Last Chinaman”: Photography and Chinese as a “vanishing” people in Australia’s rural histories‘, Australian Historical Studies, vol.42, no.1, 2011, pp.78-91

‘“And then in the distance Quong Tart did we see”: Quong Tart, celebrity and photography‘, Journal of Colonial Australian History, vol.8, 2006, pp.159-182.

‘Not so mug mugshots: Behind the portraits of series B6443‘, Crossings, vol.9, no.3, 2004.

‘The banana trade: its importance to Melbourne’s Chinese in Little Bourke Street, 1880s – 1930s‘, Histories of the Chinese in Australasia and the South Pacific, Proceedings of an International Public Conference, Museum of Chinese Australian History, Melbourne, 1995, pp.75-87

Magazine articles (selected)

With K. Bagnall, ‘Opening the archives of White Australia’, Traces magazine, edition 16, 2020, pp.38-41.

‘Researching your Chinese ancestry‘, Ancestor: Quarterly Journal of The Genealogical Society of Victoria, vol.35, no.3, Sept 2020, pp.32-36.

Theses

‘In and Out of Focus: Chinese and photography in Australia, 1870s-1940s‘. PhD, Asian Studies, La Trobe University, 2009

‘Tong Yun Gai (Street of the Chinese): Investigating patterns of work and social life in Melbourne’s Chinatown 1900-1920’, Master of Arts (Public History), Monash University, 2000

Conference papers (selection)

‘Oral histories as sources for family historians: A challenge for oral historians and the GLAM sector’, Oral History in Troubling Times: Opportunities and Challenges, Oral History Australia Biennial Conference, 13-16 October 2022.

‘Reflections from a community museum curator’, presentation at Libraries and the Community: Representing and reflecting cultural diversity in library research, policy and practice, RMIT University, 27-28 Feb 2020.

‘New Questions about the Enlistment of Chinese Australians during WWI’, Australian Historical Association Conference, Australian National University, 2-6 July 2018

‘Lucky for Some?: Exhibiting post World War II British migration to Australia at Melbourne’s Immigration Museum’, First Eric Richards Symposium, Flinders University, Adelaide, 31 Jan to 3 Feb 2017 (with Moya McFadzean)

‘Telling Chinese Australian Stories’, Grasping the Intangible at Heritage Places: Australia ICOMOS Symposium, Melbourne, 18 Oct 2014

‘Chinese Australian brides, photography and the white wedding’, The Big Picture: Lives, Landscapes, Homelands in Australian and Chinese Art: 2nd FASIC Australian Studies Conference, Renmin University, Beijing 11-12 Sep 2014

‘Linking Chinese-Australian Communities through early Cantonese-English Phrasebooks’, Museums Australian National Conference, Launceston, 16-19 May 2014

Presentations, guest lectures and talks (selection)

‘Reflections from an ethno-specific museum curator’, presentation at Multicultural Museums Workshops, Deakin University, 21-22 November 2022.

‘See Yup temple, South Melbourne’, Melbourne Open House, City of Port Phillip, 30 July 2022.

‘Tracing the myth that the Chinese “discovered” Australia’, Global Encounters Seminar Series, 16 June 2022.

‘Researching your Chinese ancestry’, Vermont South Library (online), 14 Sep 2021.

‘Victorian CEDT Index’, informal presentation to National Archives of Australia staff, 2 Sep 2021.

‘Invisible Farmers’ Project’, presentation as part of History Matters lecture series, State Library of New South Wales (online), 3 Mar 2021.

‘Warrnambool Chinese families and their place in Australia’s Chinese history’, lecture for University of the Third Age (Warrnambool) (online), 6 Oct 2020.

‘Mee How Ah Mouy: Architect and community leader’, presentation about former local resident for the City of Port Phillip, Emerald Hill Library and Heritage Centre, 17 Sep 2019 and Middle Park Historical Society (online), 1 Feb 2021.

‘So you’ve discovered a Chinese ancestor. What next?’, presentation about researching your Chinese ancestry for Glen Waverley Library, 28 Aug 2019.

‘See Yup temple, South Melbourne’, presentation about the history of the See Yup temple in Raglan Street, South Melbourne for the City of Port Phillip, Emerald Hill Library and Heritage Centre, 14 May 2019

‘What are these Victorian CEDT registers and why do they matter?’, presentation at the launch of Transcribing Chinese journeys into Victoria’s history crowd-sourced indexing project, Chinese Museum, Melbourne, 5 May 2019

‘The history of Chinese migration’, presentation which provided an overview of the history of Chinese in Australia with reference to the Darebin area and some resources and tips on researching your Chinese ancestry, Preston Library, City of Darebin, 21 February 2019

‘Canton to Castlemaine: Chinese miners in Victoria’, presentation about Jong Ah Sing manuscript for Dome at Dusk series, State Library of Victoria, 7 February 2019

Presentation on the history of Melbourne’s Chinatown as part of ‘Hidden Melbourne’ walking tour of Melbourne organised by the Professional Historians Association (Victoria) for Oral History Association of Australian conference, 8 October 2011

‘More than a pretty picture’, Re-view exhibition forum, National Gallery of Victoria, 30 January 2010

‘Using photographs for historical research’, guest lecture, 3rd year history honour preliminary class, September 2008


A full list of my publications can be found on Google scholar or Academia.

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