In Australia until the early 1970s, women were assumed to have husbands who were breadwinners and expected to be housewives and to raise children themselves. If a woman had children but no male provider, she was likely to be economically deprived. If she had never been married she would be stigmatised by society as well. This book, the first comprehensive history of the treatment of single mothers and their children in Australia, is the story of these women and their children and the lives they constructed. Starting in the 1850s when abandonment and infanticide were not uncommon, the book's main focus ends in 1975 when the legal status of illegitimacy was abolished. While the book traces profound changes from a time when single mothers were locked in gaol for discarding their babies to the point when their situation was recognised in the form of state benefits, the authors find a good deal of continuity over the period. The book covers issues of baby farming, infanticide, abortion, sex education, birth control, adoption and marriage, in effect becoming a history of sexual practice in Australia. It uses a broad range of published and oral sources, drawn from interviews, diaries, court records and the problem pages of women's magazines. Shurlee Swain and Renate Howe tell a powerful if painful and often moving story of women who were forced to dispose of their babies and punished for sexual transgression. They also show the ways in which these women, and their illegitimate children, survived. This long-awaited book makes an important contribution to social, welfare and women's history in Australia. It will also resonate with many who have experienced single motherhood directly orindirectly.

In the 1960s and 70s, Australia's inner cities experienced an upheaval which left them changed forever. People from all walks of life who valued their suburbs - places like Balmain, Battery Point, Carlton, Indooropilly, North Adelaide, or Subiaco - resisted large-scale development projects for freeways, 'slum clearance, ' and mass-produced high rises. Unlikely alliances - of post-war migrants, university students and staff, construction workers and their unions, long-term residents and city workers - challenged land-grabs and inappropriate development. When the dust settled, Australian cities were different. Many suburbs kept their village qualities. Shopping strips were revived and cultures celebrated. While areas like Fitzroy or Redcliff were derided as 'Trendyville' - the fate many American cities suffered - a 'hollow core' had been avoided. In the process, heritage conservation, party politics, and Australian assumptions about domestic life, education, and lifestyle had all been transformed. This book is an in-depth examination of the causes and consequences of urban protest in a democracy. It shows how this resistance changed the built environments, as well as its participants, and resonated in many of Australia's institutions, including politics, media, and multiculturalism