Portal:Australia
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Introduction
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Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. Australia is the largest country by area in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country. Australia is the oldest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It is a megadiverse country, and its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes and climates, with deserts in the centre, tropical rainforests in the north-east, tropical savannas in the north, and mountain ranges in the south-east.
The ancestors of Aboriginal Australians began arriving from south-east Asia 50,000 to 65,000 years ago, during the last glacial period. They settled on the continent and formed approximately 250 distinct language groups by the time of European settlement, maintaining some of the longest known continuing artistic and religious traditions in the world. Australia's written history commenced with European maritime exploration. The Dutch were the first known Europeans to reach Australia.
British colonisation began in 1788 with the establishment of the penal colony of New South Wales. By the mid-19th century, most of the continent had been explored by European settlers and five additional self-governing British colonies were established, each gaining responsible government by 1890. The colonies federated in 1901, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. This continued a process of increasing autonomy from the United Kingdom, highlighted by the Statute of Westminster Adoption Act 1942, and culminating in the Australia Acts of 1986.
Featured article -
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Selected biography -
John Hadley (born 27 September 1966) is an Australian philosopher whose research concerns moral and political philosophy, including animal ethics, environmental ethics, and metaethics. He is currently a senior lecturer in philosophy in the School of Humanities and Communication Arts at Western Sydney University. He has previously taught at Charles Sturt University and the University of Sydney, where he studied as an undergraduate and doctoral candidate. In addition to a variety of articles in peer-reviewed journals and edited collections, he is the author of the 2015 monograph Animal Property Rights (Lexington Books) and the 2019 monograph Animal Neopragmatism (Palgrave Macmillan). He is also the co-editor, with Elisa Aaltola, of the 2015 collection Animal Ethics and Philosophy (Rowman & Littlefield International). (Full article...)
Did you know (auto-generated) -
- ... that Mark Hutton was the first Australian to be a starting pitcher in a Major League Baseball game?
- ... that the dominant species in the Iron-grass Natural Temperate Grassland of South Australia are often not grasses at all?
- ... that the Bluey special "The Sign" reminded a Sydney Morning Herald reporter of Australia's housing crisis?
- ... that Ged Kearney represented Batman in the Parliament of Australia from 2018 to 2019?
- ... that Peter Read coined the term "Stolen Generations" to refer to Aboriginal children who were forcibly separated from their families by Australian governments?
- ... that "The Potato King of Colorado" survived a shipwreck, mined for gold in Australia, and helped establish an alcohol-free Methodist colony?
- ... that the 2022 Optus data breach affected over a third of Australians?
- ... that on its maiden voyage from Liverpool to Australia, the George Roper ran aground and was wrecked?
In the news
- 7 August 2024 – 2024 Summer Olympics
- French police detain Australian field hockey player Tom Craig for allegedly purchasing cocaine. (DW)
- 6 August 2024 – 2024 Summer Olympics
- Australia at the 2024 Summer Olympics
- Fourteen-year-old Arisa Trew wins the gold medal in Women's park skateboarding, becoming the youngest Australian to ever win an Olympic gold medal. (The Sydney Morning Herald)
- 30 July 2024 –
- Rex Airlines, Australia's third-largest airline, suspends all domestic Boeing 737 flights and enters voluntary administration. (AFR)
- 30 July 2024 – 2024 Summer Olympics
- Several athletes test positive for COVID-19, including Australian swimmer Lani Pallister, forcing her to withdraw from the 1500 metre freestyle swimming event. (Al Arabiya)
- 29 July 2024 –
- Sakina Muhammad Jan becomes the first person to be jailed under Australia's forced marriage laws after ordering her 21-year-old daughter to marry a man who later murdered her. (BBC News)
Selected pictures -
On this day
![Melbourne Town Hall.](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/00/Melbourne_Town_Hall.jpg/100px-Melbourne_Town_Hall.jpg)
- 1870 – Melbourne Town Hall is opened.
- 1989 – Actor John Meillon dies.
- 1989 – A pilots' strike cripples domestic air travel in Australia.
- 2003 – Major-General Michael Jeffery is sworn in as Governor General.
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WikiProject
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Consider joining WikiProject Australia, a WikiProject dedicated to improving Wikipedia's coverage of topics related to Australia. The project page and its subpages contain suggestions on formatting and style of articles, which can be discussed at the project's notice board. To participate, simply add your name to the project members page.
As of 11 August 2024, there are 204,200 articles within the scope of WikiProject Australia, of which 593 are featured and 883 are good articles. This makes up 2.97% of the articles on Wikipedia, 5.4% of all featured articles and lists, and 2.2% of all good articles (see WP:AUSFG). Including non-article pages, such as talk pages, redirects, categories, etc., there are 521,520 pages in the project.
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