Dean Kalimniou
Smyrna relieved: Joice Loch, Ethel Cooper and the Australian connection
In the aftermath of the First World War, humanitarian catastrophes abounded. The end of hostilities found Queensland-born, author, journalist and Quaker Relief Mission worker Joice Loch in Poland, assisting some …
Spiro and the land tax of Greeks
I am convinced that if Franz Kafka were alive today, he would be writing a novel about a man who, during the pandemic, has the distinct misfortune to call a …
For the love of books: The last Greek bookshop in Melbourne
“It is not who we are when we read a … book that is most important, but who we are when we close it.” St Mark the Ascetic. Books are …
Hellene, Romios, Yunnan and more…. in the name of the Greek
This year’s Census gave rise to an interesting cultural phenomenon: the perennial debate as to what our ethnos should be called. As debates go, it is rather baffling. Considering that …
Features –
An attitude to Jews in the 1821 Greek War of Independence
According to tradition, after Patriarch Gregory and other Orthodox prelates were cut down from their place of execution soon after the outbreak of the Greek Revolution, the Ottomans ordered that …
Kings, symbols and cities: Constructing the divine
A few years ago, at a meeting of Victorian Christian leaders in Parliament, the then premier Ted Baillieu, an architect by training, commented on just how intrinsic churches are to …
Census Censure: Census 2021 seeks to understand what it means to be Australian, but ignores the complexities of ancestry
According to tradition, in 16th century BC, Cecrops, the mythical first king of Athens, conducted a census of his subjects. Each Athenian was compelled to provide a single stone and …
Dialogue –
Olympic obscurities: Things you may not know about the revival of the Modern Olympics
I don’t know about you, but I’ve been off the Olympics ever since the 1990 IOC announcement that Atlanta was to host the 1996 Centenary Games. This is not only …
A taste of freedom: Viva la degustation
Contrary to common belief, dégustation is not the hipster-bourgeois Greek-Australian term for a τσιμπούσι. Referring to the gustatory system, it is derived ultimately from the Latin gustare, meaning “to taste,” …
Karen Martin’s “Dancing the Labyrinth”, a bilingual approach
Recently released in the original English and a Greek translation, Karen Martin’s novel, set in sun-kissed Crete exhausts the constructs of time, language and identity. From the outset a conceptual …