Paper short abstract:

The Cronulla riot was an eruption of white Australian national consciousness that articulated the deeply ambivalent relationship between multiculturalism and national identity. This ambivalence when crystallised into racist violence was perceived as an ugly distortion of the nation rather than recognised as a caricature of its ontological truth.

Paper long abstract:

The Cronulla 'riot' on December 11, 2005 was an eruption of white Australian national consciousness that articulated the deeply ambivalent relationship between multiculturalism and Australian national identity. This paper argues that the lack of recognition of this ambivalence, perpetuated by the then current political and public discourse, can be traced to the ideological roots of the 'State of Agnosia' that has prevailed since the inception of Australian society. Cronulla's combined local, historical, geographical and cultural-political features embody an intense magnification of the highly sensitive terrain of Australian class, gender, race and cultural issues that permeate our society. Hence I propose that the Cronulla 'riot' was the perfect homunculus of the national body, a condensed representation of these social issues that remain unacknowledged by the Australian State. This unarticulated white national ambivalence, when crystallised into the physical and symbolic 'racist' violence that characterised the 'riot', was perceived as an ugly distortion of the nation rather than recognised as a caricature of its ontological truth. I propose that the participants' celebratory and violent actions were the local cultural embodiment of the universal processes of collective identity formation, which were shaped by our national exclusionary ideology.