Overland Journal

Contending with Cronulla Riots revisionism, twenty years on - Overland literary journal Rather than writing revisionist histories of the Cronulla Riots, we need to contend with the racism and xenophobia the riots were founded upon. The mob ultimately achieved its aim, with Middle Eastern...

“Perhaps it is unsurprising, then, that anti-Arab sentiment and xenophobia are not confined to the past, or to Cronulla.”

Megan McElhone addresses revisionist histories of the Cronulla Riots, twenty years on.

Always Searching Idiotically for Order - Overland literary journal An article about my ASIO file from the years 1982 to 1991 that I published in Overland in 2018 raised more general questions about ASIO’s surveillance efforts against the far-left. One reader asked me...

“One reader asked me, “Did you ever work out who the informants were?””

After reading through more personal files and the scholarship of the past seven years, Tom Orsag follows up on his 2018 OVERLAND piece on the workings of ASIO.

2025 Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize ($6500) - Overland literary journal About the prize Supported by the Malcolm Robertson Foundation, and named after the late Neilma Gantner, the 2025 Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize seeks excellent short fiction of up to 3000 words theme...

And enter the Neilma Sidney here: overland.org.au/prizes/overl...

2025 Judith Wright Poetry Prize for New and Emerging Poets ($9000) - Overland literary journal About the prize Established in 2007 and supported by the Malcolm Robertson Foundation, the Overland Judith Wright Poetry Prize for New and Emerging Poets seeks poetry by writers who have published no ...

Enter the Judith Wright here: overland.org.au/prizes/overl...

Both the Judith Wright Poetry Prize and the Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize submissions have been extended until midnight this Friday! Links below:

OLD CENSORSHIP TACTICS, NEW BRANDING. In an article for Overland, Scarlet Alliance CEO Mish Pony explores a censorship legacy that was the forerunner to Australia’s online safety codes.

“When Senator Brian Harradine handed Prime Minister John Howard a box of pornographic tapes in 2000, he set in motion one of Australia's most enduring censorship legacies. The censorship reforms, which excluded fetishes, kink, and non-mainstream sex acts from the definition of X-rated pornography, were based not on any evidence, but on the personal discomfort of two deeply conservative men.” Scarlet Alliance CEO Mish Pony

“When regulatory frameworks embed vague, ideologically-loaded definitions and enforce them without adequate safeguards, the collateral damage falls on the sex workers, LGBTQIA+ communities, health educators, and young people...” Scarlet Alliance CEO Mish Pony

“Behind the public-facing online safety agenda, are a wide variety of disparate forces: conservative Christian activists, anti-pornography feminists, youth educators, and international organisations ...they share a regulatory instinct: that sex, pornography, and gender diversity are problems to be contained.” Scarlet Alliance CEO Mish Pony

In an article for Overland, Scarlet Alliance CEO Mish Pony explores a censorship legacy that was the forerunner to Australia’s online safety codes. Read the article via overland.org.au/2025/12/howa...

Howard and Harradine’s vision for the Internet is finally realised - Overland literary journal What binds these actors is not simply distaste for pornography, but a conviction that sexuality and identity require moral regulation. Through advisory roles and institutional influence, they're shapi...

“If Australian policy-makers genuinely want to safeguard young people, the evidence points elsewhere: comprehensive, non-stigmatising sexuality education that acknowledges pleasure, consent and diversity.”

The Scarlet Alliance’s Mish Pony on Phase 2 of Australia’s online safety codes.

The profit of distance: how universities exploit Palestinian expertise - Overland literary journal My mother was killed on 5 December 2023 in Khan Younis. An airstrike hit our home around 3 pm. The building collapsed. I learned she was dead while I was in Taiwan, working on research about how polit...

“I was analysing systems of state power at the exact moment one of those systems was destroying my family.”

Two years after his mother was killed by an airstrike in Khan Younis, Hazem Almassry writes about how universities exploit Palestinian expertise.

Settling the city: urban planning as a vector of settler colonialism - Overland literary journal The key tools of urban planning, like master planning, zoning and state acquisition of land, are derivatives of the state’s perceived need for centralised control. Urban planning assumes there is a bl...

“Planning is political, especially in a country where it has been used to facilitate settler frames of land commodification and exclusion.”

An in-depth history by Rachel Gallagher of urban planning as a colonial tool.

With respect to the poor essay - Overland literary journal Style is now a feature that we surrender to a digital pattern recognition machine, which attempts to replicate our own but often falls short, feeling convincing enough but too superficial in its notic...

A typically incisive piece by Jonno Revanche in Overland on bad essays, Substack writing, and the general state that we’re in overland.org.au/2025/12/with...

With respect to the poor essay - Overland literary journal Once, many years ago, I was on a panel discussing something for a new redundant culture publication with a few different writers of my cohort concerning the topic of “Fake News” — a panel which I glad...

“Perhaps the poor essay still reveals, through its derivative gestures, the outline of the writer it tried to replace.”

Jonno Revanche on the present of a form, and what might still amount to real writing.

The road trip - Overland literary journal The dust picks up in a cloud, coats the backseat window in dirty ochre and veils the road behind. We pick up speed. Particles fall like rain around us and I think I can make out the hazy image of a fa...

“Time is non-existent. Intangible and unknowable. We’ve been driving for days… maybe months, impossible to tell.”

Our latest #fridayfiction is THE ROAD TRIP, a new story by Jaslyn Angus.

Let them eat content: when ordinary staples become signifiers of wealth - Overland literary journal We stand at a precipice where hunger and spectacle are colliding in full view — where the performance of plenty becomes more valued than the provision of sustenance, where food functions more as an im...

“We stand at a precipice where hunger and spectacle are colliding in full view — where the performance of plenty becomes more valued than the provision of sustenance.”

Angelique Minas on the Versailles-era turn in grocery.

Literature, no place for the poor - Overland literary journal That old one — the working class as one dumb mass — is nothing but another bourgeois cliché. We are not simpletons, we’re just exploited.

“That old one — the working class as one dumb mass — is nothing but another bourgeois cliché. We are not simpletons, we’re just exploited.”

From a polemic by Sergio Chesán on literature and class, translated for us by Roy Duffield.

Frankenstein was a “bad” mother: maternity, monstrosity and disability - Overland literary journal By making the monster human and the humans monstrous, del Toro draws us back to the radical empathy of Shelley’s novel, but into familiar ableist horror tropes. Empathetic, but not empowering. He’s a ...

By making the monster human and the humans monstrous, del Toro draws us back to the radical empathy of Shelley’s novel, but also into familiar ableist horror tropes.”

Kosa Monteith on maternity, monstrosity and disability in the new FRANKENSTEIN.

Her name is a river - Overland literary journal They measured her body / with iron chains, / and gave her a new name— / as if planting a eucalyptus / into a church vase, / uprooting the old one completely.

“She learned to use ink
to slowly cover
her reflection in the water,

hiding it from every eye,
until her skin
grew a waterproof shell.”

From HER NAME IS A RIVER, our latest #Fridaypoem by Tangqing Zhang.

overland.org.au/2025/11/her-...

To fight against the annihilation of thought: an introduction to Of Weapons and Words - Overland literary journal Across Palestine and beyond, militant intellectuals continue to study the ongoing catastrophe despite Israel’s best efforts. This study and critical analysis has nothing to do with scholasticism. It r...

“During the late months of 2024, it was becoming readily clear to some of us that Gaza existed on two incommensurable planes: one which was transmitted in Arabic and the other in English.”

An introduction to OF WEAPONS AND WORDS, and to the vital task of translating militant writings on Palestine.

Over the back fence: in search of Sydney’s last “wild” emus - Overland literary journal Everybody knows there used to be emus all over Western Sydney. It’s called Emu Plains, for flip’s sake.

“Wianamattas’ emus are a testament to the importance of caring for even the ordinary parts of our living world—the parts that we take for granted.”

As part of our series supported by @copower.bsky.social, Andy Mason goes searching for Sydney’s last “wild” emus

A message from Jonathan Dunk and Evelyn Araluen.

Kids, the arts are in trouble. Censorship, interference, austerity, hyper-surveillance, ministerial oversight and the fetish of social cohesion are now standard fare across the industry.

In the wake of our fallen comrades over at Meanjin, Overland’s work becomes more vital with every passing year as the Australian publishing sector continues to flounder in the face of cynicism, bureaucracy and profit incentives that hollow out our cultural institutions and undermine the integrity of our voices and testimonies.

Overland has survived because of a community that values independent media and storytelling. By subscribing and donating, you help Overland sustain our organisation so we can keep this important platform open to all readers and improve payments to writers. With your support we hope to never let the bastards grind us down.

In the final hours of our Subscriberthon, our brilliant co-editors Evelyn and Jonathan have an important message for you. Head to overland.org.au/shop or overland.org.au/donate today.

As Tasnim writes: “You see us here, standing firm, tired, eager and haunted by the fight. We come together to be illustrated and with that act, to illustrate another sense of being the Palestinian protester.”

Portraits of resistance - Overland literary journal Tia’s Portraits of Resistance are a radical break from this assault against being a Palestinian settler in Australia. In these drawings we meet Palestinians, young and old, who found themselves holdin...

For the last day of our Subscriberthon we have set aside something *very* special: a gallery of stunning portraits of Palestinian activists by Tia Kasambalis, with an introduction by Tasnim Mahmoud Sammak.

Here’s PORTRAITS OF RESISTANCE.

Day Seven Friday Nov. 7 1. a $50 Paperback booksvoucher, 2. a Voiceworks subscription, 3. a PBS merch pack, 4. a MARION membership, (SA only) 5. a $30 Matilda books voucher, 6. an Australian Book Review six-month digital sub, (WA only) 7. a Fremantle Press book pack, (NSW only) 8. a Writing NSW membership. Subscribe, renew or donate Nov. 7 to win

LAST CHANCE! We're wrapping things up over here, which means today is your last chance to win BIG. Today's prize pack is looking pretty gorgeous, and don't forget you're still in the running to win either of our major prizes, too! Head to overland.org.au/shop now to enter!

Back when they armed the police: an interview with Humphrey McQueen - Overland literary journal In this interview with Rock Chugg, commissioned some twenty years by then-editor Nathan Hollier for a monographic issue that didn't eventuate, Australian historian Humphrey McQueen discusses the armin...

We have put a lot of effort recently in making available the entire archive of OVERLAND’s 70+ year history.

In that spirit, on the penultimate day of Subscriberthon we bring you this previously unpublished interview with historian Humphrey McQueen on state violence and the arming of the police.

We also, of course, have our two major prizes up for grabs - a beautiful writer's retreat and a suite of all five Overland prints! overland.org.au/donate

Day Six Thursday Νον. 6 1. a $50 Paperback books voucher, 2. a Melbourne Writers Festival double pass, 3. a Melbourne Djembe 5 class pass, 4. a Hachette book pack, 5. (NT. only) an NT Writers Centre membership. Subscribe, renew or donate Nov. 6 to win

Good morning! It's the second-last day of our Subscriberthon, and the prizes don't stop coming. Head to overland.org.au/shop today to support us and go into the draw to win!

Force posture agreement - Overland literary journal The men of Darwin have all taken their rottweilers / out for a walk at the same time. / For our protection. Like Pine Gap: / all those big white eyes that scan / the darkening horizon. / The eyes stay...

“We live in an oligarchy,
but with this humidity
it feels like a dictatorship.”

On Day #5 of Overland’s subscriberthon, we bring you “Force posture agreement”, a new poem by Miroslav Sandev.
overland.org.au/2025/11/forc...

Day Five Wednesday Νον. 5 1. a Transit Lounge book pack, 2. a Double pass to Eclipse Cinema, 3. a Bee Sustainable Hamper, 4. a Griffith Review subscription, (TAS. only) 5. an Island subscription. Subscribe, renew or donate Νον. 5 to win

On the third last day of our Subscriberthon, the prizes just keep coming - head to overland.org.au/shop today to support us and go into the running to win some amazing prize bundles!

No, thank YOU

Two reviews: One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This and Daybreak in Gaza - Overland literary journal Yahia Lababidi and Norman Saadi Nikro review thew new book by Omar El Akkad and collection edited by Mahmoud Muna and Matthew Teller.

On day #4 of Overland's Subscriberthon, we bring you two reviews of books about Palestine: by Yahia Lababidi on ONE DAY, EVERYONE WILL HAVE ALWAYS BEEN AGAINST THIS and Norman Saadi Nikro on DAYBREAK IN GAZA.

Day Four Tuesday Nov. 4 1. a Kuura Corp prize pack, 2. a Double pass to Eclipse Cinema, 3. a Monash University Press book pack, 4. a Scrivener code, (ACT. only) 5. a MARION membership. Subscribe, renew or donate Νον. 4 to win

Subscriberthon Day Four is upon us... today we have a prize pack that's ridiculously good - books, download codes, doubles passes, trinkets, treats, and tea! Head to overland.org.au/shop now to go in the running to win!