Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Karl Dallas: Morning Star review

Morning Star Online

BOOK:
Sixty years of Australian Union Songs by Mark Gregory

Don't be put off by the fact that this publication has the format of a masters degree dissertation. It should be read as a call to action, not only in the worldwide trade union movement but also to anyone who presumes to a cultural commitment to a better world.

Gregory tells the stories of unions which regarded songs not as something entertaining away from the union meeting and the picket line but as direct agitational tools.

Though the book's subtitle is "the Australian Folk Revival and the Australian Labour Movement since the Second World War," it includes a song about the 1937 boycott of ships taking pig-iron to Japan to be made into munitions to attack the Chinese people.

Its chorus goes: "We wouldn't load pig-iron for the fascists in Japan/Despite intimidation, we refused to lift the ban/With democracy at stake, the struggle must be won/We had to beat the menace of the fascist Rising Sun."

... the other side of the story is the equal enthusiasm of the songwriters, some from the Australian folk scene, others actual participants in struggle. If someone were to do a similar documentary job in Britain, it might spark off a resurgence over here of songs to fan the flames of discontent.

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