List of Italian Australians
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Italian Australian is the third largest ethnic group in Australia, numbering 800,256 or 4% of respondents in the 2001 Census.
The census recorded 218,730 Italian-born in Australia, although this excludes persons of Italian ethnicity and culture born elsewhere, such as Egypt (1,970), Argentina (1,490) and Eritrea (50).
There was a Venetian aboard Captain Cook's ship, the Endeavour, and prior to the unification of Italy in the 1860s individuals from regions which later became Italy made their way to Australia as free settlers. It was not until gold rushes in Victoria in the 1850s and Western Australia in the 1890s that groups of Italians began to migrate. By Australian federation in 1901, however, there were established Italian Australian communities, particularly in New South Wales, and between 1901 and the Second World War Queensland's cane fields attracted substantial numbers of Italians.
The greatest migration of Italians came after World War II, between 1947 and the 1970s, when a depressed post war economy in southern Italy and a buoyant one in Australia, alongside a government-sponsored demand for new migrants, increased the Italian-born population to 289,476 persons by 1971.
Italian Australians have a low rate of return migration to Italy. In December 2001, the Department of Foreign Affairs estimated that there were 30,000 Australian citizens resident in Italy. These are likely to be returned Italian emigrants with Australian citizenship, and their Italian Australian children.
The Italy-born are well represented in every Australian town and region but there is a disproportionate concentration in Victoria (41.5 % compared to 24.7 % of the general Australian population) and South Australia (11.5 % compared to 7.6 %). It is probable that the distribution of their Italian Australian children mirrors this.
According to census data released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics in 2004, Italian Australians are, by religion, 79.7 Catholic, 3.2 Anglican, 5.6 % Other Christian, 1.6 Other Religions and 10.0 No Religion.
In 2001, the Italian language was spoken at home by 353,605 persons in Australia. Italian is the third most spoken language in the country after English and the Chinese languages.
[edit] List of notable Italian Australians
[edit] References |
