Students majoring in History at the University of Melbourne complete a capstone subject, Making History, in their final year of study. In 2015, students completed both an archival research essay and a collaborative digital project using Omeka.net to showcase thier archival research findings. This site has been developed from one of these projects, and contains student essays and previously undigitised material from archival sources.

Explore this site to discover what life was like for Syrian immigrants under the White Australia Policy in the late 19th and 20th centuries. Make use of the archival material gathered into themed collections; delve into the huge amount of paperwork required of immigrants in “An Excess of Paperwork”, investigate the kinds of employment typically taken up by Syrian immigrants in “Employment”, learn about the advantages of being Christian in “Death and Religion”, and learn what kind of trouble Syrian immigrants got into in “In the Courts.” Use the options on the left to explore all of this and more.