{"product_id":"blackbirding-a-reckoning-with-the-australian-slave-trade","title":"Blackbirding: A reckoning with the Australian slave trade","description":"\u003ch3\u003eAn important reckoning with Australia’s unspoken history of slave trade.\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAs Australia becomes more willing to confront the violence and trauma of its colonial past, one chapter has remained largely hidden: the Australian slave trade known as blackbirding.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBetween 1860 and 1906, more than 60,000 Pacific Islanders were brought to Australia to work the Queensland sugarcane fields. Men, women and children were taken from their homelands through coercion, deception or outright abduction. Forced into contracts they could not read, unpaid until the end of their service and denied basic rights, they endured brutal working conditions that led to the deaths of nearly 15,000 people.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn this immersive and meticulously researched work of narrative nonfiction, Ryan Butta confronts one of the least acknowledged episodes in Australian history. Exposing a deliberate ‘engineered forgetting’ that has kept these stories out of the national memory, this book brings the hidden history of blackbirding into the light and reckons with the enduring legacy of Australia’s forgotten slave trade.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAbout the author\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eRyan Butta \u003c\/strong\u003eis an Australian author of narrative nonfiction that blends original research, history and literary storytelling. He is the author of \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Ballad of Abdul Wade\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cspan\u003e, shortlisted for the South Australian Premier’s Awards Non-fiction Book of the Year 2024, and \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Bravest Scout at Gallipoli\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cspan\u003e. His books focus on overlooked lives and the hidden histories that shape Australia. He lives and works on Dharawal country on the New South Wales south coast.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eRyan Butta\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePublished July 2026\u003cbr\u003ePaperback\u003cbr\u003e368 pages \u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003e234mm x 153mm\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003eISBN  \u003cspan\u003e9781923135703\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Affirm Press","offers":[{"title":"Ryan Butta","offer_id":59887409692753,"sku":"9781923135703","price":36.99,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0955\/6464\/files\/blackbirding-9781923135703_hr.jpg?v=1785206377","url":"https:\/\/shop.mhnsw.au\/products\/blackbirding-a-reckoning-with-the-australian-slave-trade","provider":"Museums of History NSW","version":"1.0","type":"link"}