QUEENSLAND'S GERMAN CONNECTIONS - PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE

Queensland Government

Multicultural Affairs Queensland

The role of Multicultural Affairs Queensland is to support the continued development and growth of strong multicultural communities across the state and to ensure cultural differences are not just tolerated but viewed as a positive and valuable resource. Queensland is now home to people from more than 200 different cultures, speaking more than 220 languages and embracing more than 100 different religions or belief systems. This diversity is one of our state’s greatest strengths and benefits our communities, workforce, businesses and trade resulting in a vibrant and culturally rich society. The percentage of Queensland’s population born overseas has increased from 17.9% in the 2006 Census to more than 20.5% in the 2011 Census. One in five Queenslanders were born overseas and more than 38% of Queenslanders have either one or both parents born overseas. Across Queensland, our German community has grown. Census 2011 figures showed 21,028 people born in Germany live in Queensland (0.52% of Queensland’s population) compared to 20,094 in 2006. Similarly, 270,889 Queenslanders claimed German ancestry in 2011 (6.74% of the population), an increase from 240,652 in 2006. On 24 August 1987, Queensland’s 21st Governor, Sir Walter Campbell qc, officially opened the University of Queensland German Department’s conference ‘The German Presence in Queensland over the last 150 years’ . His Excellency observed then that it had been “estimated that there are presently about 36,000 people living in Queensland who were either born in Germany or who have at least one German parent. They compose about 1.6% of the total population. This is a somewhat smaller percentage than the 28.5% of the population which was of German extraction in 1910.”

With more than 16,340 Queenslanders noted as speaking German at home in 2011, it demonstrates the cultural and linguistic ties many Queenslanders have with Germany. Other important facets of our ongoing relationship with Germany are trade and tourism. In 2010-11, Germany was ranked as Queensland’s ninth top merchandise import source valued at $1.267 billion or 3.8% of Queensland’s imports. It also ranked as our 19th top merchandise export destination with exports valued at $492 million (or 1% of Queensland’s exports). Also in this period more than 77,000 international visitors chose to come to Queensland from Germany supporting tourism across the state. The history of the German community in Queensland is defined by resilience and longevity, as revealed in ‘170 Years (1842-2012) of Queensland’s German Connections’, and people of German origin continue to come to live here, building on the legacy of those who came before them. The German community’s past and current contribution to Queensland’s multiculturalism and diversity is something to be acknowledged, celebrated and shared. datsima.qld.gov.au In reply, Professor Manfred Jurgensen, UQ’s Head of German Department, noted: “But not only German settlers made a lasting contribution to Queensland and Australian culture, German visitors too added substantially to the very discovery and identity of Australia, its geography and colonisation, to the knowledge of its flora and fauna, to its social and political life. What is immediately striking about this contribution to the cultural life and the very identity of a new country is its depth and range. It extends from fine arts to music, from architecture to literature, from education to religion, from the natural sciences to politics.”

“My grandparents Anna (nee Zischke) and Friedrick Wessling were very aware of their status as ‘the enemy’ after World War I and, being quiet, hard-working people, advised their children to be likewise. They would not teach their children German. This family artifact hung in my grandparents’ house, probably since 1920 when they moved from Ropely to Buderim.” Image courtesy of Jan Butterworth “What god does is done well”

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