Our Country's Good: cultural context

Our Country’s Good: cultural context

Cultural Context: British Class System

• Our Country’s Good provides a critique of the British class system, presenting it as rigid and damaging.
• It portrays characters from a range of social backgrounds, illustrating the strict class distinctions in 18th century Britain.
• The way characters are treated and their prospects for the future are often directly linked to their class status, highlighting the systemic injustice.
• Class bias is highlighted particularly in how the officers view the convicts as lower-class, unworthy scum, not deserving of humane treatment.

Cultural Context: Penal System

• The play exposes the cruelty and shortsightedness of the penal system of the time.
• Criminals are dehumanised and punished without sympathy or understanding of their individual circumstances.
• The act of transportation itself is depicted as an extreme form of punishment, sending criminals to unfamiliar, far-flung lands.
• It poses questions about the true purpose of punishment: rehabilitation or retribution.

Cultural Context: Theatre and Culture

• The role of theatre is highlighted throughout the play as a method of social transformation and liberation.
• Even in the harsh surroundings of a penal colony, a production of a play becomes a symbol of hope and humanisation.
• The rehearsals show how theatre can break barriers, revealing shared humanity across class boundaries.
• The importance of culture and art to the human spirit serves as a key takeaway from the play.

Cultural Context: Colonialism

• Our Country’s Good provides a critique of colonialism, presenting its negative impact on both the colonised and the colonisers.
• The forced transportation of convicts and their subsequent treatment is a form of cultural erasure and dehumanisation.
• The colonisers are portrayed as brutal and arrogant, devaluing the native culture and imposing their own.
• The colonised land of Australia is described in dismissive terms in contrast to the romanticised views of England, reinforcing the idea of colonial domination.

Cultural Context: Gender

• The limited roles and brutal treatment of female characters reflect the the sexism and gender expectations of the time.
• Female convicts are often subject to further mistreatment compared to their male counterparts.
• The lack of agency and dignity afforded to women serves to critique the deeply ingrained sexism within the British society.
• Women’s virtue, sexuality, and morality are recurring themes in the play, revealing societal attitudes towards women.