Dr George Vasilakopoulos explores the legacy and future of the Greek community in Australia

Dr George Vasilakopoulos, Senior Lecturer astatine La Trobe University successful Melbourne, delivered a thought-provoking lecture connected the past of the Greek assemblage successful Australia, tracing the travel from the archetypal Greek migrants of the 1820s to the contiguous day.

The event, held arsenic portion of Adelaide’s Odyssey Festival connected Sunday 5 October astatine the Olympic Hall, drew astir 100 members of the section Greek community. The lecture was presented successful some Greek and English.

Dr Vasilakopoulos discussed however Greek migrants, done their struggles for the rights of some migrants and Aboriginal peoples, helped found strong Greek communities that gave them practice and a voice successful Australian society and politics. He highlighted their pivotal relation successful shaping the nation’s multicultural identity, present a defining diagnostic of Australian life.

The lecture follows the caller merchandise of his publication Whose Homeland Is It? The Greek-Australian Communities and the Future, co-authored with world researcher Dr Toula Nikolakopoulou. The publication, drafting from articles primitively published successful Neos Kosmos, expands upon them with theoretical investigation and references. Its title borrows a enactment from writer Christos Fifis.

Photo: Greek Orthodox Community of SA Inc. Facebook

Speaking to SBS Greek, Dr Vasilakopoulos said the question “Whose homeland is it?” carries special weight successful Australia, a state built done colonisation and violence.

“For our communities, the situation is to rediscover their antiauthoritarian tradition and prosecute responsibly with cardinal questions of κοινωνικά justness and humanities memory,” helium said.

He besides offered a critique of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese, noting that its attempts to assertion governmental practice for the assemblage person often weakened corporate dialogue.

Dr Vasilakopoulos stressed that the Greek diaspora indispensable nexus its ain past with that of Australia and stand successful solidarity with different peoples facing injustice, including Indigenous Australians and Palestinians.

“If our communities stop thinking critically and neglect to reclaim their governmental dignity,” helium warned, “they hazard becoming small much than an ethnocentric display.”