Introduction

Abstract

This chapter introduces the subject matter and scope of the study. It outlines a brief historiography of the ongoing debate surrounding the evolution and nature of Australian nationalism and shows how Australian cricket historiography has also largely replicated these broader historiographical contours. The chapter also introduces the key theoretical constructs that inform the study: first, the British World framework, and second, the concept of cultural traffic. The introduction poses the central question of the study: what can Anglo-Australian cricketing relations in the later nineteenth century tell us about the composition of an Australian national identity that was a mediation of a more expansive British World loyalty and local Australian particularity?