Anne Atkinson Collection

This extraordinary collection of research material was collected by Dr Anne Atkinson in the 1980s in early 1990s. It comprises nearly 10,000 pages of notes, photocopies and newspapers articles relating to Chinese Western Australians. Anne made the collection while she was working at Murdoch University and the collection was used to write her 1988 book: "Asian Immigrants to Western Australia" and her 1991 doctoral thesis: "Chinese Labour Capital in Western Australia, 1847-1947".

Through the Digitisation Centre of Western Australia, the University of Western Australia digitised the entire collection during 2021-2022. The digitisation was funded by the University of Western Australia.

From 2024 to 2025 Dr Yu Tao and Professor Benjamin Smith made the collection a main focus of their "Two Centuries of Chinese Heritage in Western Australia" project, thanks to generous funding from the National Foundation for Australia-China Relations. This project sought to take the 10,000 digitised pages and turn them into a fully searchable online archive, open to everyone. The outcomes of this work are now shared through this sophisticated UWA Collected portal.

The collection is now searchable by anyone, for the first time in its history. It can be searched by individual names, dates, places, occupations, and many other keywords. This collection should be an essential starting point for historians and researchers interested in the history of Chinese Western Australians. It is also a living archive for descendants to use and to develop further. Everyone is encourage to submit additional photographs and family information so that we can keep building and improving the archive.

Collection summary: Nearly 10,000 pages of materials on early Chinese Western Australians, generated by Dr Anne Atkinson in the 1980s and early 1990s

Extent: THIS COLLECTION IS IN THE PROCESS OF BEING ORGANISED FOR ONLINE SEARCHING. DURING 2024 & 2025 EVER INCREASING PARTS OF THE COLLECTION WILL BECOME SEARCHABLE