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Dictionary of Sydney

The Dictionary of Sydney
Multimedia
Official opening of the Sydney Opera House 1973

The Dictionary of Sydney was archived in 2021.

Official opening of the Sydney Opera House 1973

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National Archives of Australia

[A6180, 1/11/73/125]

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Culture and customs Sydney Harbour: A Cultural Landscape

Subjects

Late Twentieth Century architecture Opera Public building Theatre

Buildings

Sydney Opera House

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National Archives of Australia

Culture and customs

Sydney's pre-industrial culture was comprehensive and public, and most European inhabitants were players, performers or spectators. After 1850, distinct but overlapping cultures emerged, imported and adapted from Europe and America. New forms of cultural transmission after World War I enabled the elaboration of new cultures based on ethnicity, age and gender, which have combined to produce Sydney's cultural diversity.

Sydney Harbour: A Cultural Landscape

Known worldwide for its beauty, Sydney Harbour has been a source of inspiration for thousands of years. First Aboriginal, then European peoples settled the shores, naming and renaming the coves, headlands and points. Artists and writers have explored the harbour's people, landscape, animals and plants. As Sydney has grown and changed, the harbour surrounding the city has evolved from a working waterway into a one of leisure and entertainment. Parts of the old working waterfront, once dismissed as redundant, have become case studies of adaptive reuse with vibrant cultural precincts emerging along the harbour foreshore.

Theatre

Late Twentieth Century architecture

Opera

Public building

Sydney Opera House

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Jorn Utzon's Sydney landmark.