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Publications
Environment Australia, 2001
Do you have a special place where you like to go? A park or a swimming pool or a beach? It might be somewhere you and your friends like, or where you go with your family. Other people might enjoy visiting it too.
A place may have heritage value when a group of people in your community, or possibly even from throughout Australia, also think this place is special.
Heritage places are what help give Australia its particular identity and are links to our past. They include places that show the history of humans in our land, which make up our cultural heritage, and also places that are part of Australia's varied and spectacular natural heritage.
Cultural heritage places can be very old or quite recent. They include places important to Indigenous Australians, like rock art at Kakadu and Laura and mission stations and stone arrangements throughout Australia.
They also include twentieth century structures such as Sydney's Opera House and Harbour Bridge, migrant hostels occupied by post World War II immigrants, plus terrace houses, hotels and other buildings from a century or so ago which tell the story of Australia after 1788.
Australia's natural environment is rich and varied. It ranges from places like the Great Barrier Reef to the Simpson Desert, from the Snowy Mountains to the Kimberley. It includes coastal regions, forests, wetlands, snow fields, rainforests, deserts and rivers. Some of these cover vast tracts of land, others may just include a very small area containing bushland no longer found anywhere else but which reminds us of what used to be here. Together, all of these areas are home to thousands of species of plants, mammals, reptiles, birds, amphibians and insects, some of which are not found anywhere else in the world.
Heritage places, regardless of their age or appearance, are places that we want to protect and keep for people in the future to enjoy too.
Heritage is all about us, and we may look at something without realising its heritage value. Making a list of places that are special to you, your family and your friends can help you see places for their heritage value. Your list can have places from your home, your town or places you visited around Australia. Collecting photos or postcards with your list is a great way to remember your own heritage places.
When you make your list, try to identify what makes each place special. Think about whether its values are natural or cultural or maybe even both.
You might like to research one special place in your local area and find out its history. Drawing a timeline can help you pinpoint important dates in its history and may even show you where important events in your life overlap, so that your life and that of your special place may be linked.