Probably during this period people understood the country as egalitarian, classless and terms like "fair go" came up. Symbols of Australia in that time were the bushranger Ned Kelly and pioneer settlers and farmers. Obviously these guys were the origin of the image of courageous and strong male Australians. This image was also reinforced by the soldiers who fought during the World War One at Gallipoli and in the Pacific. Books like Robert McDonald's 1915: A Novel (3) and also ANZAC Day reminds Australians of their traditional identity. Kapferer (4) asserted that "the events at Gallipoli and the ANZAC tradition constitute a sacred foundational myth which celebrates the prowess and egalitarianism of the Australian troops as well as their blood sacrifice for the nation". .
With the flood of new immigrants arriving from places as diverse as USA and China from 1850's on, the emerging national identity was stiffled the first time. During that time, the prevailing sense of Australian national identity was British and thus white European. In the 1890's all governments and all mainstream political parties established the "White Australian Policy", which was an immigration restriction that excluded all non-European people from the Australian continent.
So the Australians tried to create their own identity and they wanted to protect it from foreign influence of different cultures. By the 1880's three quarters of Australia's population had been born in Australia. This is an important cause of national identity because you feel Australian if you are born there, unlike previous generations, where the majority were born in other countries. .
So at this time an identity, which was formed around a distinctive Anglo-Celtic ethnical core definitely continued to increase. Australian artists and poets helped to create the Australian Bush Legend that might be "a source of unique national character" (Lecture 18.