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Norman Etherington AM is Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Western Australia, best known for his published research on the history of European imperialism, Christian missions and Southern Africa. He is a past president of the Australian Historical Association and the African Studies Association of Australasia and the Pacific. Outside the academy he is best known for his involvement with heritage conservation, having served on the Adelaide City Council, the Heritage Council of Western Australia, the Council of the National Trust of Western Australia, and as President of the National Trust of South Australia.

Early life and education
Born in Port Townsend, Washington soon after the marriage of his young working-class parents, Robert Andrew Etherington and Marion Nell Garlick, Norman moved frequently as his father progressed in the U.S. Army from Private First Class playing French horn in a band, to Major in the Medical Corps based at Walter Reed Hospital in Washington D.C. After his father left the army in 1955 to establish a practice in his home state of Washington, Norman enrolled in Mount Vernon High School, where he was active in drama, debate, instrumental music, swimming, student government and the Boy Scouts. Graduating valedictorian, he was offered Honorary National Scholarships at both Harvard and Yale College, choosing Yale.

At Yale he enrolled for his first two years in Directed Studies and, for his final two years, in History, the Arts and Letters. He was elected to the national scholastic honor society, Phi Beta Kappa at the end of his second year, Speaker of the Yale Political Union in 1962, and served as an officer of the Yale Debate Association. He won the Andrew D. White Prize in History, the Thatcher Memorial Prize in Debate and the Ten Eyck Prize for Oratory. In his final year he was elected to the Berzelius Society, the Elizabethan Society and the Battell Chapel Board of Deacons. Upon graduation summa cum laude he was awarded the Alpheus Henry Snow Prize for the person who, ‘through the combination of intellectual achievement, character and personality. . . has done the most for Yale by inspiring in his or her classmates an admiration and love for the best traditions of high scholarship.

He began further study in 1963 as a Carnegie Teaching Fellow in the Yale History Department. Under the direction of Robin Winks, Maynard Swanson and Sydney Ahlstrom, Norman’s doctoral dissertation on converts to Christianity in nineteenth-century South African missions was completed in 1971. It was subsequently published by the Royal Historical Society (UK) as ''Preachers, Peasants and Politics in Southeast Africa. '' While pursuing his PhD he worked in Yale College as Instructor in European history and Assistant Director of Debating and Public Speaking. In 1966-67 he was Instructor in Canadian history at Quinnipiac College.

Academic career
He joined the History Department at the University of Adelaide as a lecturer in 1968. Over the next ten years he advanced to the rank of Reader, serving at various times as Chair of History, Dean of the Faculty of Arts, and Member responsible for the Library and Buildings on the university’s peak administrative body, the Executive Committee. He assisted the formation of the Australasian African Studies and Modern British History associations.

In 1975, he became a member of the American Historical Association.

In 1988 he was appointed to the Chair of History at the University of Western Australia, where he taught until retirement in 2007. He served in various administrative capacities on the Academic Board and the Academic Council. From 1995-97 he was president of the Australian Historical Association. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Historical Society (UK) in 1988, the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia in 1993 and the Royal Geographical Society (UK) in 2008.

His published books, journal articles and conference papers mostly concern European imperialism in theory and practice, Christian missions, and British rule in Africa, Oceania, and the Caribbean. He has also served on the editorial boards of several academic journals. He held visiting appointments at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies (1974,1989), the University of Cape Town (1981,1993), Columbia University (1984), Humanities Research Center, Australian National University (1995), Institut des Civilisations Comparées, Université de Provence, Aix-en-Provence (1995-96) and Rhodes University (2002). He was a non-resident Research Associate at the University of South Africa from 2001 to 2021.

Heritage Conservation and Community History
From the time he arrived in South Australia, he took an active interest in the state’s history and built heritage. Premier Don Dunstan appointed him Chair of the Constitutional Museum in 1988. That led in 1981 to his selection as inaugural Chair of the History Trust of South Australia. Under his chairmanship (1981-88) the Trust oversaw development of the Birdwood National Motor Museum, the Maritime Museum at Port Adelaide and the Migration Museum. From 1980 to 1984 he served on the Board of the South Australian Museum.

In 1982 he was appointed to the Lord Mayor’s Heritage Advisory Committee, charged with preparation of the city’s first register of protected heritage places. This led to his decision to seek local government office, primarily to advance the heritage cause. He successfully stood for election as a Councilor in 1985 and in 1987 as Alderman of the City of Adelaide. Norman transferred his enthusiasm to Western Australia where he served on the Council of the National Trust from 1991 to 2004, and received the Trust’s Stirling Award in 1999. He was a member of the Western Australian Heritage Council’s Register Committee from 2004-09, and a member of the Council in the years 2005, 2008-09. After his retirement to Adelaide he joined the Council of the National Trust of South Australia, serving as President from 2012-17: service recognized with the Trust’s highest honor, the Mocatta Award.

In 2013 Norman was appointed a member (AM) in the Order of Australia for service to history and the community.

Personal life
After settling in Adelaide Norman resumed playing the bassoon, the instrument he put aside during his Yale years. After some study with Chris Pooley, principal bassoonist of the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, he played with a number of amateur groups, including the Norwood and Burnside symphony orchestras, a baroque ensemble known as the Armidean Players, and the North Adelaide Wind Quintet. He served as the City of Adelaide’s representative on the inaugural Board of the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra. In Perth he played with the Fremantle Symphony Orchestra, and served as President of the Patrons and Friends of the Western Australian Symphony Orchestra from 2003 to 2008. After retirement to Adelaide he rejoined the Burnside Symphony Orchestra as principal bassoonist.

He is a dual citizen of Australia and the U.S.A. His 1963 marriage to social planner, Wendy Sarkissian, ended in 1976. In 1980 he married historian Peggy Brock. Their sons, architect Nathan (born 1981) and literary scholar Ben (born 1982) work in Sydney.

Books

 * 1978.  Preachers, Peasants and Politics in Southeast Africa 1835-1880. London: Royal Historical Society.
 * 1984.  Rider Haggard. Boston: G. K. Hall.
 * 1984.  Theories of Imperialism: War, Conquest and Capital.  London: Croom Helm.
 * 1984.  Time Gentlemen, Please!!: The Story of the Fight to Save the Aurora Hotel, 1983 Adelaide: Kitchener Press.
 * 1991.  The Annotated She (edited, extensively annotated and introduced). Bloomington: University of Indiana Press.
 * 1992.  Peace, Politics and Violence in the New South Africa (edited and introduced). Oxford: Hans Zell.
 * 2001. The Great Treks: The Transformation of Southern Africa, 1815-1854. London: Longman.
 * 2005.  Missions and Empire (edited, introduced, and contributed one chapter).  Oxford: Oxford University Press.
 * 2007.  Mapping Colonial Conquest: Australia and Southern Africa (edited, introduced and contributed 3 chapters).  Perth: UWA Press.
 * 2010. Grappling with the Beast: Indigenous Southern African Responses to Colonialism:1840-1930 (edited with Peter Limb and Peter Midgeley; contributed one chapter).
 * 2015. Indigenous Evangelists and Questions of Authority in the British Empire, 1750-1940, co-authored with Peggy Brock, Gareth Griffiths and Jacqueline Van Gent.  Leiden: Brill.
 * 2016. Big Game Hunter: A Biography of Frederick Courteney Selous.  Ramsbury, Wiltshire: Robert Hale.
 * 2017. The 2016 South Australian Community Consultation on Local Heritage. Adelaide: National Trust of South Australia.
 * 2017. Imperium of the Soul: The Political and Aesthetic Imagination of Edwardian Imperialists. Manchester: Manchester University Press.
 * 2021. A 50 Year Plan for Metropolitan Adelaide. Adelaide: National Trust of South Australia.