Ask a librarian

Protests, activism & dissent in Victoria

Research the history of activism, protests, rallies and campaigners in Victoria using pamphlets, posters, badges, images, articles, interviews and books.

Film & video

The Australian Centre for the Moving Image's Mediatheque, which used to provide access to the holdings of the National Film and Sound Archive and ACMI, is now closed.

'With over 150,000 items in [ACMI's] collection we have taken the difficult but necessary decision to close the Australian Mediatheque, devoting staff and equipment to [digitisation] effort[s] to ensure a dynamic and sustainable access model for the short and long term.'

'We are rolling out new access points for the collection in step with new technologies, visitor behaviour and industry needs.

Some of the ways you will be able to access the ACMI collection in the near future:

  • In the building: we will bring our collection into other parts of the building via view-on-demand stations around the building.
  • Online: ACMI is making significant headway to ensure large parts of the collection available online via our website and channels such as YouTube, providing broader, easier access to digitised works on an international scale.
  • Researchers: professional researchers can still access the collection by inquiring with the collections team and assistance will be provided on a case-by-case basis.'

The State Library has a small collection of documentaries, for example Australia's anti-war movement: 1965-1972. These are held in storage at the Library, and needed to be pre-ordered for use in one of our viewing spaces. Check the Library's catalogue for more documentaries (use the drop down menu to specify that you want to search for multimedia).

Videos and DVDs held at other Australian libraries can be found using the Trove search engine.

The Australian Screen website includes video clips from documentaries and historical footage relating to Australian protest movements.

YouTube can be a useful source of footage from recent and historic protests. Try searching by topic, location and date, for example Wikileaks protest Melbourne 2011.