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I'm wondering what they actually accomplish, and if they serve any sort benefit other than causing existing citizens to feel assured immigrants have effectively signed a sort of 'maintaining cultural homogeneity' contract.
The impression I have gotten is a lot of the questions are whether people believe, or at least can express awareness of the myths locals express about who they are. And to discreetly enforce English as standard language (after checking, the resource book is claimedto be will be available in 37 languages [which I recall complaints about - that there would be any concession to people who are not fluent in English], but have not found any information about whether the test is available in other languages).
Thinking I should go and perform some research before (or at least while) pontificating on the subject, I just went to Australia's citizenship test website and took a practice version, and failed. Not by as much as I expected, but a lot of my answers were guesses, and relatively few covered things which I had even been taught in school to forget.
What does it matter, in the context of citizenship, in which year Donald Bradman broke most existing cricket records? I am an Australian citizen by birth and cricket has never mattered to me as anything but a rare way to pass an afternoon in the street. How does it pertain to citizenship to know in which year Caroline Chisholm arrived in Australia?
When I went looking for information a couple of paragraphs previous, the first thing I found was a Wikipedia article which listed some sample questions and answers. A lot of those seemed like useful information about political and legal, official details, so I thought maybe I was being too hard on the test. Maybe it would actually be useful for someone seeking to become a citizen to know when ey might be required to serve jury duty, where government is located and how it is organised... then I went to the actual site, took a sample test and was given a series of questions that struck me as nearly entirely lacking in merit or relevance.
I've now gone and taken the practice test at the government's citizenship site and those seemed more in line with the sample questions that had previously placated me a bit... but the same questions each time I try it.
I am a bit suspicious by this point. Is the other site out of date? Unconnected with the official test? Connected, and drawing questions from the entire pool? I suppose I shall have to get a copy of the resource book to see.
Skimming through the resource book it looks a bit better than I feared, although that is mainly on the basis of flipping through and asking "Does this appear to say stuff about law and government in Australia presently?" So, not exactly the most comprehensive review.
So, still suspicious, and there are things I dislike definitely, but at least there is one potential purpose served that makes sense to me, by informing in a cursory, shallow and not especially useful way of a bit of how the country says it works.
Mm, got a bit lost, me.
The impression I have gotten is a lot of the questions are whether people believe, or at least can express awareness of the myths locals express about who they are. And to discreetly enforce English as standard language (after checking, the resource book is claimed
Thinking I should go and perform some research before (or at least while) pontificating on the subject, I just went to Australia's citizenship test website and took a practice version, and failed. Not by as much as I expected, but a lot of my answers were guesses, and relatively few covered things which I had even been taught in school to forget.
What does it matter, in the context of citizenship, in which year Donald Bradman broke most existing cricket records? I am an Australian citizen by birth and cricket has never mattered to me as anything but a rare way to pass an afternoon in the street. How does it pertain to citizenship to know in which year Caroline Chisholm arrived in Australia?
When I went looking for information a couple of paragraphs previous, the first thing I found was a Wikipedia article which listed some sample questions and answers. A lot of those seemed like useful information about political and legal, official details, so I thought maybe I was being too hard on the test. Maybe it would actually be useful for someone seeking to become a citizen to know when ey might be required to serve jury duty, where government is located and how it is organised... then I went to the actual site, took a sample test and was given a series of questions that struck me as nearly entirely lacking in merit or relevance.
I've now gone and taken the practice test at the government's citizenship site and those seemed more in line with the sample questions that had previously placated me a bit... but the same questions each time I try it.
I am a bit suspicious by this point. Is the other site out of date? Unconnected with the official test? Connected, and drawing questions from the entire pool? I suppose I shall have to get a copy of the resource book to see.
Skimming through the resource book it looks a bit better than I feared, although that is mainly on the basis of flipping through and asking "Does this appear to say stuff about law and government in Australia presently?" So, not exactly the most comprehensive review.
So, still suspicious, and there are things I dislike definitely, but at least there is one potential purpose served that makes sense to me, by informing in a cursory, shallow and not especially useful way of a bit of how the country says it works.
Mm, got a bit lost, me.
