Most international travellers today are familiar with phrasebooks. These books provide a guide to pronunciation, useful vocabulary, but most importantly lists of useful phrases to help travellers negotiate their way around a country where they don't speak the language.

Anyone who has tried to communicate across the language divide without such a tool knows how valuable they are.

This web story explores how Chinese from the gold rush period onwards have used phrasebooks to help them find their way in Australia. You can compare examples of Cantonese-English phrasebooks from different eras; watch Museum volunteers Nick and David speak English using a gold-rush era phrasebook; learn a little about the lives of some of the people who owned these phrasebooks; and hear Mr Ng and Mr Leong discuss their experiences learning English in Australia and China in the early to mid-twentieth century.

We hope that teachers will also be inspired by the education kit which contains AusVELS-linked classroom activities designed to encourage students to reflect on the challenges that a lack of English might have posed for Chinese immigrants in Victoria during the gold rushes and also what the contents of these phrasebooks can tell us about the lives of these Chinese men. To supplement the education kit are a collection of historical newspaper engravings to help you imagine life during the gold rushes for Chinese immigrants.

This project is supported through funding from the Australian Government's Your Community Heritage Program.