They'd go out of their way to cover up for you' : men and mateship in the Rockhampton Railway Workshops, 1940s-1980s

Contrary to contemporary popular perceptions that mateship is a universal Australian characteristic, this phenomenon was historically contingent and both class and location specific: a working-class manifestation fostered by male workplaces. Drawing largely on oral testimony from past and present employees of the Rockhampton Railway Workshops from the 1940s to the late-1980s, this article examines a ‘mateship site’ created by the demographic, industrial, social and cultural conditions of the location and of the historical era. The post-1980s years, in contrast, have seen the demise of mateship in that environment through changes in both work practices and broader social relations.