Agreements, Treaties and Negotiated Settlements with Indigenous Peoples in Settler States: their role and relevance for Indigenous and other Australians. The project aims to examine treaty and agreement making with Indigenous Australians, including legal history and foundations, and the nature of the legal rights encompassed by agreements and treaties. It would include an audit of the current state of agreements with Indigenous parties, their purposes, status and outcomes; and would include inte ....Agreements, Treaties and Negotiated Settlements with Indigenous Peoples in Settler States: their role and relevance for Indigenous and other Australians. The project aims to examine treaty and agreement making with Indigenous Australians, including legal history and foundations, and the nature of the legal rights encompassed by agreements and treaties. It would include an audit of the current state of agreements with Indigenous parties, their purposes, status and outcomes; and would include international comparative research on treaty and agreement making. Outcomes would include a database on treaties and agreements in Australia and overseas and publication of collected papers and would contribute to the efforts by Indigenous organisations to secure political and economic rights through agreements with governments, industry and the community.Read moreRead less
HISTORICAL EXPERTS AND INDIGENOUS LITIGANTS: the role of Historical Expert Evidence in Federal Court Cases. Since Mabo, historians are increasingly being called as expert witnesses in cases involving indigenous litigants. Historians perceive serious difficulties in the Court's treatment of qualitative, historical material, resulting in a possible denial of access to justice. The project investigates this treatment, pursuing issues such as expert evidence generally, the specific relationship betw ....HISTORICAL EXPERTS AND INDIGENOUS LITIGANTS: the role of Historical Expert Evidence in Federal Court Cases. Since Mabo, historians are increasingly being called as expert witnesses in cases involving indigenous litigants. Historians perceive serious difficulties in the Court's treatment of qualitative, historical material, resulting in a possible denial of access to justice. The project investigates this treatment, pursuing issues such as expert evidence generally, the specific relationship between Law and History, and the particularity of cases involving indigenous claims. The investigation asks whether historians as expert witnesses can retain both their historical professionalism and adapt to the requirements of the courts, or whether the courts? rules of evidence themselves require adaptation.
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